Sometimes...God Turns Out The Lights

I simply started cleaning my room this morning and it has turned into a much bigger deal than I have time or patience for. Ugggg...while I was moving furniture, going through things, and throwing things away (generally tearing my room apart), Ben had taken to totally unloading my kitchen, playing in the bathroom toilet, and managed to climb up and get the cereal bowls off the counter...thus spilled milk everywhere! Ugggg!!! But did I stop...Nope, kept right on going because once I start I must finish...So then I got the vacuum and was going to town under the bed, up the walls, along baseboards, in the closet...once I made it to my bathroom I blew a huge fuse, now I have no power and no lights in my room. I think this is God telling me it's time to stop since my voice of reason is at work. Sometimes...

Smarter Than Me at Three!

Our little Violet is amazing! She listens to EVERYTHING going on around her even when she is talking non-stop to herself. I had not realized how "in tune" to life she was until one day we were just sitting on the floor playing and she stopped what she was doing, grabbed the Washington State University t-shirt I was wearing and started pointing to letters saying...

"A" says a...

"S" says ssssssssss...

"T" says t

"R" says rrrr...thats your letter mommy!

Since then, when ever we are in the car driving around she points at signs and says the sounds of the letters! The amazing thing is, we have done nothing to teach her letters or sounds because we have been working SO hard with Tage to get him reading (and it has not been easy). She has picked up on all of this by hearing the lessons and books and letter bingo indirectly! Thank God for second, third and fourth children! I am so delighted to know that we are paving the way for them all! Violet is also constantly telling me what day of the week it is...which is good because sometimes I wake up a few days behind, and she also reminds me often that it has been awhile since anyone has ate or since I have changed Ben's diaper! She is a lot of help:) Her favorite past-time besides talking and singing, is lining anything up in a straight and orderly fashion. She is also quite a little whiz at puzzles and does them often. I know it is typical of parents to brag about their kids, but I thought it would be ok since this is my blog and a lot of you grandparents and friends don't get the privilege of seeing and hearing these guys on a daily basis. They are a real hoot...a true blessing from GOD!

One Tooth-less!

Tage lost his first tooth Easter Sunday evening! I love this picture!

Easter Weekend...Oh MY!

Oh my...did we ever have a busy weekend! I'm not sure I can even capture or do the weekend justice in writing so here are the few pictures I got. Just realize we had 11 kiddos and our parish was in charge of the church breakfast, so we had to be to the church dressed and ready to go by 7:30am...YIKES!! We managed to pull it off without a whole lot of excess fussing from the kiddos or the parents! We hope you all had a blessed Easter! HE HAS RISEN INDEED!


Madson, Schumaker, and Byington Kids
1st round of Easter dinner. ..Kids then Adults.
My pretty lilies, our favorite wine and Simon's Easter center piece he made at school.

Tage and Alexis are in the prep-choir at church. They sang "He is Risen" at our Easter breakfast.
Benjamin stuffing jelly beans in his mouth after the Easter egg hunt.
Simon hunting eggs.
Helen and her eggs. I'm not sure where her bag was.
The egg hunt was divided into categories. Here are the 1-4 yr olds. They were so cute!

Beach Weather Today...Just Perfect

Unexpectedly we woke up to beautiful sunshine and little wind...so we ate breakfast and got right out to the beach to take advantage of the wonderful spring morning. After naps and a trip to the "hot tubbie" we ventured back out to the beach where we had sun, and MEGA wind. Enjoy the pics!

Off To Beach Grandmas

Happy spring break to us! We are heading off this afternoon to Westport by The Sea, to spend a few days doing some serious R&R in the comforts of Grandma Pam's beach condo! We have unlimited access to a fantastic beach (by unlimited I mean between storms), a hot tub and exercise room on the premises, and a very large assortment of movies, and really, really good food/seafood (Gram Pam is a wonderful cook). I think we will come back feeling we had a bit of a vacation get-away and will be ready to dive right into Good Friday and Easter! I'll be sure to post beach pics as soon as we return! Have a great weekend!

Sunshine, Park, and COUSINS!!!

The Schumakers came over for the weekend from Moscow to kick off their spring break and to attend The River Academy's benefit dinner. While they were here we had fantastic weather which was nice since we had a combined kid count of 11!!! We went to the park on Sat, and then hiked Saddle Rock on Sunday...We all had a blast! I am posting 7 pics so scroll down to see them all! Happy Spring!


Soren hanging on the ropes at "Spider Man" Park
Violet, out on an adventure.
Tage and Karsten...being silly...always!
Great, shot of Brooke!
Simon climbing the ropes~
Go Siggie! Don't fall...

Bronwyn and Karsten doing the "spin thingie"

Camera Setting..."KIDS and PETS"

Here are some pictures I took with our new camera. I have a "kids and pets" setting that is supposed to catch the cute things that happen quick...as you all know everything worth photographing happens quick! Enjoy! Hope you are all having a great weekend!