July 30 "Flying" children!

Friday Evening:  Here is another reason why today was such a PERFECT day ... I was able to go to Dylan and Kelly's and take care of the kiddos from 7-10pm to give Nanny Jen a break. DJ and Kelly have been out of town to celebrate #12 anniversary. When I arrived at 7, Jen told me that little Cal was already down for the night--which was actually good news because I wasn't sure HOW I was going to navigate getting all of them to bed otherwise.

The little kids wanted me to see their brand new carpet in the basement, so we went down there to play. They wanted to show me how they have learned to jump off the side of their couch onto their giant bean bag chair--so I took I bunch of pictures of them doing that. We were cracking up while I was taking pictures, because after each jump they would run over to me to see how it "turned out."

So ... these are blurry and not very good ... but they ARE funny!

Here is flying Erin! She looks like a blob of hair without a face! Whatever happened to her FACE?!?!

I missed Aidan in midair but here is his landing It looks like he is getting ready to water ski!

Here goes Erin!

Whoa! This girl FLIES! When Erin saw this picture, she said: "You'll show Kaity this picture, right?" I assured her I would.

This was our second attempt to catch Aidan mid-air ... here he goes ...

1, 2, 3 ... GO!

Rats! I missed him again. I got Erin, though, and it looks like she has fallen out of nowhere, out of the sky!

Ah! Here is Aidan springing off the couch like super hero ...

This is Aidan watching Erin's landing ...

This is the best one I got of Erin flying like a bird ... ("You HAVE to show Kaity this one, gwamma!")

And here goes Aidan ... out into the wild blue yonder ...

Oops! WHAT happened to Erin! All I can see is her HAIR!

It looks like Aidan has seen a ghost in this picture! No worries! He was just cracking up as he jumped.

We finally went upstairs to read books. We read SO MANY books tonight! (1) "Violet Comes to Stay" by Melanie Cecka (about a little white kitten trying to find God's plan for her life--it's a super cute story). (2) "Gregory, the Terrible Eater" by Mitchell Sharmat (about a little goat who liked fruits and vegetables, but his folks wanted him to eat tin cans, shoes, rope, etc. I knew Aidan would get a kick out of this story). (3) "The Mysterious Sea Bunny" by Peter Raymundo (which more of an informational book about sea slugs--but it was well illustrated, and the children had a fun time with it). (4) "The Rabbit Listened" by Cori Doerrfeld (a super cute story about a little boy who had built a block tower than fell down and how sad he felt) (5) and then we read a little book of mind, "Gideon, Blow Your Horn!" based on the Bible account of Gideon defeating the Midianites, and then (6) "Jesus Calms the Storm" about Jesus and His friends and the sudden storm on the Sea of Galilee and how AWESOME Jesus was when He spoke and the waves and wind OBEYED.

It was about a 30 minute process after that to get Erin and Aidan to brush teeth and use the potty, but we finally said our prayers and counted our blessings and then I got to spend some 1-on-1 with Brendan. We went through one of six chapters in Britannica's First Big Book of WHY--the chapter we read was about SPACE (the kind out in the OUTER space). We had such a nice time reading the chapter together.

Brendan is such an excellent reader and he LOVES to learn. He has a great memory too. I always end up learning stuff from HIM rather than the opposite. Look at his great smile. What a dear dear fellow he is.

Nanny Jen returned exactly when she said she would. Just have to say HOW AMAZING this woman is--I just love her.

One more happy thing! Dylan texted me that they made an offer on a nice home that was actually accepted! YES!! I looked it up and it's such a great house for them. THANK YOU, Lord! Please let all of the transition, paperwork, legalities, etc. go smoothly for this dear family.