This is what happens when you let a 6 year old have a turn with a digital camera

Creative Child

On Wednesday nights at our church, Graham and Carter take part in activities for the elementary schoolers. Last month, they painted a mural. This month, they are working with a church member who is a dietician to prepare healthy snacks. Last week, Graham was so proud of his creation we had to take a picture. It's a mouse made from a hard boiled egg, a radish, raisins, some spinach and cheese. Right after we took the picture, he gobbled down his mouse, spinach and all.

Happy Birthday Kristin!

My sister Kelly hosted a birthday dinner for me last weekend. We enjoyed some much needed time with the whole family and a delicious dinner. Sometimes I wonder how Kelly has two energetic, healthy children (ages 1 and 3), keeps a clean and stylish home, works full time teaching and directing a dance program, and has time and energy to cook such good meals. She somehow got some domestic genes that were lost on me.

Anyway, Carter helped out by icing my birthday cake that my friend Prentiss had made the night before, while we were waiting on the bread to rise. Luckily, no one had 37 candles so I had an easy time blowing out the three we could find.

Nice.

Waiting on Bread to Rise

As my friend Rachel says, I'm now in my late thirties. On October 1st, I turned 37. Several friends helped me celebrate a couple of weeks ago. We gathered in the mid-afternoon to learn to bake bread. While Reggie is the cook in our family, I've always been the better baker but I've never experimented with yeast breads. My freind Betty humored me and brought her kitchen-aid, her 50 pound bag of bread flour, some sourdough starter, her measuring cups and breadpans to our friend Pride's house and we started.

It takes a long time to bake bread. You mix it, knead it, let it rise, punch it down, let it rest, shape it, let it rise again, then bake it. All in all, there are about 3 hours of "down time" when the only task you have is to wait on the bread. I didn't really plan it this way, but I think this is a really good skill for me to learn at this point in my life. Life is really good but it's really full and really busy. Perhaps every once and a while, I can carve out 3-4 hours when my only task is to wait and watch my bread rise.

By the way, Betty gave me a jar of sourdough starter and I successfully made two loaves of bread last weekend. Yum!

Roll Tide

Well, after the BSC-Rhodes game last Saturday, we drove straight to Tuscaloosa to witness the Alabama Arkansas game. It was quite thrilling and Alabama was doing so well (32-10) that we left late in the third quarter. As we were walking down the ramp we heard Arkansas rally back 28 unanswered points. Ugh. It made the ride back very exciting as we listened to the now legendary Alabama drive with 2 minutes left in the game. As we pulled onto the BSC campus, Alabama scored the winning touchdown with seconds on the clock. What a night!

The Return of BSC Football

It's been a crazy year for BSC athletics. After a move to NCAA Division III, we had a year without a men's basketball team or baseball team. Even with soccer, women's basketball and softball, we've missed the other sports. Since campus sporting events are important to our family entertainment schedule, we have eagerly anticipated BSC's return to football (the last game was played in 1939) which occurred last Thursday night. Here's the historic kickoff. Listen closely and you can hear Reggie clearly worried that the JV team from Mississippi College is going to score on the first kick return. Luckily, they didn't and BSC went on to win 41-13. Go panthers!

The first game was a Legion Feild and over 4000 fans showed up. The boys had a blast. Here they are in their replica BSC beanies.

Back to School

On August 20, Carter and Graham started a new school year. Here they are outfitted with their new personalized backpacks and lunchboxes. Notice Carter has a messenger bag - evidently 4th graders are too cool to carry traditional backpacks. Hard to believe we have a 1st grader and a 4th grader. Time flies!

Eric & Christie's Wedding

Our cousin Eric got married a few weeks ago and the Erickson Huff clan gathered in Atlanta for a weekend of festivities. Carter and Graham humored us and put on their summer wedding wear, including the infamous seersucker suit.

Here's the best picture of the bride and groom. We love Christie - just look what she puts up with...

The reception was a blast. Cousin Brad was a hit on the dance floor. Check it out... Yep, he's the only dude out there.

And he managed to keep his beverage steady no matter what the move. Impressive!

Sharon, who I affectionately referred to as MOG (mother of the groom) totally let loose too:

I guess Kelly and Beth are doing their best Angelina Jolie pout.

Yoga for Elephants and Hyper Kids

So I walked in the den the other day and Graham has his book Babar's Yoga for Elephants out and is methodically doing a sun salutation following along with the illustrations of Babar in his book. For the record, the only thing more unbelievable than Graham having the attention span to do a complete sun salutation is an elephant doing yoga. Really.

Hootey Reunion

I got to visit with my college buddies a few weekends ago and it was glorious. A whole 36 hours with just my 5 good friends discussing our lives since college without husbands or children around, except for Liza's in utero. It's hard to believe it's been 19 years since we all met each other as freshmen at BSC. There have been 6 weddings, 1 divorce, 9 babies including 2 adoptions and another on the way. There was lots of laughter and a few tears, a ton of good food and drink and very rich conversation. We can't wait for next year's 20th reunion!

Rites of Passage

I knew it would happen one day - I just wasn't prepared for it today.

As I'm folding laundry and putting it away, I look out the window onto the back patio and Carter and Graham have dismantled a piece of their childhood. They've been playing with our neighbor friend Josh and they've decided it would be great fun to tie a big rope around one of their bikes and drag the little red Radio Flyer wagon behind the bike. That would actually be a good idea if said wagon hadn't been outside for, I don't know, three years, exposed to the elements. Yep, it's barely hanging together and the slightest bike ride uphill pulls the wagon apart.

I suppose I should be happy that the boys are not falling apart with grief at the destruction of their wagon. Oh no, they see this as an opportunity to transform it into something new. So they go back to Josh's house, find two cans of spray paint (orange and blue) and when I catch a glimpse of them out the window, they are well on their way to creating some bastardized folk art, or something...

I could almost feel a little piece of childhood slip away.

Long Time, No Post

Well, it's been a long hot summer without much blog posting. My apologies!

I keep thinking that I'll spend a day going back over all our adventures since, um April and fill you in but the task gets more and more overwhelming with each passing adventure. And boy, have there been adventures this summer. Here's a quick update:

Graham turned 6 and the Rave theater in Vestavia hasn't been the same since his buddies screened Meet the Robinsons in 3D.

We celebrated Cinco de Mayo with our cousin Eric and his fiance Christie at the Erickson's house.

Carter was the star of the show in his spring dance recital, with ballet and jazz numbers.

We visited Jimmy and Rosalyn Carter at the Maranatha Baptist Church in Plains, Georgia.

We went to the mountains with our friends the Butterworths and rescued/captured nearly 100 frog eggs which we've nursed into tadpoles and so far, at least one frog.

Carter was the ringbearer in Wilson and Callie Nash's wedding (which was the wedding of the millenium!) and Graham humored me and wore his seersucker suit.

The boys and I went to the beach with Kelly (my sister) and her two children (Jackson, 3 and Harper, 1) to be with our extended family for a long weekend and we ALL survived.

Our family went back to the beach the next week this time with Reggie and our fairy godmother Nina and had a BLAST reading Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, seeing Ratatouille, and watching Graham master the art of underwater swimming.

Graham has enjoyed being the "big kid" at Creative Montessori this summer while Carter has enjoyed many different camps - cooking camp at One Nineteen Wellness Center, Camp Sumatanga, art camp and the Birmingham Museum of Art, science camps at McWane Center and zoo camp.

Carter dressed up as Harry Potter for the Deathly Hallows celebration at the McWane Center and convinced me to take him to get the book at 12:01 am on July 21st.

The boys enjoyed this last week at Avalanch Ranch at Highlands Vacation Bible School. Yahoo!

Whew. As you can see, who's had time for blogging?

Well, I'll promise to post pictures of all our adventures over the next few days.

The boys (all three of them) are cooking dinner now, I better go help.


I hope your summer has been as good as ours!

The Result of Too Much Sugar from the Spring Carnival

After we come home from the Carnival, I say to the boys, let's change our clothes and cuddle up and watch a movie together. So I figure that's what they'll do. I go to change my clothes, come into the living room only to see that Carter and Graham have been kidnapped by

SpideyPirateCowboyDude

and CrusaderGrannyFireman.

I'm not joking. You can't make this stuff up.

CMS Spring Carnival or A Younger Brother's Dream

So it's like 40 degrees and drizzling this afternoon and we're supposed to go to the Creative Montessori Spring Carnival and I am thinking I would rather have a root canal, so I try to bribe the boys to go home and curl up and watch one of our gazillion Disney DVD's but to no avail. I finally give in to their pleading (it's a fundraiser for the school after all) and we pull up to the school. After a turn in the giant tiger bouncy thing and a few trips round the cakewalk, Graham spots the pie in the face booth. It doesn't take him long to talk Carter into playing and here it goes...

READY...

AIM...

FIRE...

BULLSEYE!!!

He's got a bright future as a goalie...

Graham and his teammate Blythe spent much of last week's game tending the goal like this.

I swear.

I think Graham is better at offense.

Happy Easter!

Even though it feels more like Christmas weather here in Alabama, Happy Easter!

I keep waiting on our family easter picture to post but it hasn't been emailed to us yet, so here are some shots of the egg hunt at Brother Bryan Park. As you can see Peter Rabbit paid us a visit.

And Graham found the golden egg - oh joy!

Beach Blues

We got back a week ago yesterday from what Reggie and I have said was the best beach trip we've taken in a very long time. Our good friend Pride invited us to her home at Fort Morgan Beach near Gulf Shores with four other families. We were excited but a little nervous about how so many people would live together for a week. In the middle of the week, I think there were nine adults and nine children. But it was GLORIOUS! The kids got along (for the most part) and the adults had a ball together. We're hoping to make it a spring break tradition.

Carter enjoys the wind by the beach.

Graham in a relatively quiet moment at sunset.

The kids (and us) had fun with old friends. Here's Carter with his lifelong friend Virginia.

And here's Graham with one of his best new buddies, Richard.

As soon as Betty puts all her good pictures of snapfish, I'll have more to show you! Hint, hint...

Digging for Dinosaurs

Graham was so excited today when the mail came because he got a special delivery of a Dinosaur Excavation Kit. He's been asking about it for two weeks since we ordered it at the school book sale. It's not really a book, so I'm not quite sure how it ended up in the school book sale, but whatever. He and Carter spent 30 minutes carefully excavating the bones of a t-rex with cool archeological tools that came with the kit. Graham was very particular about wearing his safety goggles. Maybe he has a future in paleontology.

Spring Fever

We're headed to the beach this weekend. But the boys couldn't wait. As we were cleaning up after dinner last night, I walked into the living room to this...

Honestly...

Mixed Blessings

I don't know whether to be proud or mortified.


Carter received a good deal of money for his birthday on February 3, which he promptly put into his savings account. I'm not sure where he learned that, because he has more in savings that we do. So he's been thinking about what to do with all that money and early this week, he figured it out. He wanted to get Graham his own ipod.


You may remember that Carter purchased his own ipod last summer with money he earned after a holding a garage sale with all the stuff he cleaned out of his room before painting it. Well, ever since, Graham has admired Carter's electronic gadget and wanted one of his own.


So we went to Best Buy yesterday (after they got out of school because of bad weather but before it got really bad) and Carter bought Graham an ipod shuffle.

I'm so proud of Carter's generosity but I'm a little disturbed at his eagerness for consumerism. But I just had to laugh when last night Graham disappeared for a while and I found him rocking out in his room with his new ipod.

Overheard at Creative Montessori Parents Night...

Once a year, the elementary students at CMS invite parents to come and watch the kids do various lessons. Tonight Carter and his friend Dagan worked multiplication problems using a checkerboard and beads (classic Montessori tools - you can see some in the background of this picture). Although we were all very tired, it was a good night and we were reminded again of how much we love Montessori.

Although we don't have any pictures, we heard some pretty cool things and I wanted to share a few...

Graham to a friend after visiting the "Dissecting a Flower" lesson: "Hey Oliver, you gotta see this. It's freakin' awesome!"

Brian, a 2nd grader, while working with bead bars, "10's are the easiest, but 9's are cool too. You just add the units together to make 9 to make sure you're right. 9x1=9; 9x2=18; 9x3=27; 9x4=36; 9x5=45 and so on."

Carter, on the way home after showing off his 4 digit multiplication skills to Graham, who seemed a bit anxious about entering the first grade in August, : "You know Graham, when I went to first grade, I didn't have a big brother to tell me that it was going to be OK and I was smart enough to do the lessons. You're SOOOOOOO lucky to have me around."

What great kids!

Carter and Harper's Birthday

Last Friday, we had a joint birthday celebration for Harper (who turned 1 on Feb 2) and Carter (who turned 9 on Feb 3). February is a busy month for our family.

Here's Carter helping Harper blow out the candles!

Harper was pretty hungry!

She loved the cake!

Carter loved the presents!

Jackson and Graham loved helping Carter open them.

Stay tuned...Jackson turns 3 on February 14th!

Carter is 9!!!!!

Which is much harder on me that it is on him.

Yes, last Saturday, Carter and several of his friends had a High School Musical party. They watched the movie and then sang several selections on his new kareoke machine (thanks to his fairy godmothers!).

Even some college aged folks got in on the action - check out Mary Page and the boys... We only wish Beth could have kareoked with us.

It was a blast but I don't think the Norton Theater will ever be the same.