Thursday, May 07, 2009

Someone Turned 9!

Well Jared is officially nine. It doesn't seem possible, yet it is true. I thought he was just baptized yesterday, not a whole year ago. He had to do a treasure hunt to find this present. Riley was his helper. He's been begging and borrowing Nicole and Riley's Ripsticks, and now he's got his own. He was thrilled. His is a smaller and smoother rolling board. It could be that the other boards around here have been used and abused and thus don't roll as well.

He obviously already knew how to use it. I have no idea how they do that, but I like to watch them. I also like that they get outside and get some exercise. It's not something I usually allow in my house....especially since "the hole in the wall accident". What a bunch of crazies I have!

Don't ask me why I got that look from either of them. The girls are just looking at each other like..."Boys!!" Jared you are loud, crazy, smart, a daredevil, and good boy and we're glad to have you in our family.




Butterfly!

Our kids were playing with their friends and they brought in a fat, green caterpillar. They wanted to keep it and see if it would turn into a butterfly. We got a jar ready and let them keep it. Things like this don't usually go well for me. The insect usually dies and then we have to go through a long explanation about why and what and all that. When it looked like it was making a cocoon the next morning, we were encouraged. When it was mostly black and looked really sad by the evening, I told them not to expect much. We decided not to throw it out yet, but to see what would happen over the next week or so.

One morning Sarah was getting ready for school and yelled. She scared me and I didn't know what she was talking about, but she said "It came out!!" Sure enough, this beautiful butterfly had emerged from its cocoon. We were all very happy it had survived and I'm glad I didn't have to explain why it died.

We let it go outside so it could be free and live a good life.


Here's what was left of the cocoon after it came out.



Snow Day!!

I know it's a bit late to be posting this, but I just uploaded these pictures and I was reminded about our huge snowstorm we had on March 28th! Winter is over by then, but we got the most snow I've ever seen here in OK. It melted the next day and we were enjoying 60 degree weather, but just look at the amount on the ground. Considering I've only seen it snow about four times in the four winters I've lived here, this was amazing.