Sunbeams

One more post. I just uploaded the pictures from my "purse" camera today and found some I wanted to share. Today was a really good day but also kind of emotional for some reason. Maybe I was kind of emotional because it was our last Sunbeams class. Carter has been taking the class for 12 weeks and has really enjoyed it. I decided not to sign up for the last session because of how much we have going on with the end of the school year. So... today was the last day of his first "class." Here are some pics from the morning:






My good friend Jenny Lark and her daughter Manna have been taking the class with us. We headed to our favorite park after the class was over to enjoy some of the beautiful weather we had today.





The other great part of my day was Carter's nap time. Our Pastor's son is home schooled and has volunteered three of his afternoons to sit at the house so I can get out for some alone time. It has been wonderful. Today while he was here I was able to have lunch with two good friends. This leads me to the other part of my emotional day. Let me just start by saying that Dan took Monday and Tuesday off because he felt pretty awful. Anyway, during lunch my cell phone rang. I answered it and it was Dan's principal. He said he didn't want to alarm me but they couldn't find Dan. I just about lost it. I couldn't figure out where Dan could be in the middle of the school day that would cause him to be gone long enough for the principal to call me. Students had gone to his classroom after lunch and the door was locked. They also knocked on one of the bathroom doors and it was locked and no one was answering. You can probably guess what everyone was thinking with Dan not having felt well this week already. I jumped in my car and headed towards home to see if he was there. On the way he finally answered his cell phone. It turns out that he had been in a meeting and lost track of time. Everyone is laughing about it now but I still feel kind of shook up about it.

After school we headed back to our favorite neighborhood park with Dan. The Maplewood Girls Soccer team practices there because space is so limited at the school. Carter is always obsessed with their soccer balls. The fact the the girls are practicing right there doesn't seem to bother him. He almost got away with one of the balls.




Ok... that ended up being a lot longer than I meant it to be.

Beautiful Bryce

Sometimes I'm so busy messing with the settings on my camera that I miss that "perfect shot." Oh well... I'm getting used to being ok with the blur...




I had to post these last two because these show more of his personality. Here he is standing on the arm of our living room chair. It's not allowed but I still had to take a picture.

One "boop" on and one "boop" off.

It's a day for the record books. No... I'm not talking about the snow that was falling this morning. I'm talking about the fact that our sweet little boy called me Mamo for the first time today!!

Some current obsessions...

1. I finally bought this song on iTunes last night. Fred and I watch American Idol together every week. Jason is one of my favorites and I LOVE this song!



2. Netvibes - Dan got me hooked on this free program that allows you to see every website you like all on one page. I have all the blogs I look at on one tab, my e-mail on another and news websites and craigs list on another. It's awesome!

3. Whoever invented this game is a genius. It is so much fun. The guys were making fun of me saying that I play Guitar Hero during the day instead of taking care of Carter. Really I only play it during naps. I did finally pass Easy.



4. Brandi Carlile - Cari was listening to one of her albums when I was visiting her a couple months ago. She's awesome.

I knew it would be hard having Dan back in night classes... but I didn't realize it would be this hard. I don't think we've felt this exhausted since Carter was born. The good news is that the end is in sight. The semester will be over in a couple weeks and he'll have his teaching certificate!! In December he will be completely done with his Master of Education. It doesn't really feel like the end is that close... and that's probably because it's really not. Dan will be starting a 2nd program in January. He will be getting a M.A.T. in Reading at Webster University. It's exciting but also a little overwhelming to think about. He still only has 4 classes to complete to get his Theology degree (the whole reason we moved to STL) at Covenant... so hopefully he'll be able to finish that soon as well.

With Dan gone so much we have been enjoying watching and playing all kinds of ball. I do have to say my wiffle ball pitching arm is getting better. Here are some pictures from the last couple weeks.

Carter taking a seat on one of the basketballs that is usually floating around our main floor. We have had to put a serious no bouncing in the house rule in effect (for all age groups) since all this rain started.

Watching Steven's fist game. Carter loved it because 4 trains went right by the field during the game. We could also see several Metro Link trains go by from where we were sitting. What more could an almost 2 year old (I decided a couple months ago that I'm not going to count Carter's age in months any more because I can never remember) ask for.

Steven catching.

With how exhausted we have felt... we are really looking forward to spending time with family this summer. Our first stop will be Hawaii with my side of the family. We were all set in January when we found an amazing deal on tickets. Then a week ago the airline we bought our tickets on went bankrupt. We were able to find new tickets on Saturday... but ended up paying twice as much and we still don't know if we'll get our money back from the original airline.

Speaking of traveling... I don't think I mentioned this... but on our way back from vacation a couple weeks ago the flight attendant stopped me at the door of the plane because she thought I was an unaccompanied minor. That is the other reason I cut my hair. I figured that I need to look older than a high schooler since we live with two. I think I finally look my age (Ellie... this pic is for you :)).

Sporting Steven's baseball gear after practice yesterday. You might mistake him for a high schooler if it weren't for that paci.

Almost a year later (Steven wanted to setting to be exactly the same).

One more reason why I love this stroller...

Let's be honest... Dan was not thrilled about the haircut.  What he really wanted to do was put a google poll on the blog asking how much say a husband should have regarding his wife's hair.  I told him absolutely not!  The whole reason I grew it out was for Locks of Love.  I came home with my pony tail of hair in a cute little bag yesterday.  I need to put it in the mail today because everyone that came through the house yesterday wanted to hold it for some reason.  Last night I went downstairs to turn off all the lights in the basement.  As I was on the stairs heading back up I heard Dan say to Steven... "don't tell Alyssa."  This is what I saw when I walked in the room...

I think Dan is having a hard time letting it go.

Guess who got a haircut! My wife is such a hottie!