Last night Caroline heard that her friend Kyle learned to ride his bike without his training wheels. She immediately asked me, "Mom, who's older?" When she learned that Kyle was "younger" that was it, she wanted her training wheels off too. I was finishing up in the kitchen and heard giggling coming from the front yard. When I went to see what was so funny I found this:



Connor had removed Caroline's training wheels and was trying to show his little sister how to ride her bike! He was adorable, lots of encouragement and lots of excitement when she peddled a few feet by herself....

We still have lots of practice ahead, but I'm sure she'll be off on her own before we know it!

Growing Up Right Before My Eyes

Every time I turn around I feel like Connor grows up just a little bit more. The other day Caroline had a friend over to play so I asked Connor if he would like to do some baking. "Sure, Mom!" Well, he did do it...all by himself. (I should mention that this cutie also decided to cook himself French Toast for lunch.)

I love this next picture, maybe not so grown up after all...

We also decided to have some fun in Connor's room. Down came the picture he has had for ages and this went up in its place. Connor loves it and I think it's pretty great too!

Crafty Kids

Caroline has been asking to do a craft for the past few days. Since Daddy is gone for the week and we didn't have any plans, today seemed like a good day for a "project." After spending lots of time cruising up and down the aisles at Hobby Lobby they finally decided that they wanted to paint something and that something was going to be a mailbox. "Mom, we can write eachother LETTERS!!!" (Hmmm, I wonder how many letters they will actually be writing??? Maybe we can keep letters from Nana and Grandma in there....)

So, here are my little Picaso's starting out. Look at the concentration!

And here are the finished projects. Caroline worked a long time on her mailbox, even adding flowers and pom- poms for a little extra decoration. She really is a girl after my own heart!

Connor did a really nice job, gotta love the robot and car :)

I love how proud they are of what they made. And the best part...they didn't fight once during the time it took to make these! Maybe they'll find a little love note in their mailboxes tonight from a Mom who thinks these kids are the greatest.

This weekend...

This weekend was fun filled to say the least! We had beautiful weather...lots of sun and lots of heat which meant that we were soaking up every minute outside that we could. After a quick dinner on Friday night we packed up the kids and headed out to Lake Elmo. Connor and Caroline had a blast on their boogie boards and playing on the beach. The best part was that Chris and I had some relaxing time together :)

After we came home and the kiddos were all showered we decided to wrap up the evening by roasting some s'mores. What a treat!

And here is how we ended the weekend's excitement....

Let's hope this guy never makes a repeat appearance.

First Post

I decided to start this blog for a few different reasons. First, since our big move last year, we are so very far away from the people that we love the most. I thought that this would be an easy way for our family and friends to see pictures of the kids and keep up with our very exciting lives out here. And the most important reason is that I am not very good at keeping scrapbooks or photo albums for the kids. Someday I would like to be able to give them something that they can look back on and get a sense of what life was really like and know how much we love them, every second of every day.