trying to catch up

i finally came to the realization that poor little sami needs to have her hair done. this pic was taken before church a couple of weeks ago. we actually were all ready on time. i'm wondering how i'm going to pull that off when this next baby is born and i have another little girl to get ready! anyway, i was a proud mommy this day because all my girls were lookin' pretty cute. mother's day was fabulous for me. derek always out does himself. he and the girls got these flowers for me, and they also got me a body pillow. (a need for every pregnant girl!!) the saturday before he took the older 2 girls for the afternoon so i could get stuff done around the house without interruption. then on sunday he let me sleep in and he made dinner. anyway...it was a great day. i'm a lucky girl!

samantha turned 2 on may 27th. really for a 2 year old i wasn't planning anything but katelyn and annie thought that was a total ripoff, so i ended up making a cake and stuff. we also recycled our tj bearytales!! annie got it for christmas in '06, and lost interest in it shortly thereafter. so i pulled it out of the storeroom and gave it to sami!!! our friends, the evers, came over for cake and ice cream.

more zoo pics

ok, it has been ages since i've posted...and it has been ages since i've read anyone else's blog. i'm am trying to get caught up one blog at a time. and i think maybe tonight i might actually get to posting some pics and stuff of what we've been up too the past couple of weeks. anyway...in the mean time...check out http://garykeller.blogspot.com/ my friend finally posted some of the pics she took of our zoo trip.

Tutus by Tina

ok, for all you who have little girls. my sister makes and sells tutus that are ADORABLE. they are great for dress ups, or whatever. annie and samantha like to wear tutus over their jeans! and if you have a newborn baby girl dressing her up in a tutu for pics looks so darling!!! so check out kristina's site.

www.tutusbytina.etsy.com

2 zoo trips

so i took annie and samantha to the zoo about 10 days ago. i had the big idea to let samantha walk. ya, that was not the best idea i've ever had. she is getting way too fast...and in my 24th week of pregnancy i'm getting slower!!! and really...i didn't have to chase her too much because she has a harness/leash combo. it gets pretty embarrassing yanking on it like she's a dog though, and she doesn't just stand next to me. so mostly she was pulling me everywhere!! luckily we live about 3 miles from the zoo, so a 45 minute trip to the zoo isn't a major waste of time. one good thing about that day was sami and annie were having a good time watching the baby orangutans.


on cinco de mayo the kids didn't have school, so we went to the zoo again with my friend teri and her 5 boys. this time i made samantha sit in her stroller and it made the day much better!! we were there from 9:30am-1:30pm. it was alot of fun...except all of the kids were hungry and thirsty by the time we got in the front gates of the zoo! teri took tons of pics with her sweet camera, so when she posts them i'll post the link to her blog!!!!!

our 1st of many dance recitals

ok, so i'm going back in time a bit. i haven't posted much lately...so i'm playing catch up. anyway. annie had her first dance recital a couple of weeks ago. i'm all about my girls taking dance and watching their dance recitals. but i realized i hate all the "extras"...hair pieces, fake eyelashes, makeup. i mean seriously...it doesn't matter out fancied up your kid is...it's not going to make them dance better...right? anyway, derek and i were sitting there watching annie and it hit us that with 4 girls we might as well face the fact that we have a life of dance recitals ahead of us!! anyway, annie did great. lucky for me with a little mascara annie looks like she has fake eyelashes on because her eyelashes are so stinkin' long!!
it is crazy how different your kids can be. katelyn came straight from a soccer game, but don't let this fool you. annie is a bigger tomboy than katleyn....she just happens to like dance and katleyn likes sports. but get them outside and annie is the crazy daredevil and the one who thinks bugs are cool. katelyn's cautious and tries to like bugs...but really thinks they are "ga-rossssss."!


samantha was totally intrigued watching annie dance. she was rockin' out part of the time. derek is such a great dad. he is so supportive of everything the girls want to do. he's a good example to me because i'm more the type to not be very enthusiastic about stuff like this.

Our First Garden

in our neighborhood there is a huge garden and whoever wants can sign up for a plot. anyway, we decided to plant our own garden this year. yesterday derek rented a tiller from home depot, and we made our rows and planted strawberries, raspberries, tomatoes, cherry tomatoes, cucumbers, baby carrots, green and yellow squash, cantaloupe, and sugar snap peas. the girls were a huge help, and they loved digging and planting. katleyn only got to help for a little bit, because she and I had to leave to go to her soccer game. annie stayed with derek and helped him the whole time. they were up there for about 3 hours, and when she came home she was covered from head to toe in dirt!! i'm really excited to go up there with the girls every morning and let them pull weeds and water. hopefully the stuff we planted will grow!!! i guess that has to happen before i get too excited. oh, so we figured we were pretty safe planting on may 1st...well, we were wrong. it is supposed to snow tonight. derek just left to go buy plastic to cover all the plants! we were supposed to have a bad storm last night and derek kept asking if i thought the garden would be ok!! and he came home from work and changed so he could walk up there and check on it! he really loves home grown veggies...plus he worked his can off planting everything, so it would be sad if it got ruined. maybe the weather men have predicted all wrong, like usual, and it'll just rain tonight. pray for no snow. forget the garden...i think i'll go insane if i wake up to snow. HELLO...IT IS MAY.

IT'S ABOUT TIME!!!!!

finally...brooke got ousted! YAHOO! did you see, no i mean hear her sobbing? i'm sure it's really sad to get booted from the competition but come on. save it for off stage. when they announced her name i made derek rewind it so i could watch it again! then we high fived each other about 20 times!!! i'm not evil...i just like justice. and i couldn't sit through one more of her awkward moments...it was painful. anyway, GO DAVID COOK!!!!