Easter, Samantha's Fever, AWANA Awards Night, and Aedan's 5th Birthday Pool Party

Samantha: 95 Months, Week 2
Aedan: 60 Months, Week 4
Owen: 19 Months, Week 1

After a few days of having the Clemons family, we had Easter at home with just our family. Ben and I had to teach first service, and we stayed for second service, like we usually do. The kids actually enjoy staying for both services, and Owen can handle it now, which is good. Before we left church, I got a few pictures of the kids for the obligatory Easter picture. Aedan wore his white dress shirt because he wanted to match Daddy. The only thing that would have made it better is if he could have had a tie to go with it as well. (Aedan woke up with some bedhead that morning because his hair is getting pretty long and needs to be cut.) Here are the best pictures we could get of our kids sitting together that morning. :)

And here's our little family all together. I feel pretty lucky and blessed to be surrounded by this wonderful family that we've created.

Since our morning was pretty busy with church, we didn't have time to let the kids see their Easter baskets, so instead we did it after lunch. We reused these little plastic eggs to put some candy and jelly beans in, got them chocolate bunnies, and Ben picked a little toy for each kid. Owen got a Paw Patrol car with a puppy, Aedan got a Star Wars Lego set, and Samantha got a Lego Friends set. They were pretty excited to see their Easter baskets, and Samantha and Aedan spent the rest of the afternoon building their Legos at the table.

That afternoon, while Owen was napping, Ben worked on mixing the carrot cake and baking the bunny cakes from the special baking tin that Aedan gave him for Christmas. After they were done in the oven, I helped cut them to level them off, and then once they were cooled, I iced them and decorated them. We made them to take with us to our get together with our small group for Easter, and Aedan was excited that we used the special bunny tin. Here is how the bunny cakes turned out. They looked pretty good, I think.

We met with our small group out at the Clark's house that evening, and our plan was to let the kids play outside and do an Easter egg hunt, followed by ham, potatoes, dinner rolls, and the typical Easter type food for dinner, followed by more time to hang out and let the kids play. Here are some videos of the kids during the Easter egg hunt.

As the evening went on, Samantha came up and sat next to me on the couch, looking like she could fall asleep. She kept saying she was ready to go home, which is unlike her. We stayed a little later than we would usually do because they didn't have school on Monday, but that night, in the middle of the night, Samantha came into our room upset because she woke up with a fever and was shaking and shivering. We gave her some medicine and tucked her back into bed, but I felt bad that she seemed to be coming down with something.

On Monday morning Samantha was still not feeling, so it was good that she didn't have school that day anyways. Her fever was still running pretty high, and she was just sitting around the house with a blanket on, mostly just reading. Everyone was acting tired and cranky that day, even Aedan. He likes it when Samantha is home so that she will play with him, but she didn't feel like playing with him that day since she was sick, which made him kind of sad and mopey.

We had a follow-up with the ENT that morning to discuss the results of Owen's hearing test the week before and to see what treatment the doctor suggested. He looked in Owen's ear and, of course, he had fluid in it. He also discussed how the hearing test showed hearing loss at low pitches, so given those two things, he recommended that we get tubes in his ears. We scheduled his surgery for May 16th because it was the only time offered that would work for surgery. I felt bad for little Owen, but hopefully this will prevent him from getting so many ear infections. However, it sounds scary thinking about him going under general anesthesia and having surgery. He is just so little, but I know this is a routine procedure that many kids I know have had. So now we have to try to keep him healthy between now and then because if he gets sick, he can't have the surgery.

The rest of the day went by with little trouble. With all the kids being tired, I had them all take naps that afternoon and even though Samantha and Aedan didn't want to take naps, they both ended up falling asleep. I hoped that the more sleep Samantha could get, the better chance she would have of recovering. Her fever was just so high that after a few hours it would be right back up around 102 again. We just kept giving her medicine to keep her comfortable and encouraged her to keep drinking fluids as much as possible.

Since Samantha was still running a fever on Tuesday, she couldn't go to school again. However, I still had MOPS to go to, so Ben took her with him to campus so that I could still go to MOPS with the boys. Our topic for the day was technology and how to be a tech-wise family. We had some good discussion at our table. Even though I feel like Ben and I have a pretty good handle on technology right now with the kids, I feel like he and I could do better about not watching TV as much in the evenings after the kids are in bed. As the kids get older, I'm sure it will be much more complicated to figure out where we stand on technology and how we will monitor it. After MOPS, we had to take down all the tables as well as get set up for the Antiquities people coming back for people to pick up their pictures, so it took me longer to clean up that day because I had to do it mostly by myself, which made picking up Samantha, having lunch, and getting Aedan to preschool a bit more stressful.

Poor Samantha was still feeling so lousy. Even that afternoon she still had a 102.1 temperature, and that was with the medicine not totally worn off yet. I had Samantha nap again that afternoon for a little while because she was clearly trying to fight something off, and her body needed some extra rest. I kept hoping her fever would break, but it was just wiping out any energy she had, which is so unlike her. I know she was hating to miss school as well.

That afternoon I had to head over to church to help man a table for people to pick up their Antiquities pictures. Ben was able to come home early so that I could head over there. I was only there for a couple hours, but it was a pretty steady stream of people coming in to pick their pictures up. Here is the main picture that we received. I also got a few more pictures of each kid on their own. The photographer was even nice enough to throw in a couple extra pictures since I helped out a lot as a volunteer. It's hard to get Owen to smile, and he kept squinting because of the big flashes, but the pictures turned out pretty cute. I love these three kids of mine. :)

Samantha's fever just wouldn't quit. She didn't have any other symptoms other than a stuffy nose and cold. Tuesday night before Ben and I went to bed, it was 102.5 again. I felt bad that she was still battling such a high fever, and it of course meant that she would have to stay home from school another day.

On Wednesday morning Samantha was acting much more like herself. She was playing and interacting with people, and had more energy than to just sit on the couch like she had been the previous couple of days. I hoped the fever would finally break so that she could get back to school. Since she was doing a little better, didn't have a fever, and I really needed to go grocery shopping, I took her and both boys shopping with me that morning, but as we went through the store, I could tell that her fever was coming back and she was losing her energy. I felt bad that I made her come with me. It wasn't quite so high that afternoon, but she spent all her energy that morning walking around the store.

Here is a video I took of Samantha that morning. As part of AWANA this year, the kids have been memorizing Psalm 23. Here is Samantha reciting it for me as practice for the Awards Ceremony that night. I was so proud of her for being able to commit this to memory. Scripture memorization is so important, and I love AWANA for instilling this discipline in the children at such a young age. Hearing how much she has memorized this year, challenged me to memorize more as well. I know it would help me to hide more of God's Word in my heart.

That afternoon once Aedan got home from school, it was actually nice outside, and the kids were begging to play outside, so while Ben and I worked on dinner together, the kids played in the backyard together. Owen was super excited to be able to play with his big brother and sister. They all went on the tire swing together, and I'm pretty sure this was Owen's first time riding on it. I told Samantha and Aedan that one of the two of them had to put their hand behind him as they spun so that he didn't fall off backwards, and they obliged. You can tell in this video that he is leaning back with a very dizzying look on his face. However, nothing is better than being included in playing with Samantha and Aedan. These three make me smile when they play together.

Wednesday night was a big night for the kids because it was Awards Night for AWANA. Since Samantha's fever was largely gone most of the day, we decided it would be okay for her to go that night. She would have been extremely disappointed if she had to stay home. They have worked hard all year at AWANA to memorize their verses and finish their books. Aedan was a little nervous about standing up in front of everyone, but he was much braver this year than last year when he stood in the back away from the rest of his group. Aedan is the third kid from the left in the front row. Samantha is the second kid from the left in the third row, kind of hidden behind the American flag in these pictures. You can see her better in the videos.

The program started with all the AWANA kids coming on stage and singing some of the songs that they sing together each week. Here is one of Aedan's favorite songs. You can tell how much he is getting into the motions for the song and concentrating really hard. (He sticks his tongue out when he is really concentrating on something.) He has really been enjoying AWANA a lot this year, and he will sing these songs all the time: in the car, in the grocery store, on the toilet, and every time I hear him singing these songs about God it brightens my heart and makes me smile. I'm so thankful for an AWANA program like this.

Samantha also really loves singing and has no qualms about being on stage. Even though she was getting over being sick with a fever for the few days before this, she was enjoying singing and doing the motions as well. I'm glad that they both enjoy things like this still, and Ben and I loved sitting there and watching them perform.

These next three videos are the song, "God of Angel Armies," and it was awesome to see how well Samantha knew the words to the song. Aedan could follow along with the motions for the verses, but he knew the words of the chorus really well. He was singing loudly and we could hear him from our seats. I love the meaningful expressions on Samantha's face as well as the fervor of Aedan's hand motions.

After that, the Cubbies stayed on stage to sing the Cubbies song, recite what they have learned over the year, and get their awards. I love that you can hear Aedan's voice above all the rest. Before going that night, he was very nervous about remembering everything he had to say, but he did a terrific job, and I was so proud of how brave he was. Aedan was the last one called for his award, and he was really excited to dig through his bag and see what special gifts he got along with his ribbon for completing his second year Cubbies' book. Next year he will be in Sparks, and we already know there is an AWANA program near where we will live in Pennsylvania.

Once the Cubbies went back to their seats, it was the Sparks turn to sing their song and get their awards. Samantha is the second from the left in the back row.

And here is Samantha receiving her awards. She was super close to finishing her book, but didn't quite make it. Sparks is designed for them to do one book a year, for three books total. However, Samantha didn't do AWANA in kindergarten, so she started last year in 1st grade, doing a book and a half, and then finishing that book up early on before moving to the 3rd book. The verses get progressively longer and harder, so she wasn't quite able to finish it. However, after the program was over, I talked to the leader about us moving out of state and starting a different AWANA program, and she said since Samantha was so close, if she wanted to finish the book over the end of the school year/summer, she would be willing to count that and give Samantha the trophy for finishing all three books. Samantha seemed interested in that option, so that is definitely something we will help her pursue. She has done a tremendous amount of work in memorizing all these verses, mostly all on her own, and we were very proud of her. I love the smile on her face when she receives her ribbons.

After the awards were all given out, the families were able to go downstairs for some ice cream to celebrate their accomplishments. The kids were super excited for their ice cream sundaes, and it was a nice way to end the year at AWANA.

On Thursday Aedan had a field trip to a local restaurant where one of the other kids' parents was an owner, so he decided he wanted to stay at preschool all day. We decided we were going to try and send Samantha to school that day since she had already missed so much school, and her fever had finally broken on Wednesday. We took her in a little late that morning and just dropped her at the same time we were dropping off Aedan for his field trip. However, we decided to not have her stay for Girl Scouts because we didn't want to push her too much while she was still trying to regain her energy after being wiped out from her several days of fever.

Here is a picture that Ben took that morning as he walked to work. Our snow is finally all the way gone, and our flowers are starting to bloom. I tried to transplant some tulips that keep growing up under the bush, and I planted some new tulip bulbs and daffodils that I bought. I'm excited to see how everything grows up as it warms up outside. The sun has been shining more, and I'm so excited for Spring to finally arrive in the U.P.

Friday was a big day in my world because we decided it was time to get Owen Bowen's hair cut. It was getting long, growing over his ears, hanging in his eyes, and his curly rat tail was getting a little out of control. Ben made appointments for Aedan, Owen, and himself to all get their hair cut one after the other on Friday morning. Here are some pictures I took of Owen's long hair before he got it cut that day.

Do you see that cute little curl in the back? That is why I waited so long to get it cut. The little curl was just too cute. Plus, I knew that after getting his hair cut he would look a lot older and less like a baby.

Here is Owen sitting on my lap, getting his first hair cut. He actually did pretty well sitting still and letting Laura give him a nice big boy trim.

And here is the end result! He looked so different to me and definitely looked more like a little boy look rather than a little baby. However, it looked really good, and I was happy we decided to give him a little trim. Here he is with his sucker as his reward when he was all finished.

I like this picture because you can see how cute his hair cut is, but also how blue his eyes are. It's cool how each of our kids look so similar, but have such differing features as well, eye color, for instance.

The rest of that day started a busy weekend for Ben and the family. Friday night was an Honors awards ceremony. Here he is with his colleague at the ceremony that night.

When he got home, I headed out for a Mom's Night Out event. We met for dinner at Zorba's, and even though it had started to get nice the last couple of days, on Friday night there was a gale warning and snow showers in the forecast overnight. I was walking to the restaurant in the snow, and here is Izzy on the porch in our backyard, also feeling unsure about what was going on with our weather. Not exactly the type of weather we want at the end of April.

Saturday, April 27th was a super exciting day for Aedan because it was the day of his birthday pool party with his friends. Because of his excitement, he woke up much too early that day, and as the morning progressed, I could tell he was tired. In fact, I actually had him take a nap after lunch for about an hour before his party because with how tired he was acting, I knew he wouldn't even have enough energy to play and have fun. He didn't resist doing that too much, which I was glad for.

Before Aedan's party that afternoon, Ben had LSSU's graduation, so he had to get all fancy in his doctoral robe and hat. Here he is taking the yearly picture with the kids before heading out to graduation.

We had the neighbor girl come over to the house to sit while Owen napped that afternoon so that way we didn't have to worry about chasing him around during Aedan's party. Then we went over to the Comfort Inn for Aedan's pool party. He invited Thomas, Henry, Kate, and Dominick from preschool, and Jeffery, Ruger, and Jordan from church. Many people came with their families, and Aedan was so excited. Here are Samantha and Aedan sitting on her cupcake float as we waited for his friends to arrive.

I bought some Lego themed decorations at the Dollar Tree and decorated this area of the hotel lobby where we were going to have our cake, snacks, and watch Aedan open his presents. It wasn't anything super fancy, but I thought it looked cute and turned out really well.

Last year I spent many hours making super hero cakes for his party. This year, especially with the Lego theme, I decided to just order a cake from Meijer because I knew they would be able to do a much better job than me in making multicolored Lego bricks. Here is his cake, and it turned out really cute, definitely better than anything I could have attempted (and much less stressful on my part).

Since the kids had plenty of friends to play with, Ben and I decided we didn't need to get in the water, but instead spent some time talking with some of the other parents that were there. I think Aedan had a good time, but sometimes I think doing stuff like this overwhelms him a little. He doesn't like being the center of attention and being around a lot of people makes him feel shy. There were a few times that I looked over at him and saw him kind of hanging out by himself, so I encouraged him to play with some of his friends, especially his preschool friends. Here are some videos and pictures from Aedan's pool party. It was fun watching everyone swim and have a good time together.

This little boy, Dominick, is definitely Aedan's favorite friend from preschool. They love having each other to play with, and they both love super heroes, so they have a lot in common. He is probably the number one person that Aedan will miss when we move away from Sault Ste. Marie.

I can't believe our little Aedan is turning 5! For some reason that sounds so old and so big, but this was a perfect way to celebrate his birthday. Here is his cake and all of his friends ready to eat some birthday cake.

And here is a video of everyone singing Happy Birthday to Aedan. You can tell he felt a little nervous having everyone looking at him and singing to him. (He even joined in the singing for a little while himself.) His cake was half funfetti and half marble, with buttercream icing, and it was actually quite tasty.

Aedan's friends knew him well, as he got a lot of Lego sets and super hero stuff for presents. Here are pictures of my sweet little boy opening his birthday presents. I just love him so much, and I was glad he was able to have this party and that all the friends he wanted to have there were able to come.

As the afternoon went on, I could tell that Aedan was losing energy. I didn't know if it was just from the excitement of his party or being in the warm water of the pool, but when we got back home after his party, we discovered that he had developed a fever. I felt bad that he was getting sick on his birthday, probably picked up the same sickness Samantha had earlier in the week of some congestion along with a high fever. We gave him some medicine to bring down his temperature, and then he and Daddy packed up there things to go back to the hotel for the night. In order to do a pool party at the hotel, you had to reserve a room as payment. We figured since we were paying for the room, we might as well use it. Ben suggested that he have a sleepover at the hotel with Aedan, and Aedan thought that was a wonderful idea. Aedan picked out his clothes for church the next day and one Lego set that he wanted to work on building that night with Daddy at the hotel, and then they were off.

Here is Aedan sitting on the bed in the hotel room with his Spider-Man Lego set, the one that he was the most excited to build. Ben said that he didn't do much to help him, just got the pieces ready if he couldn't find them, but largely just sat there and watched Aedan follow the directions and build his new creations.

Here's a video of Aedan starting to build his Lego set, starting with Spider-Man and his spiderweb.

And here he is with his finished creations! He was so proud of them, and even though he wasn't feeling well, I think he thought it was pretty cool that he got to go to the hotel and spend this time with Daddy one-on-one.

They watched a couple of shows after building Legos and then Aedan got ready for bed.

I love this picture of the two of them laying on the bed, on top of their pillows, in the same exact way.

Ben was able to sit around the corner from the bed, in the little alcove for the bathroom and work on some of his grading while Aedan slept. Luckily, Aedan slept pretty well, and Ben could hear him snoring from across the room. I also let Samantha sleep in bed with me that night since Ben wasn't there, and she thought that was pretty cool as well. She rolled over right away after reading books, was very calm and comfortable, and fell asleep with me in bed with her. I just stayed laying in bed next to her for a few minutes, enjoying these moments with my big girl who I don't get to cuddle next to very often anymore. It was a good day of celebrating Aedan's birthday, and I'm glad he had a fun party with his friends and a fun sleepover with Daddy, even though he started feeling poorly on his special day.

(Blog about April 21-27, 2019)

Sweet Family Time & Celebrating Easter

Samantha: 95 Months, Week 1

Aedan: 60 Months, Week 3

Owen: 18 Months, Week 5

These pictures are my attempt at capturing Owen's sweet little ringlet in the back of his hair. His hair is getting long, and it will probably need to be cut sometime soon, so since he was actually sitting still next to me on the couch, I decided to take a few pictures of his wispy baby hair. It's just been too cute for me to cut, but I know it's getting to that point pretty soon. To be honest, I'm not ready for him to lose his baby hair and look more grown up yet.

Ben and I served in children't ministry during the first service, we stayed for second service, and then Ben had to stay after that service for another meeting, so I came home with the kids and got them started on lunch. We just had leftovers, and everyone was hungry and tired. These mornings when we are at church for over three hours are hard on the kids, especially little Owen.

However, it just makes him that much more ready to take a nap. I love rocking him to sleep every day at nap time, so here's my little guy fast asleep in my arms that afternoon. (You can tell in the first picture that he is scrunching his eyes some from the flash shining on him.) I'm so glad he will still fall asleep with me and cuddle with me, even if I'm not nursing him anymore.

Once getting Owen down for his nap, I spent most of the afternoon cleaning up the house and getting ready for small group. We started a little earlier that night because Ben had to leave early for another meeting that night. We had a good discussion, and after eating dinner we all just talked and hung out while the kids had a great time playing together. It was fun watching them play and run around with lots of yelling and laughing. I'm so glad we were able to form this small group over this past year, and I hope that they will continue to meet even after we move.

With Ben being gone at his meeting, I did bedtime by myself that night. I think on nights that are different like this, Samantha has a harder time falling asleep. She was up five times between bedtime and 9:30, and I felt like there was really nothing I could do to help calm her down and get her to fall asleep.

Since we didn't have MOPS set-up to go to this week, I decided to take the boys back over to Canada for open gym at the gymnastics center again. Our friends couldn't go with us this time, but we still had a blast together. Owen's favorite thing was running and jumping on the long trampoline, and Aedan was really excited about pushing Owen on the swing and to go in the foam pit with him (although Owen didn't really know what to think about the foam pit because he couldn't climb around as well as Aedan could). Once again, they had an excellent snack of fruit, veggies, cheese, and crackers, and then we went back into the gym to play some more. I think sometimes Aedan gets disappointed because he wants to play with Owen more, but Owen doesn't really know how to play with people yet, which is why Aedan much prefers to play with Samantha at this point. However, Aedan made a new friend that morning. The boy was a little younger than him, but it made Aedan happy to see that he could still have fun even though his friend Owen didn't come along, too. At first Aedan didn't want to come, but I kind of forced him to because I knew he would have fun once we got there, and it would be good for him to run around and play for awhile. Here are some videos and pictures from our morning.

Since the open gym went until 11:00, we got home in plenty of time to relax and play a little more before lunch time. Aedan asked to watch a show, so I figured that would be okay. He picked Super Why, which used to be Aedan's favorite show, and Owen was very interested in watching the show. He particularly liked when the dog came on the screen. Every time he saw him, he would say, "oof, oof," which is his way of barking like a dog. You can hear it at the beginning of this video.

Owen really likes pushing trucks around the house. While I was making lunch that day, he was just going around and around with this truck. However, as soon as I tried to take a video of him, he stopped because he is always so interested in watching himself in the video. It's cute to watch Owen become more interested in toys, especially ones that Aedan never really showed much interest in.

Since Owen wanted to see my phone, I was able to sneak in a few pictures of us. I love this first picture of Owen. It's like he's really smiling for the picture!

And here he is making a couple silly faces for the camera.

I even convinced Aedan to come join in our picture, even though he didn't want to. I'm so glad I was able to convince him because these pictures of him are just adorable. I love his sweet smile, his big brown eyes, and even his shy personality that reminds me a little of myself. (I don't like to be included in pictures either.) However, as I look at these pictures now, I am just struck at the fact that he looks so old. He does not look like a preschooler anymore. He is getting taller and thinning out a lot more. I can't believe this middle boy of mine will be starting kindergarten in the fall. I love having him home with me, and sometimes when I think of the passing of time, I just feel so sad because it goes so fast, and I spend much too much time worrying about keeping things clean and getting things done, rather than just spending time with my babies. I will never have these years back with them. Soon he will be off to school, and I will miss him terribly when he is gone every day. (I love you both so much, my little boys, more than you will ever know.)

After a busy morning of playing and being active, Owen fell right asleep in the car on the way home from dropping Aedan off at preschool. He even stayed asleep all the way into the house as I carried him on my shoulder and got him into his wrap.

After picking the kids up from school, we came home and went straight outside to play because it was finally getting nice here. The snow was almost all gone from our front yard, and Owen was thrilled to be able to get his boots on and play in the driveway. In fact, our neighbors from two doors down came over to play with the kids as well. They were playing a pretend hockey game in the driveway, and it was just too fun being outside in the sun that I didn't want to make everyone go back inside so I could make dinner, so Ben and I just decided to order pizza to be delivered from North of Chicago Pizza. I am SO looking forward to the weather finally warming up around here so we can spend more time outside. The kids and I are longing for it, and we have been cooped up for far too long this winter.

After playing outside for awhile, the kids were definitely ready for dinner when we came back in. Owen ended up eating three pieces of pizza, which is amazing to me. Ben had another meeting that evening with a board meeting at church that would keep him out past bedtime again, so he rushed off shortly after eating dinner.

This was one of those days that was so wonderful I wish I could just bottle it up and relive it on days when I miss our kids at these ages. As I was putting the kids to bed that night, Aedan turned around, reached over me, and gave me a great big hug. It just melted my heart. I laid in bed with him for a few minutes, and he was talking to me about heaven, concerned that he wouldn't recognize me or that I would look different in heaven. We talked about all the other family members that will be heaven, as well as famous Bible characters that he has read about. I said to Aedan that night, "When you get to heaven, I will shout, 'Yay! Aedan is here! I've been waiting to see him again!'" And he had a huge grin on his face when he heard me give him that reassurance. Then, as I laid in bed with Samantha, she cuddled up into me as I sang to her and scratched her back. She said she wished I could stay in there and scratch her back until she fell asleep. After tucking in Samantha, it was Owen's turn. I sang him songs and talked to him about how he has always loved being held up on our shoulders from when he was first born. He fell asleep holding on to my hair, so I held him extra long as I felt his heavy body in my arms, wanting to soak up all the time I could get with him, not wanting to put him down to sleep that night.

Even though we had a really positive bedtime experience, Samantha still had a rough time falling asleep that night. She was up to go to the bathroom five times again, being up past 9:30 when Ben got home from his meeting. Part of me wondered if she was coming out to check whether he was back home or not. Four of the last five nights either Ben or I were out over bed time, and that definitely made it harder for Samantha to calm down and fall asleep.

As Ben and I have been thinking about our move to Pennsylvania, we finally decided to go with a moving company to help us. The movers gave us a really good price, making it a good deal to go with the whole moving package, which included them packing everything for us as well. Even though we would rather not spend that much money, it would be an expensive enough move to do on our own with packing our own stuff and renting and driving our own trucks. They said it will take two days to pack all our stuff, and then after they pack they will take one day to drive out there and then meet us the next morning to unload. They start with the bedrooms and put all the beds together, then they put the boxes in their places and set all the furniture in the designated area. It seems weird to have someone else pack our stuff, but they will probably be more thorough than I would be because they have unlimited resources and they want to be careful with our stuff so that nothing happens to it in transit that they would be responsible for. The more I think about it though, hiring movers that will also pack our stuff, takes such a huge burden off of me. I don't have to scramble to find moving boxes and spend the next two months packing things up bit by bit. We can largely just continue on with life like normal, living in our house as we currently do. Ben and I will take time to go through everything in May once his semester is over, so that way we don't take things with us that we don't want or need, but other than that, the work will all be done for us, which sounds wonderful.

Tuesday morning was a MOPS Bible study morning, and the boys were excited to go and play. In fact, Owen just walked right into the toddler room with Aedan, not looking back at me or crying at all. I was proud of him, and I think we are turning a corner with him not having as much separation anxiety when I drop him off at church. After Bible study the moms were all just hanging out for awhile, and my friends from small group that all had babies recently, laid their babies down on a blanket together. Owen was standing there watching the babies very interested, so I decided it would be funny if I laid him down next to the little babies. He wasn't sure what I was doing to him, but it made for a really great picture. :)

Tuesday was another rough night with Samantha, and it's been harder and harder for us to keep our patience because it seems like she isn't even trying to stay in bed and fall asleep. She was up three times this night and one time was even in her room crying so loudly that we could hear her out in the living room. We didn't understand what else we could do to help her, and it almost seemed as if the problem was getting worse. I was hoping Tuesday would be better because Ben and I were both home for bedtime, but that didn't seem to make a difference. It definitely is worse when she's tired, and with how much she has been up at night with not being able to fall asleep, she is tired most days lately.

Wednesday was our morning for grocery shopping. (Aedan really enjoys dressing to match other people, which is why they are both wearing red shirts.) We got one of the giant carts at Meijer so that they could sit next to each other, and they really do so well together. Aedan helps me with Owen when he wants his snack or water cup, and sometimes he will even help me get items off the shelves and put them in the cart. Here they are sitting next to each other in the produce section. Aedan was being really sweet and kept putting his arm around Owen and giving him great big hugs. They are lucky to have each other.

Our routine shopping trip went south when we were leaving the parking lot and something sounded really funny on the van. I pulled over right away, got out of the car to check out what happened, and noticed the back right tire was totally flat. I wasn't sure what to do, so I called Ben quickly, knowing that he was about to go into class. He ended up calling Brooks for me to see if he could help me out, so we waited just a few minutes before he arrived to help us. He filled the tire up with air, and luckily, the hole in the tire was right at the top for us to see. He said the tire should last for our drive to the tire shop, and he would follow me there just in case something happened on the way there. This was not exactly what we wanted to be dealing with, especially since we were supposed to be going home to eat lunch, but I was glad Brooks was able to come help me and then it was a relatively easy fix.  The tire shop is just first come, first serve, so we had to wait for a little while. Luckily, they had a coloring book that Aedan found interesting, and Owen enjoyed just wandering back and forth, looking at all the tires.

We didn't get home until after 1:00, when Aedan was already supposed to be at preschool, and we still had to eat a fast lunch and I had to unload the groceries. It was crazy getting all that stuff done, and Aedan didn't get to school until around 2:00, but that was the best that I could do considering the circumstances. I hoped that Owen would fall asleep in the car on the way home, but here he is right before I put him down for his nap that day. I was trying to get him to sing, "Oh, Where Is My Hairbrush," which turns out to mostly be, "Oh whe..." but it still is pretty cute. Then, he waves to say night-night at the end.

Wednesday night was another busy night as Ben had senior presentations that he had to listen to, and then they were taking the seniors out afterwards. Christy arrived just before dinnertime, so it was kind of a hectic day with all that took place. However, the cousins were all excited to play with one another, so they got busy playing while I made dinner.

The kids had AWANA that night, and it was the last one before the awards ceremony next week, so Samantha got to use up the rest of her shares. She was really sweet and got earrings for Brielle and a little stuffed animal chicken for Aedan. Ben was able to pick the kids up from AWANA, and he took this cute video of Aedan getting situated in his bed that night. He is always very particular about where Happy Bear and blankie go. Usually Happy Bear stays up at the top of his pillow as you can see in the video, and then he cuddles with his blankie. But since he had the chicken to cuddle with, his blankie also got moved to the top of his pillow. Do you see how he burrows himself in his covers and tucks it all up around his neck? That is exactly how I sleep as well. :) He never wants you to turn off the light until he gets himself fully situated in his bed. It makes me smile, even if it is a little bit quirky.

Thursday was a normal day with Samantha going to school, Ben going to work, and Aedan going to school in the afternoon. However, we had our visitors at our house to play with as well. After sticking around the house for a couple hours for play time (and lots of toys being strewn about), we decided to get out of the house for awhile. There was a MOPS play date at McDonald's, so we decided to head there for a little while to let the kids run around, play, and get some energy out.

That evening, after eating potato soup and bread for dinner, Ben and I headed over to Canada with our kids for swim lessons. It was Ben's turn to get in the water with Owen, so I sat up in the bleachers and took a few videos of the kids while they swam. Samantha has her lessons in the big lap pool and is doing a fantastic job of learning different strokes and how to swim without assistance. She has grown so much in her swimming ability. I am so proud of her.

Here she is learning how to dive! She is so brave going head first into the deepest part of the pool. That's my girl!

And here's Aedan's group jumping into the water. You can see that he waited to jump in until the instructor could help catch him, but he definitely does not need that assistance. He still is trying to figure out how to be in this pool without his floatie on, since he can't quite touch the bottom yet. However, he has made huge strides in being comfortable putting his head under water and not freaking out or getting a ton of water in his mouth. I think buying him goggles really helped with that, too.

And here's Owen playing in the beachfront pool at the end of his lesson. He really enjoys going down this slide, but he has a hard time keeping his footing because he tries to run through the water and falls face first into the water. However, it doesn't seem to phase him much at all. He's just like Samantha was in the water: absolutely fearless. He loves water of any kind, and he's been loving this time to play in the pool.

After several weeks of waiting, we got word from the Proulx's that they received pre-approval from their bank and were ready to make an offer on our house. We talked back and forth throughout Thursday night and Friday morning about their offer. We finally settled on on $147,500, including the play set in the back yard. We were all happy with the deal, and I was so excited to have things coming to an end in selling our house. In fact, they actually came over to our house on Friday morning to sign the sales agreement so that we could take the paperwork in to the title company and make everything official. Yay!

We had the kids outside playing with the Proulx's came over that morning, and Owen was just having a rough time falling and hurting himself a lot. In fact, he was trying to ride on a a balance bike that we had, and he fell and hit his chin on the handlebars. He got a pretty big cut in his chin, and he wasn't happy when I brought him inside to stop the bleeding, clean it, and put a band-aid on it. The band-aid probably bothered him more than anything. He kept moving his chin up and down and trying to pull at it. Poor kid, he was having a rough time that day. Even at nap time he was having a hard time. He just kept waking up and crying.

On Friday afternoon, once Samantha and Aedan got home from school, we spent more time playing outside while dinner cooked. We got a gift certificate for a local grocery store with great, fresh meat, so Ben got some real bacon and a beef roast. We baked the roast and served it with mashed potatoes for dinner that night. I didn't think the kids would eat the meat that well, since our kids aren't used to just being served meat by itself as a main dish (mostly because it is too expensive for our budget), but they all devoured it. But man, this meat was delicious. I thoroughly enjoyed our dinner, and as we were eating that roast, I decided Ben and I needed to splurge a little more and buy nicer cuts of meat like this to enjoy every once in awhile.

That night, after getting the kids in bed, Christy and I spent some time going through our old Barbie house and bins of clothes, getting everything ready for her to take with her the next day when they headed back home. Ben went to bed about 11:00, but I decided to stay up and talk with Christy for awhile, just the two of us. We were up until close to 1:30, and it felt just like old times when we were sharing a room and would talk until all hours of the night. I was glad she was able to come visit with Brielle and Oliver, even if she had to come up on her own since Matthew had to work. It was nice to have them visit for a few days.

Saturday was a busy day. We decided to dye our eggs that morning. We had the traditional cups with dye, as well as a different sponge paint kind that was fun for the kids to be creative with. Owen had a hard time while we were decorating the eggs because he wanted to be a part of the action, but he just didn't understand what to do and was getting upset when we moved him away. Here are the big kids hard at work!

After coloring our Easter eggs, we finished getting ready, Christy packed up her car, and then we went over to the Norris Center for the community Easter egg hunt. There were a few activities in the big gym, as well as popcorn, and a craft station. This is what Owen found to do. He really enjoys hitting balls with clubs/bats/sticks. Maybe he will be a hockey player? He is definitely more interested in doing things like this than either Samantha or Aedan were at this age. He was having a blast, and that was just fine with us.

 

Here are the big kids making egg crafts at the craft table, all very hard at work.

Here are some Daddy and Owen pictures from before the egg hunt. You can see the big cut on Owen's chin from falling down on the bike on Friday.

Here is Owen experiencing his first ever Easter egg hunt.

After the egg hunt, they read off the numbers for the raffle prizes, and Owen even won a large stuffed monkey! He didn't want to put it down the rest of the day.

It was then time to say good-bye to Aunt Christy, Brielle, and Oliver so they could head back to Aurora, and we could go on to our next event for the day. We were invited to an adoption party, and we were thrilled to be a part of their celebration of the new member of their family. Owen fell asleep in the car on the way there and I stayed him in the car for a little while until he woke up, so it wasn't the longest nap, but it was good enough to get him through the rest of the day. There was yummy food and games for the kids, so they had a blast playing together.

The weather was beautiful that day, so when we got home from the party, we got the kids' bikes ready, a stroller for Owen, and even took Izzy with us on our first walk/bike ride around campus. It was so fun to watch the kids ride their bikes again. Samantha wiped out turning too fast around a corner where there was loose gravel, but even though she scraped up her knee, she was a trooper and didn't let it keep her from getting right back on her bike again. Aedan was nervous about riding his Spider-Man bike, but he picked up on it quickly and was speeding around the sidewalks in no time. We love living across from campus and having these safe sidewalks for the kids to ride around. That is definitely something we will miss about where we live now.

And just to end this happy day on a happy note, here are the kids singing, dancing, and making music very loudly after dinner that night. Nothing is better in Owen's world than being included in what Samantha and Aedan are doing. :) And nothing is better than a day spent making happy memories together as a family.

(Blog about April 14-20, 2019)