Kace-a-base

Nine. Whole. Months.

Kacie is such a magnet in our family. Everyone wants to sit by her, everyone wants to hold her, everyone wants to get her what she needs. She's very quiet and calm. She has this uncanny thing she does with giving me "knowing looks" when something happens. We turn to each other and without a word it's like she says "I know mom. I saw it too." or "Can you believe that?" Such an observant baby. She has the sweetest little clap, loves to give mom and dad kisses, and amazes me with her mobility skills (notice I didn't say crawling...it's more of a combination scoot, twist, reach, hop, roll, pivot, lunge thing.)

It's not entirely uncommon for Kacie and I to enjoy some quite girl time in my room together throughout the day while the boys are occupied with something else...

But, they always seem to find us ;) Don't I look thrilled?

That's okay, it's fun with boys too. Just louder.

Early saturday morning...

Kacie was bright-eyed and bushy tailed. Mom and Dad...not so much.

Mind you, it is bright here at 5:30 in the morning, but come on!

Asher the Photog...

We went for an early morning family bike ride and picnic breakfast to celebrate the Fourth of July. Asher was working the camera after we ate. I think he's really good. I like his angles. It only stressed me out a little as he flung my camera around capturing things that looked important enough to him to remember. But really, I loved watching him do it. I hope he always enjoys it.

Splash Park of Happiness...

The boys love the new splash park. And the good news is that it's just a short bike trailer ride away.

They were a little cold eating their snacks but I think they still loved every second.

Cardboard is still the best toy...

I love that sweet little innocent face.

These two.

They're cute and they like to snuggle.

This has to be my favorite.

Who has 8 legs, 4 wheels, and 1 bright orange flag?

Me and my little crew, that's who.

I think I looked a bit like a circus coming down the road this morning during our bike ride adventure. The boys were in the trailer and Kacie was in the backseat. I think that if I'd have seen me, I probably would have felt a little sorry for me. But really it was wonderful. Kacie was in heaven and the boys and I talked while we rode through the neighborhoods for a few hours. One neighborhood that we rode through was mostly elderly people. They were lovely and waved and said hello. I was thinking about how the only things I was going to accomplish today were an extraordinarily long bike ride and helping the boys make delicious (and healthy) cookies. Then I started to notice how all the yards there were beautifully manicured, the garages were organized with everything labeled, and all the cars were sparkling clean. That all made me remember how there is still a bush that I've been wanting to pull out of my front yard for over a year, we can't even park in our garage at the moment, and if you can't find it, it's probably in the van. Then, I realized again that the time will come sooner than I think when I will have buckets of time to organize my garage. Today it was all about finding letters in street signs and numbers on houses with Asher and pretend laughing at Caleb's knock-knock jokes (he's in that stage...). So, we went for one more loop around before we headed back home to show the boys how to grind wheat to make the flour we needed for our cookies.

A few pictures with the timer before we got started.

Just in case you're curious... making the cookies took us at least four hours, and their favorite part was drawing shapes with their fingers in the flour that they flung all over the table. Hope they enjoyed it, because it's probably never happening again :{ Just kidding, kind of.

Happy Birthday Papa!

We hope these silly faces make you smile...

We miss you!