never seen teeth like this kid!

this post, and blog, has NOTHING to do with Taylor Lautner.  if that's why you're here, just go away.

several weeks ago Connor showed me that he had a wiggly tooth. it is very exciting when you are little to have your teeth fall out. everyone, no matter the age, knows what that means.
you are growing up.

his teeth stayed kind of wiggly for quite some time and didn't seem to get any more loose than before.

his permanent teeth were coming up, just not directly under the baby teeth.



He finally lost his very first tooth a couple of days ago. he was so excited about it. he put it in an envelope and carried it in his pocket for the rest of the day. I didn't get to see him do this, but Tim says that he kept taking the envelope out of his pocket and proudly look at it and then put it back safely in his pocket.

next it'll be time for shots and then he will be starting school before we know it.

animal rescue (well assistance anyway)

I believe in Jacque Cousteau.

Tim and I have, on several occasion, reminisced about our child hood and TV shows that have stayed with us for one reason or another. The Undersea World with Jacque Cousteau is one of those shows that have made an impact on us. I always hated nature related shows that showed the suffering of an animal and just watched it happen. I loved it that Mr. Cousteau would get involved when ever he could make a difference and they would help feed an animal or rescue it if it was trapped, etc, and send it on it's way. I remember once hearing him say something to the effect that Man is a part of nature so we are not doing anything against nature by stepping in when ever we can. I happen to embrace that philosophy.

we live near a busy road and between two lakes. there is a lot of water animal road kill around here. in the Summer and Fall we have a lot of dead geese and in the Spring we have a lot more turtles than the rest of the year. so if we can make a difference we do. Yes, we are very tree hugger about it and we're okay with that.

so this long intro is leading to this...
on occasion we find an animal that needs safe passage from one lake to the other. this unattractive monster was on his way over to the lake and was discovered by Tim yesterday evening so he chose to help him across. being a snapping turtle he was a spunky little thing.

it was a little thing compared to the monster that was in our yard almost 7 years ago. I didn't try to help that one along because I like having fingers...

he/she was at least the size of a serving platter. yikes....

back to last night.


we all came out to have a look at the snapping turtle and then the rescue team escorted it to the lake it was pointed towards when it was discovered.

I stayed behind because I had just given three hair cuts before the excitement and I was itchy and needed to clean up. Timothy stayed behind with me and allowed me to take a few pictures of his new hair cut.


speaking of hair cut.... I never did get around to taking a picture of Emma's hair cut from last month. so finally as promised, a picture of Emma's short hair (as she hams it up a bit)

okay... we were pressed for time

tonight and next week Erica has band and choir concert. for some reason they decided that the girls should have to wear their prom dresses or something formal. Erica isn't interested in prom or anything along those lines so she just doesn't have anything formal-y. so out to the thrift store we go. we were pressed for time and there are very few options when it comes to prom/formal attire around these parts (dresses with modesty issues) but we were pressed for time and I can't sew very well. we bought one of the two dresses that fit her (the one that looked less hooker like) and so I crocheted up a quick shrug to cover her shoulders and bit of back that was still bare.

while I was helping her with her hair she said "I feel like I'm playing dress up". she is so uncomfortable getting all fancy.

I wish I still had the figure that Erica has now. She's so lovely it's heart breaking.

summer? just around the corner

with all this cold weather I don't know that I can say Summer is just around the corner, but the kids only have about two more weeks of school.
they are all ready for it. Emma has even been having a hard time staying on task with her homework.
I'm not sure how I feel about that (meaning vacation being so close at hand). On one hand it's nice to not have to wake up with an alarm (though I will most likely still wake up early anyway). but the flip side is that there will be a lot more arguing noises around here for three whole months. uuuuh

we will have a new twist to our Summer... actually all of the time now.... Tim's work is rotating days off.
I'll explain. starting this week they are having a couple of people each day take the day off and then they will alternate their days off.
that is not any clearer, so for example: Monday I would have off. then I would work the rest of the week. the next week I would have Tuesday off and work the rest of the week. then the next week I would be off on Wednesday and so on and so on...

this means that we can plan for trips to the Arboretum in the middle of the week when fewer people will be there and we can feel more like it's our own little get away.
over the years the arboretum has become more and more popular and with the popularity comes the crowds.
last year we didn't get up there at all and it was kind of a horrible year - lots of fighting and lots of being couped up and not enough rejuvenation and wonderful nature. the kids really do get along much better when we run away to the arboretum. it's everyone's favorite place
you know how when you have a huge mess and you get it all cleaned up and you feel so great, then that place is suddenly your favorite place to be... it's kind of like that