Finally Caught up with Peter Cottontail

I am just getting so far behind in my blogging, and I apologize! I've been so busy lately with end-of-the school year stuff, and I'm having a hard time keeping up with it, and I am getting things all out of order. But I didn't forget Easter!

This was Katie Mei's first Easter at home (she was in the hospital last year) and she finally got to experience the Morning Easter Basket. We don't do the Easter Bunny at our house; Easter is definitely about Christ and we don't teach our kids otherwise. But we do enjoy the tradition of an Easter basket with some candy and faith-oriented gifts. Merrilee received silver cross earrings, Jacob got a more grown-up Bible, and Katie Mei was given a book about Jesus.


All three received a white chocolate cross instead of an Easter Bunny. I'm so glad they make these (though I don't think I'd enjoy the white chocolate as much as the yummy brown stuff!)



Katie Mei was absolutely delighted with her candy, as you can tell by the following photo. This child is definitely a candy junky.

Dinosaur man thought his dinosaur jacks set was pretty cool, though he looks less than enthusiastic in this picture.

The day before Easter our local YMCA,our church, and a couple other local organizations worked together to pull off a magnanimous egg hunt. They used the local ball park, which has about five large fields. Each field was for a different age group. I didn't want the kids taking their good Easter baskets out to the park, so I made some egg buckets out of old milk jugs, fabric, paint, and glue. I thought they turned out kinda ugly, but the kids didn't complain.

Katie Mei took to the hunt with a bit of trepidation. I'm not so sure she understood it was supposed to be fun. She had a very stern look on her face the entire time. She didn't really smile until it was over and she got to eat the candy.

Jacob, on the other hand, got right to business. Before the signal to start was given, I pointed out a giant shiny purple egg in the middle of the field and told him I would love to have that egg. Apparently I wasn't the only Mom who told her kid that because when the "GO!" sounded, several kids headed straight for that egg. Jacob wasn't the first kid there, and he was quite disappointed that he didn't get the prize egg for me. We reassured him that I was perfectly happy without that egg, and that he did a great job collecting his own bucket of eggs.

Merrilee went nuts! She is a fast kid and can almost outrun Jay. But put a bunch of plastic eggs filled with candy in front of her, and you'd better get out of her way! Her bucket overfloweth!

You can see Merrilee ran out of room for all her eggs. She was stuffing them in pockets and probably would have filled her socks if we hadn't told her that was enough.

Katie Mei got her first taste of egg coloring this year. She went about it matter-of-factly and handled it very well. She's got great hand-eye coordination (except for spilling her milk at meals every once in awile) and figured out how to put her eggs in and out of the coloring solution rather quickly. Unfortunatley that meant I had to watch her even more closely to make sure she wasn't making a mess.

I noticed that colored Easter eggs is one of the things that take a hit when you have more kids.
There was a day when Merrilee got to color an entire dozen by herself. For the past three years, Merrilee and Jacob have each gotten six eggs. This year it was going to be only four eggs each, which made me cringe! I ended up adding another three eggs so they each got five. Of course, that meant I threw a lot of deviled eggs away after Easter was over. Who can eat that many hard boiled eggs?!

I found a very inexpensive bunny cookie decorating kit at a local craft store, so the kids got to decorate their cookies the day after Easter (told you I'm busy...can't even remember the cookies. You know, I still have two boxes of frozen Christmas sugar cookies in the freezer, as well!)

Merrilee got a little silly with the decorations.

After the Easter morning basket hoopla and going to church, the day was hot enough to spend it outside. Katie Mei enjoyed her bubbles which she received in her Easter basket. FYI, she is so good at blowing bubbles and does not spill the liquid! She still has this bottle of liquid and has proven capable of taking it outside by herself, opening it, blowing bubbles for awhile, closing it, and bringing it back into the house intact. How's that for an amazing three year old?!

Hope all of you had a blessed Resurrection Sunday and enjoyed celebrating our Lord and Savior as much as we did!

Blessings,

Petrie

One Year and Going Strong!

Today is the anniversary of this:

Which makes me immensely grateful to God for this:

She has such a joyful spirit, lots of energy, a stubborn will that is teachable, and a huge love for her family. May God continue to grant her many happy, healthy days! Thank you, Lord, for the gift you have given us in this precious child we call Mei Mei. Prayers have been answered over and over again on her behalf, and her life is nothing short of a miracle. To God be the glory!

Please, PLEASE pray for these girls!

Both had heart surgery this week, and both are struggling to survive. Please lift them up before the Lord! http://www.thekoeppefamily.blogspot.com/ for Jiliang.

http://www.allarepreciousinhissight.blogspot.com/ for Chrissie.

Thank you on behalf of each of their families.

Petrie

Aunt Paige

My sister, Paige, came to visit us this past week and my family truly enjoyed every minute she was with us. I haven't seen my sister in two years, and she's only seen my older two kids twice, so it was such a blessing to have them be able to spend time with her and get to know her. It was also the first time she's gotten to meet Katie Mei. The kids really latched on to her, and I know they'll be asking for her to come see us again soon. Right after we dropped her off at the airport yesterday, Katie Mei was already asking where Aunt Paige was. This morning she and Pooh Bear were having a conversation about Aunt Paige and one of them, I'm not sure which, was planning to take Aunt Paige to the store. Katie Mei has also put the calculator up to her ear once or twice today to talk to Aunt Paige "on the phone". I don't think she'll be forgetting about her well-loved Aunt Paige anytime soon!

I had several photos I was going to post on this blog regarding the visit, but I just decided to do a slide show of all of them. It's about five minutes, but it covers some of the high points of the week. Besides visiting Kolomoki Indian Mounds State Park, picking strawberries, and playing miniature golf, we also took the kids to the science museum (not a very impressive one, I'm sorry to say) and did some shopping. Somehow we managed to stay busy every day she was here, but also had time to relax, converse, and just enjoy our time together. I really hope it's sooner than two more years before I see Paige again.

I'm not much on making slide shows, and I really can never come up with any kind of background music. So for now, please just enjoy the photos and listen to your favorite music while watching. Or just hum to yourself.

Thanks so much for taking the time from your busy schedule to visit us, Paige! It was a wonderful visit and we were blessed to have you here!

And Yet Another Birthday!

Yes, we have two birthdays crunched up in just nine days here. Merrilee's birthday was April 1, and her celebration had a little less pomp than Katie Mei's did this year. Merrilee chose not to get a load of gifts, instead asking that we make a donation to the Care Net Pregnancy Center. We did get her one gift, though. She had expressed a desire for a camera like one of ours that "won't run out of film". Poor girl tried so hard not to use up all her pictures on her disposable camera while we were at Disney that she ended up taking only about nine photos! She was so disappointed! She's always been very frugal.

Anyway, Jay picked up a digital camera for her and she was absolutely thrilled! She also got a beautiful pair of earrings and a necklace from Grandma and Grandpa. Unfortunately, I failed to take pictures of her opening her gifts (she opened G & G's gift in front of them on Skype, so they got to see her enjoy them. Gotta love technology when it works to your advantage!). I did take pictures when she got her special request meal (Fettucinni Alfredo) and dessert (Key Lime pie instead of birthday cake).

After dinner was cleaned up and bedtime was nearing, she asked if the family could play a game together. She wanted a board game, but I reminded her that the whole family could not play any of the games that required reading or were for players over the age of 3. So she asked for Twister, much to Daddy's dismay. He immediately grabbed his back and laid claim to the spinner. The rest of us enjoyed a quick game of contortion and forgetting which body part is on the left or right. Mommy, with the longest legs and arms, won easily--wasn't really a fair game. Hmmmm. My birthday is next. I wonder what game I'll choose to play?

Happy 7th birthday, Merrilee! We love you, and can't believe how fast you've grown into such a delightful young lady.

Love,

Mom and Dad

Birthday Again!

Yep, we went ahead and had another little birthday party at home after her actual birthday at WDW. We didn't take any of her presents with us to Disney, so we still had to give them to her. And you really can't have birthday presents without birthday cake, so we just had to get another cake. It was fun doing it again, though I didn't go all out with streamers and balloons like we usually do. She didn't seem to mind in the least.

Happy Birthday, Baby Girl! We love you! I just cannot believe you're already at the three-year mark and on your next birthday you'll be four! I'm just not ready to let your toddlerhood go! Let's take this next year nice and slow, okay?

Love,

Momma

Photos from Disney World

Our first exciting view of Walt Disney World! We had to stop by the military resort, Shades of Green, to pick up our tickets. I had no idea the military had a rec center at WDW!





The Magic Kingdom! It was so fun to see the kids so excited to be there.

Our one family photo taken by a kind stranger who, thankfully, didn't run off with the camera! You always wonder if that's going to happen to you when someone comes up and says "You want me to take a photo of all of you together?"

Daddy got the joy of riding the Dumbo ride with Katie Mei. It was hard to get a photo of her because her head was too low in the seat. This was the only photo I got where you can actually see her face on the ride. They hadn't even started moving yet. I also let Jay take the kids on the Mad Hatter tea cup ride; I knew I didn't have the constitution to handle that one. He regretted that later, as he was a little green around the gills and ready to yak up his morning coffee when I met him after the ride was over.

I took the kids on the carousel while Jay ran off to buy a new SD card for my camera. Wouldn't it figure I only had room for one more photo on my memory card when we got to the park? Fortunately, I took two cameras, so I could still get pictures.

Sometimes Katie Mei tries really hard not to smile. I don't know why she likes to play this game, but she'll just make a neutral face and avoid eye contact when you ask her to smile. But she really, really wanted to go on the carousel, and once she got on her horse and it started moving, she could not supress her smile. She tried, but it didn't work. This isn't her best smile, but she really was delighted to be on that horse.

Tuesday was Katie Mei's birthday, and she was given a Happy Birthday pin to wear around the park all day. Employees of the park greeted her and wished her a Happy Birthday everywhere we went.

Daddy and Katie Mei with the cake at the Princess Storybook Dining Buffet Hall. This is the lunch where we were constantly interrupted by princesses.

Katie Mei surprised us that she wasn't the least bit shy around the characters. Merrilee and Jacob were more than excited to meet them all. We couldn't get Jacob to shut up...he had to tell every princess everything about his entire day. I don't know how those women put up with all the excited kids, day in and day out. I think I would make a lousy princess. I'd probably get fired for telling a kid to put a lid on it!

Sleeping Beauty was the sweetest princess. She seemed like she really was as nice as she was pretending to be. Snow White was a bit freaky...she waved her arms all around and used a very weird, squeaky voice while talking to the kids. I told Jay I think she watched the original movie Snow White over and over again every night to really get herself in character. She was absolutely bizare!

We stopped to get some ice cream and saw Pooh and Tigger heading for the bathrooms (yep, even Pooh has to poo!--the kids loved that!). When they came out again we realized they were headed for a designated area to sign autographs and pose for photos with the kids. So Katie Mei and I put our ice creams down and went to stand in line. The line moved pretty fast, and after about 15 minutes we were fourth in line to meet the Duo. That's when they took off, with Tigger running across the road and back toward the bathrooms. I'm not really sure if the big, orange tiger was having an Immodium moment, but he sure was in a hurry. Anyway, we waited several more minutes and they returned to their adoring, and apparently patient, fans. I was kind of concerned that Katie Mei would freak out at the last moment and wouldn't want to say Hi to Pooh Bear, since she's really rather shy and doesn't like big, obnoxious, scary things. But she surprised us all with her warm hug for Pooh, and she posed for a photo to my heart's delight!

On our last evening there, Jay ran out for some popcorn for me, and we let the kids eat it in bed even though they had already brushed their teeth (yeah, I'm a bit of a stickler for no food after teeth brushing). The three of them had a grand time being allowed to eat in bed!

Notice Katie Mei's newest addition to her stuffed animals. We let the kids each get a toy/souvenir from WDW and she picked out a Pooh Bear. Merrilee chose a Tinkerbell book, and Jacob got a space shuttle model, of which he he immediately proceeded to break pieces off, of course. Pooh and Katie Mei have been close friends ever since we left the park.

Finally, we picked up the photo we ordered at Epcot. We had ordered and paid for a 5X7 photo, and when we picked it up at the photo place by our resort, there was a note in with the picture. It read "Thank you for letting me take pictures of your wonderful children! I have sent you an extra 8X10! I hope you have a wonderful vacation! Lisa S."

I don't know if she does that for lots of folks she photographs, but she did comment on how well-behaved and orderly our kids were. I was thankful for the fact that, for the most part, our kids were very composed and obedient. Yes, they had their moments and managed to ruffle my feathers here and there a bit, but really, they are great kids. Jay and I feel so blessed to be able to call them ours, and are thankful we can treat them to fun vacations like this once in awhile. God is so good!