Quinnism

After retelling me much of the plot in the book, she paused to think for a few minutes then asked,

"Mom, did the people who wrote Flat Stanley just let their imaginations wander?"

My cutie niece!

My Valentine's.

We got to have two extra foster kiddos with us Valentine's weekend.  I'll have to say I love my own Loves a bit more when I get to watch each of them shower love onto kiddos that are not our own, but just with us for a short time.

 Like doing endless handstands, because they make the baby laugh.

And sharing carseats and markers and jackets and buckling up littler ones for car rides....and holding hands when we walk.

On Valentine's evening we loaded up our crew to head down to Discovery Green and see the Munro Lights exhibit, which was getting ready to leave.  

The kids were WAY more into the huge grassy field and hill than the lights....but that was fine, too!  We enjoyed a beautiful night in our city, wrestling, running, spinning, playing and people watching.

  

I've shared a lot of Valentine's with this guy, and I wouldn't trade a one of them!  He's pretty great.

Quinn decided she needed to wear her ballerina get up out that night....

 Nothing like a handstand in the heart of Htown!

 Jumping over Daddy is a fun game....

 Little Guy wanted to crawl, crawl in the grass.  Good thing he had a ballerina to keep watch over him!

 And a big boy to do some gymnastics to entertain him!

This picture makes my heart smile.  Who knew, fifteen Valentine's ago, that one thing I'd love most about this man is watching him cuddle a baby that is only ours for the weekend.

 I love our city in the evening!  It's magical to be downtown during sunset and see the buildings light up.

 And....the exhibit!  It was pretty neat, though our crew was expiring by then, so I entertained littles while Matt got some cool photos!

And yes, that boy cooked me dinner after we got all those babies bathed and to bed.  What a sweet way to spend a day celebrating love--with a few extras to love--a milestone we've worked hard for as a family this past year....God continues to love on me and my little family in ways I never would have anticipated...and to teach us what it means to shine His light out of us.

Quinnisms

On the car ride in Tennessee Mimi was telling me about someone who had recently experienced the death of several family members in a short amount of time.  Quinn was listening in and interrupted to say, "Oh, did they have cholera?"  

Though it was a serious conversation, Mimi and I couldn't help cracking up at her input......that's what happens when you read your 6 year old novels....she knows all about cholera!

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At a restaurant Quinn was asking each of us what color we wanted her to color something for us.  
Beck picked blue, of course.

Q: "Beck, you win first place for choosing the ugliest color!"
B: "Thanks!"

ViaBeck

Rockets are all the rage around here these days.  This morning on the drive to school we were having a rocket discussion on how many tries it took the scientists and engineers to come up with rockets that could be launched into space--how they had many failures and had to keep trying.  After listening to Quinn and I discuss this for a while, Beck pipes up:

"That's why I like paper airplanes.  They NEVER blow up."

Wheeeew, Tennesee!

On Monday Jerre, the kids and I headed out on a spontaneous trip to Tennessee to see Megan and Matt and Madi.  Sunday before we left we started hearing about a big snow/ice storm in that area and so we had to decide whether we were going to go.  I am always a weather skeptic, and I wasn't about to let the POSSIBILITY of weather ruin our trip, so we decided to head out and stop if we needed to along the way.  We also decided to change our route (usually through Arkansas) to take a more southern one that would hopefully keep us out of the snow and ice.  

More details and pictures on all of that (they are on my phone), but here are a few pictures from my camera from the trip.  Honestly I didn't take that many pictures...as much as I love capturing beautiful moments with my camera, sometimes I just love to BE in the moment and savor it without having to tote around my camera.  So that was mostly my M.O. on this trip.  Here are a handful I took, and I do have a few more of just Madi that I need to post later.  

It was SOOOO cold there!  In the teens and twenties.  Of course that meant lots of cuddling was necessary.  Here are two of the three doggies, April and Liam, cuddling up.  

 Madi, in her blanket pallet on the living room floor that Quinn proudly created.  We were teaching her about "Baby Bowling," a game we invented with a rolly baby Beck and board books, back in the day.  :)

 Beck is a winter boy, I tell ya!  He loves snow and wanted to be out in it as much as possible.  As soon as we arrived in Tenn. he jumped out of the car and spent a good long time playing, and then every day afterward!  He and I took a long walk on Thursday afternoon and we pretty much turned to ice, but it was so fun being out in the crisp, beautiful snow!

 He especially adores icicles.  He toted one along on our walk and wanted to save it to bring home.

 Look, I found a heart-shaped piece of snow, too!

 That was one of my favorite parts of the trip, that long walk Beck and I took around the neighborhood and over to a nearby field we knew from a past visit.  We had so much fun just exploring the snow and playing in it!

 One more of my cutie niece!!

Happy Valentine's Day!

At Oma's house....

There's hot chocolate after you play out in the snow.  

These pictures are in their office/playroom.

 Opa plays "Library" with you.  Quinn's favorite thing to play at their house.

 There's goodies to make!  Peanut clusters, fudge, scotcharoos, etc.

 Of course we use Grandmommy and Grandma B's recipes!  Makes us smile to see their handwriting.

 Oma had the great idea of BUYING the gingerbread men the kids wanted to decorate.  That was the best idea of the whole trip....by the time the kids had just decorated them, they were done.  Had we gone through the whole process, it'd been way too much.  But they had so much fun adding frosting and candies to their gingerbread peeps!

 Check out the bling on Quinn's!

New Years...revisited!

(catching up a bit....) 

The Merediths came over to ring in the New Year with us.  Matt took Beck and Grammie (ha!) to buy fireworks the night before so we (ha, HE!) could shoot some off on New Years.  

 Beck is ALL BOY so of course he was obsessed with the fire and fireworks and lighters and anything to do with the whole process.  I was nervous he was going to start on fire all night because he kept wanting to get so close to the Matt's doing the fireworks.  Man, there is just something about boys and fireworks....all 3 of them were giddy!

We had fun playing around with sparklers and ML using my camera to try cool stuff....

 Me and Shann...it was FREEEEEEZING outside.  The super humid cold that soaks right into whatever warm clothes you have on.

 This was the Grand Finale:

 (Quinn was being moody and didn't want to get in any photos or participate in fireworks if you are wondering why she's missing from all the photos.)

And a random photo of my New Years centerpiece.  I had fun working on it!  A friend gave me the star candle lights for Christmas and I just love them! I made the little hardwood trees from some scraps my father in law gave me for the kids' nature table, but I keep stealing them for my own decorating.  :)

We spent the evening watching crazy youtube videos, Shann taught me some new crochet skills, we made a new fizzy cranberry drink, and made fun of the New Years Eve countdown show.  Good times!