Happy 17th Birthday Garrison!

17 years old-where does the time go?

Blowing out the candles . . .

Pictures with all the grandparents . . .

and the siblings- except for Gabe (at work) and AJ (in bed). Look, Dwight takes after his mother :)

Best quote of the night-After Garrison had opened his card and gift from Grace, Dwight, Cosette and AJ, I reminded him that he needed to thank them. "Thank you, my people!" said Garrison. Where does he come up with this stuff? He's a funny guy!

Working the room

While BBQ-ing with friends over Memorial Day weekend, AJ decided to do a little mingling. He walked right over to Kami and said, "Hi there, I'm AJ. Let's play!" It was funny because Kami is a little over 2 months old. They start so young, don't they?

I got a haircut

Potty Training

AJ went to the bathroom in the toilet tonight for the first time. Don't get me wrong, we're not pushing him to get potty trained early (but the thought of it sure sounds nice, right?). Gregg and I were pretty excited but Cosette was the most excited of all. She ran around the house screaming and giggling,"AJ peed in the toilet! AJ peed in the toilet!" After her excitement died down, Cosette went into the bathroom and said disappointingly, "I wish he would have flushed!" One step at a time, Cosey!

Amazing Grace

While eating dinner the other night, Grace talked about taking a quiz on the Luther movie they watched in Faith class. (Yes, that's her religion class at school.) She was perplexed by the last essay question: What is one thing you have learned from this movie that can make you more like Jesus? Grace, being her father's daughter answered, "Nothing I do or try to do will ever be anything like Jesus. Jesus is perfect and I am a sinner. If I could do anything to be more like Jesus I would have done it already!"Immediately she raised her hand. When the teacher walked over to her desk, she asked if she would be in trouble for her answer. Glancing at it, he said, "That's one way to answer that question I guess." Grace is amazing! Grace is a sinner! Grace is redeemed by her Lord Jesus Christ!

Lions and Tigers and Bears! Oh NO!

Today I went to Zoo Montana with Dwight's Kindergarten class. My mom, dad, Cosette and AJ came along for the ride. Zoo Montana is a small zoo-a really small zoo. Since I grew up going to the St. Louis Zoo (which is still free ), I'm a little "zoo" spoiled. Today we didn't see any lions (there aren't any) or bears (the new Brown bear habitat was empty-work in progress). We did see a Siberian Tiger facing the other way the entire time. Even with the sweet coaxing of "Here kitty, kitty" from some of the kids, that tiger wanted nothing to do with us. All in all I think Dwight and his class had a great time- on the playground. :)

Frankenstein medals at the games

For reasons only he knows, Garrison is obsessed with the name Frankenstein. A few weeks ago at Grammie's brunch he spelled "Frankenstein" using magnet letters then changed it to "Mariostein," "Nintendostein," etc. In one of his classes he was to make a necklace with his name. Apparently, neither he nor his teacher thought "Garrison" was worth stringing.
Garrison medaled big at the State games in bowling and we are so proud of him. He received a gold for Team, a silver for Doubles and a bronze for Singles. I'm impressed considering this is competition with the whole state. I'm even more impressed because bowling really is harder than it seems--at least to me anyway. Can anyone say "gutter ball?"
Well done Garrison!

Dollars and sense?

Cosette has been obsessed with her piggy bank the last few days. She sits on the floor and counts her "dollars" over and over. The sad part is that she hasn't quite figured out that each individual coin isn't worth a dollar. She had 2 quarters, a nickel and two pennies and was excited that she had 5 dollars. When I told her it was only 57 cents, she scowled at me and said, "This dollar stuff is ridiculous!It makes no sense."

Ta Da

AJ has been making "ta das" in our house for a long time. I'm not sure when it started but before he was one year old, I would build block towers with him and proudly say "Ta Da!" before we would knock them down together. Right now he is sitting on my bed with a huge container of Legos (did I mention that it's a HUGE container of Legos?), picking up one Lego at a time and saying, "Nother one and nother one and nother one". Can you guess what he said when he had finally gotten out the last Lego? Yep, you guessed it, "Ta Da!"

Flying

AJ decided to swing on his stomach and proudly yelled,
"Look mom, I fwy-ing, I fwy-ing . ."

Pater Noster . . .

Besides reciting the Lord's Prayer in Latin, Dwight and his Kindergarten class recited poems, sang hymns, and performed the play Three Little Kittens for their Spring Program last night. When the program was over, we headed to the fellowship hall for their car show. Out of only a cardboard box, Dwight made a mini-van, complete with a hatchback. Dwight has really flourished this year at Mount Olive Lutheran School. We are thankful for the opportunity to have a classical Lutheran school right here in Billings!

Off to Great Falls, MT

Garrison is leaving today for Great Falls to compete in the state Special Olympics. He participates in bowling these next three days. Friday he's home again. Garrison looks forward to the state games every year. The main reason is that he gets to ride a cool bus but also because he gets to go without his parents. Typical teenager? Yes (and that makes me feel great!). Every year a couple weeks before he is ready to go, he tries to find out if this is the year I'll go too. The conversation is something like this: "Mom, you go to Great Falls with me?" "Do you want me to go to Great Falls with you, Garrison?" "No, you stay home and miss me." "Ok Garrison, I'll stay home this time." And I WILL miss you! Good luck Garebear!

Night Terrors

Due to all the Mother's Day festivities yesterday (is playing Apples to Apples with the family a festivity?), AJ missed his nap. No big deal-he's done this before. I know the drill. He falls asleep fairly early in the evening and then it happens. Around midnight, I hear this inconsolable crying. He's screaming and kicking and talking all with his eyes CLOSED! I try everything I can think of to calm him down, but really I know it will be about 15 minutes of this "night terror" before he does. Nothing I do or say to him seems to help. This time though I was a little desperate because Dwight was starting to wake up. How about a song? I did my best rendition of Jesus Loves Me and with his eyes still closed, AJ got in my face and yelled, "QUIET, QUIET!" Wow, that hurts. I know I'm not the best singer in the world but I'm not the worst either. I started singing, I Am Jesus Little Lamb. AJ immediately stopped crying and said "Better. Better. I sleep now." He laid his head down and fell right asleep. I know what you're thinking-I've found the solution to AJ's "night terrors". I wish; he's almost 2. It's not likely he'll be content with an encore.

Happy Mother's Day

Cosette needed a picture of the two of us for her "share time" today in preschool. Since Mother's Day is right around the corner, she was going to need the picture for a special project. I was frantically looking through pictures on my computer and then it hit me: I really don't have a lot of pictures of me with my kids. Sure, I have the newborn photos at the hospital. But, I don't have pictures of me with my kids since then (OK, I do have a few). Let's face it, I am a little "camera-shy."I'm not the most photogenic person. I often have my eyes CLOSED in pictures no matter what I try to do to keep them open. So, I have lots of excuses for not being photographed, Right? Right? When I actually take the time to think about it, it's really a disservice to my children. Pictures are important to me and hopefully to my kids because they create framed stories into the history of our family. I take all kinds of pictures of my kids because I don't want to miss anything and I don't want them to miss anything either. I want them to look back at their childhood memories with fondness the way I enjoy looking back at mine.
Thanks to Dwayne, I found a nice picture he took this past Christmas of Cosette and me. Preschool "share time" was saved. All I have to say to all you camera shy people out there (and you know who you are)is "Buck up and smile-even if your eyes are closed! You'd hate to miss something!"