Love: Sister Photo Shoot.

While big brother was at school, the girlies and I took advantage of an overcast day to do a little photo shoot by an old shed on our land. The older sister refused to look at the camera and the little sister ate grass. 

Love it.

 

Have a lovely weekend!

Love: The Week.

Baby Lydia getting lots of attention from visiting relatives. Sweet baby.

Teal pants!

The hutch purchased from my bestie. LOVE!

Look who's big enough to join us at the table! That Phil & Ted's Me Too chair has now held all three of our little ones. Love it.

Naomi and her little bestie, Emery. Cute girlies.

Nutty face time with the baby. I was snapping away at her giggles in the mirror and caught this gem of myself. And teenage girls think the duck face is cute ..?

Peppers, avocado, chicken, and tomatoes in lime juice. We eat them on Romaine lettuce "boats". Yum!

I cleaned out my closet and organized my dangly things. Earrings, and ... 

... the necklace wall! Too long for my little jewelry box. :)

I saw a friend of mine do this so I totally copied her--indoor hopscotch on these hot, hot days.

The Great Closet Cleanout unearthed some frames I had forgotten about! I added new pictures and hung them in our master bath. Engagement pic, wedding pic, pic of each our kids. Love this. And the IKEA mirror. :)

Outfit from the Great Closet Cleanout. I bought this dress last year but put it away because I got pregnant. I was happy to find it again.

Have a lovely weekend, friends!

Love: Triplets.

No. I'm not pregnant with triplets. Ha ha.

I found pics of my big kids when they were five months old to compare to Lydia. I always thought she looked just like Caleb, but now I'm not sure. Either way, it was fun to see all of my babies at the same age and can I just say, time flies. As in, I blink and my five month old is three and the other one is two and I suddenly have a brand new five month old. Goodness gracious.

So, there you go, some baby yumminess to start your weekend off right.

Have a lovely weekend, friends.

TWO (SOB)!

To our smiley, sassy, exuberant, hilarious little Mouse.

We love you more than you know.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY!

Love: The Week!

Little Nomes walking the beach at Lake Michigan. The road trip to visit my brother was a huge success and so, so fun! They live a few blocks from the lake and it was actually warm enough on Sunday for us to go to the beach. Love. 

Me and Cub! I'm wearing a strapless maxi dress. I felt the need to clarify that, ha ha. :)

Okay. I'm a huge fan of my aviators. I love them. So, the plastic-y MTV-esque eighties mod sunglasses trend has not appealed to me AT ALL. I still can't wrap my mind around red frames. I guess this just means I'm old, or terrified of thinking that I'm trying to look thirteen. I found some at Target super cheap and tried them on. Based on the fact that I didn't HATE them, I decided to purchase them. The clear frames were not as audaciously intimidating as some of the others. 

(Note: When I presented my dilemma to a (teenage) friend of mine, she replied: "Um, I think they're just supposed to be fun."

I overanalyze my sunglasses.

I'M OLD.)

I love historical fiction, especially when it involves foreign royalty, and this book about the last days of the Romanov imperial family is keeping me on the edge of my seat. My SIL, who grew up in Russia, lent it to me. Love it.

Speaking of my sister-in-law, she made these amazing homemade Oreos and let us eat a lot of them when we visited. HOLY COW. YUM. I will write a post about the trip soon!

Cub has been carrying this vile of fish tank water around all week. He thinks it's super cool. Kids are funny.

Grilled cheese, yum. Vermont Sharp Cheddar on Rudi's Sourdough, grilled with real butter. And a watermelon. Summertime, I love you.

Okay, seriously. Our Lydia Ladybug has her own ladybug romper. I mean, the cuteness. Ladybug buns!

My hair looks like this at the end of almost every day. This is a reason I cannot cut my hair short. I would miss the messy bun. I wish I could say I have some awesome way of styling it, but so far flipping my head upside down and twisting it into a rubberband and tucking in the fly-aways is the best technique I have! Humid days means the hair has to be up.

Have a lovely weekend, friends!

Love: The Week.

Little Lydia Ladybug, on her way to church. I mean, really. The cuteness.

I got an order from diapers.com and the kids have had a hayday with the box. I fold the wings in and drag the kids to a new room. They like to try to guess which room I'm going to. I like to try to guess how long it will take before my arms and legs give out. PHEW.

Okay. Have y'all tried soap.com? I hadn't given them a whirl, but after my diapers.com order, I decided to try. I opened a Target.com window and a soap.com window and compared prices between the two, and they were mostly within a few cents of each other. With free shipping to boot, I happily placed a big order with soap.com. It came the next day and now we have plenty of toilet paper and fabric softener to last until June. I love running errands with the kids ... just not when it's a frantic we-ran-out-of-this-necessary-item errand! We'll see if I prepared wisely. And, don't get me wrong ... we'll still frequent the Bullseye. It has my heart.

We had massive storms last weekend, and they cleared the air for beautiful weather this week. This is baby bunting and I on a walk. Have I mentioned how much I love the sling?

I tried a new Pinterest-y recipe this week. I didn't have all of the ingredients, so my version is very modified. Anyway, the filling you see is avocados, red onion, cilantro, and olive oil. I wrapped them in won-ton wraps (which were supposed to be spring roll wraps ... oops ...) and pan-fried them in olive oil. HOLY YUM. They were delicious. Naomi ate three.

I was recently joking with some friends about the trends emerging for spring. I saw a link that listed twenty-five of them, and I liked only two: Neon being one, nautical stripes being the other. I'm old and un-trendy, I know. But, here I am, trying on neon for size. Hard to miss me in a crowd!

One of our hens absolutely refuses to leave her nest. We think she's trying to hatch this group.

And, lastly, poor buddy got a fever this week. I hate when he's sick ... but I do love the snuggle time!

Have a lovely weekend, friends!

Love: The Week.

Daddy and his littlest lady. He's quite smitten.

As I headed out the door to Zumba, my little girl fussed and my big girl wanted "up". See why I want to be strong?? ;)

Way yummy fish tacos: White corn tortillas, guac, fish (I recommend tilapia but had to use salmon, since it was all I had--quite fishy!), shredded red cabbage, drizzle of jalapeno ranch. Yum.

An attempt at a pic whilst grocery shopping. Welcome to the parade! (Look at Lydia's tiny head and that huge yawn! She loves to sleep in the sling.)

I attempted white jeans for the first time. They weren't as scary as I thought they would be. I took this picture to send to my Mom. Who already owns white jeans. Also, whenever I take mirror pictures, I raise my eyebrows. Why is this? My natural smile has un-raised eyebrows, but when I see my reflection, up go the brows. I notice this when other people take mirror pictures, too. What gives? Hence, I look slightly evil. Sorry.

Food, jeans, babies, grocery shopping. Welcome to my week. Welcome to my life, actually. :)

Have a lovely weekend.

Love: Sweet Syrup

We eat breakfast with my grandfather-in-law once a week and today I walked in to find a bottle of real Vermont Maple Syrup, just for me. He prefers pancake syrup, but he knows I prefer the real stuff. It was such a sweet and unexpected gesture! It's the little things. Love.

Love: Little Mouse On the Prairie.

Love: The Kiddos.

Love {The Week}!

Friday:

After VBS I took the van to get the oil changed before we headed off to the lake. Notice the glazed-over look on the kids' faces. Apparently, The Disney Channel (which we don't get at home) is quite captivating!

Saturday:

Ugh, I got sick at the lake. Lots of sneezing and headaches and such. This is one of the several cups of coffee I inhaled. It didn't help, but it tasted good!

Sunday:

Home from the lake and taking a dip in the tub. Love the little blondies taking a bath!

Monday:

My husband left to be a chaperone/counselor at Junior High Camp for our church for five days. My parents sent me my favorite flowers (daisies and alstroemeria) with a passage of encouragement attached (Psalm 121) and it was a wonderful surprise! This is the longest Josh and I have been apart since we've had kids.

Tuesday:

My dear friend Penny popped in for a surprise visit, so we loaded up the kids and headed to Chick-fil-A! I so appreciated her thoughtfulness in stopping by and it was great to wear out the kiddos before bedtime! Caleb was excited to have his picture with the CFA cow. :)

Wednesday:

Naomi eating spinach tortellini for dinner. I have no idea why this is the only picture from Wednesday, since we had two play dates and then my parents came to visit ... but oh well! :) It works!

Thursday:

I had a craving for some pollo con crema at a local Mexican joint, so I loaded up the kids and we went for an early dinner together. I was a bit nervous being outnumbered by the kiddos in a restaurant that lacks a play place :), but it was so much fun! The kids were great and because the restaurant was pretty empty (remember, we went early ... it's all strategy, folks!), there was a steady stream of waiters coming by the table to tickle Naomi's chin and give Cub high-fives. They gave us the royal treatment and it was such a fun spontaneous night out with the kids! Oh, and you can't tell in this picture, but Caleb insisted on wearing his Lowe's nail apron. That only added to the cuteness. :)

I can't wait for my hubby to come home today. :)

Have a lovely weekend, friends!