It's no wonder...

the youngest of the Powell clan is always fighting to get noticed and to be heard. 

He frequently feels left out and is often found yelling over his brother and sister to voice his opinion.

And I've perpetuated this even further by failing to mention that he turned four over a week ago.

*Hangs head in shame*

Yes, my sweet litte baby Charlie is a big four year old.

In all honesty, though, I think that the reason I've failed to mention this milestone here is because I'm a complete slacker when it comes to this blog I'm in total denial.  Aside from blogging nothing about his birthday, I also bought a number 3 candle, realized it, bought regular candles when a 4 was no where to be found, and then only put 3 candles on the cake.  Thankfully someone called me out on that.

So, yes, I am not ready for my baby to get older.  But it's happening anyway.  And so here we are.  10 days past his birthday and I'm finally blogging about it.

Charlie, we love you so much and are so glad you are in our family.  I'm sorry you have to deal with being the youngest. Thankfully you have your Uncle Andy to offer you sympathy on this plight.  We love your humor (you are most definitely our Chuckles) and your energy.  Your non-stop energy.  We just love you!

Oh, yeah.  He had a first day of school too.  *Sigh*.

Look! A truck!

Anyone who knows my Jack will remember his obsession with John Deere, excavators, garbage trucks, backhoes, bulldozers, dump trucks any and all things with wheels.

(Jack, spring 2007)

and how he loved making "parking lots".
Yes, that a parking lot designed to look like a house.
When you make about 5 million parking lots a day, you need to spice it up a little.

Obviously my attempts to keep the obsession from infecting Charlie have failed.
Yesterday, I caught him in this position.

His favorite word used to be "no". Now it's "truck".
I'm not sure which is better.



Oh well. At least I have one little princess who's more concerned with whether or not the trucks are pretty than how many wheels they have!

PSF and security

Not a lot has changed this past week.

Other than VBS at our church, we can still be found here.

Tying to stay cool and have as much fun as possible.

Last week, I mentioned a big change in Jack. A few weeks ago, he was happy to stay on the steps and in just one fun morning, he was all over the place.

At first I thought it was my stellar teaching ability and that motherly way about me that naturally builds up my children's confidence.

However, once I downloaded these pictures, I don't think I can take credit for my son turning into a little fish.




Honestly, I think he just found his security object and held on tight.

*Sigh* I should have known. After all, it's not the first time.



Hosted by Cecily

Radioactive Jack

This past weekend we went yurting with five other families from our Sunday school class. Yurting is a lot like camping, except instead of a tent we stay in a yurt. (For the record, I never plan on tent camping. I'm actually not sold on yurting again either.)

Here is the yurt.

The children had a blast. Melody got to hang with her BFF, Ava, as well as a few older girls who fawned all over her. (Yes, she was in princess heaven.)

Here is Little Jack, Ava, Big Jack, and Melody.

This is Addie. Melody and Addie just love each other and stayed together most of the weekend.

Jack got to run around with the older kids, riding bikes and scooters.

We took several walks to the water fall, or water fountain, as Melody calls it.

And let's not forget about the staying up late and eating s'mores.

Since the kids were getting to stay up late, we gave them all those glow-necklaces and bracelets so it would be easier to see them in the dark.

My kids love those. They love them so much that they insisted on wearing them to bed.

So, late Friday night, we tucked them into the yurt and then walked back outside to where all the adults had their chairs placed, sitting around chatting. After about 15 minutes Alex walked back to the yurt to make sure the kids were asleep.

As expected, they weren't.

Jack was, however, glowing. All over.

Apparently that's what happens when one chews through the glow necklaces and the glow-making agent leaks out.

And now Jack is known as Radioactive Jack.

PSF and a lesson learned

I learned a lesson the hard way the other day.

If you're out in a clover field

having pictures made of your two adorable younger children

and cannot stop commenting how adorable the three year old looks in her tutu


(Photos courtesy of Pam "P3" Powell)

it is still very important to keep an eye on the 19 month old

because if he eats the clover flower

he'll probably throw it up later that evening.

And you'll probably be in the car, a 1/2 hour from home, when it happens.


Hosted by Cecilyand Debi

Sugar and spice and everything nice...

that's what little girls are made of!

(Melody 15 months)

Snakes and snails and puppy dog tails...

(Jack 2 years)

that's what little boys are made of!

(Charlie 17 months)

Yes, that is Charlie with his finger up his nose and laughing about it. Hysterically, I might add. And,yes, I realize he's in a pink bib, but that's just because it's the only one he can't pull off.

*Sigh* He's a complete mess. A cute mess, but a mess nonetheless!

True Story Tuesday and what's that sound?

My True Story Tuesday this week is by request of Rachel, the True Story Tuesday genius over at Once Upon A Miracle.

The scene is one evening about 9:00, Alex and I are comfortably sitting on the couch watching TV engaged in interesting discussion.

Though our children have been asleep for well over an hour, we hear Jack's door open. We thinking nothing of it and just assume that he will use the restroom like he does most nights and then head right back to his room.

Now, the kids' bathroom is not too far from the stairs and if the door is open, it's relatively easy to hear what's going on in there. Sure enough, a few seconds later, we hear the unmistakable sound of, um, as Alex would say, "someone taking a leak."

Only it sounds loud. Really loud. Way too loud to be in the bathroom.

So, I walk into the hallway to peer up the stairs and see what's going on.

And I almost get peed on.

In his sleepy daze, Jack bypassed the bathroom completely and walked right over to the staircase. I'm assuming now, he was thinking about coming downstairs and telling us he had to go, but the urge got the better of him. He simply dropped his pants right there and took aim between the balusters. I have to tell you, it's quite shocking to walk over to the stairs and almost get hit in the face by a stream of pee.

By the time I pulled myself together enough to exclaim, "Jack!" he had already finished. He pulled his britches right up and headed right back to bed. Alex was totally cracking up. I have to admit I did giggle a little bit, but not as hard as Alex did. After all, I was the one that had to clean it up!

Maybe he's just not a choir boy... (UPDATED)

This video was taken at Jack's church choir Christmas performance last Wednesday.

It's worth watching. Who doesn't want to see a kid scratch his butt. In the middle of the song. In front of the whole church (or at least those who were at church last night).

I had more videos too. But for some reason blogger won't let me upload them. After 3 days of trying to upload them, I gave up. Even I have limits.

It's too bad too because the other videos were even better than the first. I will however summarize his behavior for you and you can just use your imagination.

In the second video he tries to pick a fight by waving his hands near the head of the little boy to his left.

And in the third he just tortures stares and makes faces at the poor boy next to him who is just singing his heart out.

If this behavior continues I'm going to quickly become the mother of the boy who the other mothers don't want their children to be friends with.

In the meantime, I'm thinking choir isn't going to be his thing...

*UPDATED*

Since several of you expressed disappointment that I didn't post all the videos, here's the link to youtube to watch them there. (Yes, I'm aware I can post youtube video to my blog, but for some reason I couldn't figure it out. I finally gave up after I had one of those I-going-to-throw-this-computer-out-the-window moments.)

This is my favorite one:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SBX8GXxyitA

and also check this out:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p2FUQWA9de4&feature=channel