Oh my goodness what a crazy couple of days! My dad had a heart attack and will be having quadruple bypass surgery on Tuesday. I hate that they no longer live close to us and that I am not there to be of any help. I can't believe it happened to him of all people. He is so active and always working on something or another, they guy never sits still. We have so many people praying for him, and I am so grateful for all of the wonderful people who are so willing to offer encouragement as well as share their stories of success with similar procedures.

 

Seneca had her friend Corbin over to play a few times that past couple of weeks. By play I mean they sometimes are in the same room and mostly take toys from each other. She gets pretty funny when I hold any other kid, all of the sudden she needs me. I am working in nursery again and a few weeks ago I had quite a few kids all by myself. We went out into the hall to get a drink and two of the kids quickly took my hands, before Seneca could. All those who witnessed this in the hall started laughing, she was just glaring at the other kids, then grabbed my leg and said "My mom!"

 

If you look in the bottom corner of the picture you can see a lovely ceramic cat. Seneca named it "Mowe" Seneca loves to carry it around and pet it and even sleep with it. I have named it Death Mowe because it seems to enjoy waiting unseen by innocent passerby's for the perfect moment to cause a fierce toe stub. I have fallen victim to this terrible beast many times and every time I put it outside someone brings it back in.

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 Katurah does not like to wear shoes outside. She tries to get around this by asking if she can "Jump on the jumpoline with foots." She is also quite fond of teasing people about their eyebrows "I see your eyebrows!" It is the most humiliating thing to have exposed eyebrows, I mean who does that? If you tell her you see her eyebrows she just might run away crying.

 Zeke is still my little reading machine. He is so funny to watch as he loves to run and crash still as well. He will place his book on the couch and stand as he reads a page then run as he is reciting what he just read, crashes into the nook or the wall, then turns the page and does it again. He makes reading a workout! This morning he was saying the prayer and said "Please bless that everyone will listen to their moms. And please bless that no one will listen to Satan."

Amari has had some crazy enlarged tonsils. On Friday she had to go get bloodwork to check for mono. They couldn't find her vein and she had to be poked 3 times. It was brutal, I was crying as she was crying. She knows from Zeke's recent experiences that each time you get blood work done you get to pick out a special toy. She wanted a beanie boo and the only place I knew to get them is like 20 minutes from our house and probably 30 minutes from the hospital we were at. I told her we could look in the gift shop, but it really didn't look like it had much of anything. Then we turned a corner and they had an entire shelf full of the toys that she wanted!!! Amari, this is what we call a tender mercy.

Pantera is begging me for a pet parakeet. This may be driving me insane. I told her if she can keep her room clean until her birthday in November I would consider it. That didn't last a day. But she continues to ask. Today they were playing outside and she came in saying "There is a huge swarm of bees out there." I asked where it was and she said "Well it's gone now." Uh huh.

We have been keeping pretty busy. I have been trying really hard to invite friends over for the kids at least a few times a week so summer is fun for them. It is a struggle for me, I have always been quite content just being around my family and honestly too much social interaction stresses me out. So my children, I hope you appreciate my effort on your behalf;)

 

When one of Amari's friends were over, our dog Olaf found a snake and a chipmunk. This caused quite the stir with the 3-5 year old crowd. This little girl was so funny about the snake and told all of us "Be careful it could bite you, kill you, or poisonous you!" We were very cautious of the gardener snake. They even made a snake trap using a sandwich bag, some grass, and a dog bone....totally foolproof.

 

I was so proud when Amari came in the house holding a huge toad. I love that my girls are not afraid of animals (most of the time). Unfortunately tadpoles are a different story. Pantera brought home some tadpoles from a friends house and that night I went in to her room to find a very  scared little girl. When I asked her what was wrong she said "I am scared of tadpoles. They don't have any legs, or eyes, or mouths!" This is terrifying because they could not chase you, or see you, or bite you.  

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 Zeke has been suffering from sleep deprivation maybe cuz Seneca likes to snuggle really really hard....

 The kids moved into the old master bedroom after we put on the addition. The plan was for the youngest 3 girls to share that room and for Zeke and Pantera to have their own rooms. Zeke wanted to share with his sisters and it was so funny each night to see how closely they would curl up on a king sized bed. It is a good sized room and I have wanted to build something fun for them so I went on Pintrest for ideas. Katurah saw a castle bed and just loved it so this past week I made them a castle bunkbed. Now there are 4 beds in the room and they still all sleep together.

I am constantly working on something or another and may have a spraypaint addiction. While I was spray painting one of my projects Zeke told me he was going to go somewhere that he couldn't smell the paint. I asked him if the smell bothered him he replied "No, I like the smell I just still want some brain cells."

 

Seneca is truly a joy. She is so darn funny. She is talking so much and loves to repeat EVERYTHING!

 We got a butterfly garden again this year. I absolutely love these things and so do the kiddos. It is so neat to see the whole process from caterpillar to butterfly and especially to hold the butterflies before releasing them.

 They loved walking around the house with butterflies on them. "He loves me!" Katurah would exclaim when one would stay on her.

Jess was putting in some pretty crazy hours a few weeks back. He had gone out to a location and got some nasty stuff on his clothes, so he left them out on the couch hoping he would remember to take them to work to be cleaned. Well he was pretty tired and ended up forgetting. This really stressed Zeke and Amari out. Zeke asked "Mom, where is dad?" "He is at work why?" "He forgot his clothes!" Amari quickly adds "He isn't wearing clothes, he went to work naked!" Good news, Jess came home fully clothed.

 Pantera has her good days and her bad days. Today was a mix of the two. She can have such and attitude and I know it is just going to get worse. Today I convinced her that the boy she has a crush on is related to us. Her reaction was pretty funny trying to find a loophole "It's just a second cousin right?" Gross!!!