Memorial Sunday

the fabulous six commense their bonding. 

 Lucy is SOOOO annoyed that I came into their domain to take a photo.

the bonding continues with food and gossip on Kari's bed. 

 I imagine she'll be finding surprises in that bunk for a few camping trips.

four girls, a dog and a much needed beer.

Lucy and her new bff.

we had such a fantastic day AGAIN.  Tho' I will say that Lucy wasn't the most well behaved kiddo in the first half of the day.  She actually earned her self a time out in the middle of a car trip.  Yup, in a grassy knoll at a gas station there she sat, gathering her thoughts, getting out her angst and deciding to rejoin the car with a different attitude.  she did a bit better after that, still too close to morgan (in the neighboring carseat) for comfort.  those two stinker can be a real challenge together.   We spent the morning at MY grandma's house.  I am sure my grandma was glad to see us go, she sort of pushed us out the door and watched us pull away until we were well around the corner.   After visiting grandma we stopped to hang out with Kari, Shonna and their friends and children (and husbands).  I was unsure of the level of fun we would have given the attitudes of a couple back seat passengers but we had a BLAST!!!   Lucy was in Lucy heaven, she had tons of little girls to run around with, plenty of leeway on her mom leash, plus teenage boys to gush over ...  we stayed for hours and got home just in time for bed.

Some days ...

are just perfect.

and just as perfectly impossible to capture on camera

breaking in the new camping year

We had our first camping trip of 2010 this weekend.  It was cut short due to thunder/rain and my lack of desire to pack up wet soggy gear after two nights of little sleep.  We slept one night and that was good.  2010 marks the year where Lucy become actually helpful in setting up camp!  We two were able to get the tent up much much easier then in past years when I set it up alone whilst redirecting a wayward child.  Lucy was helpful all around, it's going to be a great camping season. 

one of Lucy's new jobs is to put our card on the post.  she did great!

it wasn't long before Lucy captured a frog.  she was so excited.

this little mole would not leave us alone. he was not afraid of us and lucy was obsessed with him

went on a little hike. lucy brought her backpack/purse

lucy is prepared to roast the marshmellows

and she waits

relaxing by the fire

getting her to relax and go to sleep was more challenging then in the past

shaking the pancake batter!

our annual lucy in the eagle nest photo.  she's getting so dang big.

first fest of the summer!

It's going to be an awesome summer!  Lucy is going to be a great companion at festivals this summer. She loves the people, talking to everyone, petting the dogs hearing music.  Tonight we went to Lyn-Lake Festival

while waiting for the bus Lucy found a ripped up "dear john" letter.

part of it was missing leaving us with a big mystery over who loved who and

who hurt whose feelings.  Lucy handed over half of the half of the letter

to her bus seat buddy "random stranger/friend #1,228"

there were about 3 billion dogs at the Lyn-Lake festival

everyone of them admired and pettedy by Lucy.

Lucy watching "random stranger/friends #1,256 and 1,257"

Lucy and Har Mar Superstar

we had to miss most of this concert because of the close

proximity of a smoker.  Lucy, bless her heart is on a very

obsessed, very shaming of the public anti-smoking campaign.

Lucy and HarMar

Had to trick her into smiling ...

doing something ...

I figured that we needed to do a little more then just **tch on facebook about the sorry state of affairs in Minnesota and how much Pawlenty irks me.   So I introduced Lucy (and myself) to some political activism right outside of the chambers, during the closing session when legislators are trying to balance our budget.  We wanted a fair approach to balancing the budget (not so much on the backs of children and folks in poverty please).  We wanted them to "do the right thing".   

A little photo essay of the evening:

Lucy on the steps of the State Capital.  She's ready to rock and roll!!!

Thankfully we ran into our friend A (not pictured) who is married to someone in the know!

He let us in the side door and brought us up to the rally. 

turns out we walked in the doors closest to Tim Pawlenty's office.  Shockingly he was not at work.

Here's Lucy handing a note requesting a meeting with our representative

Jeff Hayden.

While we waited for Rep. Hayden to come talk to us. Lucy chatted it up

with various Representatives.  Apparently she gave an Invest in Minnesota sticker

to the republican nominee for governor (i might have this fact mixed up).  She also offered a

sticker to a pretty conservative lobbyist (for the "other side"). 

We didn't have to wait long before Rep. Hayden came to chat with us, his constituents.

He was really awesome.  Lucy (with no prompting) told him that Pawlenty made it so the Southside kids couldn't go to work anymore. She also mentioned that our friend Risa couldn't go to work anymore.

Lucy asked Mr. Hayden to please get our money back, and he told her he would do his best! 

Lucy learned about making her voice heard tonight!

Here is Lucy listening to someone talking, and cheering "do the right thing"

Lucy inside the State Capital, in the hallway near Pawlenty's office and Lucy on the front steps.

my sweetie pie did really good work tonight!!! 

Thanks for speaking up baby cakes!

busy building boys (and girl)

I decided to overcome my strong urge to "make everything easier" by allowing computer/wii/nick jr to babysit for me tonight. I was glad I did. We had a pretty mellow, fun evening playing indoor basket ball with a beach ball and a puppet theater followed by building structures (or in some cases guns) with toothpics and gum drops. Unbelievably the kids were entertained by the building for about 45 minutes!

Jacob was NOT content with playdough. He needed sharp pointy toothpicks just like the big kids

by far my most serious "engineery" builder

Isaac spent a lot of time resisting the urge to eat the building materials

I was shocked that Lucy stayed involved and focused almost the whole time.

after an initial catastrophic building collapse,

Nathan revamped his design implimenting the ever strong triangle.

Some nights ...

Some nights are dreamy.  I arrive at preschool and Lucy seems chill.  Good reports on her school day all around.  Lucy walks from her room, down the steps and climbs into the car just like that (believe me I never fail to appreciate when the normal things go smoothly, usually by this time we've had at least 3 "issues"). 

Arrive at home, Lucy lets the dog out and we chill for a bit.  I lay on the sofa, feeling pretty spent, Lucy plays with Zep, chats with me and the house is still dark (it's been real rainy) and quiet (no radio, no tv).  I finally get up, cook a simple dinner and put it on the table.  Lucy walks over and sits down and STARTS EATING.  No struggles, no whining just easy like a dream.  We chat during dinner.   While I clean up dinner Lucy plays with playdough and then we make lemon poppy seed muffins together NOT ONE SINGLE STRUGGLE.

While the muffins cook Lucy changes into pj's.  We play some more.  Before I know it it's snack time and tv time.  We settle in for 1/2 hour of Idol and then it's lucy's bedtime. 

EASY EASY night.  
I do see that this blog would have died years ago if every night was like tonight.  
boring
safe
and totally appreciated (every once in awhile)

5 year old stats

Took our Lucy girl to her well child check this morning.  The girl was BOUNCING off the walls, but in a energetic (non naughty) way.  She was a hoot.  Lucy had 4 shots today, poor kid.  Well I was correct in my feelings that the kid grew a million feet over night.  Since she was about 12 months old she's been consistantly on the 25% for height 25% for weight ... suddenly now at her 5 year check she's at 50-75% for height and maintaining 25% for weight.  Her BMI is perfect. 

Weight: 37#
Height 43"

To those we left behind ...

We talked about you today (we do that a lot).  We thought about you today (we do that everyday).   We bought these roses, as we do every year so we could see, touch and smell you on Eskedar's birthday. 

Sharing her birthday

It's Lucy's birthday AND It's World AIDS Orphans Day, a grassroots campaign to draw attention to and advocate on behalf of the 20 million children orphaned by AIDS. AHOPE for Children is a non-profit organization that supports children in Ethiopia--from newborn babies to teens--orphaned because of AIDS and infected with HIV/AIDs thems...elves. Please consider supporting AHOPE by texting 85944 and type in the word "AHOPE" to make a $10 donation.For more info and other ways to donate please visit http://www.ahopeforchildren.org/. p.s. Mother's Day donation cards are available on the website (thank's BTW to whoever I stole most of this status update from).

Four no more ...

Today was Lucy's last day of being four years old.  I must admit she rocked it!   Mama had a advisory board meeting until 9pm on Wednesday night and Lucy was still awake when I picked her up at 9:30.  She went to bed when we got home at 10pm so that put her at T - 2 hours of sleep deprivation which historically ain't been pretty.   Lucy held her stuff together pretty well today considering.  Brief melt down when Zep left to go on "errands" with Jen tonight but other wise she did great which was stellar considering it was  the big KINDERGARTEN registration night at her new and huge school. 

first lucy and baileys the cat had a nice snuggle session. i think the cat helped to center lucy and emotionally prepare her to the evening ahead.  lucy sure loved that baileys wanted to sit on her lap!

lucy sat very still during face painting time

crazy fancy facepainting

lucy sitting at one of the tables in one of four kindergarten classrooms.  oh the nerves of it all.

and then they put our little tiny babies on these huge ginormous yellow tubes of death

breathe stacy breathe

she's soooooo teeeny tiny.  what if they let her get off at the wrong stop? what if she hides under the seats?

what if she falls asleep??? ...  breathe stacy breathe

miss kitty cat lucy was PISSED that the bus didn't actually go anywhere. 

it was about here where the -2 hours of sleep started rearing it's ugly head.

lucy was all sorts of teenager cool telling grandma about

her evening at her big kid school.

Can't believe that when Lucy wakes up she will be 5 years old.  Wow. More on that later.