Grand April Snippets

There are many WONDERFUL photos of the grandkids on my phone....photos I'd not blogged yet. I've decided the easiest way to handle the backlog is to do a giant post of photos which Mommies sent me in April. Thanks for all the mommies for keeping me well-supplied with content.  This is a shameless Grandma blog post. Look at the cuteness! HOW did I not get a photo of Liv? I will remedy that! 

This is Jojo on the left and Trudy on the right - both born on Nov 17th  - 2 years apart

And so begins he adventure. Jared reads The Hobbit to Noah. 

Such a happy little one! 

Noah learned to roll over....

Visiting Papa and Bachan!

Jared and Noah

Bachan and Noah

Noah

Noah and Larissa! 

Can we take a minute in simple awe of all the props and outfits Larissa has prepared for Noah? 

Noah Bear

Such sweet Sisters - 2 of BreZaak's gals

Bella and Trudy

Gideon's post dentist treat...something my mom started. 

Annie and Trudy

This is from WAY before April...but I found it on my phone so here it is...Josiah and Trudy. 

Gideon and Trudy

Sweet Dream Isabella

Stacia went over and spent a few hours with the kids. The plan was to teach Bella how to use a round loom, but all of them joined in. 

Dinner time! Trudy 

Jojo LOVES Trudy. He's always nearby. He loves to sit and read to her. 

Gideon 

Jojo set up chair lets and used his cars to form a make-shift bowling alley after the church bowling party on May 6th...so this should be with the May Snippets...but I'm leaving it here. 

CoRielle took a major step in making Little Buddy officially a part of their family. 

 Stacia joined me one Tuesday and it was nice to have another set of hands at the park! 

Cuteness overload. 

Bella's Friend Party...

It's unimaginable that Bella turned SEVEN in April! Bella is turning into a beautiful young lady - inside and out!  Bre and Izaak hosted her friend party today. It was fun to see her surrounded by so many friends. We are starting to truly put down roots in this place. It's a good thing. Bella was one year and three months old when she moved to Alaska. 

She chose Bunnies as her theme.  Bre made cute cupcakes with Bunny ears...personally, I loved the baby carrots. LOL 

This game is darling. Bre wrapped a gift. Then rewrapped it again and again. I have no clue how many layers - but a lot. As the music played the kids passed the gift. When the music stopped they unwrapped one layer. Repeat until the gift is unwrapped and the gift belongs to the child who unwraps the final layer.  

Earlier in the morning our Gather Table group had met for brunch. Three of us were at the party...me as Grandma and Joelle and Rebekah brought their children. It was a bonus friend day for me.  I caught Bre with something in her mouth - but I think she needs to be in the photo anyway. 

Bre, Rebekah, Lindsey 

These sisters, Jenni and Joelle, have been a joy to get to know. Jenni is our children's team lead, she is also on youth staff, and attends our lifegroup.  Joelle is on the women's ministry team and leads the table group I've been a part of for the past five months. They are also TCKs (Third Culture Kids) and I love hearing their missionary kid stories...a thing we have in common. 

Jenni, Me and Joelle

Stacia, Jenni and myself met Mike and GG over at the church where we helped Ed and Jennifer set up for tomorrow's potluck dinner.

Shannon was upstairs and we took the opportunity to chat. We are sure going to miss Shannon and Lindsey. Tomorrow is their final service with our church body. 

Jenni Joined our Chaos

Jenni, the gal on the left, is a youth leader at church, is our children's pastor and attends our life group. She is also proctoring Stacia's exams with Global University. We like to keep her after the test for dinner. We had THOUGHT we'd invite some of the younger folks from life group for games, but it turned out to be this is the day CoRielle are moving...and we have the boys too.  She was willing to hang out of with us in our chaos. 

Jenni, Stacia, Allie, Michael 

"Which hand, Little Buddy?"  He loved playing this game with Jenni. We were happy we got Little Buddy to eat.  The move had unsettled him and he hadn't eaten all day. 

Ah, cuddling in Papa's chair. Life will get back to normal soon. 

Little Buddy, Benny, Danny

Hungry Hippos

It was a fun evening. 

Note: Little Buddy's social worker said photos are fine if his name isn't included. We have opted not to show his face...but are letting profiles ride. 

Chicks are Here

 Look what arrived! We ordered a dozen Golden Bovan chicks. This is the breed we got last year and we are LOVING them. They are gentle and great layers - even through the winter. 

HOWEVER, when Michael went to pick up it appears we got 1 or 2 Golden Bovans and the rest are Red Novogens. The Reds are the ones we usually buy. We attempted to buy them last year and they convinced us to take the Golden. LOL I'm a bit uneasy as the Reds are more aggressive and we had a lot of trouble with our reds getting cabin fever and attacking/killing each other.  Even without the coloring it was quite easy to tell which breed was which. The reds - even at a day old - attacked my fingers and were fighting over a wood chip....the goldens like to snuggle. LOL 

We only got 12 this year. We currently have 24 hens. We had a year a few years back where we ended up with all old hens, no one laying...and we decided to just add some every year to hopefully avoid that scenario in the future. 

This is a NOISEY bunch! We are surprised how much noisier and messier they are when there are half what we usually buy. LOL 

BTW the chicks arrival is a sure sign of spring - regardless of the stubborn snow on the ground. 

Allie is 19

Allie turned 19 on the 19th of April. She was met that morning with well-wishes and hints of things to come.  Birthdays are a bit of moving target around here. We celebrated with the family on the 15th. 

Allie chose to wait for a date when the boys could join us for lunch to do gifts etc.  The day arrived. We went out to a favorite Japanese restaurant, Stacia made Allie's favorite Toffee pudding, we visited, ate, gave her gifts and thanked God for another year well-lived. 

This was a great break in a busy weekend. Michael and I spent the evening and the next day speaking at a parenting workshop at Farm Loop Christian Center. 

Renewed Energy

I am finally feeling NORMAL.  My energy is back. I spent the morning with the boys.  As soon as Arielle left Danny turned to me and said, "Bachan, Hide - SEEK!" Little Buddy was quick to chime in, "Hide, hide, HIDE!" We played hide and seek, read books, talked about their upcoming move....

Little Buddy and Danny are both in training pants this week! They were pretty happy about the turn of events. We made a couple of trips to the bathroom. "Messy, messy." Yep. 

Arielle has packed closets, extra clothes and toys. This week she took the pictures off the walls. Benny's response was priceless, "Mom, don't you think you're being a bit aggressive?"

I had an hour and a half at home between playing with grands and haircuts for Stacia and I. I managed to get a bunch of "kitchen" projects done. I harvested and flavored a new batch of kombucha, brewed tea to get another batch fermenting, made banana/oat "cookies", made sugar free, decaf Hospitality Chai, and made a gallon of cauliflower soup for the week. 

Stacia and GG began working on a puzzle. Benny gave it Stacia for Christmas and she's ready to get it put together and hung on her bedroom wall. This proved to be a great distraction for GG and allowed Michael and I to disappear to work on the upcoming parenting workshop we are facilitating this weekend. 

It was just Stacia, GG, Michael and I for dinner. GG went to bed shortly after dinner. The rest of us settled in to read. 

Hey - look! Someone very loved turns 19 tomorrow!!!!