Outer Banks Trip

Joseph playing

Painting fun

Pool fun

Random Reunion Pics

What Did you Do all Day?

A man came home from work and found his three children outside, still in their pajamas, playing in the mud, with empty food boxes and wrappers strewn all around the front yard. The door of his wife's car was open, as was the front door to the house and there was no sign of the dog.
Proceeding into the entry, he found an even bigger mess. A lamp had been knocked over, and the throw rug was wadded against one wall. In the front room the TV was loudly blaring a cartoon channel, and the family room was strewn with toys and various items of clothing.
In the kitchen, dishes filled the sink, breakfast food was spilled on the counter, the fridge door was open wide, dog food was spilled on the floor, a broken glass lay under the table, and a small pile of sand was spread by the back door. He quickly headed up the stairs, stepping over toys and more piles of clothes, looking for his wife. He was worried she might be ill, or that something serious had happened.
He was met with a small trickle of water as it made its way out of the bathroom door. As he peered inside he found wet towels, scumming soap and more toys strewn over the floor. Miles of toilet paper lay in a heap and toothpaste had been smeared over the mirror and walls.
As he rushed to the bedroom, he found his wife still curled up in bed in per pajamas, reading a novel. She looked up at him, smiled, and asked how his day went. He looked at her bewildered and asked, "What happened here today?" She again smiled and answered, "You know every day when you come home from work and you ask me what in the world I do all day?"

"Yes," was his incredulous reply.

She answered, "Well, today I didn't do it."

Enjoy the laugh!!

Bubbles

Family Pictures

Hula Hooping

Soccer

Rennie Refuge

Since our Carr family will be moving soon, we thought it would be a great idea to give each of our families something that they can enjoy while we're gone. For Ben's mom, we sneaked up to her place one Saturday and spent the whole day fixing her a land mark so people can find her place much easier. We got the whole family in on our secret so they'd keep Rose away from the house all day. Thankfully it worked out well, because it took way longer than we thought, plus we had to revise our initial plan a couple of times as time and space ran out on us. Check out the results!

Labor Day Stalder Reunion

After a stormy Sunday night, it was surprising to see bright, hot sun, cool breezes, and happy attitudes when we woke up on Monday. After a slow morning of sleeping in, we were ready to start our day off. We quickly packed up and headed up to Mom and Dad's. It was great! We started playing soccer at a local church field. Though the teams were lacking in people, it was totally fun. Joseph found out how much he loves to kick the ball, get in the middle of everything, and decided that he doesn't like water poured on his hot head to cool him down.

After a quick break of cooling off in the ice box...err rather the pool. It was a blast trying to get each other in the freezing pool, without getting in ourselves. Joseph even got in the pool and enjoyed it.

To warm up after the pool, we ate a typical Brazilian lunch: sausage and black bean soup on rice, fresh pineapple, jello salad, and a milkshake lemonade. To allow us time to digest our yummy, filling lunch, we decorated our T-shirts, and wrote Josh a letter out of sticky letters. It was a lot of fun, trying to spell as many words as we could without resorting to using a marker. However, we could only get so far, until all the vowels were gone. So Josh'll have a very brightly colored and funny letter to read when he gets it. This was also Joseph's nap time, so when we woke up right before our next activity, it was great timing!

Next up Botchie Ball. This was so much fun, though if you don't stretch before and after you play your arms, shoulders, and upper back muscles are SUPER DUPER sore. Travis won by far. Though each of us succeeded in botching up his high score. After a unanimous vote of moving onto dessert. Travis willingly accepted our vote of him as winner in favor of the food.

After a quickly disappearing dessert, we headed out to the Secret Garden for picture time. After a time, the youngest members of our family decided it was time for something new. We trouped onto the deck for some family unity games of hula hoop. First up was the human circle where we passed our bodies through two different hula hoops circling us in opposite directions. It was a lot of fun to see how quickly we could accomplish this task. After the Human circle, came Show Off Time. Which consisted of anyone who thought they could or rather everyone who couldn't hula hoop, prove that they couldn't hula hoop. That evolved into Dare Devil show down, to see who could run through the hoop before it fell. It was a great laugh!

After a rigorous ab workout, we decided to target our brain waves. Mom set up tissue paper for each of us, and using a collection of colored and scented bubbles, we painted our master pieces. It was a ton of fun! We painted the deck, our hands, fingers, feet, T-shirts, each other...we decided to stop before something terrible happened. It was really cool. The only sad part was Joseph really wanted to blow the bubbles, but we didn't want him to go home with a green, blue, red, or brown mouth. Poor kid, but Uncle Bart helped us out. He brought out normal colored bubbles, but special kinds. He bought some silicon bubbles so Joseph and all of us got to catch the bubbles, and try to wipe off the plastic leftovers from our hair, shirts, and shoes.

After a very long, fun, and hot day it was time to quit and eat some grub. Not literally, otherwise we'da...anyways. We were starving. So while the "Men folk" occupied themselves with some basket ball, I got to keep Joseph and Mom company while keeping Joseph from thinking about basket ball, since he was too young to join in. After dinner we had a wonderfully uplifting lesson from Mom, to put the finishing touches on such a GREAT day! She topped her meaningful lesson with a sweet surprise: Chocolate Fudge Brownie. It was the best ever!!

To see the full account of our day, look forward to the slide shows that are coming!

Week Long Adventures

Sunday August 24th at 3:00 Ben drove us from the church to the air port, where we joined the many people there saying "good bye" to their loved ones as they dropped them off curbside, at the Continental terminal booth. After Ben joined the throng of people going into the terminal, I drove off with a sleepy boy to go home and take a nap. A little after we got home, Ben called to say he got to his gate within 15 minutes, so he had 2 hours of sitting ahead of him, waiting for his plane. What fun...

Joseph and I had a whole week a head of us without Daddy...what can we do to stay busy...hum?

Monday: walking, breakfast, swimming, lunch, mutual nap, pick up winter clothing for Joseph, dinner, play with Grandma Rose, clean, bath play time, bed for Joseph, Mommy gets "me time"!!

Tuesday: no walk, no swimming (it rained all day), breakfast, play indoors, go to library, lunch, mutual nap, play indoors some more, read books, dinner, clean, play in tub, bed for Joseph, Mommy gets "me time"!

Wednesday: no walk, no swimming, breakfast, play, indoor picnic lunch and B-day celebration with play group, mutual nap, play, go get food, dinner, play, clean, bath tub fun, bed for Joseph, Mommy gets "me time"!, watch Princess Diaries

Thursday: late morning walk, breakfast, shower, play, lunch, mutual nap, go late B-day shopping with and for Grandma Stalder, go play with Stalder Uncles, dinner, play, play, watch movie, Mommy and Grandma sew clothes, bed time for Joseph, Mommy goes to bed, Joseph wakes up at 1am vomiting, Mommy cleans up, helps Joseph feel better, back to bed for all,

Friday: wake up again super early to give Joseph medicine, Mommy helps Joseph feel better, back to bed until 7am, help sick Joseph get better, take a hot shower bath, eat breakfast, go get sick food to help Joseph feel better, take a nap, eat lunch, play a bit, clean, clean, clean, nap, Mommy get's "me time", dinner time, play at park (to burn off fever), watch movie, bed time for Joseph, Mommy get's more "me time", watch Ella Enchanted

Saturday: Joseph wakes up through out the night, Mommy sleeps in while Joseph plays, breakfast, clean, play, watch Nelson boys, lunch, mutual nap, shop at Target, play at Toys R Us, eat Wendy's for dinner, dinner at Pullen park, ride the chu chu train at Pullen, bath for Joseph, bed for Joseph, watch Holes

Sunday: Joseph wakes up through out the night, Joseph wakes up early, TV and play time for Joseph, Mommy sleeps in, church time, lunch time, mutual nap time, GO GET DADDY!!! YEAH!!! Daddy is home now!!!!!

What a fun and busy week. It was a bit rough to be a part for so long, but it was a great experience.

WHEN YOU THOUGHT I WASN'T LOOKING

WHEN YOU THOUGHT I WASN'T LOOKING

A message every adult should read because children
are watching you and doing as you do, not as you say.

When you thought I wasn't looking I saw you hang my
first painting on the refrigerator, and I immediately
wanted to paint another one.

When you thought I wasn't looking I saw you feed a
stray cat, and I learned that it was good to be kind
to animals.

When you thought I wasn't looking I saw you make my
favorite cake for me, and I learned that the little
things can be the special things in life.

When you thought I wasn't looking I heard you say a
prayer, and I knew that there is a God I could always
talk to, and I learned to trust in Him.

When you thought I wasn't looking I saw you make a
meal and take it to a friend who was sick, and I
learned that we all have to help take care of each
other.

When you thought I wasn't looking, I saw you give of
your time and money to help people who had nothing,
and I learned that those who have something should
give to those who don't.

When you thought I wasn't looking I saw you take care
of our house and everyone in it, and I learned we have
to take care of what we are given.

When you thought I wasn't looking I saw how you
handled your responsibilities, even when you didn't
feel good, and I learned that I would have to be
responsible when I grow up.

When you thought I wasn't looking I saw tears come
from your eyes, and I learned that sometimes things
hurt, but it's all right to cry.

When you thought I wasn't looking I saw that you
cared, and I wanted to be everything that I could be

When you thought I wasn't looking I learned most of
life's lessons that I need to know to be a good and
productive person when I grow up.

When you thought I wasn't looking I looked at you and
wanted to say,'Thanks for all the things I saw when
you thought I wasn't looking.'

Live simply.

Love generously.

Care deeply.

Speak kindly.

Leave the rest to God.

Daddy and Ball

Now that Joseph is officially 18 months old, he is starting to pick up more words. He knows a ton of words and phrases, and can say a handful of words...and just to Ben and me a few phrases. We didn't take away his pacifier until after the doctor said it could impair is speech. Well since we don't want that, and since the only reason we let him keep the pacifier was because he is still teething, and most of his teething was awefully painful, so we cold turkey'd his pacifier.

So what words does Joseph know how to say: Ball, Daddy, Mommy, Light, Milk, Bottle, Doggy, Kitty, Thank you, balloon. What phrases have we heard him say: What is that?, Where is it? Who is it? Where is the ball? Of course there are a few others, but we can't think of them right now... What words does he say most often: "Daddy and ball. Everything is daddy and ball, in some variation or other.

Its very interesting how that happened, but somewhat frustrating too, because we want him to say other words too, even if its words he knows how to say, but now all of a sudden, out of the blue he won't say anything but daddy and ball...oh well. He's still just so cute!

Fire Trucks

The other day after dinner, we all went on a family walk up the street. It was a muggy evening, but beautiful sky, and weather. As we were walking up the street, on the side walk, we heard a fire truck siren coming closer and closer. I turned around to see which way it was coming from. It was coming towards us. So Ben turned Joseph around so he could see the truck. Right as it passed us, the driver honked his horn as I was pointing to the truck so Joseph could focus his eyes on it. It was so cool. Even though they were rushing to a fire, they took the time to honk at us, while we watched them pass by. What a nice thing to do.

3rd of July celebration with friends and family

Joseph dances

Daddy and Son Time

Mommy and Joseph