Those Crazy Akers!

We took a moment while shopping at the mall tonight to snap some pics on one of those photo booth things. I think these are the best family portraits we have taken! :)

I hope my kids will always be silly. It amazes me how serious I see some people are with their kids. Yes, we do need to discipline and teach manners, etc... but kids just need to be kids most of the time! I think how fast you grow up, and how quickly you have to be "mature" and are told to "act your age", when we don't even let kids act their age when they are 3 most of the time! And being silly and having fun are things that are learned, and mostly from your parents.

I hope that my kids will always find the funny, silly side to everything, that they won't take this crazy world too seriously, and will find something to do in their lives that makes them smile and laugh every day!

My friend Amy (hi Amy!) has a link on her website to a children's band website that I have visited called Dog on Fleas. They have a song called "When I Get Little" and I think it really captures the idea of not growing up too fast, that it really isn't all it is cracked up to be.

Here is the link to their lyrics page...

Dog on Fleas lyrics - When I Get Little

This is my favorite part of that song...

"When I get little I’m gonna quit my job (2X)
Spend all day just pickin’ some flowers
Minutes fly by and so do the hours
When I get little I’m gonna quit my job

I won’t know the word priority
But I got ‘em lined up in front of me
Eat and sleep and play in the dirt
Daydreamin’ all the time"

That song seems to be written especially for my dirt digger, Brody!

Our house

Thought this was cool. Here is a picture of our house that I took from up in Bobby's plane! Ours is the one right in the middle with the blue garage doors.

Catching Butterflies

We bought Brody a bug box and a butterfly net today. I saw him in the backyard trying to catch butterflies. Too cute.

It's a Bird, It's a Plane, no wait, it IS a plane!

We went up again today in "Mister Bobby's" plane. Brody loved it and actually held the controls for a while! He was extremely upset when we had to land. Maybe we have a pilot in our family!

First Trip to Busch Gardens

Yesterday was our first trip to Busch Gardens for the season. We have season passes, so we usually go later in the day, around dinnertime, walk around for a while, and then leave. We went with our good friends Kim and Keith and their kids, Abby and Emily. We shot some real cute pics of the kids. Don't Brody and Abby just look so old in this picture? I can almost see two teenagers sitting there! *sigh* :(

one 12x12 page!

Well, I am just full of blog entries today!

I am so excited! It has been a LOOOOONG time since I have done any scrapbooking. I seriously can't remember the last time I sat down to do some cropping, but I actually did one page today! I am starting our Disney Memories book. We took a trip last Nov and I plan on putting all of our Disney trips into this album, becuase I KNOW there will be many more! I finally made the title page to begin the album!

Waiting for Jesus

Brody said today that Jesus was going to come down from Heaven, come into his room and love him (which is our term for cuddle/tickle/kiss), then when Jesus was done, Brody was going to go play. :)

The Tacky Inflatable Pool

I am sure my neighbors love this, as it is sure to drive up property values :)

I bought an extremely tacky plastic inflatable pool for the boys to play with this summer. I am sure it won't last long, but even if it pops today, it was worth the money! The boys played for a while this morning and I just sat back and clicked away with my camera! Here are just a *few* of the 156 pictures I took. (tee hee)






Oh, and I caught this with my camera too. This is a usual occurrence around our home, that is, Brody taking things away from Seth.

It doesn't get better than this

Brody's 2 favorite things in the whole wide world are Poochie and Chocolate Milk. I captured him here in sheer bliss!

Raising Believers

As a Christian and parent, I see teaching my children about Christ and helping them to walk with him as the MOST IMPORTANT thing that I do in this life. It is also one of the most difficult tasks, what with all of the things that society teaches us about what we should value and how we should live. And, being a sinner myself, there are more times than I care to recount that I do not follow the example of Christ, therefore not setting the right example for my children.

So, when something happens like what happened today, my heart soars.

Brody has had a lot of questions about Jesus lately. We try to talk about Him regularly, so that He is a normal, everyday part of our lives.

We were driving in the car and Brody wanted me to sing a song that he likes, but I was listening to a Christian song, so I told him that I wanted to finish singing my song because it is about Jesus and it makes me happy to sing to Jesus.

Here is what transpired:

"Mommy, where is Jesus?", Brody asked.
"Jesus is in Heaven with God, but He can always see you and hear you when you pray."
"Is God behind our house?"
"No, sweetie. Heaven is way, way up in the sky, even higher than the clouds. We can't see Heaven, but God and Jesus can see us," I replied.
"Yeah, you need a really big ladder to get there,"he realized.
"No, you can't get there with a ladder. It is too far. But you know what? You know how you can get there? If you love Jesus, he will help you get to Heaven with God." I said as my lip started to quiver.
"I want to go to Heaven and be with Jesus," he said.
"Well, it isn't your time to go to Heaven. But, if you love Jesus, when you die, you will stop living here on earth and go to live in Heaven with Him. "
Brody replied, "I want to love Jesus and go to Heaven when I die."

And that was when I lost it. There is NOTHING like hearing your child tell you that he wants to follow Christ, even when he is only 3 and has such a small understanding as to what that really means. At least the seed has been planted and now we can build upon that.

*sigh*

Three Graduations!

Last Wednesday, Brody had a graduation, or "Stepping Up" ceremony at his preschool. It was really wonderful. I got lots of great pictures of his class and they did a sweet job singing songs for us. I can't believe he is out of school for the summer already! Needless to say, this week has been *interesting* having both the kids home the whole day on Mon,Wed, and Fri!





Then, on Monday night after dinner, we went out to City Park and Brody graduated up to the big kids slides! Both kids had a lot of fun. Seth is fearless. Truly.





Then, this morning, Seth graduated to his toddler bed! He LOVES it! He went right down for his morning nap with no problems, but for his afternoon nap, I did have to go in and put him back in his bed twice. But, after that, he went to sleep. Then, tonight for bedtime, he went straight to sleep! It is so wonderful to have good sleepers!




I remember Brody being the same way when we switched him to his toddler bed, although, we did have to go in and move him back into his bed after he fell asleep in some crazy positions, as you can see below!