Everything but the kitchen sink...

The rain stopped for one whole day this month, so we took advantage of it and headed to the Akron Zoo for the afternoon. We took a carousel ride, in which I held Andy with one arm, while standing guard of Nattie on her giraffe, while photographing Ben and Nat, all while spinning in circles. Bad parent? Good multi-tasker? Both?

Nat loves her shades...and, unfortunately, her paci too. It's really only for naptime these days, but, in my defense, we were at the zoo right during her typical nap...so, I let her have it. I will take it away for good one of these days.

Miss Independent (absolutely nothing like her big brother in that regard!)

These pictures were taken right before Nat wiped out on the concrete, resulting in all kinds of scrapes and bruises and a bloody nose...poor thing! After about 30 seconds of crying...she was back to running around like a wild thing.

This little dude sat like this for the whole outing. He makes me want to have another (they all do, really!).

The graduate! Benny "graduated" from Pre-K this past week. He loved the three years he spent at WCP and kept saying all week that he was sad that it was over. I love how he is walking down the aisle waving both hands at everyone like he's some kind of celebrity! :) He did a great job during the program. His class sang "We Want to See Jesus Lifted High" and recited Ephesians 6:13-18.

At his end-of-the-year party, his teacher, Mrs. Capper, gave each of his classmates a Bible character award that described what character in the Bible they were most like (based on her observation of them this year). It was a really neat idea. She told Ben that he was most like Nehemiah, because he was the official "toy clean-up supervisor" this year (a self-appointed role, no doubt!). Anyway, I didn't really know much about Nehemiah, so when we got home, I looked him up in the Bible. He led an effort to repair and rebuild Jerusalem's walls (and left a prominent position in the Persiean government to do so!). He saw a problem and he wanted to fix it, instead of complain about it. He motivated the Jews to help him in this effort. Nehemiah's life was an example of leadership and organization. I think Mrs. Capper definitely had my bud figured out. We sure will miss her, Ms. Murphy, and all the WCP staff!

I swear I didn't pose this picture. It was one of those weird moments in time when they all three sat in the exact same position and looked right at me. Weird...and funny.

Benny's soccer season was supposed to start almost a month ago, but it's been so rainy that every game and practice has been cancelled. He finally had his first game (with no prior practice!) on Saturday morning. He met his teammates and coach...and the game began! He did a great job for his very first ever attempt at a new sport! He even scored a goal!! He was pretty worn out from running so much, but he had fun!

Little sister was in Heaven watching her big brother play. She wanted out there too. Everytime he came off the field, she was right by his side hugging him. I think she will be his biggest fan!

Who needs a dog when you have this guy? His new favorite thing to do is crawl into the kitchen and under the table to eat scraps that have fallen on the floor. Here he is eating potatos that my messy eater Nat dropped. He was happy as a clam under there just snacking away.

We headed to an Indians game on Saturday with Papa and Nana. We watched about 20 minutes of the game and then a torrential downpour began and didn't stop. We hung out at the ballpark for a couple of hours before they ended up cancelling the game for the day. It was still fun getting to spend some time with P & N sans three crazy kiddos! Thanks for inviting us!

Andy LOVES his big brother. These two are funny together. Ben has all of a sudden started to show more interest in his littlest sibling. I think it's because he is realizing that Andy thinks he's really funny...and, of course, that makes for a fun game of "what weird thing can I do now to get you to laugh!"

The crazy people I love! Nat discovered the Goodnight Moon game today and loved matching all the pictures. Oh...and a funny Nat story...I told her yesterday that we were going to go get flowers for the porch. I said, "Do you want to get pink flowers?" She said, after thinking for a second, "How about polka-potted flowers, Mommy?" :)