Graduation!

Thursday evening Ben graduated from preschool! It was a bittersweet time. It's hard to believe that he is about to start kindergarten. He started at St. Xavier preschool when he was just three years old. Almost three years later he is more than ready to move on. When he started he was a shy little boy ready to learn and explore. Now he knows all of his letters and numbers, days of the week, months of the year, continents and so much more. Most importantly, he has great self confidence and is so outgoing.

Pictured below are the graduating students. Only about 1/4 of them are from Ben's class. The others are morning students and students from the other class. Ben is in the upper left corner.


Mrs. Whitaker was Ben's teacher for all three years at St. Xavier. Next year will be her first year teaching without Benny in her class! We are really going to miss her. We wish that Sophie and Addie would have the opportunity to be in her class.



Graduation consisted of a musical program sung by the students. The kids sung about 15 songs with the help of Mrs. Whitaker and Mrs. Rubash at the piano. Our friends Jennifer, Christian and Taylor came and brought Benny balloons. He was so excited to see them in the audience. We sure will miss our time and friends at St. Xavier. We will miss playing outside everyday after school, and I will miss all of the fun projects that Benny brought home.

I tried to film some of the musical program. Enjoy these sweet preschoolers singing about God and their parents.

A Day at the Dairy Farm

Last Wednesday Benny's preschool class enjoyed a trip to a working dairy farm. It was a very fun, and very stinky day! Parents and siblings were invited too, and we had a great turnout. Nick was unable to join us, but I brought along Sophie and Addie. I think that Sophie may have had a better time than her big brother. The first thing she said to me when I woke her up on Wednesday, was "Cows, cows!". I told her that first we had to go to church group and play (she goes into the childcare there). Her response was "No play, cows!". By the time lunchtime rolled around, we were leaving church and heading to the dairy farm which is less than two miles from our house. I never knew we were so close to the farm, and now understand why it is so stinky here when we get a north wind!


We were taken on a tour of the farm when we first arrived. We saw the bottling room, the sterilizing room, and the the milking room (above). The boys especially were fascinated with the milking room.

After we saw the inner workings of the farm, we got to see the best part. The cows! The kids were able to get really close to these black and white girls, but the cows were pretty shy and would pull back.

After we saw the adult female cows, our tour guide took us to an open barn where they kept all of the baby cows. This was the highlight of the day! The kids loved looking at all of the baby cows. There must have been about 50, and two of them had just been born the day before. Ben and Sophie ran from pen to pen exploring. Sophie must have said "Oh, baby cow!" about 100 times on Wednesday and talked about the baby cows for the rest of the week.

"Oh, baby cows!"

I'll have to say that our day at the dairy farm was a hit! When we were finished with our tour the staff gave the kids cookies and samples of milk-white, strawberry and chocolate. I think Ben had three glasses of white milk while Sophie enjoyed some chocolate. I'll leave some videos of Sophie to sum up our fun and stinky day!

Playing Catch Up

We've had a quite few weeks around here and not much to blog about. After Easter our home showings really seemed to drop off which was both a relief and a worry. I've been relieved because Nick is gone TDY (temporary duty for you non-military folks) for the third time in three weeks. As I mentioned before showing the house is stressful since you get hours notice to get everything clean and get out of there with the circus in tow. But, this past week, things picked up again and we had three showings. For the third time we were on some one's very short list, but again, they picked the other house. We were really bummed, and are starting to get nervous that we won't sell before we move.

Nick is working crazy hours and they still haven't found a replacement for him. The General jokes about keeping Nick around, but luckily he's already signed Nick's leave form and our packers are scheduled for the second week of June. We're hoping that anytime now they will find a replacement so we can get ready to get out of here! Nick usually works from 6am to 8pm, and has worked three of the past four weekends. It's not much fun because frequently he doesn't even see Sophie, and will only see Ben for an hour before he goes to bed. Thankfully, this craziness should be coming to a close. Last weekend however, we did get to enjoy a perk of the job. The USO brought the Lt. Dan Band to Fort Riley for a concert. The Lt. Dan Band is headed by Gary Sinise who is a huge supporter of the Army and the USO. He also happens to be a personal friend of "the General". Nick had to escort the General to the show, and I was invited to come along! It was great fun because we all rode together in the General's Army van and got VIP treatment. Now Nick had to work, but Addie and I tagged behind. First we went to a VIP party, and then we got to go into the Green room and meet the band! I was thrilled because, I am a big Gary Sinise fan. Unfortunately, I didn't get to shake his hand, but Nick stood right with him and the General for quite some time. Nick said he was very down to earth and humble. The Lt. Dan Band put on a great show. Gary doesn't sing at all, but plays the bass. The band is a cover band, and they covered everything! It was a long and loud concert and Miss Adeline slept through the entire thing! (Our other two children were with a wonderful new babysitter. Why is it that we find a great babysitter now that we are leaving?) It was fun to have a night out, even if it involved some work for Nick.

Soldier's who just returned from Iraq had the priority up front seating. Luckily we sat back from the speakers since we had Addie with us. The noise still didn't bother her though.

The next day was Mother's Day. It was great to celebrate being a mother to my three beautiful children! Ben and Sophie brought flowers into the bedroom while I was getting ready for church. They each had their own bouquet for me and were so proud! Some of the flowers are still living and Sophie keeps telling me "Mommy's flowers". Nick tried to teach her to say Happy Mother's Day, but all he got was "Happy Mommy". It still melted my heart. After church we had a big dinner with our friends Jennifer and Christian. Our priest, Father Al even joined us. He has spent lots of time lately with Nick and Christian. They meet with him weekly for a drink at his house while the kids are at CCD. Funny to be friends with a priest!

I'm still working on getting that 'perfect shot' for Adeline's baby announcement. She is turning two months old this week, so I probably should get around to that before the move. I did take these photos of her this morning. She was so alert and smiley that I couldn't resist having a little photo session.

We have a big week this week. It is the last week of school for Ben. On Wednesday we a taking a field trip to a working Dairy farm. That should be interesting with 15 preschoolers. On Thursday night we have Benny's preschool graduation, which he is very excited about. Friday Nick's parents will be joining us and meeting Addie for the first time. We will also have Addie baptised on Sunday. So, I promise lots more blogs soon!

Sleeping Beauty and Sweet Smiles and Kisses

Our Baby Adeline is a Sleeping Beauty. We joke that it's her self defense mechanism against the chaos of our household. She has some wakeful time in the morning and in the evening, but during the hustle and bustle of the day, she is usually fast asleep. It doesn't help that I have to drive Benny to and from preschool each afternoon. Buckling her into her car seat is the fastest way to ensure that she falls sound asleep. She even sleeps through trips to the grocery store when I put her into the Baby Bjorn carrier. (How else does one make it through the store when you have two little ones? I have to have room in the cart for babies AND groceries!)




She still likes to sleep curled up in a little ball. She doesn't mind being swaddled, but she does prefer to be loose with her arms up in the air. If you look closely you will notice that her legs are pulled up out of the sleeper. When she wakes, she will start crying her absolute loudest because she can't straighten her legs out. It makes her really mad! At nighttime we put her into a gown to avoid this problem.


In the past week or two she really has begun to smile. Now I am certain that she is happy to see us and that her smiles aren't because of gas!

I tried to catch a few of her sweet smiles yesterday. (It's just so hard to get the camera to snap at the right time!)

After taking a few pictures of our smiling girl, I decided to try and catch the smiles of all three kids. This was not an easy task, and after taking about 10 photos, I still didn't get the perfect shot.

Sophie loves for Nick and I to read to her in the chair in her room. I had propped Adeline up in the chair to try and get a cute picture of her, and Sophie decided to join her. Before long, she was hoping in and out of the chair 'reading' Adeline her favorite books.

After reading time was complete, we made some time for kisses.

Don't worry-I'm always just an arms reach away from these two when they are together. My worst fear is that Sophie will treat our real baby the same way she treats her baby dolls. (Which is gentle for the most part, but the babies are frequently dropped or thrown on the floor when she is done with them.)