State of the Family #50

Oh I am so bad at this.  It has been almost an entire month since my last post.  I think I overwhelm myself with these SOF's because they get so long and it takes too long to type them.  I think I am going to try something new after this 50th SOF (so it might be the last one for a while or the last one altogether depending on how I do).  I think I am going to try and just do short posts of random things that we do to keep things updated.





For the most part.  You know not much has been going on when I wait so long for an SOF.

Of course there was Easter and celebrating our Savior's resurrection and victory over death.  We really tried to keep it centered on that now that the kids are getting more and more influence on the Easter Bunny and those types of things at school.  We of course still had egg hunts with the grandparents and cousins that were a lot of fun. 

The kids got kites from Grandma and Grandpa VW so that was a lot of fun.  Miss Firecracker was the most into it and flew her kite forever.  She got to be a pro, moving back and forth and side to side as needed to keep her kite in the sky.  Noisy Man needs a little more action than watching a floating thing in the sky and moved on after about 15 minutes.

Here is a photo blast of our Easter activities.

Cousins on mommy's side minus the two babies and C who lives in TX

Cousins on Daddy's side

I took a few pics for Miss Firecracker's 4 years out at a pond we fish owned by some friends.  They turned out really well.  I still need to get a few more of her with her hair down since it is fun to see how much it grows from year to year in these pictures. 

That night at the pond ended up being quite exciting.  But not really the kind of exciting that I would want.  The pond has a little island in the back corner with two huge logs acting as the bridge to get to it.  For some reason, Noisy Man realized he could cross it by himself and we let him.  In hind sight, this is where the problem started.  Well, Noisy Man, Miss Thumb Sucker and I were out on the island fishing when Noisy Man caught a fish.  He insisted that he take it off the hook himself which he can only do by using the pliers.  So he took off across the logs to get the pliers from daddy.  I was showing Miss Thumb Sucker the fish when I saw Noisy Man slip off the logs on his way back over.  I caught the end of the fall after he shouted.  Then followed by the splash and dissapearance of my little boy under the water.  It is amazing how many things can go through your mind and be accomplished in such a short amount of time.  I shouted his name, then yelled for daddy, who had gone up to his truck to get something.  I set Miss Thumb Sucker out of the way and told her to stay put as I did with Miss Firecracker on the other side of the logs who saw everything as well.  I threw off my camera and headed for the edge of the pond while picturing search and rescue teams draining the pond to find my son.  All of this happened in 2 seconds and thankfully he resurfaced, flipped over to his back and started floating/swimming.  He was headed toward the middle of the pond out of his shock, but as soon as he saw me at the edge he changed corse and turned for me.  Seeing he was doing just great, I decided to stay at the edge (where my feet were lodged in mud) and encourage him over.  Daddy, meanwhile, had heard me scream at him and ran straight for the pond, not even looking before he jumped in.  Noisy Man was 2 feet from the edge by the time Daddy joined him.  But it was good to have him there to help him out. 

The logs he fell off

What a scary time those 2 seconds were.  My heart was still racing more than half an hour later when we got home, but I couldn't wipe the smile off of my face due to the pride I felt for Noisy Man and how awesome he did in the situation.  I give all the credit to the Float 4 Life swim classes I enrolled him in last summer.  They made this (in hind sight) just a funny story rather than a tragedy.  They were very hard to watch them go through, if you remember me blogging about them last summer, but so worth it.  I highly recommend every parent check them out.  They offer them at most YMCA's. 

Our last exciting thing we did was going to the zoo with Grandpa G on his birthday, the day after Easter.  It was a busy day there, since I think most people had school off for an Easter break, but it was great to go, since we hadn't been in quite a while.

Checking out the sea lions who were
swimming around and showing off

Only other happenings around here have been some ornery fevers.  Both Noisy Man and Miss Firecracker have gotten these random fevers in the last 2 weeks.  They will run 100 -101.5 but they will act perfectly fine.  No other symptoms at all, just a fever.  Noisy Man thought this was great.  He got to stay home from a day of school and watch TV, play board games with mom and read books all day and he didn't even feel sick.  Miss Firecracker also thought it wasn't too bad.  Thankfully, they didn't last long, about 24 hours, and they were back to normal.  Noisy Man's came back after a few days but then stayed for less than 12 hours the 2nd time.  We just chalked it up to some weird virus.

The birdhouse daddy and Noisy Man built

I am still trying to find time to train for the 1/2 marathon.  There were a couple of weeks I only got in a quick 5K here and there or a lucky 5 mile.  I did do the State Farm 10 mile run the last week in March and was spot on for my goal time.  My training partner did the 5K and totally smoked it!  Here is our beautiful picture.  We are doing 9 tonight and 10 on Sunday, so wish us luck.  Only 17 days until its here!  I also am trying to get back into some circuit lifting at the Y.  I have been so terrible at strength training the last couple of years and it is starting to show.  I am a bit sore.

A car Noisy Man and daddy built.  This little boy is a builder.  Legos, wood, paper and glue, he'll build anything!

Noisy Man reads a book to his sisters while they hide behind the curtains

Daddy is busy planning our garden shed for the backyard.  Something he has been wanting since we moved in 5 1/2 years ago.  He also pulled a Handy Hubby stunt this past weekend, while he was watching the kids by himself nonetheless!!!  He stripped off the top of my peeling kitchen table and refinished it for me.  I wish I had before and after pics, but he did it before I could take a pic and had it done before I had my camera back from loaning it out for a couple of days.  My table looks great, but still has never been my ideal table.  If you haven't seen the farmhouse table from pinterest before check it out.  My wonderful, handy, hubby is also putting together plans to build it for me as soon as his garden shed is done (on a slightly smaller scale, as an 8 ft table would not fit well in my dining area).



One last bit of exciting news is that two of my best friends just had adorable baby girls.  I am going to love spoiling them (or would if they lived closer than 2 and 2,000 hours away!)