She's Baaaaaaaaccckkk!

For just a couple of days, anyway... we get to watch Tori while her brother is over in Seattle having surgery. So - it's fun to see her again, she has grown SO much! She is super BUSY, BUSY, BUSY, though! :)

Missing....

A certain small little girl -

It still feels quiet around here... it has been almost a month since Tori left - and Finn is still asking about her, "Tori at visit still, Mama? She coming back now?" How do you explain foster care to a 2 year old? We are planning on going to see her soon - maybe tomorrow - her Mom said she'd be happy to let us keep her for a couple of hours!

Ah, Memories....

Well - we decided to go through some things this last weekend, and I found some wonderful pictures from way back when...

Isn't she cute? This is from Kedron's 2nd Birthday party, so it must have been DoRe's 25th?

And from many, many years before that:

This was a few months before we got married - it will be 15 years this month! Wow, how time flies!

A post for Do Re'

Well - I apologize to any of the rest of you (if any) that read this - but this post is just honoring a request from Do Re'....

It's been WAY too long...

Okay - I'm going to try to catch up on the past 4 months! The problem is - we've done SO much since April that I've avoided updating my blog because it seems like there's TOO much to update! S0 - in a brief month-by-month rehash, here are the highlights:

APRIL

We went to visit Adrian's grandparents

(this is the Grandpa that one of Finn's middle names Leon is after!)
Grandpa & Grandma with our family

We saw a lot of the relatives - just didn't get many pictures!
I guess we'll just have to go back to remedy that!

MAY

Our Miss Anya B. turned SIX! Can you believe it? She had a roller skating party.

Adrian was 'Man of the Year' for his company! Finn loved the balloons that he got.


Finn got more new teeth - although his top ones aren't showing, he now has 4!
Our annual Van Lierops photo shoot...Kedron refused to NOT make a funny face in any picture.




JUNE

Anya graduated from Kindergarten!

She got an 'official' diploma from her teacher, even signed by the principal!

We went to MOUNT RUSHMORE!!!! I've always wanted to see it...and we finally did! My Mom & Dad came along, which was really fun!

We also went to visit the Devil's Tower in Wyoming.

JULY

We got home from our trip just in time for the 4th of July! We lit exactly 3 fireworks - 2 day parachutes and one mortar. Woohoo. You may notice that Anya lost her first tooth that day! She was not sure if she should be excited or scared, so she laughed and cried at the same time!

We spent a weekend out at my parent's property at Lake Sutherland.

AUGUST
(so far)

We went to our church convention at Milltown, WA.

We stayed in our new trailer for the weekend.

My handsome boys on Sunday morning!

Now - school is starting for me - at least teacher days next Wednesday!

How did summer fly by SO fast?

Baseball Season

The kids are doing Little League this year - so far they are really enjoying it!

Anya in her uniform -- Her team is the 'Muckdogs'!

Kedron at Batting Practice - His team is the 'Pirates'!

Anya's Feet Are Stuck

Poor kid...we're glad she can provide some entertainment for us though!

I always feel like....somebody's watching me~

So - you know how sometimes you kind of get that feeling that somebody is looking over your shoulder - and you look around to see if somebody is actually there? Well...I got that feeling the other day, looked up - and lo and behold - there was somebody keeping an eye on me!

I never knew that fruit could take on such personality! :)

And, no - this was not placed this way on purpose by anybody! It just happened to accidentally be arranged that way when putting the fruit on it....

Just a little post...

I just LOVE little baby toes! They look like a little row of pink peas!
Finn found Kedron's Winnie the Pooh bear...he thinks it's pretty neat!

Mis hijos...

Well...for some reason, I guess I feel compelled to take pictures of my sons in sombreros! Maybe it has something to do with the fact that I am a Spanish teacher? In any case, after taking a picture of Finn in a sombrero the other day, I was looking through some old pictures of Kedron, and found that he, too, had been subjected to a hat bigger than he was perched on his head!

See if you can tell who is who...although it may not be too hard, considering the size of Finn's cheeks and Kedron's ears!

Here's Finn chilling with Grandpa D in their almost matching hats! If you look closely, you will see that Grandpa has a stripey blue shirt on, too!

A Prize for you? and for me!!!

Well - this sounds like too fun of an idea to pass up, so instead, I too, will pass it on! Since I was one of the first 5 to leave a comment on my friend Jean's blog, she is going to make me a surprise! Yay! And now for you...

Lucky you! The first five people to respond to this post will get something made by me! My choice. For you. This offer does have some restrictions and limitations:

1- I make no guarantees that you will like what I make!

2- What I create will be just for you.

3- It'll be done this year. (might be a little while)

4- You have no clue what it's going to be. It may be a story. It may be poetry or an article on properly cleaning your face before a masque. I may draw or paint something. I may bake you something and mail it to you. Who knows? Not you, that's for sure!

5- I reserve the right to do something extremely strange.

The catch? Oh, the catch is that you must repost this on your blog and offer the same to the first 5 people who do the same on your blog.The first 5 people to do so and leave a comment telling me they did win a FAB-U-LOUS homemade gift by me! Oh, and be sure to post a picture of what you win when you get it!

Let the New Year ROLL on in!

Finn is 4 months old now - boy how time flies!

He had his check up the other day, and he is a healthy 19 lbs. now!!!

We just had to take some pictures of his chubbiness -
He has such fat little thighs that they hang over his knees!

He is above 95th percentile for both Height & Weight - but only 90th for head...

hopefully that will even out! We don't want him to be a pinhead!

A Little Boy Waving His Arms...

This is from a couple of weeks ago - I just thought it was funny
I looked out the door to see Kedron doing this - and asked him if he was making a snow angel (duh!)...he says, "No, Mom - I'm making a little boy waving his arms!"

I thought HP stood for HorsePower...

Well...as many of you know, we've had trouble with our lawnmower - and although it's not mowing season yet, we thought we'd get a jump on things and have somebody come out and look at it.

He said we might need a couple of new hamster wheels under the hood...

(Seriously - this little squirrel has been sitting on our lawnmower all day - I hate to go out and look at what kind of mess he's made on the seat! I have no idea why he likes the lawnmower so much!)

Winter Pictures...

Well...I guess we should join the bandwagon and post some of our wintery pictures!

Well...so we wish, anyway!

Okay - here are some real wintery pictures!

Anya and her spiffy snowsuit!

The camera shutter didn't open all the way - but I think it made a nice frame on the picture!

Kedron, Going, Going....

Gone! Oops!

Our three all bundled up! Finn wasn't that pleased about the cold air!

Some more pics...

Here are some of my favorite pictures from the last couple of months!

Finn's first Jack-O-Lantern - I made it a 'self-portrait' for him.

Kedron's first time off of the diving board at swimming lessons - he was SO excited!

Our 3 kiddos!
I asked Anya to help me get Finn to smile for a picture - here was her honest interpretation...



Every year we do Christmas Wish Lists at Grandpa Dave & Grandma Pat's house...
Anya & her cheesy grin
Kedron almost done!
Finn's not really sure what to do...

Crazy Christmas

Okay....this is really silly, but couldn't resist!

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