Gotta love those school photos!

The school now does pictures in both the Fall and Spring.  I was hoping for better luck with the Spring photos.  Although Elena's Fall photos turned out great, she got to them before I did with a scissors and cut them as you would expect a 5 year old to do.

Elena picked out a beautiful outfit to wear for her school pictures.  The pose we chose would show her from head to toe so we picked out a fancy purple dress with sparkly tights and black dress shoes.

Since she wears her boots to school, I put the black shoes in her bag so she could put them on at school.  Unfortunately, she forgot they were there and she put on her Dora the Explorer gym shoes.  Needless to say, they look a little funny with her dress clothes. I'd put the picture up, but I don't want to violate copy right laws.

I just thought I'd set the record straight for any who see the picture - I did my best, but there's only so much a mom can do.

I guess it could be worse: she could have worn her huge, bright pink snow boots.

We had Charlie's baptism last weekend. He was the first of our children to be baptized by Seth's brother, Jason, who was ordained a deacon last Spring. I told the local family about it, but forgot to tell anyone else until the day before. My apologies to the out-of-towners who should have been notified.  If it makes you feel any better, my parents forgot to tell my dad's 8 siblings (and his mom, I believe) that I had even been born until I was 2 weeks old.  It must be a 3rd child thing...



Check out these handsome boys!

With godparents Maria and David

This isn't from the baptism; I just wanted to show you his chubby cheeks.

Togetherness

This is how many of Charlie's feedings look (for the comfort  of the viewer, this picture was taken during the burping stage):

I'm hoping at least one of them will outgrow this before we have any more kids.  I can handle 3 on my lap; 4 would be a stretch.

This is only 6 months overdue

I haven't gotten around to uploading any pictures since the last time I wrote on here so I'll do some catching up.  I failed to put pictures on here from Sam's first time as a ring bearer in August.  A year after Elena was flower girl for my cousin's wedding, Sam was in Seth's cousin's wedding (in the same town, even). And just as Elena was paired with a shy ring bearer, Sam was paired with an even shyer flower girl who would not pose for any pictures.  I did manage to catch a few of them together when she wasn't looking, though.
Anyway, Sam did a great job as ring bearer and he will get to do it again in May for his godfather's wedding. He even stood up front with the groomsmen for over half the wedding - until I heard him turn to the best man and say, "I don't really want to stand up here this long."  So I motioned for him to come and sit by us. Lindsey (the bride) sent us a few great pictures so here they are at last.

Sam and the flower girl:

 There must have been a little feedback on the microphone:

And here's one of my favorites.  Although it looks like he has to go to the bathroom, he was really just flinging the pillow between his legs. I didn't realize he had been doing this during the wedding until we got the pictures. I'm sure it added a nice touch to the ceremony:

Violet Lice

Sammy: Mommy, this is Violet Lice.

Me: Violet Lice?

Sammy: Yeah.

Seth: What is he talking about?

Me: I think he means Fur Elise (it was playing on the CD player)