This is fun. :-)

 

Ten years ago was a very busy time in our family. Kelly, Jennifer, Monica and I were all pregnant and due around the same time. I was due in January, Kelly & Monica were due a few days apart in February and Jennifer was due in March. The twins ended up being born two months early on December 22nd, Brooke came 4 weeks later on January 23rd, Mason was born 4 weeks later on February 20th and Erin was born 4 weeks after that on March 17th! Yes, a very busy time. We have a few pictures of all 5 babies together – none of which I’ve scanned on the computer yet (my print photos aren’t very organized ). But I do have a picture of the four girls that we took at Mom and Dad’s when they were about 1 year old. It was probably Easter and I’ll bet Mason was at his other grandparents’ house. Mom and Dad had bought matching outfits for the girls and they were all wearing them that day, although when we took the picture, they were in various layers. Since they all turned 10 recently, I thought it would be fun to line the the girls up again for a comparison picture. They’re all so similar and yet unique!

After they posed nicely, they started hamming it up.  It all started when I told them to look distinguished:

and then ANGRY …

and then, well, things just kept getting crazier and CRAZIER!!

 

 

 

          

Love all these girls!

P.S. Here’s Mason (“Mr. February”) taken around the same time as the girls:

P.P.S. And as if all that excitement from December 2003 through March 2004 wasn’t enough, Jordan was born in October of 2004! So, that makes 6 babies born in 10 months!!

Catching up a little

I wonder how many other bloggers do something like this: in the midst of some funny/interesting/amazing event, she thinks to herself “I’m definitely going to blog about that!”  She takes several pictures and vows to blog about it as soon as possible. And then a couple of days go by, and something else funny/interesting/amazing happens, more pictures are taken, more vows made, more time goes by. And eventually, it all fades into the background.

So, I have a few quiet moments this morning (have to get up pretty early around here for that to happen) and I’m browsing through the photos on the laptop from the past few months and suddenly, this seems like the perfect time for a summary-type post.

So, while this may seem quite random, there is a common thread: all these pictures are from the laptop. How’s that for a theme? And before I start to feel too smug about getting this blog post done (finally!), I remind myself that there are actually lots more pictures on the other computer. Yikes! Oh well. Gotta start somewhere!

The Worleys visit the Worleys.

Back in April, we got together at Grandma Worley’s for a cookout. It was a mild, beautiful day, which is really amazing, considering the fact that 2 weeks before, we had a lot of snow! The kids had a lot of fun running around in the woods and playing in the little pond Uncle Rick put in.

What the girls probably remember most about that day was finally getting to meet cousin Nicole’s newest little one, Zavier. Sweet little guy who was happy to be held by all.

Back in the late 1970s, Mick’s dad bought this property from his parents that is located right next to theirs. He built the house just beyond some woods that separate the two properties. I took several of the kids on a hike through the woods and climbed up a little rise to show them this:

the beautiful pond that Mick’s Grandpa Worley put in decades ago. Mick spent many happy hours fishing on and around this pond. I went with him several times (caught a really big largemouth bass once!). I’ll never forget the time we were fishing and spotted a large, black snack slithering through the water in the general direction of our little rowboat!  For a split second, I didn’t know whether to stay in the boat or jump in the water and try to make a mad dash for the shore! We have great memories of being there, not the least of which were the many, many visits with Mick’s wonderful Grandma Worley. (Mental note: need to write a blog post about Great Grandma Worley!)

There’s nothing like visiting something from your past and finding that it looks exactly as you remembered it. I think that’s pretty rare.

Two Bruce cousins come for a visit – because six girls in the house just isn’t enough.

Back in April, Heather and Ron took a rare vacation, so two of the girls stayed with us. Anna divided her time between her caregivers and Mom and Dad.

They were here from Wednesday through Sunday, which meant lots of playing, giggling, late-night chatting and even quite a bit of work on a new production: a sequel to that great classic The Secret of the Vioin.

Alix and Kate joined the fun on Saturday night, so Sunday morning getting ready for church was fun. :-)  I really wanted to get a picture of the girls getting ready, but I was too busy and didn’t make it upstairs for a picture. Rachel said it was quite a spectacle to see everybody jockeying for position in front of the mirror.  :-D

Several nights during their stay, Erica entertained the younger girls with a show featuring many of their stuffed animals. The star was an interesting stuffed dog of Ellie’s named “Diddly” whose name, for some reason, was changed to “Old Joe Crotchety” for the show :-D This all usually started pretty late at night and went on for quite some time.

She had quite a rapt audience.

  

They spent a couple of days working on the drama, and I must say, as they get older, their costumes and props are getting much more elaborate and authentic-looking.

 

The acting ability is even improved: more dramatic.

 

The Bruce girls will be staying with us again towards the end of July, so hopefully they’ll be able to finish this elaborate production then. Filming delays are common in the industry, of course. I’m sure the final product will attract lots of attention and accolades at area film festivals.

Mother’s Day.

One of the fun things about this Mother’s Day was that all six girls sang together for the first time at Grandma Worley’s church. They sang “Sweet, Sweet Spirit” and did a wonderful job! Grandma was beyond thrilled and made us promise not to buy her any more Mother’s Day gifts. “The girls singing was my gift!”

One of these days, I want to go back through our pictures (yes, even the print photos <gasp>) and put together a collage of Mother’s Day pictures with Lois. We’ve been going to church on Mother’s Day with Grandma Worley since the girls were very young; I can’t even remember when we started doing it. I think it would make a fun collage.

And then it was on to Mom and Dad’s. I’m sure we were laughing at the kids in this picture.  :-D

That’s all for now. More to random, picture-filled posts to come!

Summer 2012 – Part 1

I don’t know how many parts this is going to be … maybe only 1 … but I do know that we’ve had an action-packed summer so far and I haven’t blogged hardly any of it!  We’ve managed to take lots of pictures, though, so I’m relying on those to help me document what we’ve been up to.  So, here is a recap of our summer so far, in no particular order.

Kittens!

On May 11th, our kitty Violet had a litter of kittens.  The girls were sure she  was pregnant. I wasn’t so sure, but what do I know about pregnant cats?  Not much, apparently.  In my defense, she was very small – understandably, since she only had 2 kittens.  Here is a picture of her taken 2 days before she had them. 

She is on the left – I think Bentley (aka “Dad”) looks fatter than she does!  The kittens are healthy – one girl “Lily” and a boy “Basil”.  Here is Basil, sleeping next to his mama:

and here is Lily:

Yes, they are cute and have been lavished with love and attention since their arrival.  Anyone want a kitten?  :-)

Family!

Back in June, Jennifer & Steve and their crew came to stay with us for 5 days.  They have bought a new house, but couldn’t take possession before they needed to move out of their house, which sold very quickly (2 weeks!). So they have been between homes for a couple of weeks now (almost a month!) and won’t be able to move into their new home until the end of July.  They stayed with us, the Orrs, Steve’s parents, friends from church, and now they are at Mom and Dad’s, probably until they move into their new house. 

We did a little bit of musical beds/sleeping bags to get everyone situated, but I think everyone settled in quite comfortably.  The kids were thrilled with the adventure, Jennifer and I were a formidable team in the kitchen, and Trent & Alyssa entertained each other, as toddlers tend to do.

Drought

Unfortunately, this has also been one of the driest summers on record.  There has been record heat – several days over 100 degrees – and record lack of rain.  June was the driest June on record.  I recently read that more than half of the US is in some stage of drought.  I’ve never seen the corn as low as it is this summer. Our grass is crackly and brown – like most lawns. Any rain we’ve gotten has been very welcome, but brief, which is why I’ve grabbed the camera the few times it has managed to rain.  Here is Trent playing in a rare puddle after a recent rain. Notice all the brown grass.

He was really fascinated by the water dripping down the window.  :-)

Water coming out of the down spout – AMAZING!

OK – that’s all for now.  More later!

Cousins’ Christmas Tea Party

It’s a universal fact that girls like pretty things. Our family has been blessed with lots of girls, hence, we have acquired lots of pretty things. Because we enjoy using those pretty things, eating and being together, we have recently begun the tradition of a tea party in our family. In order to include the Ramseys in this event, we schedule it during their Christmas visit to Indiana. This year, the tea party was held on December 27th. Scheduling the tea party so close to Christmas has its benefits. One is that we enjoyed a beautiful snowfall the morning of the party. 

Another is that we can take advantage of the fact that we have lots and lots of tasty and special food that we’ve been making and eating for the holidays, so we can usually borrow some of it for the tea party.

So, we all converged on Mom and Dad’s around noon on the 27th, with all the young ladies looking lovely in their tea-party attire. The male cousins and uncles hid out in the basement for awhile, then headed out for pizza while we were eating. 

At a tea party a couple of years ago, Mom got out some family heirlooms and talked about what the items were and the ladies who had owned them. We also read out loud -- I think the Proverbs 31 verses and maybe a poem or two. We were better organized that year.  :-)  We didn’t have any presentations or readings this year, but we did have cute place settings:  vintage handkerchiefs which contained goodies wrapped inside. Great idea, Kelly!  We also managed to get group pictures, which is always a feat for our family!

 

 

  

  

 

Heather noticed that one of the girls had placed her dolls’ shoes inside her own shoes to keep from losing them! Too cute!  (and very resourceful!)