Charlotte turns 8!

Sweet Charlotte might have had the happiest birthday yet with the best gift being to celebrate with Uncle Steve, Aunt Jenny, Karis, Isaac & Olivia.  On top of that, Gigi spent the night with us AND Gaga & Pawpaw were in town! What a hustle & bustle kind of day it was!

24 hours prior she asked if she could make her own cake. Talk about independent! She did awesome & was happy with the results. She chose a strawberry cake because that is Aunt Jenny's favorite.

As tradition requires here at the Nest, on birthday eve, the special boy or girl is banned from the downstairs & decorating commences. Owen & Anson used to be excluded but are now part of the festivities. This year they were fantastic at attempting to blow up balloons and succeeding in covering them with saliva leaving me to be the one to complete the task. YUCK! Germ sharing & all, it went well & bedtime was calling our name.  Her smile was big & bright when the sun came up & we headed downstairs.

My mom passed along her old camera & Charlotte took one of her first pictures of these delicious sugary treats in the shape of a number 8. I have been her mama for eight very special years. As far as the photo goes, I think she might have some talent with the flash turned off, candle in focus & the rest of the photo fading behind. She has certainly taken more selfies of silly faces than anything else but what do you expect from an eight year old little girl?

After breakfast she got down to business opening her gifts. Eloise convinced us to let her give Charlotte a stuffed cat which is certainly better than a real cat but just adds to the stuffed animal insanity. I will admit that it is really cute & snuggly & has been given the coveted spot on the bed.

A week before Charlotte's birthday, Robby was outside when a delivery person with an absurd amount of balloons (like at least 20) asked if she could leave them at our house for the next door neighbor. Charlotte was a little sad that they weren't for her and was super surprised on her big day to see her own little balloon bouquet on our front porch with a sweet note from Kate & Travis.

Another fun gift she received was from Uncle Scott & Uncle Kyle who got her an HP Sprocket printer so she could print pics on the go. They had her upcoming Colorado trip in mind & boy was it fun to have!

Earlier that morning I had been in touch with Jenny & Jeannine about an overnight delayed flight for Uncle Steve who was returning from Poland & a middle of the night trip to Urgent Care for Jenny.  I prepared Charlotte for not having anyone up here to celebrate at lunchtime as we had planned. Inside I was heartbroken & praying that someone could come. We were shocked to hear that all were en route to our casa by mid morning! Charlotte could not have smiled any bigger when Robby relayed the message Uncle Steve sent. He told the airline desk attendant that he HAD to get to Dallas because he would not miss celebrating his niece's birthday. He must have looked serious because he got on the plane ; )

This was our first reunion two years after they moved away. I was a puddle of tears seeing Charlotte & Karis hug each other.

We took on a few boxes of pizza.....

then moved along to the cake. Karis & Charlotte's birthdays are just over a month apart & Charlotte was insistent to share blowing out the candles with the almost 7 year old.

My favorite picture of all....

Cake was yummy enough to dab on everyone's nose. Oh Livi-Lou with all the big girls, she is a cutie!

Just a smattering of pictures of the party-goers starting off with the perfectly coordinated great grandmothers & grandparents.

oh my....first clue we were in for it. They looked like this for much of the following 2 weeks!

What a fun coloring book she got!

We attempted a family photo. Attempt is the key word. It was the only picture that Grammy & Papa were a part of & they were compliant but others were not. Weird faces, back of heads, grumpy child glaring from the chair, etc. They were there though...promise.

That baby that made us a mommy & daddy is growing up to be a lovely young lady. She is a delight, really funny, helpful, confident, creative & loving. We love her more than she knows.

1st day of school ~ 2017

Say what? It's already time to go back to school? These five + their mama were actually really excited to get back into the swing of things! This year it's 3rd grade for Charlotte, 1st for Eloise, Pre-K for Owen & Anson, then Arlo gets to tag-along. Everybody loves him.

and those little learners with their favorite teacher....

I don't think I am actually their favorite teacher all the time but I certainly love them more than any other teacher ever will : ) I guess Arlo was reluctant to go. It was only 8am & he had already started the belly button rubbing. The good news is that he survived with minimal amount of tears. He even let them dip his hands in paint!  Anson was just about the cutest little thing & did his very first presentation. I was shocked that he even stood up to speak. He had his cue cards. The first was his name & age, the second was Grammy & Papa & the third was a raccoon in a cage that was caught at Grammy & Papa's house. It was short & sweet.

 Arlo was attached to my leg when I picked him up.

The only bummer about being a tutor is that I miss out on being a part of the girls' classes. Thankfully they have incredible women (and friends) teaching them this year. I heard great reports about their first day. Here are the chickadees from the girls' classes.

The twins with their buddy Moses. They were sooooo cute & had to be separated for week two due to some wiggly-ness & tickling each other. It was awesome.

One new & exciting part of this school year is that I am teaching the 4 & 5 year old class! This will be our fifth year in a Classical Conversations Community & due to some changes among tutors I was asked to take over the littlest learners. I am beyond thrilled & am looking forward to getting to know the children & families in my class. It is really special to be in there for the boys' first year. I did call them the wrong names about 10 times that morning & I have no idea why. They had on very different shirts & I can tell them apart but maybe I was so distracted I couldn't get it right! This cycle of CC is my favorite. We are studying American History & Geography, Anatomy & lots of fun English Grammar facts along with many more things. I'm just highlighting my favorite parts!

We stayed for lunch then rushed home to get a look at the solar eclipse. What an incredible way to start the school year! We all looked about a million times between 1 & 3 then found out that Dallas will be a city that will experience a full eclipse in 2024. Countdown is on!

We love these five & are so thankful to have the opportunity to guide them in their education. I get to learn lots of things too! Here's to a great year!

Arlo at 21 months

Arlo is WAY to close to turning two but for right now he is still our little bitty baby. A 21 month old is still considered an infant right? Okay, good...just checking. He's cute as a button while  ransacking the house one kitchen cabinet at a time.  We are enjoying the busy-ness of an almost two year old showing us a bit more of his personality each day. He's affectionate, snuggly, content & very much my side-kick until Daddy gets home.

21 things about Arlo Benton at 21 months:

1. It's funny to start with saying "at 18 months" after stating this is about Arlo at 21 months but, at 18 months he weighed 23 lbs & was 32 in tall. His thighs are certainly chubbier now.
2. He grosses us out everyday when he dips socks into Bella's water bowl then is spotted sucking on them. He also dips a cup in the bowl if he needs a swig. YUCK! He also can locate a toilet bowl brush at record speed. That's even grosser.
3. Setting the table comes naturally. He comes over to the cabinet where the kids plates are kept & carries over one at a time, stands on his tippy toes & places it on the table. The next one goes just behind it pushing the previous one closer to the middle of the table. He basically makes a plate train with a "I'm so proud of myself mom!" kind of face. It's a tough job for a 1 year old! He is a helpful fellow around the house. He loves to take out the "tash" & make sure everything that even resembles "tash" goes straight in the can!  He has his own min-broom that he screams for after a meal then follows behind us to spread out the crumbs we just swept up.
4. He likes to play games with his siblings. His favorites are Crocodile Dentist and a version of Hot Potato that plays a song that gets faster & faster. When it stops he always yells "Ahhhh!" He's also pretty good at Freeze Dance....he's got awesome moves. Of course he does, he is my child ; )
5. You can always find him behind the one door in the hallway that is closed. He climbs out of his crib & pack n' play & takes off on a mission to play hide & seek or SUPRISE MOM & DAD! We were out on the driveway one afternoon with the big kids while Arlo napped. We heard a sound in the garage, turned around & Arlo was there smiling at us saying "Hi!" We were shocked & thankful that he found us, haha! The big brothers certainly encourage this behavior. They are having a good time being roomies. One evening Arlo kept fussing & fussing so Robby went to check on him & found Anson sitting quietly in the middle of crib while sucking his thumb. We have also found all three boys bouncing like they are on a trampoline but the sweetest was finding Anson & Arlo snuggled and asleep.
   
6. He absolutely loves Bella. His chore every day is to feed her. He will drop everything & run to the laundry room saying "eat eat eat!" He fills the cup, races to the bowl, dumps it in & says "lella, eat!" He then stands really close with his hand on her back leaning around to watch her take each & every bite. He's so mad when we drag him away but at her old age she needs to be able to eat in peace.  He really pays attention to how we talk to Bella & does a fantastic job opening the back door & screaming "Lella!" to get her to come in. He also does a good job telling her no & calling her by patting his legs & doing a kissing sound. If you ask him to call Daddy he does the same thing! He went through a phase where he would copy her movements like yawning or shaking.
   
7. While we are on the subject of dogs I must mention that Arlo loves each and every animal he sees. If we see a dog at the park, he runs as fast as possible to say hello then after we say goodbye he starts yelling "LELLA" & chasing them down the sidewalk. He would follow a squirrel for a mile & squeal while watching him scale a tree to escape the toddler. He likes to look at books that have animals & either makes some sort of sound that is supposed to be the name of the animal or the sound it makes. His favorite book for a LONG time has been From Head to Toe by Eric Carle. It has been a favorite for all of our kids in the 1-3 age range but as they get older they love it even more because they watch their siblings act like the animals. The whole book is simply perfect & easy to follow. It says "a buffalo raises his shoulders, can you do it? I can do it!" Arlo's favorite is the gorilla that thumps his chest. For at least a month he followed me around with the book, beating on his chest & saying "ooo-ooo-ooo!" which was him requesting me to read it. Loved every second of that!
8.  When he wants you to follow him he is serious. He walks up to you, gives you a tug then says "cuh-cuh" waving you along. Then he shows you some cool trick his siblings taught him like jumping onto the couch from the ottoman. When he wants seconds on something he holds his finger up to his mouth & says "moh more" like "one more." Moh-more" is also the sound he says when he sees the mower. blower, vacuum or hair dryer.                     
9. He will sit in his booster seat at the table FOREVER! There is nowhere to contain him safely at certain times of the day so I strap him in, hand him a book that he throws to the ground & he settles on sucking his thumb & rubbing his belly button.
10. Darling Arlo doesn't mind getting his haircut one bit. He doesn't move a millimeter & never makes a sound. It makes the stylist giggle every time.
11. He only says "yes" sometimes & when he does it's in a whisper with a long ssssss sound at the end. The rest of the time he says in his husky little voice, "yeah". We certainly need to work on manners. All I think of when he says that is when I was growing up I spent a lot of time with my friend Laura & her family. Her dad said that there van was the yes van & it stopped if you said "yeah." Haha! Arlo would not be able to live in this home. When I correct him & prompt him to say "Yes Mama" he says "yeah (smile) mama." I will let it slide for now. It's the blue eyes that get me with him.
12. He plays with race cars & trains using all the appropriate sounds & is starting to not be so destructive with the things his brothers work so hard to create. He loves the battery operated train with the light on the front. They build a track, turn the light off & lay on the ground to watch it go round & round.
13. He is a let no crumb go to waste kind of kid with all carbohydrates, all fruit, bell peppers, carrots, cucumbers, nuts & some meats. He loves to eat an open faced peanut butter & jelly with pretzels sticking out of it and a cheese cube on the end. His brothers taught him that. They make their creation then sing Happy Birthday to each other. He loves chocolate chips, oatmeal, peach cobbler, applesauce & ice cream. He is often found in the pantry with a bag of something in his hand scooping the content out & into his mouth like he has never been fed. He follows us around all the time saying "eee-eee-eee" which means eat. 
14. He absolutely loves to sleep. Pretty much anytime you put him in his bed he will go to sleep. He was down to one nap for a long time then went back to happily taking two many days a week. It's so nice though that he survives without a nap & it's not the end of the world! He prefers his Chugga Chugga Choo Choo book, a song while being snuggled chest to chest but like he's sleeping with his knees up so he can rub his belly button. He likes to lean down & give me kisses between the bars of baby prison.
15. He goes bonkers when Robby gets home from work & it's the sweetest thing. Arlo likes his daddy's jeep & points out jeeps when we are driving. We flipped his car seat forward just a couple weeks ago. He's a big fan & we love being able to see his chubby little cheeks.
16. He races up the stairs, to the tub & has his leg over the side while fully clothed if someone even mentions something that sounds like bath. He often bathes with Owen & Anson & they are TROUBLE! It's like 3 shamus performing at Sea World. He gets out & runs full speed down the hall (in the nude) to burst into the girls bathroom. If Eloise is bathing she screams the highest pitched scream you've ever heard. Arlo copies the wretched sound then runs back to his room where we capture him to put a diaper on that little hiney. As far as self care goes, he REALLY like to brush his teeth & let's you know by holding up his finger in front of his mouth & making an electric toothbrush sound.
17. Arlo likes to dig in the dirt, hold bugs, make mud & apparently eat rocks. I found evidence of that in a diaper tonight! He's all boy & learned to hold something such as a pool noodle & say "On guard!" We were cool with the pool noodle but then he advanced to other items such as spatulas, sticks, his baby sized fork which he actually jabbed my arm with, paper towels & even his own finger. The most memorable moment was when Robby & I were cleaning the kitchen & we had left him in his favorite booster seat. The rest of the Fab Five were acting ridiculous & apparently distracting us when Robby calmly said "Is anyone watching the baby?" I turned around to see Arlo with a butter knife pointing it at us saying "ON GUARD!"
18. He's bossy when you get him a cup of water. He starts yelling "I! I!" which means ice. I attribute this to Gigi when she visited in July. She got him saying it....it's cute. We find it really funny that an almost two year old this time around barely frustrates us. I guess four older kids really put it in perspective ; ) He is definitely starting to express his opinion when you do not comply with his demands.
19. He acts like you are leaving him forever when he is dropped off in the nursery on Sunday mornings or at school. He is pitiful! For many weeks he would be found strolling around with a mom. He now survives without tears until one baby is picked up then he thinks we forgot him. It's really sad but it's life little man!
20. He's a really big boys at the park that is confident to climb, swing high & slide down the big slides. He sticks with sliding down feet first on his belly. I'm good with that! He's more chatty but still Arlo language that we understand much better than anyone else. Some cute things he says- "Lolo" for Eloise, "Lala" for water & something that sounds like "Lalo" for Charlotte. He says his name is Bubba. He points at the guitar & says "Papa" for my Dad. "Pitzi" for pizza & "yizard" for lizard. He can also say car, truck, jeep, cho choo, book, read, milk, juice, ouch, go, NO & all sorts of sound combinations. When he had a sleepover with Grammy & Papa a few weeks ago they caught a raccoon in the trap Bob had set up. Josh from Animal Control stopped by two mornings in a row to relocate the raccoons. If you ask him what happened to the raccoons he says "dosh, bye bye."
21. He's just the most darling little person. He melts our hearts every single day. We are always silly & whisper to him when the other kids aren't around "all our kids are cute but you are the cutest!"

Here are some typical Arlo faces-

We are all in love with the baby of the family & agree that we will not allow him to turn TWO in October. Sometimes you want to freeze time (and sometimes you don't) but right now, we do.

Ah, summer!

We started off our summer with a bang....about 10 days in Kingwood full of swimming, playing & attempting to sleep all night. As always the neighborhood pool did not disappoint! We talked about doing lessons but once everyone was in the pool Charlotte remembered everything from last summer, Eloise got the hang of things very quickly & the boys were little bitty yet confident fishies. Arlo just liked to disobey the "no running" rule & try to climb to the top of the slide. There were a lot of overcast days & I just don't like to get in the water unless the sun is beating down & keeping me warm. I'm kind of like a snake.....that's probably why Eloise likes me so much. I was thankful that my Dad would stay in the pool for three (chilly to my standards) hours without complaint. 

 

Here's the swim team...  

 

 

There are always a lot of musical instrument sounds when we are at my parents' house. My Dad enjoys playing his ukulele & Arlo could not get enough of him! He sang "Arlo had a Little Lamb" a million times & Arlo looked like this each & every performance. This picture will be one of my favorites forever.

 

Speaking of Arlo.....remember when I said that we attempted to sleep all night? It was because of this little stinker.  There are so many options for sleeping there & long story short we had a lively game of musical beds for our entire visit. Arlo was not yet rooming with his brothers at home so we kept him separate from the other four. I also did not want to be his roommate but ended up doing just that during all the switcheroo-ing. We started him in this little closet where the modem & printer etc are. It proved to be a little too toasty & he was waking up at the exact same minute (near 5am grrrrr) everyday. We thought maybe some techy thing reset & made a noise so he was relocated then relocated again. The only place he did not sleep (for obvious reasons) was in the room with the bunk bed. He could get up there SO fast!

 

Talk about the pool not disappointing, Gaga just gets better & better! She had some crafts planned & a poster board with all of our days listed & post-it notes labeled with different outings or yummy treats we planned to have. It was fun until Arlo started ripping all of them off. It's like he's almost two or something.

The trails in Kingwood were perfect for this bike rider although Kyle said she had to pedal so fast while he was just coasting along. She enjoyed being with her uncle & doing something "big."



The first week we were there which happened to be the week Eloise turned six was monumental in her life! Suddenly it clicked & she dropped the training wheels & was pedaling with a big smile on her face!

There were lots of wobbles along the way which made us laugh so hard. She just has the best facial expressions ever. She was cruisin' a little too fast around the cul-de-sac & got pulled over by a constable! Marcus lives across the street & we always enjoy visiting with him & his family. He checked her rider's license, gave her a few tips & sent her on her way!



I must give credit to Paw Paw who got her on the right track. Eloise is one of the most determined people I know & it was serious business to ride that bike! The neatest part of this major accomplishment was that the bike belonged to my friends Laura & Bethany that grew up down the street. It is a vintage Schwinn from the 80's. Can you call that vintage? Not only that but I was sitting on the curb of the same street I practiced riding my bike as a kid & near the spot that I crashed on my rollerblades, busted some teeth along with my chin. Glad she didn't re-enact that ; )

While on the topic of vintage toys, we found the Talkboy & had a blast recording & explaining what a cassette tape is, ha! It made me want to watch Home Alone with my brothers.

Uncle Scott came to play too & got some attention from little Miss Elo. Since the 25 year old playground was demolished as soon as my dad retired the only playing in the backyard was yardwork which the girls happily did.

A huge highlight of our trip was spending a couple hours with Edie. She was a good friend in Orlando that took care of Charlotte when she was teeny tiny & I was working a shift a week. She also came over on my 30th birthday when the twins were two months old. She brought party hats, we celebrated then she sent me to take a nap. I woke up FOUR hours later. That is in top five best gifts for a mother! Another story about Edie that still makes me laugh is when Charlotte was about two. Edie was looking at some books on our bookshelves & Charlotte came up to scold her saying "No touch, Daddy's books!" I wish Arlo was trained that well ; )

It made me teary eyed when she pulled away. Charlotte was standing by me waving & yelled "Bye Edie! I love you!" Then she looked at me & said "I really do. She is so special." It was the sweetest most natural thing. I was teary eyed thinking about the little pieces of her life story that began in Orlando. Char was right. Edie IS special!

 

Back at the pool....or the waterpark driveway....

 

Oh what fun it is to be there! Robby picked us up in a jiffy the following weekend & we were headed north! It's always painful to detox from so many adults & SO many fun activities but we keep going back for more...it's worth it!