Happy 12th Birthday, Zach!

Wow, 12 years ago we prayed, paced, worried, prayed lots more for this tiny scrap of life that arrived 5 weeks early. At birth you weighed 5lbs9oz, but within days you quickly dropped down to 4lbs5oz. So tiny, and spent a week in a special neonatal intensive care unit. Dad, Mom and big(little only 21 mos old) sister spent the week at Ronald McDonald house, and then onto a motel, spending every minute we could with you. Thankfully, only 1 week and you were strong enough to go home, at 4lbs8oz. We're so thankful your life was spared, and ours have been so blessed to have you, our oldest son. Its amazing how quickly you are growing into a wonderful young man, so thankful to see your walk with God too. Glad you're so strong, I'm sure going to depend on your help in the coming months in the parlor! For his birthday, Zach chose to have money put into his bank account to save for a four wheeler. Happy happy birthday Zach! We love you SO much!

Happy Birthday Sam

Today is Sam's birthday, guess it is mine too! We had a very nice visit with Sam, neat it worked out that our birthday was on a Saturday this year so we could go visit. Shawn and I, and Uncle Billy.

New venture

Children patiently awaiting loan closing

Doing school work at bank

Crowded under the table!

Trying to nap on big brother!

Well, after a year we are on our way to becoming, dairy farmers! Paperwork signed last week, hope to see some action on the farm next week. Can't wait, although, I may have a different opinion after months of early, early rising(no more 7:30 sleeping in!) and learning a new trade. Seriously though, we are really excited about it and looking forward to milking! I'll keep updated, and we have a blog for the dairy. It's listed on my blog roll or visit ourfamilydairy.blogspot.com  Hang on, here we go!

This one is for Hannah!

Thanks for sneaking a picture when I was taking a ride with Noah!(probably shouldn't share, oh well!)

Just in case you forget what it was like to have your two eye teeth out, one on this side :)

And this side

And a front view, still beautiful though honey, and those teeth are growing, slowly!

Flipflopping weather

One day its snowy

Then its sunny

I loved the caught in mid flight look!

Today was more like this, lots of sun and warmer. Nice!

Our afternoon interruption

Turkeys!

I was able to ease the door open on this one so a little better.

Little blurry taken through window so I didn't scare them.

We have regular visitors every afternoon that almost always interrupts school. Turkeys! On Wednesday we counted 60! Incredible watching these birds scratch and dig for any leftover kernel of corn they can find. We thought we had the difference figured out between toms and hens, but thanks to Carlton we found what we thought were the hens are this years hatching's! That was neat to find out. Seems as though we have several flocks that have come together, some days only 18-20 and some considerable more. They are about 50 feet or so from our schoolroom window, so I guess you can see why they'd be an interruption. Good one though, not everyone has wild turkeys in their backyard.

Happy 5th Birthday, Noah!!

VERY heavy cake, he had us all cracking up with his red face and grunts!

Noah made a birthday list in February, and a big tractor without a scoop was on it

All decked out with new "black jeans" , shirt, and belt buckle from Grandma

Water race against Dad

Our 4 precious young uns

Taking a roller coaster ride

Big brothers playing together

At library, Momma's little man

But a LOT like Papa!

Our brand new baby! Little Noah how the years do fly!

Enjoying brother #3!

Are we sure about this Mom, he's kinda noisy!

Making plans to be best buddies already!

First picture with 4 children! Oh the joys!

Today our youngest became school aged! So hard to believe that in 5 months he will be old enough for kindergarten! The years are flying by and we are enjoying them so much! We celebrated with mayonnaise cake and ice cream with DQ peanut butter topping. Today we enjoyed the morning together celebrating at the fun "mouse house" playing arcade games(Dad took the day off!). The little fellow then spent his birthday afternoon at the library while we waited for our car to be repaired(broken ball joint). We did enjoy a birthday lunch in the city at our new favorite chicken strip restaurant. Happy happy birthday little man! You are quite the fellow that certainly livens our lives! We love you, little critter.