Big Day / Big Spill

Quite a few things to catch up on even though it's only been a few days. Recently John has been asking a lot for time "just Mommy and me, not Baby Eve and not Daddy". I don't know if he knows what's coming or what, but we've tried to do a few things (not that we don't have lots of time together, but it's special when it's really one-on-one). Today we planted the vegetable garden (and by we, I mean me...he lasted about 5 minutes and said he was done). The peas we had planted inside were taking over the cups and we finally finished the space for them outside, so now they have plenty of room and plenty of dog poop to help them grow. So far we've planted sugar snap peas, zucchini, cucumber, watermelon, broccoli, lettuce, spinach, carrots, green onions, and eggplant.
A few days ago we made cookies together for Grandpa Bucky's birthday. John really enjoyed that and actually did a good job following directions and being patient. And the cookies were yummy.
BUT, the big day was this past Monday evening. He's been saving up money from jobs done around the house in his little jar. This was the first time he asked for special time together, so I suggested that after supper we go to Target to get a toy with his money. We counted $5.10. After much deliberation and many attempts at explaining why there were certain toys he could afford, others he couldn't, and why he couldn't get ALL the toys he could afford rather than just one, he made a careful decision to buy Kelly the truck crane from the Thomas series. I made a huge deal about him working hard to make the money for the toy and paying for it himself. He was so excited that he took Kelly to bed and said he was going to dream about it. It was so cute and so fun for me. His first purchase...and with his own money! (he was a lot happier than he looks in the picture, but I had to sort through a lot of goofy faces because he wasn't crazy about me taking a picture before we opened it)


And, of course, the big spill. Tuesday we went to the playground with some friends. Eve is really climbing on a lot of things that I'm not ready for her to climb, but at some point, I've got to let go. She has no fear, but unfortunately is also easily distracted and doesn't always pay attention to where her feet are. Anyway, she was climbing up her favorite slide with very narrow fire escape type stairs. Makes me very nervous...and apparently for good reason. She was almost up to the top (above my head), and fell to the mulch below. Fortunately God helped her fall...backwards instead of into the ladder, and onto her feet then bottom. Her nose came forward and hit the mulch, and was amazingly the only injury. She cried for about 10 seconds because of the fall, then it was clear her cry switched to being mad that I wouldn't put her back up at the top of the stairs. That girl is tough as nails, and so darn cute with her little scraped nose (and a tiny scrape on her chin)!

In other news, the other weekend we went to NC with my college roomies and another friend...and all our families. It was so much fun until I caught the stomach bug Saturday evening (and a bunch of the rest caught it after they got home). We did have a great time, though, and realized on the playground that we've grown from 5 of us to 17.5 and counting! What a change 9 years makes!

Not the best family photo, but one of OUR best. At least our eyes are all open and we're all looking at the camera.

Here's the whole gang! Back row: Cameron, Scott, Flynn (almost 2), Matt, Jarrod

Middle: Jen, Kayleigh (3 and some), Claire, Ian (1 1/2), Becky, Shannon

Front: Meghan (6), Knox (3 1/2), Me, John (3 1/2), Buck, Eve (close to 2)

And then there was St. Patrick's Day. The kids were at Mom's because we had a meeting. The leprechauns made a little mischeif at the house (put books in her fridge, dog toys in the bathroom, played with the kids toys, etc. and left their crayons on the table after making a Happy St. Patrick's Day sign). John helped Mom clean everything up and was so excited to tell me about it when I got there to pick them up. He was also excited to pinch me because I wasn't wearing green (and continued to do so throughout the day even after I put green on "you're not wearing green THERE". Next year I'll have to paint myself green if I want to avoid it). They had a party at school, so I made rainbow jello, and was quite proud of how it turned out...

And I think Eve liked it too (I just liked that finally I got a picture that really shows her blue eyes well).