The boys

I just adore the boys in my life. These pictures are of late. Oh, these boys.

Last names

While tucking Joshua in tonight, he asks...."mom, what is Jesus' last name?" "Christ", I reply.
"Our Lord", he says. "Absolutely, Joshy Joe." My goodness this little guy. How totally awesome.
So sweet, so quiet- like, so true. I love it.

Bunches of stuff

Plain ol' precious

Banning the highchair for her bar stool. Notice, it's back there she just wont use it.

Building volcanoes in our sandbox.

George. Nothing more to say when you know this awesome little boy.

This is Riley.

So to begin, I must talk about precious little Riley Clair. Although tiny and yes, super precious, she is by far the biggest handful of the three. She is more agile, more curious, more loud, more demanding... more able. I've been struggling with her because she is so opposite of both boys that none of my parenting instincts even touch her with a ten foot pole. She accomplishes more in a quarter hour than I ever thought possible. Although hard to keep up with, I do find myself in awe of the things she can do. I'll list just a few off the top of my head. Keep in mind she is only 19 months old. She can climb the rock wall along with the actual ladder (with ease) on our swing set out back. She takes the tray off of her highchair, lays it on the ground and climbs into her highchair when she is hungry. After saying that, Im reminded that she has now decided she doesnt want to sit in a highchair and so scoots a bar stool up to the table, climbs onto it, sits down and eats with the boys. She puts on Joshy's underwear..correctly. When it is time to go outside, she brings me her sweater, goes to the shoe box and picks out a matching pair of shoes, sits down and waits for me to help put them on. It really is fun to watch her. Tiring to clean up after, but fun to watch nonetheless. She does ALL of this, yet doesn't say a word. Only in the last two weeks or so has she really started talking.
Onto George. George has really blossomed this winter.His biggest milestones have been learning to spell his name and learning to ride his bike. A weekend spent away from the kids, and upon return, Jamie had taught him to ride. Such an accomplishment for Georgy. How very proud I am.
Now Joshy Joe, my vulcanologist. He, like so many other times has found a passion. This time for volcanoes. He loves reading about them, watching footage on the computer of actual lava flows, listening to different peoples' stories of living with volcanoes, scientific research of vulcanologist and the like. Jamie and I listen, watch and talk each night about Joshua, knowing he is special. He loves to wonder and discover. And he is so good at it.
Below are clips of Riley showing off some of her verbal skills, Georgy riding his bicycle, and Joshy chopping wood in Virginia.

A wish is made

This past weekend, Joshy spent the afternoon touring the inside of a Leer Jet. Words really cant describe the day. He was thrilled to say the least. After touring the jet, running around in the hanger, watching airplanes take off and land literally in front of us, we spent some time in the lobby eating popcorn and sipping coffee. A gentleman dressed in a fighter suit walked down the hallway. Kindly enough, he offered to take us on tour of his FIGHTER JET. Most close family and friends know about our weekly trips to the airport to watch passenger planes and fighter jets take off. Standing this close and getting to see the inside of a fighter jet really seemed unimaginable.

The marine who flew this jet. What an awesome guy. He was so good with making Joshy feel important. Answered a bunch of questions and explained all the parts and procedures.


Next on the list.....Kate. Joshy's new friend. He adores this little girl and it is easy to see why. She is precious. We had her over for a play date, where the two of them raced in the backyard, played Uno, trains, decorated Christmas cookies and giggled. Here are a few pictures of the two of them after their school Christmas performance.

Kate and her brother, Will

Just a really cute picture of Georgy decorating cookies. Look at all that icing. It's not on the cookies, that's for sure.

A little of this, a bit of that

It seems like we have been so busy lately. All in a good way, just really on the go. A few weeks ago, we traveled to Virginia to spend Thanksgiving with my brother and sister in law. What an awesome time we had. It's so nice to have such a close relationship with the two of them. My sister in law Beth and I went to the same college, so there is this sense of camaraderie there. Radford Girls! Jamie and Charlie, brothers, are just Jamie and Charlie, so it works- of course. Anyway, the kids had a wonderful time spending time with family, playing in the leaves, riding horses (thanks Papa Peter and Dammaw for bringing them over) and bowling. Joshy discovered the Wii this trip and was all over it. There is a reason we wont own one. Thanksgiving dinner was lovely. Charlie and Beth tag teamed the whole operation beautifully. We came home glad to be back but sad to leave what felt like our home away from home.

Picking out a tree, Christmas shopping and decorating the house were next on the list of things to do when we got home. Jamie hung the lights on the house, we picked out our tree as a family, and decorated it together. This year was special because it was obvious that the boys enjoyed the decorating part.. George worked surprisingly diligent. He took special care to make sure the ornaments fit just right. Super Cute. Joshy placed the star on top, while Riley admired all the different colored lights. I managed the hooks and Jame took the pictures. A straight up Beaver Cleaver moment. I'll leave out the part where we fought like ---- trying to decide on weather or not we would use LED lights or yellow lights. Merry Christmas! We are enjoying this holiday seasons filled with cookie parties, Christmas get togethers, holiday music, Bible stories, Santa Claus, trains, lights and each other. A few pictures that captured these events.

A bath before the trip to VA. This is a natural pose. They were all watching TV together. I had to get a picture of this.

Fried turkey for this family.

Papa Peter and Damaws horses. They dwarfed the backyard. It was so cool! The neighbors were in awe.

Joshy on Thor

This picture doesnt do justice to how nice this table looked. It was gorgeous.

Those chocolates Uncle Beth gave her eventually made a huge mess. It doesn't take her long.

How cute! I loved watching this.

Riley picked out these glasses while shopping the day after Thanksgiving.

Joshy hangs the star.

Just us

A moment with George this afternoon was surly worth writing down. Each afternoon, before nap time, I lay with Georgy in his bed and read him a story. It's my way of blocking out 20 minutes of alone time with just George and I. (I do the same with the others, just at different times in tune with their specific schedules) He chooses which book he'd like to read and we share a few special moments. At the end of the book I usually rub his back, play with his hair and snuggle a bit. Today, I attempted to get up without the usual snuggle. Not on purpose, I guess I just didn't realize we had started our own special tradition. He grabs me around the waist and says "Wait mommy, we forgot to snuggle." Melting my heart, I lay back down and snuggle. I cherished that snuggle so much today. As another season approaches, I am so thankful for George and his soft little touches that he saves just for our own special time.

My Baby Blues

Joshua James, my first born. My first child. My very first precious gift from God. What I did to deserve him I will never know. He truly is everything I expected in a boy and much, much more. Today he turns 5 years old. I'm just in awe of where the time went and why I'm so sad to see him grow up. The older he becomes, the more charming he is. Why would I not be thrilled about seeing him at 25? And I am, but I am so sad. I want my first baby boy to stay small and innocent forever. It's selfish, but I want him to be mine and mine only. It's a love to deep and special to give to anyone else. Even though I hear the whisper.....No, he belongs to me. The One who created him. The One who mapped out his life. And I Love him just as much, but more. Joshua is just so special, for more reasons than to list in a blog, but I'm going to give it the ol' college try. First, he was the typical "book" baby. He met each mile stone just like the books recorded. He slept perfectly, had a huge appetite, sucked his thumb, didn't like loud noise, loved to be rocked....with white noise, in a dark bathroom. Okay maybe that wasn't by the books. He walked at the right time, talked on cue, had a strong love for books and music. To me, especially looking back, he was/is so unique. When Joshua was told he was going to be a big brother, it didn't phase him. He tried to test the waters, but really quickly realized that George was here to stay. And after that, he was fine. He accepted George and turns out, he hasn't found a companion more accommodating or willing to wrestle on demand. As Joshy grew bigger, so did his obsessions. It started with the beach. Starting at the ripe age of 6 months, Josh and I played at the beach. It didn't take long for Jamie and I to notice how interesting it was that he seemed to study the waves. Even now, he spends most of his time watching the waves, commenting on the change of tides, and just watching. Next was the flag. He adored the American flag. He could not of made his very conservative father more proud. He pointed each one out, sang the Star Spangled Banner by heart at 2 1/2, knew the pledge of allegiance verse by verse, the Fourth of July was his favorite holiday. He adored flags. Next came trains. Not as long a love as flags, nonetheless, trains became pretty cool. And so what did Jamie and I do? We introduced him to Thomas. We forked out the money for each Thomas the Train character, even contemplated a train table, only to watch the trend shift to cars. The Disney movie changed our family. Josh became a fan at 3 and early 4 of Lightening McQueen, Mater, The King, Chicks Hicks and the rest of the other Cars characters. Once again we fed his love by buying his favorite cars and watching he and George replay the movie on our living room floor. Racing the cars back and forth. Jamie recognized this as an opportunity to introduce Josh into his own weird love for Nascar. Joshua ate it up. He loved the real life aspect of Nascar. He studied the cars, listened to the commentary and mimicked it once again on our living room floor.Only this time, he created his race track on our braided rug so he could pretend it was a real track. Nascar, as hard as this is to admit, is pretty popular in our home. So as I've watched my first born son grow from a chubby baby into a little boy, birthday themes have changed, clothes sizes have gotten bigger, song choices more mature and language more grown up but what has stayed the same is his most precious disposition when he is trying to be sweet or funny. the way he uses his "det" to rub his nose and mouth while sucking his thumb. The way he holds his cup to the side when he drinks. How he uses his hands to describe something really important he is trying to say. The way he still thinks Jamie and I are the most incredible people on the planet. His love for his brother and now his baby sister. And his sweet baby blues. I can't imagine what I did to deserve this precious little gift 5 years ago today. I pray that as he continues to grow that he will become a boy, a teenager, a young man that loves God, loves his family and experiences life to the fullest. I am so excited to see what the next five years has in store for Joshua.