The Parker Bunch

Ten Months Old!

2012-01-23T20:00:00.001-06:00

Wow, Rachel is 10 months old. It seems like this month just flew by, but Rachel has done so many things. She is doing the inchworm (this is what I call her version of the crawl). She isn't quite crawling, but she gets on all fours, then bends her knees forward, then she moves her arms forward slightly and then falls on her face. Then she does this entire process all over again. Since crawling is not her forte yet, she rolls all over the place and now she easily gets into and out of sitting from her belly. Many times she just sits on the floor and cries in hopes that someone will either pick her up or bring her a toy. So I'm trying to make it so that she has to move so that she actually will. She is eating cheerios like a pro and now will eat all kinds of baby puffs and yogurt treats without any hesitation (now they all make it into her mouth). We can't wait to see what next month brings.

Here is her giraffe picture...

This is how I keep finding her at nap time. It's almost like she gets into the sitting position in her crib and then forgets how to lay back down again. So she just gives up, lays her head down, and falls asleep.

I thought this was a cute one with Ethan.

The kiddos thought it would be funny to make Rachel look like ET.

Love that smile...

Rachel enjoying her new jumpy toy.

Our Ballerina

2012-01-09T22:17:00.014-06:00

Emma started ballet tonight. She was so excited to wear her leotard, tights, and ballet shoes and she found out at practice that if she can do the first five ballet leg positions correctly then she will have the privilege of wearing a pink tutu. She is super excited about that and is hoping to earn it by the next practice. Wow, these pictures make me realize that my little girl is growing up way too fast.

She wanted to be able to see her ballet bun, so I took a picture. I know this seems ridiculous, but I had to look online at a video to figure out how to do a bun (I remembered that my friend, Stacy, had to do this when her little one was in ballet...thanks Stacy.)

Emma is borrowing a black leotard from her cousin...thanks Bridget.

A super excited little ballerina!

Happy Birthday, Hannah!

2012-01-08T23:02:00.000-06:00

Hannah turned 3 today. We had a nice day. She woke up to balloons in her room and then we went to church. After church we met my parents and my sisters family at Jumpin in CO which is a place filled with lots of bouncy houses and bouncy slides for kiddos to play on. Then we went to a restaurant and ate lunch, opened gifts, and enjoyed cake. The day ended with our family cheering on the Broncos and Tim Tebow to a win in the playoffs.

Happy Birthday to our sweet Hannah.

Hannah in the bouncy house...

Ethan mastering the slide...

Joshua on the slide...

Bridget and Emma bouncing...

Emma having fun at Jumpin...

Aunt Kristin and Rachel...

Here's the birthday girl...

The kiddos making pizza...

Hannah opening her gifts...

Here is Hannah's Little Einstein's rocket cake. Hannah really likes the Little Einstein's so I was excited to be able to make this cake for her...

However, for the past week Hannah wanted me to make a Rapunzel cake. So because I had already planned to make the Einstein's cake, I decided to add a little figure of Rapunzel for her to enjoy as well.

Here are the kiddos with Grandma and Grandpa at the end of a fun day celebrating Hannah's 3rd birthday...

Happy Birthday, Hannah!

Happy New Year!

2012-01-02T21:47:00.000-06:00

Happy New Year! The Parker family had a really fun new year. First, Jeremy's parents came to visit for a few days after Christmas. The kiddos enjoyed playing with their grandparents and having fun together. To ring in the New Year we all went out for dinner and took the kiddos to a movie on New Years Eve. Then we played some Twister, foosball, basketball, and watched some TV while munching on some goodies. Rachel and Hannah went to bed early on in the evening. Emma tried so hard to stay up to ring in the New Year. She made it until about 10:00 (which is actually midnight on the east coast), but then she had to go to bed. Ethan, Mommy, and Daddy made it to 12:00 to watch the ball drop - pretty impressive that I was able to stay awake. Here are some pictures of our visit with Grandma Karen and Grandpa Dave.

Grandpa feeding Rachel.

Reading the Bible before bedtime. I think Emma is dressing like Mary.

Rachel and Grandma

They are just loving having their Grandma and Grandpa visit.

The highlight of our week was on New Years Day where we had the awesome opportunity to go to a Denver Broncos game and watch Tim Tebow play. It was our family (minus Hannah and Rachel who stayed with a babysitter), my sister's family, my parents, and Jeremy's parents. We had an awesome time. Go Broncos (they ended up losing to the Kansas City Chiefs, but we still had an awesome time)

My sister's family...

Here we are...

This is the closest picture my camera would take of Tim Tebow. Bummer.

We had a great time and we hope to do it again next year.

Merry Christmas!

2011-12-31T14:50:00.002-06:00

So I'm finally getting to post about our Christmas. We had a really nice Christmas. The kiddos were off school the Wednesday before Christmas, so I met my parents in CO and they took Ethan and Emma to their home for a slumber party and to have some fun with the grandkids. They had a great time with Grandma and Grandpa, especially because it snowed 11 inches at Grandma and Grandpa's on Wednesday night and Thursday. So they had some fun in the snow. Jeremy, Hannah, Rachel, and I drove to Colorado on Friday to meet them so we could all celebrate Christmas together. We had a nice time and everyone enjoyed getting some fun gifts.

Here is a picture of our Christmas tree at home (for those of you looking closely you can tell that we still only have pictures of 3 kiddos up on our mantle...we are working on getting updated pictures of the kiddos and adding the 4th kiddo to the picture wall...I just had to clarify for those of you that will ask - haha.)

Here are Ethan and Emma enjoying the snow at Grandma's and Grandpa's in CO.

Emma must be making a snow angel.

Here is the tree at my parents home.

Here are the kiddos getting their first look at their presents Christmas morning.

Here is Rachel checking out one of her gifts.

I think she likes it.

Emma loving her princess kitchen (this is all that she asked for before Christmas and she loves playing with it.)

Ethan and his new guitar. He is definitely our musical man. I think I'm going to learn how to play the guitar with him. It should be fun.

Hannah loving her Little Einsteins piano.

By the time we finished unwrapping gifts this is what I found Hannah doing.

Love, love, love this picture.

On Christmas Eve, the kiddos helped me make and decorate Jesus birthday cake. I think they did a great job. We sang Happy Birthday to Jesus on Christmas day and enjoyed eating a yummy cake.

Here is everyone enjoying the snow.

The girls sledding together.

Daddy and Hannah...

Grandpa pushing Emma.

Ethan after taking a tumble off the sled.

Making their way up the hill.

Hannah after a collision.

Grandpa having fun. I found out that Grandpa went down the hill after I went in the house with the camera. I would have enjoyed getting that picture. Oh well.

We all had a great time with Grandma and Grandpa.

Nine Months Old!

2011-12-23T08:00:00.004-06:00

Rachel is 9 months old today. It seems like this past month Rachel has learned how to do so many things. She is now sitting up without any help and rarely falls over. One day I found her sitting up in bed. I'm not sure how she got that way because I put her in bed on her back and I've never seen her get into the sitting position on her own. But somehow she did it. She is also very close to crawling. She will get on her hands and knees and rock back and forth and then she'll just fall over on her face. So not quite there yet, but almost. She continues to babble more and more. She is better at eating Cheerios, although most of them end up on her bib instead of in her mouth. We can't wait to see what next month brings.

Here is her giraffe picture...

Hanging out with Grandpa...

Big brother showing how great he is at feeding Rachel...

Sisters...

Rachel's first bath in the big bathtub...

Two Fun Christmas Programs

2011-12-16T23:19:00.003-06:00

Ethan and Emma had their Christmas programs at school this past week. Ethan's was last Thursday and Emma's was today. They sang, did sign language, and Ethan even had a small speaking part. It was so much fun to watch them. Enjoy the pictures.

Here is Ethan signing...

Here he is singing...

Here are the kiddos singing the "Hallelujah Chorus". It was awesome. That chorus is a hard one for adults to sing let alone kids singing it. The kiddos did great. Ethan practiced and practiced and practiced at home as he loves to sing. (Ethan is in the first row all the way on the right.)

Here is Emma's preschool group...(she is in the second row...third child from the right)

I just love her hands in this picture...

Here she is signing...

Grandma and Grandpa Stefko were able to come to both programs. Here they are with the girls after Emma's program.

From the look on her face I think she had a good time.

Fun Conversations of the Week!

2011-12-04T15:00:00.001-06:00

Here are some fun conversations that we have had in the last couple of weeks:

1. One day I was frustrated with the kiddos and I yelled, ahem, I mean - raised my voice. Then I felt bad that I raised my voice and I told them that mommy was sorry. Then Emma looked at me and said, "Mommy, you're trying to be a good mommy...I know."

2. Emma was talking to my mom one day and she looked at her gray hair and said, "You have white hair...you're going to heaven soon."

Then the next day Emma was getting her hair cut and she was telling the hairdresser that she got a Rapunzel dress from her Grandma and Grandpa. Then she said, "My grandma is getting old." Then I said, "Emma, what makes you say that Grandma is old." Then she said, "Well, she has gray hair."

That same evening I was talking with Emma before she went to bed and I said, "You know Emma, it's probably not a really good thing to tell Grandma that she is old because that might make her feel sad." Then Emma looked at me in a confused way and said, "But why would she be sad...she'll get to die and go to heaven and be with God...she'll get lots of yummy snacks and treats." Oh Emma, you are so right. If we could all be waiting so expectantly to see our Creator - what a day of rejoicing that will be.

3. We were talking about Thanksgiving and how we were going to see Grandma and Grandpa Stefko, Aunt Kristin, Uncle Jacob, Bridget, and Joshua. Then Emma said, "What about Grandma Karen and Grandpa Dave? We never get to see them. I just want to hug them for real and then I want to do smackdown with them." Our kiddos just love smackdown with Daddy and Grandpa Dave.

4. I was putting Emma to bed one night and I told her that I was sorry that I had yelled at her earlier in the day (here I go again, yelling). Then I asked her if she forgave me. She said yes and then she said, "I'm not putting it inside my brain. I'm letting it go away. That way I won't remember. You should do that too, mommy." Wow, what a picture of how the Lord forgives us. He doesn't even put it inside of "his brain".

5. One night Emma was looking at Jeremy's stubble on his face and she said, "You have a little baby beard." Little does she know that Daddy would love to be able to grow some facial hair. First, Uncle Sam won't let him and second, even if Uncle Sam let him he still wouldn't be able to grow much.

6. Ethan did not feel well after school one day. So at dinner time I asked him if he wanted any dinner. He did not want what we were having because of not feeling well but he thought he would try some jello. After dinner we decided to give the girls some candy for dessert and then Ethan chimed in that he wanted some too. That's interesting, I thought he was not feeling well. He proceeded to say, "When I'm sick I just like candy. Everything else makes my tummy worse." Very interesting.

7. Hannah is so very funny these days. Many of her conversations don't even really make sense to us. When we do our football picks for the football pool each child, except Rachel, gets to do their own picks. And they actually do their own picks. It's pretty funny. Anyway, Hannah is a big fan of the "Baltimore Raisins". She also keeps talking about an "Eagle Witch". I think it is a character in a game on Emma's DS. So I ask her, "Hannah, don't you mean Evil Witch". She says, "No Mommy - an Eagle Witch." OK. She also loves, loves, loves Rapunzel and will just break out into the song, "I've Gotta Dream." It's hilarious and she knows most of the song which is even more funny.

8. And last but not least - this is Rachel's fun conversation of the week - enjoy!!!

Happy Thanksgiving!

2011-11-30T22:42:00.002-06:00

We had a really nice Thanksgiving. We went to Estes Park, CO and stayed at the YMCA there with my parents and my sister and her family. They had all kinds of activities for the kiddos. There was swimming, roller skating, basketball, family games, all sorts of crafts, smores, and an evening lighted Christmas parade where it snowed - A LOT!!!! There was only a 10% chance of snow that day and would you believe it actually snowed during the parade. It was pretty neat and it really put us in the Christmas spirit. But it was definitely cold and the snow was totally unexpected. Would you believe that I have no pictures of the trip because, yet again, I forgot my camera. However my Dad took a lot of pictures. So as soon as I get some from him I will post them on the blog. We hope you all had a great Thanksgiving.

Eight Months Old!

2011-11-23T21:00:00.000-06:00

Rachel is 8 months old! My how time flies. Rachel is sitting better now. She can sit by herself for about 2-3 minutes without falling over. Go girl! She is still rolling around everywhere and I think she is very close to starting to crawl. She loves to study things, especially her hands. She also gets easily distracted by the kiddos and the dog when I'm trying to feed her and is also in constant motion when I feed her. This makes feeding time quite interesting when the spoon is trying to find the mouth that is in constant motion. She tried Cheerios for the first time and still has not figured out how to eat them. She just puts them into her mouth and then just spits them out. Wow, I can't wait to see what month 9 brings.

The giraffe picture...

Smiling at Grandma...

The Cheerio chin face...

Happy 7th Birthday, Ethan!

2011-11-19T21:51:00.002-06:00

Today Ethan turned 7 years old. He has been sooooo excited all week for today to come. He woke up to a bedroom full of balloons and then he ate one of his favorite breakfast meals - waffles. Yum! Then he helped us get ready for his birthday party that would be happening later in the day. Around lunch time he went to basketball practice. From 4-6 we had a superhero training birthday party at the house. All the kiddos trained to be superheroes by making their very own mask; getting rid of bombs placed by an evil villain (various colored balloons); maneuvering through an obstacle course to save a baby and Snow White from the evil Lex Luthor, Doc Oc, and the Penguin; and then finally saving all of us from a dinosaur attack (a pinata). By the end, all of our trainees earned a certificate of completion naming them full fledged superheroes. It was a fun birthday party and I think all the kiddos enjoyed it.

Here is Ethan's Thor Hammer birthday cake...

Ethan opening some of his gifts before his party. Is he excited or what!

Rachel and Aunt Kristin...

Some of the kiddos making their superhero masks. Hannah is working so diligently with the help of Aunt Kristin.

Here are the kiddos waiting to start the obstacle course.

Here I am showing them the beginning of the course...me going in the door and through the tunnel.

Bridget going through the next tunnel...

Emma slaying the bad guys to save the baby...

Then taking the baby to its mother...

Next, Joshua racing to slay Doc Oc...

Bridget beating Doc Oc...

Next, Emma had to scale the tall building by jumping over it and then making three turns on the sit and spin...

Finally, Joshua shooting the Penguin wth silly string so that he can save Snow White...YAY!

Ethan, the Incredible Hulk, saving us from the evil dinosaur pinata...

Time for cake...

Time for presents...

By the end, they all became full fledged superheroes.

Cousins, Joshua and Bridget in their superhero masks.

Happy Birthday, Ethan!

Playing a little catch up

2011-11-11T19:00:00.000-06:00

Wow, so the fall just flew by us and I can't believe that we are in the middle of November. There are a few things that I didn't get to blog that I thought I would share from the past couple of months.

1. First we had little soccer and football players in the house. Emma played indoor soccer and Ethan played flag football on base. They had a lot of fun. Since this was only Emma's second time playing soccer she was still getting used to things. Ethan really enjoyed playing with his team, especially when he got to play quarterback or attempt to run for a touchdown. He was team captain many games and got to call the coin toss.

Emma's team was the Blue Dragons and Ethan's was the Bengals.

Ethan is number 5 and the one in the foreground of the pictures.

2. The month of October was a month of sickness for the Parker household. Jeremy and I figured that we had someone sick for at least 1-2 days each week in October. I don't think we were able to go to church all together as a family for about 5 weeks. So when we went to church last week together that was AWESOME! Is this what happens when you have 4 children?

3. Emma had surgery to remove a dermoid cyst that she has had since she was a baby. The doctor decided that it would be best to have it removed so that it wouldn't cause any problems in the future. So we had it done in October about 1 week before her birthday.

This is the day of her surgery. She did really well after surgery except that her right eye watered a lot and she had to hold a washcloth on it so she wouldn't scratch it. Don't you just love that she has matching jammies with her doll, Halley. I also included this card that Ethan wrote for her. I absolutely love it because he did this all on his own with no prompting from Mom and Dad. What a neat brother. I also like how he spells surgery (serdre). He spells it just like it sounds.

Here is sweet Emma about 1 week after surgery right before they were going to take out her stitches.

Here is a close up of her stitches. I think there were only 3 stitches.

4. Here is what the girls like to do while Mommy is cleaning the floors upstairs...play school. Emma is the teacher and Hannah is the student along with the other cuddly students.

Emma teaching Hannah the alphabet. Not sure if Hannah is bored or what...

Emma reading, If You Give a Moose a Muffin.

And all of her students enjoying the book. Where is Hannah...oh there she is.

5. The little girls doing what they do when big brother and bigsister are at school...hang out together.

6. Here is what Daddy loves to do with the 4 kiddos every night before bedtime...read their Bible.

Thor, Rapunzel Squared, and Little Kitty

2011-10-31T22:35:00.000-05:00

Happy Halloween from Thor, Rapunzel Squared, and Little Kitty!!

The kiddos had a great time getting candy this evening. Hannah still had an ear infection and was not feeling well so we let her go to a couple of houses before coming back home. And poor Rachel is now sick so she got to miss trick-or-treating all together and stayed home with Mommy. Both Ethan and Emma brought home a stash of candy. We'll see how long it lasts.

Happy Birthday, Emma!

2011-10-30T21:00:00.001-05:00

Happy 5th Birthday, Emma!

Today was Emma's birthday. We started the birthday weekend by having a party yesterday, the 29th. The plan was to celebrate her birthday with a princess party at our house. Everyone was to dress up like a princess or a prince and we were going to play games, eat pizza and cake, open presents, and then the highlight of the evening would be "The Pinata." "The Pinata" was really all that Emma wanted at her party. Who knew that a pinata could be so popular.

Anyway, I guess you could say that our plans changed. On Friday evening Hannah was not feeling well. Well...you guessed it...she was sick. She was still sick on Saturday morning, so we quickly changed plans and moved everything to Pizza Hut. She had a great time. We played a couple of games, did the pinata thing, ate, and opened presents. She was dressed up like Rapunzel and had a great time. Then today we celebrated some more with family presents and more cake. She was so excited to turn 5.

Emma with her Rapunzel cake...

I had fun making this one...

Ethan helped with some of the decorations...

Getting ready to blow out her candle...

Her little princess and prince friends and cousins...

Here are 2 pictures from today. We tried to get one with all of the kiddos on her birthday, but as you can see Hannah was pretty pitiful. She had an ear infection and was just not feeling well...

This one is a little better...

Happy Birthday Emma. We love you!

Seven Months Old!

2011-10-27T23:30:00.002-05:00

Time is flying by. Rachel is 7 months old. I can't believe it. She is starting to actually laugh (which I love), she is sitting for 30 seconds to 1 minute at a time, she loves to play with her feet, she is really good at grabbing for toys that she can grasp and then she shoves them in her mouth, she rolls around everywhere (it's her new mode of transportation), and she loves to laugh and smile at all her siblings. Emma is especially good at making her happy after she has been crying. She is babbling and saying "Da-da-da-da-da-da", which Jeremy is excited about. She is just too cute for words. Enjoy the pics!

The Pumpkin Brigade

2011-10-23T22:41:00.000-05:00

So this is what we did this afternoon while enjoying our 60 degree weather (which could possibly be the last nice weather weekend of the season - we're supposed to get very cold and snowy weather Wednesday - yikes).

A little football and soccer...

Here we are carving our pumpkins...

Here is Hannah's masterpiece (she had a little help from Mommy)...

Daddy and Rachel's pumpkin...

Emma's pumpkin (she drew the face on the pumpkin and then I carved it out)...

Ethan's masterpiece (Daddy helped with the carving as well)...

Fun Conversations of the Week!

2011-10-10T21:26:00.001-05:00

Oh how my children just crack me up. This is such a fun age, especially when they say the neatest things. Here are a few.

* When 1st grade started this year Ethan was so excited. He came home the first day and said, "Hey Mom...what is studying?" I'm not quite sure why he was asking what studying was because he brought reading assignments home in Kindergarten. I guess we just didn't call it studying. So I proceeded to tell him that studying was when you brought work home from school so that you could practice it in order to learn it. Then he shouted, "I LOVE STUDYING." We'll see if he says this in a few years.

* One day Hannah was crying and we said, "Hannah...why are you crying?" Then she said in a very matter of fact way, "Because I'm sad." She was probably thinking, "I'm obviously crying because I'm sad people." Then another day Hannah was crying again and I said, "Hannah, why are you sad?" Then she said in a very matter of fact way, "Because I'm crying." Oh I understand now...NOT!

* Rachel is all about spitting. So right now she spits when she is happy and she spits when she is sad. She justs spits and spits and spits and spits!

* One day before lunch Emma was praying and said, "Thank you God for my family. Thank you God for the military. I pray for the bad guys that You would change their hearts and they would follow God." Her definition of a bad guy is the person that the soldiers in the military protect us from. I think it's so neat that she cares so much for the bad guys and realizes that they need to change and turn to God in order to actually change.

* On Sunday we asked Emma what she learned at church and she told us that she learned about Noah and the ark. So Jeremy said, "Emma, would you like to be in Noah's ark?" After thinking for a moment she said, "Well...I don't think so...that would be 40 days and 40 nights...I would hate to do that...I would have to pee pee."

Let it snow, let it snow, let is snow!

2011-10-08T22:42:00.000-05:00

OK...so it's October 8th and we had our first snowfall here in Cheyenne today. Last night Jeremy said, "Hey, did you know that it's supposed to snow tomorrow?" I proceeded to tell him that there is no way that it will snow because I looked at accuweather on the internet and it was calling for rain. Well, guess what...it snowed. This first snowfall of the season is about one month earlier than last year. Does that mean we are in for a rough winter? I hope not. Would you believe that Ethan actually had a football game this morning even with the snow. These Cheyenne football fans are hardcore. Here are a few pictures from the day.

I took this one so you could see how much snow was accumulating on the table. I think we got around 4-5 inches. It was nice and wet...great for packing.

Samson having a blast.

Not sure if Hannah is having the best time.

OK, now she's better and the kiddos are enjoying eating the snow.

Little Miss Rachel got to stay inside and stay warm.

Six Months Old

2011-09-30T21:30:00.000-05:00

Rachel is 6 months old! She is doing all kinds of things. She is rolling all over the place, she is starting to grab for toys while she is on her tummy, and she can sit for about a second with both arms supporting her before falling over. But the biggest milestone that she achieved this month was starting to eat baby food. She loves fruit and hates veggies, already (ugh). So I have to hide the veggies with the fruit in order for her to eat them. Oh well. I gotta get them in somehow. She is also starting to notice when mommy and daddy leave the room. She is just as content as can be when we are near, but if she notices us leave the room then she will just start to cry. Rachel really enjoys her older sisters and brother. She loves to smile at them and we almost got a giggle out of her. What a personality

Look at this sweet face. These 6 month pics were definitely better than her 5 month pics with her giraffe because she cried through most of them.

Rachel's First Feeding

2011-09-10T22:37:00.000-05:00

Today we tried feeding Rachel baby food for the first time. We gave her rice cereal and then mixed it with some bananas. She really enjoyed it and figured out how to eat it pretty quickly.

She is ready for some food...

A sweet messy face...

Someone is excited...

Lions and Tigers and Bears, Oh My!

2011-09-05T20:37:00.001-05:00

This has been the week of wild animals for the Parkerbunch.

First, my sister called me earlier in the week to tell me that they found a bear in her residential neighborhood, 2 doors away. The bear had fallen out of a tree and was stuck between 2 fences and couldn't get out. Then she proceeded to tell me that my brother-in-law got to pet the bear. I'm thinking...what??!?!?!?! He pet a bear...what is he thinking? Then she told me that the bear was tranquilized. Oh, OK. Here is a picture of the bear (with his tongue hanging out-pretty funny.)

Second, Ethan's school has started a school fundraiser. I am not a huge fan of these types of fundraisers as I don't like asking people to buy things that they probably didn't really want in the first place. However, being the good mother that I am, I decided to take Ethan to just a few of the neighbors homes to see if they wanted to buy anything from his catalog.

We got to one of our neighbors homes and she invited us in so that we could get out of the wind (remember, it is windy in Cheyenne) while she looked through his catalog. Normally I decline the offer to come in and we just wait outside. However, I decided to go in and wait. As we entered her hallway I noticed some pictures of her husband with some animals that he had obviously hunted. I commented on them and she said, "Is it OK if I show the kids (Ethan and Emma) some of the animals that he has hunted downstairs?" I'm thinking..."sure...why not...I bet Ethan and Emma would enjoy seeing that since we don't hunt." I was expecting to see a few deer heads and that's it.

Boy was I wrong. I kid you not...there were probably 20 different animal heads or hides. There were long horned sheep, mountain goats, AN ENTIRE MOUNTAIN LION, a zebra hide made into a rug, a standing 6 FOOT BEAR (yes...I said a bear), a bear head, another bear on all 4's, and a couple of bear hides. Then I looked in a furniture case and I saw approximately 10 skulls (yep, you guessed it...bear skulls). So I said, "Did your husband hunt all of these animals?" Come to find out...he did. So needless to say, this week the Parkerbunch was all about bears and other wild animals (even if they were just tranquilized or stuffed and sitting in someones home.) Only in Cheyenne.

The Love of Grandparents

2011-09-03T21:19:00.000-05:00

You've just gotta love a picture with the best grandparents.

First Day of Preschool

2011-08-30T22:37:00.001-05:00

Wow, my sweet Emma started preschool on Monday. It is not her first time in preschool as she attended a preschool in San Antonio the last year that we lived there. When we moved to Cheyenne last year the preschool that we liked was full, so Emma got to hang out with me last year. It was nice having her home and she was such a sweet sister and a huge help for me with Hannah and then with Rachel when she was born. This year we got a spot for her in the preschool and she is soooooo excited to be in school like her big brother. She will attend 3 mornings a week.

She loved her first day. I picked her up that morning and the first thing she did was give me a kiss on my hand and told me that when we are not together that I will always have her with me because of the kiss that she put on my hand. That was so sweet. I think they read the book, “The Kissing Hand” which is why she planted that kiss on my hand. Here are a few pictures of Emma on her first day of preschool.

The excited foursome...

This is such a sweet picture of Emma (I didn't even ask her to fold her hands and she just decided to pose this way.)

Five Months Old

2011-08-30T22:27:00.000-05:00

Rachel turned 5 months last week. I took her to her 4 month appointment last week when she turned 5 months - can you say that I am a little behind. Oh well. She is a whopping 11 lbs 5 oz which puts her in the 1st percentile for weight and 23 inches long which puts her in the 1st percentile for length.

She has really started to become a little baby and not just a "thing" that only sleeps, eats, cries, pees, and poops. She smiles a ton, she is just beginning to giggle, she is rolling onto her back and then onto her tummy a lot, she can hold her head up to 90 degrees while she is on her tummy for quite some time, and she holds her head up really well while we hold her in sitting. She loves to play on her activity mat where she can bat at little animals and chimes and she can also grab and hold onto toys with one hand or both hands together. Then she decides to put all things into her mouth. She is sleeping 11-12 hours at night and then takes a 1-2 hour morning nap and a 2-3 hour afternoon nap (Although this is getting totally messed up with Ethan and Emma starting school and me trying to figure out a good schedule. It may take me a couple of weeks to figure it all out.) Enjoy the pictures.

Here is her giraffe picture. I just love the progression of these four pictures. She was obviously not very happy.

Here is my sweetie on her activity mat.

First Day of 1st Grade

2011-08-25T21:40:00.000-05:00

Wow, my 6 year old started 1st grade this past Tuesday, August 23rd. I can't believe it. He is just getting to be such a big boy. He was so excited to go to school and he is really liking the responsiblity of no longer being a kindergartner, but a 1st grader.

The girls and their big brother...

A super excited 1st grader...

Ethan Lost His First Tooth

2011-08-22T23:00:00.000-05:00

Ethan lost his first tooth on Saturday, August 13th, while on our trip in Branson, MO. He was super excited and he actually lost it in the car while riding with both sets of grandparents. I was bummed as I missed out on one of his “firsts”, but was glad that the grandparents could see it. Check out his toothless grin.

He was so very excited...

Family Vacation - Part 2!

2011-08-22T22:29:00.027-05:00

Part 2 of our vacation started on Friday, August 12, where we packed up the car and headed for Branson, MO. We drove to Kansas City, Kansas where we met my parents and then drove the rest of the way to MO on Saturday. The drive took a little longer than we thought because we did not take into account that much of the border of MO was closed due to the flooding that had occurred months ago. Many of those border towns along the river are still flooded and under water. So we had to take quite a few detours. I have never personally seen that kind of flooding until this trip. It just reminded me that we need to continue praying for these families as they are still dealing with the devastation months later.

We arrived in Branson on Saturday and met Jeremy’s parents there at the resort. It was fun to be able to go on vacation with my parents and Jeremy’s parents. That night we went to see the “Noah” musical at Sight and Sound Theater. It was awesome. We saw this musical BK (BK = before kids). When we first saw it I was actually pregnant with Ethan but didn’t know it yet. We liked it just as much this time around as we did last time. The kids loved it as well. The rest of the week we spent hanging out by the pool, swimming in a nearby lake, eating yummy food, and checking out nearby attractions – the Human Body experience, Silver Dollar City (an amusement park), and Dixie Land Stampede (a show where they re-enact portions of American history using horses and tricks while you eat dinner – by the way, you eat with no utensils which was extremely interesting with the kiddos). We had a great time and would enjoy doing it again sometime.

Here are the kiddos on some rides at Silver Dollar City...

Ethan looks sooooo happy...

Here is Rachel taking a nap at the beach on the lake...

Here is Hannah at the beach...

Here is a picture of all of us (a little fuzzy)...

Would you believe that my camera battery ran out after this picture was taken. So I didn't get any more pictures. I think this is a theme with me and cameras. Ugh! I will try to post some more pictures once I get them from my parents and Jeremy's parents.

Anyway, we were glad to get home as we did the drive back all in one day. It was supposed to be 14 hours, but was closer to 16 due to all of the detours with the flooding. We had a great time and really enjoyed having some family time together.

Family Vacation - Part 1!

2011-08-21T22:23:00.004-05:00

This past week we had a family vacation. It started on Wednesday, August 10th, when our good friends from San Antonio, the Davies, came to visit for 2 days. The kiddos enjoyed playing with their friends and it was so nice to get to spend some time with them as we miss them a ton. The highlight of the visit was going to a Bison Ranch here in Cheyenne. We rode a train that takes you where the bison graze and you are able to feed the Bison from the train. The kids loved it. The Bison just ate out of their hands. There was also an area where the kids could feed some ponies and practice using a lasso. After the train ride we got to eat Bison burgers – yum, yum!

Here we are on the train...

Some of the bison...

Ethan, Jeremy, and Rachel attempting to feed the bison...

Caleb and Emma feeding the bison...

Sidney, Ethan, and Hannah getting ready to feed the bison...

Brett and Tyler (sorry Tyler about the girlie hat)...

Stacy...

Emma and Hannah enjoying a tractor seat...

Ethan using his lasso to bring down the bull (he looks determined...

Rachel hanging where she usually does on our family outings...

The kiddos having a great time...

So this was just the beginning of our vacation. Stay tuned for Part 2.

Fun Conversations of the Week!

2011-08-09T20:38:00.000-05:00

I haven't posted funny conversations in awhile. Here are a few that we've had over the past few weeks.

* One morning I was helping Emma brush her teeth at the sink. We had already had a pretty crazy morning and the kiddos had only been up for about 30 minutes. At one point I think I heard Hannah crying about something and I turned to Emma and jokingly said, "I have too many children...I don't know what to do with them anymore." Emma looked at me in the mirror with her hands up in the air and just said, "Just throw them in the garbage." That just cracked me up.

* The kids and I were eating lunch together one afternoon. (To help you better understand this story I have to fill you in on table manners in the Parker household. Jeremy and I are sticklers when it comes to eating at the table and not making a mess. We don't want the kids to make a big mess at the table. So one thing we ask them to do is to eat leaning over their plate and to have their plate close to them when they eat. This way they won't spill food all over the table or their clothes.) OK, so back to the conversation. Then out of the blue (I had not said anything about eating over the table that afternoon) Ethan said, "Adam and Eve didn't have to lean over the table when they ate... " I wasn't sure what he was referring to so I asked him, "Why do you say that?" Then he said, "There was only one rule...don't eat fruit from the tree." I looked at him and said, "That's right." Then he said, "They could have messed with an alligator if they wanted to." That boy is too funny.

* I asked the kiddos what they wanted to get for Jeremy's birthday and Emma said, "Mommy, I know what I'm gonna get Daddy for his birthday...when Daddy gets old, I'm gonna get him a wheelchair." Too, too funny.

I hope you enjoyed those as much as I did.

Happy Birthday Jeremy and the Awesome Privilege

2011-08-07T22:09:00.000-05:00

Today Jeremy turned 35! We had such a nice day celebrating his 35th birthday. We woke up and had donuts for breakfast as Daddy loves donuts. Then we went to church and Jeremy had the awesome privilege of baptizing Ethan. Ethan has been wanting to get baptized for a very long time, but we felt that he needed to understand what it meant to get baptized before we let him. He accepted Jesus as the Lord of his life about 2 years ago and we thought that now was a good time for him to get baptized. Little did we realize that it would be the same day as Jeremy's birthday and that Jeremy would have the privilege of doing it himself. It was awesome. Then we came home and opened gifts before going to Olive Garden for lunch with my parents. Then we came home and had cake. Fun. Happy Birthday, Jeremy!

Ethan getting ready to be baptized...

He was so excited...

Grandma and Grandpa with the grandkids...

So Fun To Be Near Cousins

2011-08-06T19:48:00.001-05:00

I must say that we are enjoying living near family. My parents and my sister and her family live about 2 hours away in Colorado. We try to get together when we can and the kiddos love hanging out with their cousins.
A couple of weeks ago we met my parents and the cousins and visited my sister's school to see her room before the school year started. Then we took the kiddos to a water splash park near the school. They had a great time.

Emma and cousin Bridget having a blast...

Just enough time for a hug and a pose for the camera...

Ethan and cousin Joshua just 'chillin...

Now they are getting into the action too...

The four big kiddos covering the fountain...

Hannah dressed in her clothes as her mommy did not think to bring her bathing suit (Emma and Ethan were able to borrow their cousins bathing suits thanks to their resourceful Aunt Kristin)...

Rachel just chillin in her carseat unaware of all the activity around her...

Just drying off after a fun time at the park...

Anniversary

2011-07-31T20:23:00.001-05:00

Jeremy and I celebrated our 12 year anniversary this weekend. We celebrated by going to Heavenfest on Saturday. Heavenfest is a Christian music festival held to worship Jesus Christ. It was held in Loveland, CO this year. There were about 8 stages with around 100 Christian music artists there throughout the day to lead over 38,000 people in worship. Also, all of the money they received through ticket sales was going to organizations that serve the poor, the hungry, and the exploited. It was awesome. Jeremy and I were so excited to hear the artists, especially Jeremy Camp, Mercy Me, and Skillet. Here are a few pictures from the day. We also had great tickets so we got to stand pretty close to the stage.

This is Jeremy Camp...

the lead singer of Mercy Me...

and Skillet (This is one of Ethan's favorite groups. We like them a lot too.)

Someone was nice enough to take a picture of us before one of the concerts started.

Four Months Old

2011-07-29T20:00:00.001-05:00

Rachel just turned 4 months old. It feels like just yesterday that she was turning 3 months old. She is doing so well. She is sleeping 11-12 hours each night. She tolerates tummy time a little more these days. It is still not her favorite thing to do but she appeases her mom for a little while by staying on her tummy for a few minutes before screaming. She weighed over 9 lbs which now puts her in the 3rd percentile for weight. Woohoo - she went up a percentile. She has started to grab and hold onto toys with her hands. She smiles a lot and is making some more vocalizations, like "aah". Too cute. We can't wait to see what next month brings. Enjoy some of these pictures from the last month.

Rachel with the giraffe...

getting a bath...

love those eyelashes...

Estes Park

2011-07-20T21:00:00.001-05:00

This past Saturday we met my parents at Estes Park, CO. We had a nice time hanging out with them and enjoyed God's beautiful creation surrounding us.

I just love this picture of Emma (it really captures her sweet spirit).

and here comes Hannah...

and here comes Ethan...(we asked Hannah to smile and this is what she gave us)

and here come the rest of us.

Would you believe that I actually had my camera this time but after taking these pictures the battery died. BUMMER. Estes Park is so beautiful and I'm sorry that I have no pictures to show for it. Maybe next time.

Hannah's Week

2011-07-17T20:00:00.002-05:00

I am calling this week Hannah's week because of a pretty important milestone that happened this week. She is POTTY TRAINED!!!! Woohoo!!!! She was pretty easy and so far she has been the earliest one of the kiddos to be potty trained and I am so excited to not have 2 in diapers. YAY!!!!

So here are a few pictures that I enjoyed taking this last week:

For some reason she loves to take her naps on the floor. About 80% of the time she ends up on the floor sleeping on top of her pillows with her dolls set neatly around her.

Thumb in mouth...

Having fun with her big sis...

July and My Crazy Man

2011-07-17T19:00:00.000-05:00

I've been so impressed with my husband these days as he is running to and from work a few days a week. Running is definitely not his favorite thing but he figured that if he runs to and from work then he doesn't have a choice whether to run or not...HE HAS TO. Anyway, so this past week he has wanted to run many times but has not been able to because of the rain (for the most part it has rained every afternoon for the past week). This past Tuesday afternoon he saw the dark clouds rolling in but figured that he would run home anyway because the dark clouds were south of where he would be running.

I was waiting at home knowing that he was running and looked outside and it started to downpour. Then it started to lightning and thunder. I thought, "Oh my goodness...I hope he gets home soon." Then lo and behold there was my sopping, wet husband standing at the door. He got in and about 2 minutes later it started to hail...and I mean hail a lot. Come to find out from "the natives" this size hail is not normal for this area. It is usually pea sized hail, not nickel to quarter sized...(and in some spots downtown they had golf ball sized hail.) So needless to say we are so glad that we still have a Daddy who was not taken out by the hail or lightning who is able to run to and from work. I think he may think longer next time when he notices those dark clouds rolling in.

So here is a picture of our backyard after it started to hail.

A closer look...

Sorry for those of you that don't like feet, but here is a picture of one of the larger hail balls next to my foot so you can get an idea of the size (I didn't think to go get a quarter or something like that so you wouldn't have to look at my beautiful feet - haha!!)

The Top Fifteen

2011-07-08T21:02:00.011-05:00

It's hard to believe, but this is our one year anniversary of living in Cheyenne. It was actually this past weekend a year ago that we moved from San Antonio to Cheyenne. So we thought that we would think over the last year and give you the TOP FIFTEEN SIGNS YOU KNOW YOU LIVE IN CHEYENNE, WYOMING:

YOU KNOW YOU LIVE IN CHEYENNE WHEN:

15. You get annoyed when a drive from one side of town to the other side of town takes a whole 15 minutes.
14. You can sit at any stop light in the city and not sit for longer than 22 seconds (I know, I've counted.)
13. You actually have time to sit and count how long each stop light is when driving (I know...I'm pathetic.)
12. You can go to a drive in liquor store to buy liquor. That is an oxymoron.
11. You have a baby and people come by to bring your family dinner and the first 2 meals that are brought over are "game meat" - apparently "game meat" is something you shot, cut up, and cooked.
10. Moths. Thousands upon thousands of moths. And that's just in your garage.
9. You can drive by a certain house in a particular neighborhood where a dog sits on the roof much of the day. It is known by the natives as "that house with the dog on the roof."
8. You are told (over and over and over) that it is so windy here that one of the most important things you can do is "to park into the wind" to avoid having your door ripped off. This advice is given by people with first hand experience who can also tell you the best mechanics to whom you should bring your doorless car.
7. You can have a cart full of groceries in the Wal-Mart parking lot (with kiddos in the cart) and have to hold on for dear life so that your children won't roll away in the wind.
6. You can drive your child to school using cruise control for 75% of the ride in order to avoid the busiest road in Wyoming and all three of its stop lights.
5. You are welcomed to the neighborhood by an old guy who won't stop helping you move in even after you (and his wife) kindly ask him to stop...and you find out later that he is the mayor.
4. You can look out your window and see a Menonite woman (in full Menonite clothing) sitting on a tractor lawn mower mowing your neighbors grass.
3. You notice your kiddos playing in the outdoor kiddie pool on July 3rd - they are shivering and have blue lips because they are cold...did I mention that it was JULY 3rd?
2. You drive your child to school in the winter while wearing coat, hat, and gloves in the car because it is minus 15 degrees outside of the car...BRRR!!!
1. You are told repeatedly and mind numbingly, "Oh...wait until you feel the cold and the wind". And you think to yourself, "Come on...it can't be that bad." Then winter comes and you realize that, in fact, it can.

We thought that was a fun way to celebrate our anniversary here. We can't believe a year has already past. All kidding aside, we are enjoying it here and have found Cheyenne to be pretty interesting. We know that the Lord has placed us here in Cheyenne for a reason and we are thankful for that. If you ever want to visit and see these 15 signs for yourself, we would love to have you.

Three Months Old

2011-06-30T20:30:00.002-05:00

Rachel is 3 months old now. Wow...is that hard to believe. When she was 2 1/2 months old she weighed 8 lbs. 8 oz. That put her in the 2nd percentile for weight. YAY!! She is eating well and sleeping well (She is now sleeping 10-11 hours at night most nights of the week - woohoo!!!!!!! Can't wait to hit that 12 hour mark.) She is smiling a lot. She is starting to make the AH sound and gurgles in the back of her throat. She holds her head up well when we support her on our lap. She is not fond of tummy time, but we're going to work on that this month. We are loving every minute with her and are really enjoying the personality that is starting to emerge.

I think she just might be the same size as the giraffe.

We have never used any bows or ribbons on the girls hair when they were babies, but a friend of mine gave us this so I thought I'd give it a try. It is so cute...

But we noticed that it doesn't quite fit yet...(and she just kept on sleeping).

Sweetie pie!

Superday

2011-06-29T21:00:00.001-05:00

This past Saturday was Superday in Cheyenne. It's a festival with lots of food, fun for the kids, vendors selling crafts, organizations with information booths, a car show, and so much more. The best thing about it was that everything was free, except for food and the vendors crafts. The kiddos enjoyed a bouncy slide, trampoline gymnastics, a rock climbing wall, a mechanical bull, and a boy scout ropes course and we didn't get to do even half of the activities. We had a lot of fun!

Emma on the mechanical bull...

and Ethan...

Ethan climbing the rock wall...

He climbed all the way to the top.

Hannah enjoying her thumb...

Emma on the ropes course...

Ethan on a ropes course a little higher off the ground...

Here is Rachel's ride...

It was a Super Day!

Happy Father's Day

2011-06-19T16:03:00.002-05:00

Happy Father's Day! Here are the kiddos with their favorite person after church today. YAY DADDY!!!

Our T-Ball Boy

2011-06-18T22:29:00.000-05:00

This season Ethan is playing T-ball on base. He is really enjoying it. This is his second time playing. His first time was in San Antonio during the summer season and he did not really love it then. We were crazy for playing a sport in San Antonio during the summer. Crazy hot! But he is really enjoying it here in Cheyenne. He has a fun team and his coaches are great.

Up at bat...

He hit it...(can you see the ball?)

On 3rd base giving one of his coaches a high five...

Taste of Fort Collins

2011-06-18T20:53:00.002-05:00

Last Saturday we decided to drive to Fort Collins, CO and check out the festival called, Taste of Fort Collins. It's a festival to raise money for the Special Olympics. They have lots of vendors, restaurants selling food, bands playing music, and a Kids Zone for the kiddos to enjoy. We met my parents and my sister and her kiddos. The kids had a blast. They rode on a roller coaster (this was Ethan's favorite thing), played in hamster balls, jumped on a bungy jump thing (this was Hannah's favorite thing), decorated cupcakes, had their faces painted (this was Emma's favorite thing), and was carried the entire time in the Bjorn (this was Rachel's favorite thing-just kidding). It was a fun day!

(I forgot my camera, yet again, so most of these were taken with my iphone. Sorry if they're fuzzy.)

This is a fun bunch - my mom and dad, my sister and cousin Bridget, Jeremy, Hannah, and Rachel.

This was Ethan's favorite thing - the roller coaster. Emma is sitting in the very back with a kiddo we don't know and then Ethan and cousin Joshua are in front of her.

I think Emma is enjoying it by the look on her face.

Here they are in the hamster balls and loving it. Here is cousin Joshua and Bridget...

and Ethan...

and Emma...

This was Hannah's favorite thing - the bungy jump thing. Here is Ethan...

and Joshua...

and Bridget...

and Emma...

and Hannah...and she is loving it!

This is how Rachel enjoyed the day.

This was Emma's favorite thing - the face painting.

As you can see, we had a great time together.

Our New Found Love

2011-06-10T18:50:00.001-05:00

I must say...our family has come upon a new found love. After Rachel was born we found this love and we are addicted. Feeding Rachel at various hours of the day and night has allowed me to start watching TV a little more than I used to. But there really is not much good TV out there, especially in the evening or late at night. I was flipping through one day and decided to try the Food Network. About 5 years ago I remember thinking my Dad was a little goofy and boring to be watching the Food Network. (Sorry Dad - I am now admitting the error of my ways). Anyway, now I am hooked, Jeremy is hooked, and yes...the kids are hooked. They love watching anyone cooking anything, but they especially love cake shows and cooking competition shows. Even Hannah will sit and watch a 30 minute cake show. She never liked to watch any TV and now she loves the cake show. Now Ethan and Emma want to help me make and cook everything that we eat. Ethan (with the help of his sisters) is even trying to make his own cookbook with pictures of the food that we make together. I will have to blog about it once he finishes it. Anyway, if you also want a new found love...try the Food Network.

Here they are getting ready to make yum-yum brownie muffins for our cookbook.

Two Months Old

2011-06-06T22:00:00.001-05:00

Sweet Rachel was 2 months old the end of May. Wow. I can't believe it. She is quite a sweet pea and the kiddos just love her, love her, love her. She is starting to smile a lot, especially when we're talking to her and smiling at her. She loves to be held (maybe a little too much as she is sometimes quite discontent if she is not being held). She is sleeping pretty well at night. She averages around 5-7 hours at night - woohoo!!!! She also took her first plane trip to San Antonio a couple of weeks ago. We can't wait to see what month 3 brings.

Here she is with "The Giraffe" (right now he is bigger than she is).

Is she sucking 2 fingers? Not quite sure I've seen someone using their thumb and index finger.

Love, love, love this picture...

And this one too...

Our Trip to San Antonio - Part 2

2011-06-03T20:30:00.001-05:00

We made it to San Antonio - YAY!! We stayed with our good friends, the Davies. It was 4 adults and a total of 7 kids in one house for a week. It was crazy at times, but so fun. We even had a sick kiddo in the house the whole week but that didn't stop all of the little ones from playing nonstop with each other. They didn't care and I don't know how it happened, but none of my kiddos got sick. Praise the Lord! We got to go to the church that we attended when we lived there, we saw the finished elementary school that they were building behind our house when we lived there, we visited some parks, and we ate at some of our favorite San Antonio restaurants. But the most important thing for us was the chance to see all of our wonderful friends and to just hang out and catch up a little. The kiddos enjoyed seeing their friends too. It was around 100 degrees in San Antonio while we were there and we actually enjoyed the warm weather for a change. Unfortunately I didn't take many pictures. I'm not quite sure why. I guess I was just so excited to see friends and catch up that I didn't take the time to get out the camera. Oh well. We can't wait to see our friends again soon.

Here are some pictures of the kiddos at the park.

I still can't believe I don't have any pictures of our friends. Oh well. Maybe next time.

Our trip to San Antonio - Part 1 (The Airplane Trip)

2011-06-02T21:00:00.000-05:00

Last week we had the wonderful opportunity to go to San Antonio. Jeremy was TDY taking a course all week so we thought it would be fun to join him. We had a crazy week but it was so much fun. So let me start from the beginning. Part 1 (Warning - this is long so beware if you decide to read the whole thing. I mainly wrote this so I will never forget our experience because it was a crazy one.)

On Friday, we picked up Ethan from his last day of Kindergarten around 11:00 and headed to the Cheyenne airport. We were hoping to make it to San Antonio by Friday evening so that we could go to the Bible study group that we were a part of when we lived there. There are no straight flights from Cheyenne to San Antonio so we had to connect in Dallas. We knew that we would only have a 45 minute layover in Dallas so we figured that we would have to book it in the airport to catch our next flight even if everything was on time on the Cheyenne end of things.

So we got to the Cheyenne airport and the weather was just beautiful for flying. I figured that there would be no reason that we would be late to Dallas. However, we ended up sitting on the airplane for about an hour before we left. It was something about having too much weight on the airplane (or something like that...still not quite sure since they never explained it to us.) We knew that we had missed our flight in Dallas because we were late and it also looked like we would not make it to San Antonio for the Bible study. Come to find out there was really bad weather in Dallas. Our plane had to circle the airport a couple of times before we could land and the airport was even closed for an extended period of time so many flights were cancelled.

Once we landed in Dallas they told us that they had rescheduled us for another flight to San Antonio, but not until Saturday afternoon. WHAT!!! Bummer. They told us that our luggage was on the next flight to San Antonio that night (we asked three different people where our luggage was and they all said the same thing.) So we had no flight and no way to get our luggage. Double bummer. Because our luggage was sent to San Antonio that night we decided to try to stick it out at the airport in order to try for a standby flight instead of just calling it a night and getting a hotel. We thought the chances of actually getting on a plane standby was highly unlikely since we had our entire family to try to get seats on the plane. But one lady told us that our chances were pretty good so we stuck it out. After not getting on the first standby flight we actually got seats on the next standby flight. We were so super excited.

By this time it was around 8:30 in the evening. We were tired, but we knew that we would be in San Antonio later that evening. About an hour later they told us that there was a problem with the walkway from the terminal to the plane and the lights were out because of the bad storm earlier that evening so we would actually have to board the plane by going outside and then using the stairs going up to the plane. We were bummed that the plane would be leaving later but were still so glad to actually get to San Antonio that night.

Then around 9:30 they told us that the flight was totally cancelled. WHAT!!! Ugh. And because we had actually gotten tickets for that flight our seats on the 3:00 flight on the next day, Saturday, were no longer available. Now the earliest flight we could get on Saturday was for 9:00 in the evening. WHAT!!! Ugh!! We decided to get a hotel and then get to the airport on Saturday morning to try to fly standby and get to San Antonio earlier.

We got to bed around midnight that night. Wow, what a day. The kiddos were troopers but were not really fond of flying at this point. We got up on Saturday and made it to the airport again. We did not make our first standby flight but made our second one and got to San Antonio around noon on Saturday. We were so excited to get to San Antonio and we were excited to be getting our luggage.

I forgot to mention that I had only packed enough diapers for Hannah and Rachel for one day on our carry on bag. I only had 2 diapers left for Rachel and one left for Hannah on Saturday. Hannah actually had to sit on the last flight with a poopy diaper because we ran out of diapers for her. We got to the baggage claim and guess what...our luggage was not in San Antonio after all...is was still in Dallas. WHAT!!! They told us our luggage was in San Antonio and we slept in a hotel in Dallas with no new clothes, no toiletries, and no good way of getting clean and our luggage was sitting in Dallas the entire time. WHAT!!! Oh well, there was nothing we could do but wait. Our luggage came in that night on a later flight. Whew. Even though this part of our trip was crazy, Jeremy and I just got to the point where all we could do was laugh. I think some people were looking at us and wondering why in the world we were laughing.

So this was the beginning of our trip to San Antonio...more to come.

This is a picture of 3 of the kiddos late Friday night waiting to get on a standby flight. Check out their cute shirts that a friend gave to us after Rachel was born. Rachel's shirt said "Little Sister".

Here we are Saturday morning waiting for another standby flight. Notice the kiddos have different shirts on. I actually thought to pack each of the kiddos a shirt in our carry on bag in case one of them got sick on the plane or if they got spit up on etc. Who knew that they would want clean shirts because we wouldn't have our bags.

Here I am with the 3 girls on the plane on Saturday (we got the last 5 seats on the plane).

Here is Jeremy and Ethan on the plane.

Kindergarten Graduation

2011-05-29T22:55:00.000-05:00

A big milestone happened in the Parker household on May 12th...Ethan graduated from Kindergarten. I can't believe that my first baby will be in 1st grade next year. We are so thankful for all that he learned this past year. I think he looks excited to be graduating.

Our Soccer Girl

2011-05-29T22:46:00.000-05:00

Emma started playing soccer this month. This is the first team sport that we have put her in and she is so excited to be able to finally play instead of just watching her brother play. She is also excited that her team color is purple. (I think the kids like the snacks just as much as playing - can't you tell).

So What's Been Going On

2011-05-16T22:04:00.002-05:00

So what has been going on in the Parker household this past month...? LOTS!!!

This is what my girlies do in their spare time...they call it face painting.

Here they are hanging with cousins...

Here is a Daddy of 3 little girls (getting his nails painted...and loving it - I think he was given 14 coats of nail polish this day and had to use a chisel to get it off).

This is a multitasker...attempting pull ups while holding a baby in the Baby bjorn. GO DAD!

Here is my big helper trying to snap Rachel's buttons.

I think they all love their new sister.

More to come...

One Month Old

2011-04-29T21:01:00.001-05:00

Sorry it's been awhile since I've posted anything. I can't believe our sweet Rachel is one month old. What a whirlwind we have had over the past month. After Rachel was born we spent the first week together as a family adjusting to our new little addition. The next week Jeremy went to San Antonio for a class and my parents came to stay with us. The following week Jeremy's mother and father came to help out. We had a great time with grandparents. Here are a few pictures of our time together.

Here is a happy Grandma and Grandpa Stefko:

Here is our cutie pie:

Here is a happy Grandpa Dave and Grandma Karen:

Here is Rachel with her bili blanket. She was pretty jaundice after she was born so she had to be on a bili blanket for a week (Do you see the blue glow?)

Some more cutie pie pictures. I must say, she is pretty adorable.

Stay tuned for more pictures...

My first day all by myself with all 4 kiddos

2011-04-06T21:42:00.001-05:00

Well, I made it through my first full day and 2 full nights all by myself with all 4 of the kiddos. I can honestly say I was a little nervous. Jeremy flew to San Antonio for a class on Sunday so I was winging it on Sunday and Monday. But then praise the Lord my parents drove up on Tuesday afternoon to help for the rest of this week. Yay!!! Go Grandparents!! I must say I don't think I did too badly. Everyone was dressed in the morning, nourished at each meal, bathed in the evening, and everyone is still alive and accounted for. I think I might just be able to manage this once all of our company leaves...I hope!

Going home

2011-03-24T16:47:00.001-05:00

We got to leave the hospital on the 24th around 3 PM, so little Miss Rachel was not quite 24 hours before we got to take her home. We were so glad to be able to leave the hospital and go home to be near the kiddos and to try to get some rest.

Do you see the bow that one of the nurses put on her head after her bath? Cute!

Jeremy has a tradition where we get a picture of each of the children as he does his Heisman pose.

Getting ready to leave the hospital.

At home in front of our house (we also try to get a pose in front of our door with all of our kiddos when we bring them home from the hospital.)

Here are the kiddos after they opened up their gifts that they got from Rachel. They were very excited to see that she gave them each some books.

Sorry this picture is so fuzzy, but I thought it was precious.

Meeting the family

2011-03-24T15:38:00.001-05:00

On Thursday, the 24th, Rachel Ann got to meet her brother, sisters, aunt, and cousins. As you can see she was very excited and so were her sisters and brother.

Everyone got a chance to hold Rachel.

Is this child excited or what!

Even her cousins got a chance to hold her.

My sister was awesome. She held down the fort at our home while we were in the hospital. She took care of all 5 kiddos and the dog by herself and did an awesome job. Thanks sis.

Welcome Rachel Ann!!

2011-03-23T21:00:00.001-05:00

Rachel Ann was born today, Wednesday, March 23rd at 4:41 PM. She weighed 5 lbs 8 oz and was 18.5 inches long. We are so excited to welcome her into the Parkerbunch.

Hannah's First Hair-Cut

2011-03-22T16:46:00.000-05:00

Here are a few pictures of Hannah's first haircut. There are not any cute cartoon kid places to get your hair cut here in Cheyenne. So we opted for Great Clips. She still doesn't have too much hair but her hair was just getting crazy so I thought I'd better take her in before baby #4 comes. Isn't she adorable!!!!

Here she is with crazy hair...

OK, so it still looks pretty crazy, but having it out of her eyes makes it worth it. She sure is enjoying her lollipop.

My pregnant self

2011-03-22T16:11:00.002-05:00

For those of you beautiful friends who keep asking me to post a pregnant picture of myself...here goes. We took it last week when I was 36 weeks. Smile!!!!

Field Trip - Dairy Farm and Aquarium

2011-03-22T16:00:00.000-05:00

This past Friday Ethan's class took a field trip to a dairy farm and the Denver Aquarium. I went along and took the girls as well. At the dairy farm we had a great time learning about how cows make milk, the temperaments of the different types of cows, watching the cows being milked, and we even got to pet baby calfs and feed some goats. At the end of our tour they gave us some yummy ice cream that they make there at the farm. At the aquarium the kiddos enjoyed all of the fish, sharks, and sea life that they could. We were pretty tired by the end of our day but we can say that we had a lot of fun.

Here is Ethan feeding a goat.

Here is Emma and Hannah petting a cow.

Here are the kiddos at the end of the aquarium tour

Funny Conversation of the Week - A Great Parker!

2011-03-17T21:56:00.000-05:00

I have to tell you about a funny conversation that I had with Emma this week. It just cracked me up.

A couple of days ago I was encouraging Emma and Hannah to clean up all of the toys that they had played with in the basement that day. I started to become frustrated with Emma because she was starting to complain about having to do it. So I looked at her in a very calm way (I was actually very calm and I did not raise my voice) and I said "Emma Grace Parker." Then all of a sudden she started to cry and sob and carry on. I was shocked. I know that I've said this before and I've never gotten quite that reaction from her. So I pulled her aside and knelt down and looked into her big blue eyes. First, I told her to calm down because I couldn't understand anything she was saying. Then, I asked her..."Emma, what's wrong? Why are you crying?" Then she said between gulps of air and tears streaming down her face, "You said, I'm not a great Parker!" "You said, I'm not a great Parker!" Oh my goodness, I thought. She didn't think I said, "Emma Grace Parker", she thought I said, "You're not a great Parker!" That just cracked me up and I started to laugh and then I explained to her what I actually said and that she will always be a great Parker.

Painted Faces

2011-03-08T21:45:00.000-06:00

This past weekend Ethan's school held a fundraiser, which was a carnival night filled with games, auctions, chili, and fun. The kiddos had a great time and my parents and my sister's family came to have some fun as well. Here is a picture we got of the kiddos and their painted faces. As you can see Emma and Hannah were butterflies and Ethan was a tiger. By the end of night no one wanted to take off their painted faces. But they finally agreed with a lot of coaxing.

Father Daughter Banquet

2011-02-06T21:14:00.000-06:00

Yesterday evening Jeremy and Emma went to a Father/Daughter banquet given by our church. They had a great time. There was a dinner, dancing, professional pictures, and Emma even got to bring home a rose and balloon. They had a great time. She decided that she wanted to wear her new "beautiful" dress and she wanted to wear her hair like "Hally's" (a new doll that she got for Christmas).

Here are some before pictures...

and some after pictures with her balloon and rose.

I think they had a great time together.

Brrr!!!

2011-02-02T22:56:00.001-06:00

Can anyone say brrrr!!!! This is what the car temperature gauge read yesterday morning when I was driving Ethan to school. This was the actual temperature and then I remembered that the wind chill was actually 40 degrees below zero. I don't think the high got above negative 2 degrees all day. Yikes. I can honestly say I've never lived anywhere the temperature was that cold. I'm sure some of you out there have, but this kid never has. It's quite an experience.

Isn't She Just The Cutest

2011-01-30T22:36:00.000-06:00

Isn't she just the cutest munchkin you've ever seen? (And Hannah really loves to read her Bible so I just had to get this picture.)

Little Miss Independent

2011-01-28T20:57:00.000-06:00

This week has been a week of sickness in the Parker household. Hannah was sick for a couple of days over the weekend and then Emma got sick this week. Hopefully the rest of us will not get it this weekend. Anyway, Little Miss Emma showed quite an independent side to herself one evening this week.

She told me that her tummy was hurting, so before she went to bed I gave her a bucket and I put it next to her bed. I told her that if she had to throw up that she should try to do it in the bucket if she could. Then I told her that she should come get me if she needed me at all that night. So around midnight she woke me up and told me her tummy hurt. I went to her room, rubbed her head a little, and gave her some medicine. We both went back to sleep and then I never heard from her again that night. When I woke her up the next morning she looked at me and said, "I threw up in the bucket last night." I said, "You did?" She said, "Yes." I looked in the bucket and, sure enough, she had done it in the bucket. Then I said, "Why didn't you wake up Mommy so I could help you?" She said, "I don't know...I just threw up in the bucket."

Talk about an awesome independent kid. I felt bad that she didn't wake me up but then I also felt pretty good that I didn't have to wake up. I wonder if this will happen again. We'll see.

This picture was taken over the summer, but I thought it was cute of my munchkin.

Fun Conversations of the Week!

2011-01-25T20:49:00.001-06:00

So it's been awhile since I posted any fun conversations. Hopefully you'll get a kick out of some of these.

1. One evening I was standing in front of the bathroom mirror taking off parts of my face that don't belong there (yes...waxing...something women love to do...NOT). Anyway, Emma was just staring at me and she asked me why I was doing what I was doing. I told her that sometimes when you get older this is something that women do.

Then Emma said, "I don't want Mommy to grow old."
Then I said, "Why?"
Then Emma said, "Because I like this Mommy."

Isn't she just soooooooooooooo sweet.

2. One night Jeremy was getting ready to read the Bible to the kiddos and he said, "Ethan, can you get me the Bible?" I guess he was far away from Jeremy because he proceeded to say, "I can't throw it, that would mess up God's word."

3. One night I was doing something (I can't remember exactly what it was. I could have possibly been eating some peanut butter or something and Emma had just brushed her teeth so she couldn't have any). So she said, "Mommy's and Daddy's get to do whatever they want to do...but kids can't do what they want to do." I just thought to myself, "You're exactly right kiddo."

4. Tonight we were eating Mac-N-Cheese (the Toy Story kind where the noodles look like Toy Story characters) and all of a sudden Hannah said, "I want Woody." This is coming from a child who just started talking more clearly about a week ago. Prior to this we couldn't hardly understand much of what she said. But it was clear tonight that she wanted Woody. Now how in the world she knows who Woody is, is beyond me. Must have heard it from an older sibling.

Our Raggedy Ann/Barbie/Supergirl

2011-01-19T21:56:00.000-06:00

Emma came downstairs this past week dressed like this and asked me if I would take a picture of her. I'm not quite sure what or who she was trying to dress up like, but I thought it was so cute that she put together an outfit from a bunch of different characters. She has a Barbie dress on with a pink cape and a Raggedy Ann wig. What a cutie.

Our Basketball Superstar!

2011-01-19T21:40:00.000-06:00

Ethan started his first season of basketball back in the fall on a base league. They mainly practiced in the fall, but now that the holidays are over they have started playing games. Their team name is the Timberwolves. Ethan had his second game tonight and he scored his first 2 baskets of the season. He was so excited that he was able to help his team win.

These are pictures from his first game.

He loves playing defense...so much so that he is constantly guarding his guy (Here he is looking back to make sure he doesn't lose his guy.) His coach is the guy with the maroon shirt on in the background.

Ice Skating Fun

2011-01-18T17:42:00.000-06:00

Yesterday, we went to Fort Collins, CO to an outdoor ice rink to take the kiddos ice skating for the first time. I think they had fun. Hannah spent her time in the stroller with me outside the rink, Emma spent most of her time gripped to Jeremy, and Ethan spent most of his time horizontal on the ice. They only lasted a little while but I think they had fun. Enjoy the pics taken from my iphone.

Here is the beginning of the skating fun. All three standing and skating together. How cute.

Here are the three...2 still standing and one on the ground holding on for dear life.

Ethan keeping Daddy pretty close.

Emma using a trash can to help for balance (the skating rink provided these trash cans to help the little ones with their balance - neat idea.)

Ethan with his trash can.

By the end of the day...Daddy leaving the kiddos in the dust, Emma gripping the trash can for dear life, and Ethan on the ground more often than balancing on his skates.

Little Miss Hannah hanging out with me in her stroller. Adorable. Maybe she'll get a chance to skate next time.

Happy Birthday, Hannah!

2011-01-08T21:48:00.001-06:00

Hannah turned 2 today! I can't believe it. She is getting to be such a big girl and she is growing up too fast. We had a nice time getting to celebrate her birthday with a kitty cat cake and lots of presents. I decided to do a kitty cat cake because she loved to run after the 2 cats at Grandma Karen and Grandpa Dave's house in Florida while we were there over the Christmas holiday.

So kitty cat cake it was.

Hannah trying to blow out her candle. She never did quite figure it out, but she sure can pucker.

Why use a fork when you can use an entire fist.

Can you tell they are having fun?

Oh my goodness...check out those tonsils.

Hannah and her gifts.

The crew.

Here are a few pictures of when we celebrated Hannah's birthday last weekend with Grandma and Grandpa Stefko and my sister's family.

Oooh...an outdoor bike and an indoor bike.

I iced some brownies to make the early celebration special.

Happy 2nd Birthday, Hannah! We love you!

A Happy New Year

2011-01-07T21:52:00.000-06:00

We the chance to celebrate New Year's Eve with my parents and my sister's family. They drove up from Colorado to hang out at our place on December 31st. We rang in the new year together, ate yummy food, and played a lot of Band Hero.

Jeremy, Ethan, Uncle Jacob, Joshua, and Bridget enjoying Band Hero.

Ethan loving the drums.

Emma and Ethan playing the drums together.

Even Grandma and Grandpa got in on the action.

Emma and Bridget enjoyed having their nails painted by Aunt Kristin.

I just love how Hannah wants to be like the big kiddos. They have their Leapster and Hannah has her own music phone.

Our Florida Christmas

2010-12-30T22:38:00.001-06:00

It's crazy to think that it has taken me so long to get to blogging about our Christmas. So sorry for all of you who are waiting anxiously to hear. So here goes...We had a great time and there is so much to share. For Christmas we traveled to Florida to spend it with Jeremy's family. We flew out on Saturday, December 18th. We arrived in the afternoon and had just enough time to drop off our things at his parents house and then we went into the city to watch the Orlando Magic basketball game. Emma wanted to stay home with Grandma and Hannah, so it was just me, Jeremy, Ethan, Grandpa Dave, Uncle Kelly, and Aunt Jenny. Ethan loved it. (By the way, many of these pictures are from my iphone so may be somewhat blurry.)

On Sunday, the 19th we drove to Tampa to see the Tampa Buccaneers game. It was awesome. We sat right in front of the pirate ship which shoots off sounds like a cannon whenever Tampa gets a touchdown. It also shoots out beads to catch as well. That was a lot of fun for the kiddos.

Here we all are (Emma, Cousin Alyssa, Jeremy, Hannah, Ethan, Aunt Jenny, Cousing Megan, and Uncle Kelly).

We were actually sitting this close to the pirate ship.

We stayed in Tampa at a hotel that night and then drove to Fort Myers, FL on Monday the 20th to hang out at a beach resort for the next 4 days with Grandma Karen, Grandpa Dave, and Jeremy's sister and her family. The kiddos enjoyed playing on the beach, finding seashells, building sandcastles, and swimming in the pool. Thank goodness the pool was heated because it was chilly in Florida and would have been too cold to swim if the pool had not been heated.

This is how Ethan played in the sand...he jumped in the ocean, jumped out quickly as it was cold, and then proceeded to roll around in the sand. You gotta love the sand.

Emma spent most of her time finding seashells.

Hannah just loved walking around in the sand and getting sand and saltwater between her toes. She also liked to keep Mommy and Daddy hopping in order to make sure that she didn't take a swim in the ocean.

Here we are looking for seashells and making our first attempt at a sandcastle. Cousin Alyssa joined in too.

Here is our second attempt at a sandcastle. I think we did much better.

Check out that beautiful sunset.

We drove back to Sanford, FL on Friday the 24th and went to the Christmas Eve service and Jeremy's parents church. They even had a living nativity. We spent Christmas day at Jeremy's parent's house. The kiddos loved their gifts and we just had a really nice day hanging out with family. Even the youngest cousins got to sit, relax, and cuddle with Grandpa Dave.

We flew back home on Sunday, the 26th. We had an awesome time and would love to do it again sometime. (On a side note - we did not take our camera on the trip because we knew that there would be lots of cameras going. So all the pictures above, except the ones taken with the iphone, were sent to us from Grandma Karen. Thanks, Grandma Karen).

Christmas Program

2010-12-13T21:16:00.001-06:00

This past Thursday evening we had the privilege of attending our first ever (for our kiddos) Elementary School Christmas concert (there will be many more to come after this one.) Ethan's school put on their Christmas program and it was awesome. There was singing, drama, sign language, the band, the handbells, and some good ole' fun. Ethan and his Kindergarten class sang a couple of songs and helped out by reciting various verses of the Christmas story. Ethan and 2 other boys were the wise men and he got to stand up and recite a verse and then say "Frankincense", which was the gift that he brought for the baby Jesus. He was so excited to sing and have a speaking part and he was so excited to have all of us and Grandma and Grandpa Stefko there to watch. That morning he woke up and asked if Daddy and I were going to come to the concert. I thought it was so funny to think that he thought we might not come. We loved it and can't wait for many more years of programs like this one.

(Don't you like the heads in the front of the picture? - sorry).

You gotta love the shirt hanging out while doing some sign language. He sure does look cute with his vest and tie.

My Cookie Monster

2010-12-11T21:49:00.000-06:00

This week Emma and I made Christmas cookies for the neighbors. We made our Daddy's famous Chocolate Chip Butterscotch cookies. As you can see, Emma had a good time. Even Hannah got in on some of the action.

Base Christmas Fun

2010-12-09T21:47:00.000-06:00

A week ago, on Friday, we took part in the FE Warren Base Festivities. We went to the Christmas tree lighting and then went to the base community center for some food, bouncy house fun, and pictures with Santa. As you can see, Hannah was not all that excited about Santa so I had to get in the picture with the kiddos because she did not want to get close to him without me.

Here are the munchkins enjoying some hot chocolate at the tree lighting (I can't believe that I didn't even get a picture of the tree. Can anyone say LOSER!)

It's bouncy house time.

What would we do without our yearly Santa picture.

A little closer up (notice all the kiddos in their Bucs shirts).

Gotta get one with the kiddos on Santa's knee (sure wish the youngest one would have gone for it).

The Rest of Ethan's Birthday Pictures

2010-12-08T21:14:00.003-06:00

Here are the pictures of the rest of Ethan's birthday celebration. Jeremy and I missed it as we were in route to Florida to be with Jeremy's family after his Dad had a heart attack. We had planned to go bowling and have dinner, cake, and ice cream in Wyoming with my family from Colorado. With the change of plans my family had a little party for him at their home instead. The night before I made a Star Wars X-Wing Fighter cake so they got to eat that as well. I must say, it was pretty fun to make. Enjoy the pictures that my Mom and Dad took!

An Unexpected Thanksgiving Blessing

2010-11-25T23:05:00.000-06:00

We woke up Saturday morning, November 20th, to what we thought would be a day of bowling, eating cake, and singing Happy Birthday to Ethan to celebrate his birthday with his aunt, uncle, cousins, and Grandma and Grandpa. We also thought we would get the opportunity to call Grandpa Dave later in the day to sing him "Happy Birthday" as today was his 54th birthday. But lo and behold the Lord would bring a different type of blessing to this day. Right after breakfast, around 8:45, Jeremy got a call from his mom telling us that his dad (Grandpa Dave) had a heart attack that morning and was having a cardiac cath. At around 10:45 the cardiologist called Jeremy to tell us that his dad had a major heart attack where they had to shock his heart with "the paddles" and that one of his vessels was 100% blocked. They were able to place a stent in it, but the next 48 hours were critical. He would either make it through without any complications or he might die. So needless to say, we took the kids to my parents home in Colorado and hopped on a plane to Florida to be with his family to help out in any way that we could. His dad was in the ICU for 2 days. He made it through those first 48 hours and he is doing well. His heart is at about 50% of normal function. So he has a challenging road ahead of him where he will have to change his diet, change his workout regimen (the doctor won't even let him walk 100 yards yet in order to allow his heart to heal), change his stress level etc. He was allowed to go home today, Thanksgiving of all days. What a wonderful thanksgiving blessing. We are so thankful and blessed that the Lord orchestrated the events of that Saturday in a way that only He could do. I hope you take a moment to thank the Lord for what you are thankful for today. We know that this tops our list.

Happy Birthday, Ethan!

2010-11-19T21:36:00.006-06:00

Wow! I can’t believe my baby boy is 6 years old! He woke up early this morning to greet the day. He came downstairs and just gave me a big smile. He knew he was 6 and you could tell he was so proud. Anyway, he went to school dressed in his “dressy” clothes. They had school spirit week all week and Friday was dress up day so all the girls wore fancy dresses and the boys wore dress pants and ties. He was so excited and he looked too cute. We decided to have his birthday party at school this year (mainly because all of the neat stuff that we had thought to do, like renting out a gymnastics place or swimming or bouncy type things, Ethan was still not able to do because he is only a couple of weeks out from his eye surgery). So we took pizza to share and I made cupcakes for the kiddos to decorate. I think they really liked it. Ethan was so excited because he also got to invite a couple of the older kiddos in school that have been playing football with him during their recess time. He thought that was so special. After school he chose to have tacos for dinner and then we celebrated and gave him our presents. Fun, fun, fun. I think he had a good day. Enjoy the pictures.

More to come with more birthday celebrations!

Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow!

2010-11-18T21:12:00.011-06:00

OK…so I don’t think I’ve lived anywhere where it snowed 4 out of the 7 days in the week. Well, now I can say that I have. Last week it snowed about 4 days. It didn’t accumulate very much but it was just so interesting to have it snow for a few hours one day and then the next day it would snow a little more. I also don’t think I’ve lived anywhere where it snows and is icy and the kiddos still go to school on time. Well, now I can say that I have. This Wyoming life will certainly be interesting.

The kiddos had a blast in the snow and were so excited to make their first snowman/snowlady. We call her a snowlady because the snow was pretty powdery and not very good for packing, so we used the melted snow that was on our patio to try to make the rest of the snow packable. So needless to say it was really hard to make actual snowballs for the body of our snow person. Well, maybe we should call it a snowmound with a head. HA!

Are you ready for a snow ball fight?

Here is our very own snowman/snowlady/blob.

A Visit from Grandma and Grandpa

2010-11-16T22:39:00.000-06:00

This past weekend we had a nice visit with Jeremy's parents, Grandma Karen and Grandpa Dave. This was their first visit to Cheyenne, so we were able to show them the sights of Cheyenne and nearby Fort Collins, CO. We were also able to fit in a few snowball fights as it snowed the first day they were here.

Here is Grandpa Dave at the playground.

Here is Grandma Karen (wow...she is spinning fast).

Here is one of the many snowball fights. Grandpa Dave is winding up.

This is what Hannah spent most of her time doing (eating snow).

Emma enjoying the snow.

How cute is she.

Can you believe that this mother allowed her children to play in the snow without gloves and without snow boots (To my defense...I did not realize that we were going to play in the snow when we left the house. Oh well. I guess I should always have cold weather gear in the car.) As you can tell from Ethan's fist of snow, I don't think he minded.

Hey, who is that masked clone trooper?

Happy Halloween from the Spidey Triplets

2010-10-31T22:51:00.000-05:00

So Happy Halloween from the Parker Spidey Triplets. Yep, you guessed it...we had Spider-Man, Spider-Girl, and Spider-Baby (and would you believe, Hannah kept on the mask the entire night).

Here are a couple funny stories from today:

1. For the last couple of months Emma has been saying that she was going to dress up as a princess on Halloween. So we figured that she would wear one of the many, many, many princess dresses that we own. So I took Ethan to get his costume and he wanted to be Spider-Man. Then Emma saw a pink Spider-Girl costume and had to have it. So she quickly decided that she no longer wanted to be a princess, but Spider-Girl. Then the two older ones saw a Spider-Baby costume for Hannah and they all wanted to match. So that is what we decided to do.

2. As we were beginning our annual pumpkin carving excitement we thought the kiddos would be so excited to get their hands extra gooey in their very own pumpkin. Ethan began by saying, "I don't like this stuff. Mommy, would you take out the guts?" Then Emma started to cry and cry and cry. So being the wonderful and kind parents that we are we told her to get over it and start taking the guts out. So after she calmed down she slowly started taking the insides of the pumpkin out. The entire time she kept repeating this phrase, "Disgusting...gooey...piece of junk." This just cracked us up.

This is a really bad picture, but this was the best one I could get of Emma's disgusted face.

Here is the pumpkin I made with Emma.

Here is the pumpkin Jeremy made with Ethan.

3. As we were trick-or-treating in our neighborhood we started seeing a lot of kids. For those of you that don't know, we live in an area that has quite a bit more older people than kiddos. I think I've only spotted maybe 12 kiddos that are of elementary school age in our little square of a neighborhood. So I only bought 2 bags of candy. I even kept the bags figuring that we would have lots of left over candy to eat. Anyway, as we proceeded to one of our neighbors houses he came out and said, "Are you ready for the spectacle?" So we said, "No, what do you mean?" Then he said, "Oh, you should expect to have about 400 kiddos come through tonight." What! Where are all of these kids coming from. I looked at Jeremy and he looked at me and we realized that we totally did not have enough candy. Needless to say there were a ton of kids walking our sidewalks. Not quite sure where they were all coming from. I think a lot of parents drove their kids to our neighborhood to go trick-or-treating. Well, now we know what to expect for next year.

Happy Birthday, Emma!

2010-10-30T23:05:00.000-05:00

Happy 4th Birthday Emma!!! Today Emma turned 4. This past Thursday we celebrated her birthday with Grandma and Grandpa S, Aunt Kristin, Uncle Jacob, cousins Joshua and Bridget. Emma chose to go to Chuck-E-Cheese, so that is what we did. We had a blast. We played games, ate pizza, ate some princess castle cake, and opened gifts.

Today, Emma's actual birthday, started out with a hoot. For every child's birthday in our family we always decorate their room the night before after they have gone to sleep. So after Emma went to sleep last night we blew up balloons and put them in her room along with a happy birthday banner. Around 1:00 this morning I heard crying and sobbing coming from Emma's room. I quickly got out of bed and went to see what was wrong. When I asked her what was wrong she said, "What are these balloons?" Then I asked her if she was scared of the balloons and she said, "Yes." I quickly told her that they were her surprise birthday balloons and that she should not be scared of them. She seemed OK after that and went back to sleep. When I asked her about it at breakfast she said, "I thought the balloons were from the monsters." I was just cracking up. Anyway, the rest of our day brought more cake, more presents, a movie, pizza, popcorn, and mommy and Emma going to a beauty salon to get Emma's nails polished. I thought Emma would love that and she did. Enjoy the pictures!

It was a lot of fun to make her princess castle cake.

This was the first time she saw it and I think she liked it.

Hannah really likes Chuck-E-Cheese.

Emma enjoying the ferris wheel chair.

Joshua and the race car.

Bridget and the horse.

Ethan and the football throw.

All of us eating pizza.

Emma blowing out her candle.

Emma giving a kiss to her new Fancy Nancy Doll.

Emma showing off her presents today, her birthday.

Happy Birthday! We love you!

Ethan's Eye Surgery

2010-10-30T22:03:00.000-05:00

We left for Denver, CO on Thursday for Ethan's pre-op appointment for his strabismus surgery. Then on Friday, the 29th, we got up bright and early and went to an outpatient surgery center in Colorado for Ethan to have his surgery. The doctor did the surgery on both eyes. She basically cut a muscle on the middle part of his eye (near the nasal bone) and reattached it to a different spot in order to allow his eye to no longer cross. He did well in the surgery and it only took the doctor about 30 minutes, pretty quick. He was pretty groggy to wake up but did well when he finally did wake up. The afternoon was pretty rough because his eyes were hurting pretty bad. But he slept well that night and only woke up one time for about an hour needing some pain meds and an ice pack for his eyes. He was much better by this morning. He is our trooper. Here is a before and after surgery picture. Thank you to all of you who were praying for him. We could tell.

Here is the before picture that morning.

Here he is on Saturday, the day after.

I Guess This Is The Beginning

2010-10-25T22:08:00.000-05:00

I guess this is the beginning of our winter weather here in Cheyenne. We have been waiting for the "so called" winter weather that everyone here has been warning us of. But so far the weather has been really nice...that is, until today. I woke up to watch the weather man say that we would have cooler weather and strong winds...with possible gusts up to 65 mph. Did I hear him correctly? Did he say possible gusts up to 65 mph? That doesn't seem like just strong winds. That seems like hurricane force winds to me. Anyway, I'm not sure if we ever got up to 65 mph winds but they were pretty strong. I think the strong winds are pretty much a norm around here. So we better get used to it.

Then around 5:00 tonight I was upstairs with the kiddos and I looked out of the window and saw that it was snowing. I couldn't believe it. They weren't calling for snow and 5 minutes prior it was nice and sunny. So the snow mixed with the wind made it look like we were having a serious snow storm. It only lasted for a couple of minutes and didn't really do much after all. The kiddos were excited and had to go outside to play in the snow, or lack therof. Enjoy pictures of our first snowfall here in Cheyenne.

The kiddos showing off their new snowboots. You can see a little snow on the grill and the patio chairs that tipped over because of the wind. If you look closely you can even pick out all of the branches and twigs that we have been cleaning out of our backyard. Thank goodness that project is almost done.

Here is a picture I took after the kiddos went to bed so you could see just how much snow we got (not that much...but the kiddos were excited anyway.)

A Whirlwind of a Weekend

2010-10-24T21:48:00.000-05:00

This past weekend Jeremy and I had the privilege of flying to Hawaii so that Jeremy could take his Pediatric Boards so that he can be a board certified pediatrician. Pretty neat. We have never been to Hawaii and thought it would be a great opportunity to go. We flew out on Saturday, the 16th, and flew back on Tuesday, the 19th. So it was a whirlwind of a trip. We were so thankful that my parents came to watch Ethan, Emma, and Hannah while we were gone. The kiddos had a great time and I know they were sad to see Grandma and Grandpa go home.

On Saturday we got to our hotel on the island of Oahu and walked around the area to see the beaches and shopping and all that Waikiki had to offer. I was pretty tired by the evening as Hawaii is 4 hours earlier than Mountain Time so I actually took a nap (I know...pretty boring).

On Sunday, we decided to rent a car and drive around the island of Oahu. It was really neat to see most of the island and all of the scenery was just beautiful. We made a stop at the Dole Plantation where Dole fruit (especially pineapples) are grown and ate some yummy pineapple ice cream and fresh pineapples. At the end of the day we stopped by Pearl Harbor but we were too late to go on any tours so we just walked around the area and could see the USS Missouri from a distance.

On Monday, Jeremy was busy taking his test for most of the day. So I went for a run along the beach, did a little shopping, spent some time taking pictures of the beautiful trees (the trees in Hawaii are just awesome), and just relaxed.

On Tuesday we headed to the airport bright and early and headed home. Definitely a whirlwind, but well worth it. Enjoy some of the pictures. Unfortunately I did not get pictures of some things because I did not have my camera on me the whole time (Go figure - how could I not have my camera with me at all times in Hawaii - oh well.)

Here is a picture when we were driving around the island:

Here we are at the Dole Plantation. This is how they grow pineapples:

(I can't believe that these are one of the few pictures we have of us. We didn't take any of the 2 of us together. Bummer.)

These are some pictures I took on Monday just walking around the area:

The view from our balcony:

Polynesian Cultural Center Dancers:

A look at Diamond Head Crater from a pier:

Here are two pictures of some of the amazing trees on the island. The trees, and just the beauty of creation, were amazing in Hawaii.

We had a great time!

Our football maniac

2010-10-06T21:34:00.000-05:00

There is no denying it, but this kid loves football. I don't really think he had much of a choice in the matter as his dad is a huge football fan, he was given a stuffed football soon after coming out of the womb, and he even made his own picks in a football pool at only one year of age. So instead of playing soccer this year we thought we'd try something different - flag football. He loves it. The kids have fun and it's neat to watch all of them have a chance at being quarterback and running the ball for a chance at a touchdown. At Ethan's second game he actually ran for a touchdown. Pretty cool. Funny thing is - he didn't even know he got a touchdown. Everyday at school he gets to play football with the older kids at recess. They are so nice to allow this little Kindergartner to play with them and he loves every minute of it. I think he talks more about what he did in football at recess then what he did with his teacher that day. Ok, so we'll have to work on that one. Enjoy the pics of him running for his first touchdown.

Here he is in the foreground with the blue ball in hands...

There he goes passing everyone...

Here is sweet sis with the Y mascot...

Here is Emma's skills at taking a picture of me (I thought she did a pretty good job)...

Hannah and Daddy enjoying the game...

Ethan's First Field Trip

2010-09-19T22:25:00.002-05:00

This past Friday was Ethan's first school field trip to Miller Farms in Longmont, CO. I went with the girlies as a parent helper and we had such a good time. When we got there we rode on a hay ride to various fields. When we got to each field the farmer would stop the tractor and we would get off and pick whatever crop was growing in that field. It was really neat because the children got to see just how vegetables and fruit are grown. I think we picked corn, onions, radishes, beets, tomatoes, peppers, carrots, cabbage, and pumpkins. Wow, that was a mouthful. Then after the hayride and picking, which lasted about 2 hours, we came back to the main farm and had lunch and let the kiddos play on all of the fun stuff at the farm. They had a moon bounce type thing, a hay bale pyramid, a firetruck, big tires, and other cool stuff. We were tired when we got home but we had a really fun time on his first field trip.

Here they are in the wagon ready for the hay ride.

Here we are in the pumpkin patch.

What a cutie...

Someone looking very tired at this point...

Ethan with his pumpkin stash...

Ethan and Emma on the bouncy thing...

The pyramid...

Ethan made it to the top...

Emma made it to the top...

Our stash...

What is your favorite number?

2010-08-24T20:49:00.001-05:00

That is a question that we have been asking some people lately.

- Jeremy what is your favorite number..."4". Why do you say 4?

- Hey Ethan, what is your favorite number..."4". Why is 4 your favorite number?

- Hey Emma, is your favorite number 4 too..."Yes". Why in the world is everyone saying 4?

- Hey Hannah, what is your favorite number..."oi kee so hah". I'm pretty sure that is baby talk for 4.

- Hhhhm, maybe I'll try Samson. Hey Samson, what is your favorite number..."Woof"!!! That is 4 in dog.

What could possibly be so cool about the number 4?

BECAUSE THAT IS THE NUMBER OF CHILDREN THAT WILL BE IN OUR FAMILY IN APRIL. HOORAY!!!!!!

First Day of Kindergarten

2010-08-23T23:10:00.000-05:00

Wow, I can't believe my little boy started Kindergarten today. He was so excited that he woke up at 6:30 all ready to go. He already loves his teacher and he and Emma told her this morning that she is the best teacher. She just smiled at that. When I picked up Ethan he was able to tell me a lot of what he did today, so I was pretty impressed with that. His teacher has told us many times that she is so blessed and honored that we have placed our most treasured possessions in her hands. I just love it that his teacher spends time praying with the children each morning and learning from God's Word. Awesome, awesome, awesome. I can't wait to see what tomorrow brings.

Here he is with his bookbag and supply box.

I think everyone is excited about today.

Ethan is so excited to have his picture taken with his teacher, Mrs. Mulhern.

Look Ma, No Training Wheels!

2010-08-22T21:26:00.002-05:00

Today, Ethan rode his bike for the first time without training wheels by himself. He had tried a couple of months ago back in Texas with my Dad. But it just didn't seem like he was getting it. So we put the training wheels back on. So Jeremy decided to give it a second try today. We couldn't believe it when he started riding all by himself. He went around the block with quite a bit of help and then by the second lap, Jeremy decided to just let go and see what happened. And you know what...he figured it out. He did awesome. Check out his elbow pads and knee pads. He is set.

We can't forget sister on her bike.

Frontiercade

2010-08-21T15:43:00.001-05:00

It seems to me like everything here starts with the word "frontier". Anyway, on Friday, the base had their annual Frontiercade. From what I gather it is a time for the service men and women with their families to get together and have competitions against each other. Jeremy had to work so my parents came up and we took the kiddos to check it out. It was a ton of fun. The active duty military had all kinds of races, like the 3 legged race, wheelbarrow race, spinning bat race, 50 yard dash, archery contests, soccer tournaments and I could go on and on. They had so many fun things for the kids to do as well. They had bouncy houses, bouncy slides, running races, clowns, a train to ride, crafts, and carnival type games. They also had various tents set up with many of the base offices present and giving away items just so you could get to know what was on the base and what they provided. To top it off, they provided a barbecue lunch for everyone including dessert. There was so much to see and do...they even had dog races for your pets.

Here are the kiddos on the slide...

Here they are with the clown...

This may be my favorite because Ethan put his arm around Emma while waiting for their balloons and I can't believe I caught it on camera. What a sweet brother.

The clown made a sword for Ethan, a mouse for Emma, and an apple for Hannah. Unfortunately they all popped before we made it home.

Here we are on the train...(By the way, if you look in the background of some of the pictures you'll see red brick buildings which are the officer housing on base. They are beautiful, historic homes that were built in the 1900's and they still look great.)

Awesome Parks and Slip-N-Slide Fun

2010-08-21T15:10:00.000-05:00

Here are some pictures from the last few weeks that I wanted to share:

A couple of weeks ago I met my parents with my sister's kids in Fort Collins, CO where we met at Fossil Creek Park. I don't know if any of you have been to Colorado or even Wyoming for that matter, but they know how to make awesome parks for kiddos. This park was huge and had all kinds of fun stuff for the kiddos. It even had a "rock climbing" wall that was made to look like it was made out of fossils. Pretty cool. Behind the regular park was a splash park that the kiddos loved. It was a cool day so we had the splash park to ourselves.

Here we are at the splash park.

Here are some fun pictures of the kiddos on the slip and slide behind Grandma and Grandpa's house.
Here's Emma...

and Bridget...

and Joshua...

and Ethan...

Does Anyone Else Think This Child Is Adorable?

2010-08-14T22:13:00.000-05:00

I do. But I know I'm biased. Hannah just loves Samson. I would say about 50% of the day I will turn around and find her doing this. She loves to lay on Samson, next to Samson, or near Samson. If she isn't laying on him then she will follow him around the house saying "Sha-shaw". Maybe we have an animal lover on our hands. Three cheers for Samson for being such a good dog to allow her to lay all over him or play with his eyes, nose, mouth, and teeth. He just sits there and lets her do it. Go Samson!

Fun Conversations of the Week!

2010-08-12T19:45:00.001-05:00

* The kiddos were playing outside and then I heard Emma say, "I'm terrible mad at Ethan because you killed my best friend...he killed my best friend, my grasshopper." I know that they were playing with a grasshopper and I'm pretty sure that this is the first time that Emma has ever seen a real grasshopper. Ethan has a tendency to hold onto bugs a little too tightly and they end up getting "killed". Poor grasshopper. Poor Emma.

* One day Emma came up to me and said, "Mommy, I have poopy in my underwear." Now this child has been potty trained for awhile so I asked her, "Emma, what do you mean you have poopy in your underwear?"
She proceeded to show me the tiny amount of smeared poopy in her underwear.
Me: "Emma, why did you poop in your underwear?"
Emma: "I thought it was a burp."
Me: "You mean a fart?"
Emma: "No mommy, I thought it was a burp in my pants."

Well, I guess we have obviously not taught our children the proper terms for fart and burp- who knew?

* We all love to rock out with some Christian rock music. Currently we are really liking Skillet. They sing a song where in part of the song they sing, "Waking up, Waking up...waking up, waking up." When we get to this part we all yell, "Waking up, waking up...waking up, waking up." The kiddos love it. One night when Jeremy was putting Emma to bed they were singing the song and all of a sudden Jeremy heard Emma sing, "Right Caleb, right Caleb...right Caleb, right Caleb" instead of "Waking up, waking up." We thought this was so funny. She didn't think anything of it. I'm not quite sure what "Right Caleb" means but it sure seems like she is missing her good friend, Caleb, back in San Antonio.

Happy Birthday, Jeremy!

2010-08-07T22:30:00.001-05:00

Happy 34th Birthday, Jeremy! Today we had a nice day celebrating Jeremy's birthday. We woke up, opened presents, drove to Colorado to hang out with my parents and sister and her family, ate some yummy steaks my dad cooked on the grill, watched the kiddos play on the slip and slide, and drove home. To round out the day and to make the 2 hour drive home a little more fun we went to one of Jeremy's new favorite shake places, Good Times, to enjoy some yummy milkshakes. It was a fun day. I think Jeremy had a nice birthday.

Here we are at breakfast eating some yummy waffles. Look at that present the kiddos helped me wrap.

Here is Jeremy with his gifts. Exercise clothes!!!

The yummy cake that Ethan and Emma helped me make. They loved adding all of the sprinkles.

Uncle Jacob's birthday was last week so we celebrated his birthday today as well. Here he is getting a smackdown from the kiddos.

Jeremy thought it would be perfect to make a Parker Bernstein kid sandwich. I think you can make out all of the kiddos in the pile, minus little Ms. Hannah.

Heavenfest!

2010-07-31T22:03:00.003-05:00

Today, July 31st, Jeremy and I celebrated our 11 year anniversary. We thought it would be fun to celebrate it at Heavenfest in Longmont, CO with the kiddos. Heavenfest is a Christian music festival with 70 bands and artists performing on 7 stages with 7 interactive areas all in one day. We had a great time. They had a kids play area with moon bounces, face painting, bungee trampolines, and a lake where the kiddos could swim. The other area of the park had all of the stages where the bands and artists were performing throughout the day. We got to see a lot of different artists including OC Supertones, Petra, Barlow Girl, Mary Mary, and Casting Crowns. It was a lot of fun and awesome to be a part of this type of worship experience. Enjoy the pics (some of them are not the best quality as I took my little camera because I didn't want to have to carry around my other camera).

Here we are listening to one of the bands.

Here is Petra (This is a band that I liked when I was in high school. It's amazing that they are still around making music. The next picture is their lead singer - he is the same lead singer they had when I was in high school and he still sounded good. Crazy.)

Here is Casting Crowns. This is an amazing group. They have so many awesome songs out today that I'm sure many of you have heard. They were great!

Here is Hannah enjoying herself.

Here is Emma enjoying the bouncy house.

Here is a video of her in the bouncy house (This is the first time that I have used video on the blog - I can't believe that it's taken me this long.)

Here is Ethan loving the bungee trampoline. (I don't know if you can see his face in the second picture but it is hilarious.)

Here is a video of him having a great time.

Worshiping the Lord with my family - I can't think of a better way to celebrate our 11 years of marriage together.