Finger Paints and Oh My!

 The kids got to make the wrapping paper for Daddy's birthday present. 

I forgot to take a picture of the present though...  We put a poem about walking in Daddy's footsteps in a 10x13 frame and they each got to put a footprint on it too.   They loved getting to do that, so I got out the finger paints that I got them for Easter and hadn't let them use yet.  Basically because I'm lazy and didn't feel like cleaning up afterwards.  But for Daddy's birthday I decided to go for it.  They had so much fun and the paper turned out great.  In fact after wrapping the frame up it looked like a modern art canvas instead of a wrapped present.  So now I have a fun idea of making a collage of 'canvases' to hang in my kitchen.  This week is way to busy to attempt that though, so that will be coming later, and I will try to get pictures up as soon as we do it.

 Kaden really enjoyed the finger paints and he worked and worked at his pictures, drawing lines and 'round' aka circles.

 Kindi didn't really get that she was supposed to put the paint on the paper.  She really enjoyed playing with it and wiping it on her legs, or sticking her feet in it though.  She started to get more into it when I started painting her hands and having her hit the paper instead.  She is a touch on the violent side!

And just in case you are having a bad day and need something to laugh at:

I stepped outside and didn't see Kaden anywhere until I looked in the corner under a tree and saw this.

  At least he didn't potty his pants!

Dress Up

My best friend, Julie, told me about some pictures that a friend of hers did with her little girl.  I fell in love with the idea and decided that I just had to steal it!

She put her little girl in her wedding dress!  And the plan is to take a picture of Kindi in my dress every year.  It will measure how much she grows as well as just be stinkin adorable!  She wasn't terribly impressed with the idea this first year, but I hope that as she gets older she will enjoy it and look forward to it too.  I debated about doing this with my wedding dress.  What if it gets ruined?  Then I thought, What IF it gets ruined?  It isn't like I am ever going to wear it again and Kindi is going to want to pick her own wedding dress (Ugh... I can't think about THAT yet!).  Even if I wanted to put it on again it will never fit me.  Having nursed two babies...  if I did ever manage to get my waist that small again I certainly wouldn't be comfortable going out in public spilling out the top!  With those thoughts in mind I was also brave enough to cut out the built in bra.  It made it much easier to take pictures that didn't look completely ridiculous on Kindi.  Having cups sticking out of her belly button was just not working for me!

We couldn't leave Kaden out of this little dress up episode, but obviously I couldn't put him in my dress too!  Okay, I suppose that isn't entirely true.  He is young enough right now that he doesn't know that boys don't wear dresses.  He would have done it and loved it, but Jeremy wouldn't have been to thrilled and there is no way I am going to talk a 13 year old boy into putting my wedding dress on for his yearly picture!  So we went with Daddy's suit coat instead.  Jeremy rented his tux for the wedding so I don't have that, but he does own a very nice suit that will work just as well.  Kaden loved it!  He giggled and begged me to put it back on him when it fell off time and time again.  When he started getting a little bit wild and I put the coat away, it devestated him!  He cried and threw himself on his bed begging to have Daddy's coat back, please, please, pleeeeassse.  So I don't think it will be a problem to get him to put it back on next year!

Kindi was way more impressed with my veil than with my dress!

This picture of Kaden is so great!  He was having such a blast dancing and being a man just like Daddy.

This was one of the first pictures I took of Kindi, before I took the scissors to my dress.  It still turned out very sweet though.

I sure do have beautiful children!  What a wonderful blessing they have been in our lives.  We had a rough road getting them here, but no pain or sorrow compares with the joy that they bring to us every day.  God is good!

Kindi is 8 Months Old

Well I'm only half a month behind this time...  

My Kindi girl is 8 months old.  And she crawls!!!  

She just started crawling the day after Christmas.  She is still pretty slow and adorably deliberate with every placement of her hands.  She also still has a tendency to forget to move her hands...  She doesn't tolerate the face plants very well.

 I am so excited about her new ability.  I always suspected that she was extra cranky because she so intensely desired to follow her brother around and play with the toys on the other side of the room.  Turns out I was right!  Yesterday, while I worked on the computer and Jeremy and Kaden had a date, Kindi roamed around playing in Kaden's room (where most of the toys are) for at least half of an hour!  All by herself!!!  If you haven't spent much time with Kindi you won't realize what a miracle this is, but for this often haggard mommy it was a slice of heaven!

 Today she was so sweet following her daddy into the kitchen.  We were all in the living room and she was doing a great job playing with the books.  Jeremy went to work in the kitchen and she took off (like a snail) to hunt him down, twice.  Squealing with glee when she made it around the corner and there he was.  

She is still Kindi though, don't worry.  She still knows how to throw a fit, does not tolerate any kind of pain, and is a total Mama's girl.  But life just got a little bit sweeter (and a lot less cranky) in the Wells' household.

A Boy's Gotta Do...

Kaden has such a helpful spirit.  This is a good thing, and we hope he stays that way to balance out the stubborn side to his spirit!  So even if it is less than helpful we try to be patient and let him do his thing.

Kaden loves to pick the tomatoes.  He relished the afternoons when Daddy was home to take him out to the garden to bring in the tomatoes for me to can.  He often came bursting into the kitchen carrying some new treasure that he (or Daddy) had picked to show me.  Tomatoes, zucchini, cucumbers, squash, beans, they were all wonderfully exciting!  Unfortunately it wasn't until the end of the season that he figured out you are only supposed to pick the red tomatoes.  But maybe that was because the season was so stupid this year that we didn't have any ripe ones until the end of the season!  Once he figured that out though, he could often be found wandering around the garden and yard with a big juicy tomato dripping from his fingers and mouth.  Just like an apple!

We had an incredibly irritating problem with flies this year.  After watching his Daddy successfully combat the nasty vermin, Kaden knew that he too was destined to be a fly killer.  He cracked us up, he would hear or see a fly and whip his head around to follow it exclaiming, "Uh, oh!".  If he could find a swatter within his reach he was quick to flail it around, accomplishing nothing but bringing a smile to our faces.  Which is even better than killing flies!

Oops!  I forgot to rotate this one.  So tilt your head to the left for a moment!

We are having issues with the wiring in our 1950's house.  It just wasn't made to handle two computers, including monitors, modems and speakers, two printers, and a phone.  Go figure!  So we were having problems with them all just randomly blinking off for a moment, kind of like a quick power flicker, but only in this one corner of the house.  Then Jeremy heard the outlet sizzle, so we had to do some rearranging.  Now we have extension cords running all around the room trying to spread out our power draw.  I think Jeremy and Max are going to put in a new breaker and outlet just for the computers next time they make it down.  As you can see, Kaden was a great helper as Daddy was crawling behind the desks trying to replace the fried socket and reroute things.

Whatcha doing Daddy?  Need some help?

Our ever resourceful son.  If you can't get in by climbing over Daddy's back there must be another way.  Just climb under the desk instead!

More recently Jeremy has been tearing down the garden getting it all ready for the long cold winter months.  He had some T posts in the ground that he needed to pull.  They were stuck really good, so he called in his back up... Kaden Raymond to the rescue!

The worked and worked at it.  They dug out the bottom with a shovel, shook the pole, and pulled really hard.

Kaden is such a mimic, so in perfect Daddy fashion he grabbed the pole, pulled hard and grunted.  It was priceless!

And in perfect little boy fashion he decided to climb the extra hog wire that hadn't been torn down yet!  He was quite impressed with himself as he went up and down.

Hitching a Ride

In addition to all of the hard work my men did putting in a new lawn, they had a lot of fun.

Kaden wishing he could ride the rototiller, but instead having to be satisfied with a little time exploring it. He did get to push it around backwards for a few minutes with Daddy's help.

This is our portable yard debris compactor!

He looks a touch worried but have no fear.  It's all an illusion.

Kaden had a blast riding around in the trash can whether it was full on the way to dump in the backyard or empty on the way back to the lawn.

The next day Jeremy switched to a wheelbarrow.  Once again bringing along his portable compactor which also doubles as a nice weight for holding your grass clippings in.  He rode on top and got a kick out of toppling out just like the dead grass.

One of Kaden's favorite times of the day is when Daddy gets home from work and they go outside to water.  Jeremy carries a couple of 5 gallon buckets around the front and sides of the house to water all of his plants and Kaden goes along either pulling an empty 5 gallon bucket or bringing his own little bucket to help.

Putting in a New Lawn

Jeremy has been hard at work whenever he has a few spare moments.  On the weekends, after work in the evenings, sometimes even before he leaves for work in the mornings!  He has been redoing our front and side lawns.  Most of the work he did all by his lonesome, but some of the time he was blessed with an extra pair of hands:

Jeremy did the rototilling without his helper, but Kaden was eager to jump in and help as soon as he was able.  First they raked the dead grass clumps out of the dirt...  

Then they shoveled the grass into a trash can to haul it back to the backyard for composting.

Sometimes Kaden got a little bit carried away and just started 'shoveling' down the sidewalk!

Then they raked again...

Now Kaden is feeling like a big boy.  He doesn't need Daddy to help him with the shovel anymore!

Well, maybe the shovel is too heavy to lift all by myself... 

 I'll just carry the dead grass...

and throw it in the can.

Sometimes he got a bit confused and threw the grass into the street instead.  Well, that isn't exactly true...  if you have spent any time with Kaden you realize that he just threw the grass into the street because he could.  He may not be allowed to go into the street, but he can throw the grass there!

And then it was break time!

He was scooting down the curb just like that.

Just for Fun.

Daddy getting some special cuddle time with our two beautiful children.

Hmm... what shall I eat today?

I don't remember what post it was in, but we have a picture of Kaden in this towel too, he was a bit younger though.

Jeremy and I each took a picture of the same sunflower in his garden.  Which one do you like better?  :)

A Blast From the Past.

Okay so you probably can't really classify it as 'the past' when your son is only 20 months old and your daughter is only 4 months old, but... I did anyways!  I uploaded the pictures from Jeremy's camera the other day.  That doesn't happen nearly as often, so some of these are fairly old.  (You know, like 4 months!)

Jeremy chaperoned a field trip to the Civil War Reenactment here in Lebanon at the end of last school year.  Because it was here he just met the bus there and was able to take Kaden with him.  Kaden went on his first horse ride... okay so he sat on a horse and promptly begged to get off!  Jeremy said that when they shot all their big artillery cannons Kaden didn't even flinch!  What a brave little man.

One of the first few days of Kindi.  Kaden desperately wanting to touch and play with her!  This was when she would actually sleep on Jeremy's chest, although she never liked the tummy to tummy position.  Much to Jeremy's chagrin.  

Kaden on the other hand, still loves to sleep on his tummy!

Me and my precious babies!  (Yikes!  I may not be losing it very fast this time, but thankfully I am losing some of the weight!)  Kindi cracks me up with her hands by her face.  She almost always sleeps like that.

Kaden checking out Daddy's new car with Grandma, Papa, and Lily.

Oh how he loves to give his sister kisses.  He is always crawling up next to her or squatting on the floor beside her, while I am warning him to be nice, just to give her kisses!  I've got him trained to give me kisses now too.  I get three!  One on each cheek and one on the lips.  I love it, he is so sweet!  (Sometimes I have to bribe him to do it though, he is always willing to kiss me for an Oreo!)

Kaden snagged my cell phone and then took off running.  Well feeling kind of aggravated that he was running away with my cell phone I followed only to have my aggravation melt away into smiles of adoration.  He needed to sit in his rocking chair so he could 'talk' on the phone.  It was too cute to stay irritated!

Apparently wearing Daddy's shoes is hilarious!

I don't get to play out in the sand box with Kaden very often, so when I do I am sure to teach him important things.  Like how to bury his leg in the sand, you know, crucial life lessons.

Kindi discovered she has a tongue.

And she is adorable when she smiles with it!

Gangsta rap star?

Please, no pictures!

Jeremy is making it a tradition to take Kaden to work with him on the last day of school.  Everyone knows that the last day is basically just a big party day anyways, so Kaden just adds to the festivities.  The kids love him.  And as you can see he makes himself right at home...

...Getting into everything!

Kaden loves to make 'forts' under the table and barricade himself behind all of the chair legs.

Kindi's first trip in the belly pack.  She did great!  She even managed to make it all the way to Grandma's house!!!  

(Okay, for those of you who don't know... Grandma's house is the blue one behind me and I am standing by my fence exactly one block away.)

Look at that poor face!  If I remember right the long scratch and bruise on his forehead was from falling and hitting a book that was standing up open.  And then the cut under his lip I think came from the coffee table... but it's hard to remember what owie is what!  That boy gets new bumps and bruises almost daily!

Luckily they don't effect his attitude.  He is still full of smiles and laughter.  The sunshine in our days along with Kindi!