Growing Roots: February....

February is long gone, but here are some photos of our family life from that month. We had two birthdays and special visitors.

If you come to our home on any given Tuesday evening, the moment you open the door you will immediately get a whiff of buttery popcorn, and find a bunch of kids snuggled up on the couch watching a movie. Tuesday evening is our family movie night!

We have a cute little beggar in his walker, hoping someone will throw him some popcorn.

A couple of things about us homeschoolers. Number one, perhaps we forget to brush our hair in the morning before we start school. You will notice Noah's bed head. Number two, we permit the use of headphones during math class to help drown out the plethora of children near by. I myself could never do school work with music on, but Noah takes after his Dad and they both prefer to be listening to music while they work.

Noah set out one morning building "something" in our back yard. He said he was building it for the kids. (This is how he refers to his siblings...."the kids") Totally cracks me up.

And my sweet Lauren making this mama's dreams come true. She can officially do all of her own laundry from start to finish. Someone please pinch me.

And before you start feeling sorry for this little lady, please know that this gal begged me to teach her. And I am so glad I did! Now if only I could get her brothers to be as enthusiastic about doing their own laundry.

Luke spends quite a bit of his time playing with his action figures making sound affects. Unfortunately those sound affects drive his big brother Nate crazy. But nonetheless, they work it out thankfully.

Noah actually started collecting these galactic hero star wars guys when he was just 3 years old. I have photos of him with his very first ones. Now he has over 100 action figures, and was happy to pass them along to Luke. Out of all of the kids, Noah and Luke are the most similar. As in Luke reminds me so much of Noah at this age.

Taking a break looking at pictures in his tractor book. Luke is just in the beginning stages of reading....so exciting.

So the big reveal was a Pirate Ship that Noah had been working on. The kids were so excited, and happily got into character. Noah was the captain.....of course.

What a pretty pink pirate.

I adore this photo of Nate and Luke. They certainly butt heads, but as they get older they really do enjoy each other.

Don't worry mom....that hatchet Adam is carrying is rubber. I had a photo of him licking the snow off of it, but I didn't want to concern anyone who was only looking at the photos and not reading the commentary :)

A tradition in our home is Saturday morning French Toast. Daddy makes the best french toast according to our children.

The kids like to help shake the batter for Daddy.

What a handsome chef....I so love that man.

This little dude won't stop growing.....or smiling.

Nate plays with his legos everyday....always working on something.

Still our only freckled face cutie.

As Adam gets older, he and Luke play, (and fight) together often. It is fun to watch Luke be the big brother.

Drawing never gets old around here. We don't have any budding artists, but we do have some creative minds.

Such fun for this kid!

One morning as I was getting up later than usual, I had three kiddos come over to our room and crawl into bed, so I ran down and grabbed my camera because I wanted to capture this sweetness. (A few moments after I snapped this shot, Adam punched Luke in the face and it kind of ruined the moment..oh well, at least I got a cute shot in :)

Aaron is the sixth baby to use this crib. We got it at our baby shower when I was pregnant with Noah. There is something unbelievably precious waking to see this face.

Noah made this lap book a few years ago when we did a Space unit study. Luke enjoyed looking at anything big brother makes.

This is a common view I have while making dinner. Never a shortage of helpers around here. We have breakfast for dinner every Thursday....this night was waffles and bacon.

It's official....we have another reader in the house. Teaching my children to read is definitely one of the many joys of being a mother. I love sitting beside them on the couch when they first "get it", and to experience their excitement along side of them when they realize that they are really reading.

We are all set if there is a fire or if something needs a fixin'.

Luke wanted me to take a couple of tough guy photos....so here you go.

Noah playing peak-a-boo with the baby. By the way, everyone calls my baby Aaron, "Chuck". His middle name is Charles, so Jared thought that he needed to have the nickname Chuck....thanks honey. I am personally not a fan of that name, but I had better get used to it because it is starting to stick, much to my dismay. I will admit that I have accidentally called Aaron Chuck a couple of times....must have been that blasted sleep deprivation! Aaron still isn't sleeping through the night.

A few of the kids decided to make Valentine's cards. We always get them a candy bar and I make each of them a card for V-Day. And Jared gets me chocolate...that he eats....then I have to hide it. Not joking.

My two bald men.

Nate's love of puzzles has definitely rubbed off onto Lauren and Luke.

I told Noah and Luke to stand by the window so I could take a photo of the two of them. I wanted you to be able to see all of the snow outside and these two guys wearing shorts. They wear shorts all winter long!

Then of course they had to stick their backsides out at me.

Typical Noah....I have other pig nose shots of this guy through the years. It always makes the little ones laugh.

Jared is so thankful to have a strong dude take care of the sidewalks and driveway while he's at work.

Oh, and I turned the big 37 this year! I was surrounded by all of my favorite people on my special day. I wouldn't have it any other way. They baked me a cake and got me a new blender. And Nate's best friend, Josiah was there as well, so it made it extra special.

Feeling so blessed to have had another year with my family. Life is a gift.

We have been living in Indiana for over 3 years. This winter was by far the most snow that we've gotten since we've lived here. The kids had a blast in it. I was happy to be keeping warm inside with the little ones, watching the big kids through the window.

That is our big vehicle we use for our big crew. I like to refer to it as "The Party Van". The kids call it "The Bus"

This is what Lauren looks like when she is tattling on one of her brothers.....just in case you were wondering.

Luke...this is the face of sweetness.....or mischievousness. You decide.

All of my kids are snow eaters. It's so weird, that's the first thing they do when they go out to play in the snow.

Ahh....now there's the Lukey we all know and love. It wouldn't be quite right if he didn't throw snow all over his big brother's face. Thankfully, Noah was a good sport because that could have ended very badly for Luke.

We were so happy to have my Mom and Dad visit with us for a week. The kids are always so excited for visitors. Grammy brought lots of sweets for her sweeties. It is a highlight of my kids lives to see and spend time with their Grammy. She pours out so much love on them, and we are so thankful for her.

Noah and his Pap Pap have a special bond in that they are both coin collectors. My Dad showed Noah his coin collection a couple of years ago, and Noah found it extremely interesting and started his own coin collection.

It is such a delight for me to see my son and Dad have a common interest that they can talk about together. Noah enjoys showing others his collection. I love listening to him sharing the history about his coins, much of what he learned from his Pap Pap. They had fun shopping at our local coin shop. Noah had been looking forward to taking his Pap Pap there.

Nate and Luke love playing Grandma's iPads!

Our little drummer boy. Luke turns 5 in June, and we may take the plunge and get him a real drum set. This could be a great thing....or something I will regret!

An impromptu pizza party.

Lauren turned 6!!! We enjoyed celebrating her day with her. Such a special girl she is. You can see more photos of her birthday in the most recent birthday post.

Nate is still in love with baby Aaron. He would love for us to have more babies, in fact he has been praying for us to have twin girls. He really wants Lauren to have sisters.....so sweet of him to think like that. We are content and very thankful for our six, but would be overjoyed for God to bless us with more. No, this is not an announcement :)

Lauren is really excited to be borrowing my Dad's violin that he played when he was a boy. She has been wanting to learn how to play, and we hope to get her lessons in the near future. This was very kind of my Dad to loan to her and it is very very special to Lauren.