Cross My heart....pinkie promise

I pinkie promise to rewind soon and journal about some of the latest Stine news. Since May, we've had 5 family birthdays, VBS, camp, swim lessons, a dance recital, Father's Day, Mother's Day....tons! I want to post a few pictures of our zany life! And it's true...when they get older you get busier and busier and busier. Oh, the season of minivan rubber meeting the road is coming in 5 more weeks. For the first time, back to school is going to mean something in this house!!!!

I'm planning now for special "back to school" activities. I have a few ideas...but would love to hear from friends what you do/have read/have dreamed of for making back to school memorable for your child. (So far...Matt is taking the day off so that I can take Abby all by myself to her class....and of course we're having a special outfit made just for her....and we're going to take "first day" pics...and probably have a crazy breakfast (on a special plate I'm thinking)...) But I need some "out of the box" ideas. Anyone game?

She's just plain crazy!

Oh, I just have to stop and thank Isabella for being just plain crazy. The past few weeks she has really mellowed out on her temper tantrums and difficult behavior...and she has been a riot! I believe God put her in this family to keep us guessing and laughing and laid back. When things get too serious, add a little Isabella and all lightens up. More often than not she has us laughing ourselves silly at the dinner table with her silly antics. Tonight she asked for an Oreo for dessert after she heartily finished her meal. I said sure since she'd eaten all of her food. She looked at me so seriously and said, "I'm gonna sneak one." Then she brought the whole pack out to the table. Matt looked at her and said, "I hope you never get a job as an investigator!" Later she whispered to me "There are 2 more Oreos for you and me to sneak later." She was beaming from ear to ear as she whispered it in that no so quiet voice of hers!

Boys and Honey...

Yesterday Abby and Isabella went for a few hours to Rock Star Camp at Stars in Motion (their dance studio). They had a wonderful time of course! They loved it!

In the meantime, I took Ali Kate and Grant to the gym so that I could get some exercise. I worked myself silly! As we were leaving, I was asking Ali how she enjoyed playing at the gym. She says to me very seriously, "I love playing my new friends, but boys are baaaadddd." (She has a very long Southern drawl on that bad.) It was hilarious!

Today I called her to come downstairs, and she said, "I'm coming, honey." When she reached the bottom, I gave her a kiss and hug and said, "Am I your honey? How sweet." She quickly said, "No, you're not my honey. You're my mommy. You're not a bee. A bee is honey." Pretty adept for a new 2 year old!


Oh, Ali Kate says so many hilarious things these days...and I've got to stop forgetting to start remembering to write these things down (ode to Silly Tilly there). (You have to have read the book.)

And Miss Abby herself is actually finally getting excited about kindergarten. She's not been excited about leaving home but is beginning to get cautiously excited about it. I think secretly she's super excited but is guarded about showing her enthusiasm. She told Matt yesterday that she is going to "graduate from naps on August 11th" (the first day of school). I did promise her that...and she won't let me forget it!

An exciting day in the blog world!

Today's a big day for the Stine family in the blog world! My shop is featured and having a giveaway at Memories on Clover Lane (I love this blog!! She has 5 kids, so I can identify with her on so many levels. And she takes pictures I only wish I could take!!). Hop on over and check out her beautiful blog!



And....Isabella is the featured kiddo today on Totally Tots. They have kind of an "interview" about her. Isn't she adorable! And now those pretty blue eyes are famous! Well, in the mommy blog world at least! I love this site because it is chock full of millions of creative ideas for toddlers and preschoolers (and since we've had a house full of toddlers and preschoolers since before I can remember...it's a favorite source for creative Bible lessons, arts, crafts, etc.) Journey over there to see our adorable Bella (who is actually getting too old to be on this blog....yes, she just turned 4. I can hardly believe it!)

Happy Father's Day, Matt!

I want to wish you a Happy Father's Day, honey! Not many dads deserve the thanks that you do. You put in a full schedule at work and then come home to 4 wild kids each and every day. (I think the fact that you come on home is impressive on its own!). You have learned to speak my love language (serve, serve, serve)...and you do so much to help! Not many dads work as hard and as long as you do. You are a wonderful husband and father. Thank you for loving these four kids so much and helping raise them every day. You have a special bond with each of them (still working on that one with Big Al a bit, don't you agree?)...and it's sweet to see your individual relationships with them. Grant is going to have lots of fun learning about "boy stuff" with you (cause his mama would probably keep him from all things dangerous like football till he's 45).

Thank you for helping clean up dinner, pick up toys, read books, sing songs, get ready for birthday parties, go get balloons, bandage boo boos, fix lunches, give me breaks, taxi kiddos to dance, put on leotards and tights, dance on stage with Isabella and Abby, check blood sugar, give way too many shots, take care of the yard, teach them Bible stories, pray over and with and for them, change diapers, take them to the potty, brush teeth, fix bows, roll ball, feed, fix dinner, feed, entertain, and did I mention feed?

It takes some serious stamina, love, patience, and caffeine (or chocolate in my case) to care for our crew! And you, Matt, have been there every step of the way. And every diaper of the way, every spilled juice along the way, every ER visit along the way, every nighttime feeding...you've done the dad thing for a long time now! Almost six years!

The girls all think you rock! And I'm pretty sure Grant does too with his "da da da" all the time! We love you and want you to have a wonderful, relaxing day. It's all yours, baby! Kick back, put your feet up (but not on the furniture of course...oh, so just kidding in this house...whose feet haven't been on the couch?!?) and just enjoy the kids that call you Dad on this Father's Day.

We love you!

Oh...and the above picture for anyone else reading this...that's Matt dancing on stage at the girls' dance recital in the "Daddy Dance"...in front of about 250 people...now that's a real man for you! Sweet, honey!

Look Who's Featured on Totally Tots!

Hop on over to Totally Tots to see a sweet birthday picture of Isabella. She's the only one turning four in June! I also nominated her to be featured there...maybe she'll be picked soon. My friend Ashley told me about this site, and if you have little ones at home....you have to check it out! It's an awesome resource for all things related to little ones!

If only I'd had the camera...

then you would have seen ME mowing the back yard today! Yes, that's right! I mowed about 1/3 of our very steep back yard. Matt was getting so tired and sweaty, and he looked like he needed a break. I was out there trimming bushes and cleaning out flowerbeds (I'll share a story about that soon!)...and I'd been dripping sweat (I'm sure you wanted to know that too!). But he looked worse than I did...so I offered to finish the yard. Well, he actually laughed at me when I said it. So of course then it was on! I was going to finish it if it killed me! I did mow all the time when I was a teenager (my mom made me), but I've never mowed once in our married life (sad, I know). I actually wanted to mow rather than be inside with the kids. Yes, today was that rough. 99.9% of the time I'll choose kids over almost anything (especially anything involving yardwork), but we had a very rough day and I needed to sweat my frustrations out! Let's just say that we had a botched attempt at potty training, Ali Kate decided she was really 2, Grant has been crawling and getting into everything and putting it all in his mouth, Abby is "the B word...bored for those of you who are new to my blog", we've had activities like every night, and well...I'm just tired! And why I am blogging at 11 p.m.? Because I'm working on Isabella's stickers for her party favors for Saturday...and I always multi task on the computer!

Need to wrap it up though!

Duck Duck Goose Giveaway

If you're reading this, you need to take a minute and head over to my Duck Duck Goose blog to enter our first giveaway!! Details are on the blog! Good luck!

Needles upon Needles

 

 

I was cleaning out underneath our kitchen sink the other day and took these pictures. Upon first glance, it looks like we're stockpiling formula for a major disaster. Grant would be full for days with this much formula on hand. However, open the lids and the picture changes quite a bit. These three Similac containers are full of used syringes. Each container has dozens of used syringes that I used to inject insulin into my child. Each needle there has actually pierced my baby's skin. I usually throw each container away once it's full. For some reason I didn't...and accumulated three of these. It almost took my breath away to see this harsh visual picture of what I do to keep my baby alive every day. Harsh reality.

While my other three kids have no medical issues at all, Abby takes several daily injections to stay alive. Those words are hard to type. Hard to read. Hard to swallow. Every once in a while it hits me hard. The day I cleaned out the cabinet was one of those. There were probably 200 needles under my kitchen sink that day. That's alot of shots. Alot of injections. Alot of pain.

I do pray that a cure will be found in Abby's lifetime. She deserves it.

Kid Talk

So Anna Claire spent the night Saturday night (I gotta blog about Saturday sometime soon), and she and Abby had the funniest conversation on the way to church Sunday. It went something like this:

Abby: I can count backwards from 10.
Anna Claire: I can count backwards from 13. 13, 12, 11, 10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1.
Abby: I know what 5 plus 5 plus 5 plus 5 is.
Anna Claire: How much?
Abby: 18
Anna Claire: How did you know how to do that?
Abby: Because I know how to do stuff like adults. That's how I know it's 18.

Matt and I were about to crack up laughing as they kept doing their version of adult math!