Nosy Boy

Last night we were having popcorn and Orioles night in my bed. We had just gotten finished and I went to the kitchen to put the dishes away. Caleb comes walking down the hall with his finger in his nose saying "popcorn" "nose". Dread falls over me. I say "Caleb, is there popcorn in your nose?" The response, "yes". I look, and sure enough, there's a popcorn kernel lodged in his nose. What do I do? I think we've only had something in the nose one other time over the last six years. Of course, Dave is not home. My first thought is, great, I'm going to the emergency room with all four kids tonight. My next thought is how do I even begin to get this out of his nose without pushing it up farther. (those of you with boys are probably thinking, get used to it) Tweezers, toothpick, barrett? I try a few of those things, but I know it's a bad idea to stick another foreign object in his nose. I was desperate. I begin to pray. The girls begin to laugh. I'm thinking this is really not funny. The ending...thank the Lord... I was able to push the kernel out of his nose from the outside. Never a dull moment.

Happy Birthday Sarah!

My baby is one today! It's hard to believe.

#5

No not another baby! The other morning I found myself fixing breakfast for five kids. Caleb insisted that Clifford eat breakfast with us. He told me that Clifford needed Oh's and some juice. It was so funny!

Sleepy Reading

On two different days recently this is how I found the girls. Mikaela fell asleep like this at bedtime, and Alethea was like this during naptime. Like her costume! I thought these were too cute. I couldn't resist the picture.

Hiding Place

Mikaela found a new place to hide for hide and seek!


Yes....that is under the van!

Violin

Alethea is learning to play the violin. She is doing a camp through the church. With the camp she gets 6 private lessons and then 5 days of a camp setting. Her instructor is amazing. She is very good at what she does. What I have been so impressed with is that I knew she was a great player herself, but it's so neat to watch someone who is a great teacher as well. Alethea has only had three lessons, but she has learned so much already, and she loves it. Of course I had to be the proud mom and take pictures of her first day. I don't think she minded too much. Dave thought I was a dork though!

Anniversary Trip

Dave and I celebrated our 9 year anniversary last week. It's been so great. Nine years of marriage and four kids. Not bad!!We were able to get away for two nights at a place called the Glasbern Inn. The setting was just beautiful. We had a great time being together, enjoying undistracted conversation, good food, and a whole afternoon sitting in the sun by the pool. It was such a relaxing time. Two of the pictures are of the actual place we stayed. The other picture is of something we saw while out on a drive. It is a picture of an old fire company's garage door. It says fogelsville fire co. It was so neat.

Vacation

It's been a while. Needless to say things at the Brewer house have been very busy. I guess that's summer and life with four little ones. Thought I'd go back a little while and start with vacation. We went to Hilton Head Island in South Carolina with my parents and sister for a week. It was great! Aside from the very long drive, I think it is a GREAT beach for little kids. No waves, warm water, lots of space on the beach, and not very crowded. We did lots of fun stuff like mini- golf, the beach, a dolphin watching cruise, kayaking (just Dave and I), fireworks, and late night trips to the pool. It was so great to be together. It's neat to watch how vacations change as the kids get older. It gets easier! Not that is was totally restful, but I didn't come home feeling like I needed a vacation! I did have to share the most memorable moment of the whole trip. It actually happened even before we left our house. We had decided to get the kids up VERY early the morning we were leaving. The plan was for Dave and I to get up at 3:30am finish packing the car and get the kids up at 4am. Our logic behind this was hopefully they would be so tired later in the day that they would actually fall asleep in the car at some point. So, 4am comes, we get them up, in the car, buckled in ready to go. Dave goes to start the car and we have a dead battery. I had plugged in the DVD players the night before. I thought I had turned them off, but I had actually turned them to stand by. They are powered by the ligther thing in the car, so it had been sucking power out of the battery all night. Trying to remain calm, I say to Dave, "no problem, let's just get the jumper cables and jump the car using the truck." His response, "I don't have jumper cables". Trying to make light of what I could I say "You failed at this man job." Long story short, we called my parents who were not supposed to leave until 6:30 and asked them if we could come and get some jumper cables. (can't exactly ask the neighbor at 4 in the morning) My parents graciously got up and came down to jump our van. We finally got on the road around 5:15 and all caravanned down together. How did the kids do? They were amazing! Aside from a few whines here and there, they just sat in the car with their granola bars and milk while Dave and I sat on the driveway and watched the sun come up!