today we knew everyone would be at work so we hit the beach early! we got a prime parking spot, too! 🙂 here’s the little ham:

my boys were good to me.. stayed close and just built sand castles. 🙂

we love this beach. so much smaller, less crazy, we feel like we are far, far away from the city! 🙂

and during els’ marathon nap, i scrapped! for fun! again! this time, i was scoping out blogs for challenges/inspiration and found valerie’s sketches.  me likey!

do you know any other blogs that do those challenge things? i liked the idea of this one but the current challenge was too similar to the way i normally scrap. so will be checking that out again another time. i am on a roll with the daily posts! since we aren’t going to the beach tomorrow, i hope i have something to blog about!

our first try to the beach was at 9am– it was totally packed already. so we left and we came back around 6pm. it was still pretty busy but we stopped to play anyways. thank goodness mom was there with me… the boys were totally in the water and drifting while els totally wandered around the sand without a care in the world if i was following her or not. good thing her mom is the paparazzi with her. 🙂

so nice to wake up to this:
thank god for claritin… so crazy for me to be able to be this close to a cat!

her name is shiloh and els calls her ‘shy-shy’. the roles have reversed.. els is so glad to see her and wants to pet her and poor shy-shy is scared to death of her. 🙂
doing what she loves to do… pull all of mama’s photos off her fridge.

sorry, babe- but what do you eat for breakfast when you are at your grandma’s house? doughnuts!


ps- im having major yahoo issues today… if you sent me an email, i haven’t been able to see it… sorry!

nope, not much in this post. no amazing photos, not an amazing story, lotsa whoops camera settings wise.. but for someone who is checking this blog specifically for things like this… this is their kinda post. 🙂
after a long car ride down south, someone is beyond happy to see little einsteins on tv. 🙂

pls excuse the open leg shot. but MAN! look how long her legs have gotten! she seriously did some major growing in the last few weeks. so many of her dresses are tight on her and sniff… sniff… she moved up to a size 4 diaper. 😦

very wrong settings… but what a sweet face 🙂

SOOOO GREAT that i have the table in focus here. HAAAAAAAAAA! my mom recently got a cat and this was elsie’s first time around her. this is the ‘checking out how close that cat is to me’ squat.

and another that shows off how much she’s grown. look at those fingers!  sorry, i didn’t quite manage to get anything in focus today. lol

one of cam, very excited about something.

bear with me… i am going to be posting like this for a few weeks…maybe even daily.  have i mentioned that most of the really good shots on this blog lately have been taken by chris, not me?? LOL i have been so out of it.

school’s coming up so we buzzed off the ‘mohawk’!

it’s always a shock at first when we buzz their hair. but chris has been doing their hair since birth (they both came out with a ton of hair) so they are used to it. can’t believe school will be here in less than a month! all of the kids will be gone till 3:00– elsie will be so sad! 😦

daddy even cuts elsie’s hair. her back curls came back and they were getting sooo long, i had him chop them last night. 😦 i need to get pics. i did get this one.. i don’t know how.. i get the heebie jeebies when i see this.

she doesn’t look as thrilled as he did… taken a few years ago. LOL

oh and can i just share this layout? it’s for the midmonth garden.

my layout before elsie took a black marker and wrote ALL OVER IT. sigh. 😦 what a toddler. 🙂

and unfortunately for some people, this isn’t gonna be too exciting! 🙂 it’s a scrapbook post. but i am going to try and post a lot more in the next few weeks.. gotta try and pull out the camera more, been very lazy about it.
so, over the weekend, i scrapbooked. it’s been awhile since i scrapped just for the heck of it.. not for an assignment or company.. just me. ok, i lied… i had to get in the groove- so i started with this one is for KI.

it’s for this week’s challenge.  so go do it! 🙂 i did that one in the car while elsie was sleeping. that was a first! scrapping in the car. we were at chris’ office and i brought stuff along for the day, so i thought, why not? ha! 
here’s one that is for fun. thanks shan, for the new hobby lobby elsie stuff! 🙂

and a totally random one. that’s me. almost 30 freaking years ago. how crazy is that??! i don’t scrap myself very often but came across this picture and just had to.

so there you go. i even made a new folder in my computer that’s called ‘for fun’–i’m gonna try and add to it at least once a month. 🙂

he came home last saturday 🙂

daddy surprised him by coming up for the pick up ride… i am so glad too! he was able to get some shots of the campgrounds. this is his teepee he slept in with a few other boys. he said he missed us but didn’t get homesick.. that he was too busy having fun. which i was SO glad to hear.. i wanted him to have so much fun. 🙂

he met some cool friends (which warms my heart because he is such a little introvert) and had such exciting adventures. we went to develop his disposable camera today and i was so pleased with his shots! ya! 🙂 the funniest part was when i unpacked his clothes.. half of them were still folded so nicely, the way i packed them.. i don’t want to know why. 😛

i am so glad we sent him. he grew leaps and bounds.. in so many ways. we will send him again and again from now on. and on the way home.. singing all the songs he learned.. teaching them to his number one fan. his little bro. 🙂

catching up…doing a lot of nothing. having rootbeer floats at 11 in the morning. 🙂 staying up way too late and watching war movies.. almost back to normal. 🙂 kira comes home tomorrow. yay!

i only have 2 kids with me for a few days. it is definitely a strange feeling! like i left one at the store and i need to run back and pick him/her up! ha! i’ve been wanting to take elsie to this indoor playground for awhile and today was perfect. i love how most of the kids are preschool and under.. lots around her age.. you pay a few bucks and can stay all day and pack a picnic lunch to eat there. and they constantly come around to wipe down toys.. a total must for this germ freak. 🙂


already a mother hen:

always trying to keep up with the big bro:


elsie was pushed around a few times but since she is so used to her brothers and sisters she totally held her own! what a difference– when i just had kira, and something like that would happen, it was so devastating.. now i am like, stand up for yourself, els! 🙂 ha!

so play nice, they did. 🙂 i am SO thankful that caleb will still do “young” things with her… he is so sweet to her. i love it. i have a feeling we will be spending lots of time here once school starts.. she will be missing the big guys so much! so play date mamas, come hang out with us here!!! 🙂

so our theme at 2peas this month is digital scrapbooking. while i don’t scrapbook digitally exclusively, it’s something i can appreciate and enjoy. here’s my favorite from the month:
the enlarged photo, the mix of fonts and THE SEWING! all things i normally don’t do while paper scrapping. love that digi lets me do that at a click of a button. 🙂
also, went through photos last night. elsie got a bunch of hand me down princess dresses from her cousin, jaeden. i managed to quickly snap this and when i edited it i was amazed. 🙂 i’m not sure i am ready for princesses again. 🙂 but how could i resist?!

and this. she really is so tiny! she pulled this top out of her closet and at first i thought, that’s way too small.. she wore it last year! but what do you know? it still fits!

and i was trying to compare it to older photos i had of her in it.. but they are on my old computer.. so all i could do was find this layout that elsie flannigan made last year when we had a KI photo swap. 🙂 look how little our peanut is! 🙂 and she’s 17 months today. sigh. if i could keep stuffing her in old clothes to make her stay small, i would. 🙂
wednesday today…halfway till my boy comes home. yay!!! 🙂

my heart’s been hurting lately.
cameron left for camp yesterday and i can’t stop thinking about him. it’s not his first time away from home, but first time without the siblings. they are always together. at least him and caleb are.

and so i can’t stop wondering about him. looking at the clock and wondering what he’s doing. wondering about him at night and hoping he’s happy and not homesick. hoping that we did the right thing to send him. hoping that he learns so much and makes so many amazing memories. i don’t even care if he forgets to shower. i just want him to remember the chapstick and sunblock. 🙂 and to be very, very happy.
it’s not the same without him. when any of our kids is missing, it’s never the same. always a little quieter. caleb cried and cried last night for cam. broke my heart. but at the same time, i am so glad they have that bond.

i know it’s good for him. i know this is one of many times he’ll be away. i know i should be happy for him. but inside i am just a mom who loves her boy and thinks he should be home with her. if this is a tiny glimpse of what it feels like when your child goes off to college, i am going to be a wreck.