No More Thumbsucking in This House!

Of my 4 children, 2 have taken a paci, and 2 have sucked their thumbs. Luke never even attempted to put his thumb in his mouth. He took a paci in the hospital and when he was 1, we just had it at naptime and bedtime and then at 18 months, it was gone. Sara took a paci off and on for about 4 months. When she was mad, she would spit it out and suck her thumb, but when she turned 4 months it was bye bye paci. She loved her thumb. Hope never even took a paci. It was always the thumb. (The funniest thing is both girls sucked their right thumbs. Never their left thumbs. When we talked about it recently, Sara said as serious as she could be, "the other one doesn't taste as good." HA!) And finally Emma. She's always been a paci baby. I caught her sucking her thumb 2 times when she was a newborn, but once we found the paci she liked that's all she's done.

So when Sara was 3 1/2, I bought some of that clear finger nail polish that tastes like vomit. I'm not mean, I promise! It took 3 hours to break her! It was amazing! Everytime she put her thumb in her mouth, she cried for a drink or something to eat.

Today, it was Hope's turn. As she told her Daddy, "Momma put the bad finger nail polish on me." HAHA! But miracle of all miracles, it's worked again! All through the day, she would run to the kitchen and fill her glass with water from the fridge when she forgot and stuck her thumb in her mouth. Once, when I was walking past the kitchen, I looked in and she was standing at the counter drinking a glass of water. As I passed, she just looked at me and said, "sucked my thumb" and went back to drinking the water. I don't know why, but it struck me as hysterical!

She's very proud of herself. We've been bragging on her all day!

Where does the time go?

Wow. I can't even begin to make up for not blogging for two weeks. We have done so much the past two weeks. Two weeks ago we went on the best camping trip ever! We left first thing Tuesday morning and stayed until Sunday. Our friends the Maiers came for a couple nights and we had a blast! I can't find my camera right now, but when I find it I have tons of pictures. One of my favorite memories will always be of the kids doing the Jr. Ranger program. Luke was INTENT on finishing the program in one day. It was so cute when they went to the ranger station the next morning to turn in their booklets, they had a swearing in ceremony! It was adorable. They got badges, patches, and a certificate. They were all so proud. They had the great idea to put WalMart bags on their bicycles on drive through the campground picking up trash for the service project they had to do. I was proud of them.

Luke started school last week. I have a second grader! How in the world?!?! He's loving it so far. He hasn't complained once about getting up in the morning for school. He really likes his teacher and I am looking forward to a great year.

Since we've been back, I've started a home business. YIKES! It's been brewing for a few weeks now, but I "launched" it this past week. I'm making custom vinyl decals for cars, walls, sippy cups, stick figure families, you name it. I've always loved vinyl decals, and then the opportunity to start this business fell into my lap. I am supplying a boutique in town with Greek letters and alphabet letters to apply to water bottles, sippy cups, whatever. I got the order Monday, couldn't get my vinyl til Wednesday and the order was for over 5000 Greek letters! Holy Cow!!! I couldn't get enough vinyl to fill the order, but I did make 3400 letters. My Mom and Dad and brother and SIL all helped me pull it off in 2 days. We joked that our dining room was my sweat shop! HA!

I'm really going to enjoy doing this because it is something that I can do at naptime and after the kids are in bed and it won't take me away from my family. And I will be able to pay for our family vacations and some blow money. It's fun!

So now, after I get the pictures uploaded, I'll be caught up for the most part on our lives.

Sweetest Thing In the World

We had a productive day today. Lance and I both cleaned out our cars today. His truck is disgusting! He never cleans it, but we are taking it camping so it really needed it. He felt really good about it after it was done. His floorboard is rubber, so I was scrubbing it with a scrub brush and Hope and Sara came up and wanted to help clean Daddy's truck. It was cute. They were just scrubbing away.

Then it was my Tahoe's turn. It was nasty! Luke and Hope had destroyed the back seat. You couldn't see the floorboard. It took almost 2 hours to clean it all up. The good thing is; MAJOR milestone...Emma is facing forward now!!!! We ran some errands to get ready for the camping trip and she LOVED looking out the front window. She's technically 2 weeks away from turning 1, but she's 20 pounds so I went ahead and turned her. She was a happy girl.

After we ran our errands, we grabbed some dinner at Wendy's. Luke and Sara sat a table beside us, but Hope sat by her Daddy. While he was getting our drinks, Hope said, "I sit by my Daddy, Momma. I like to sit by Daddy. He's the best Daddy in the whole world." The sweetest thing in the world!

I'm Back!!!!

OK, so it has been a crazy 2 weeks! This is the longest I have gone without blogging since I started! Aaaahhhh! I promise I won't do it again!

There is no way I will be able to remember all that I would have blogged if I had done it every night the past 2 weeks, so I'm just going to hit the highlights. We went camping for a week with Lance's parents, sister, and her family. Her boys are Luke and Sara's age. Her oldest is almost exactly a year older than Luke but they are best friends.

I am so happy that we bought our camper last year. Jennifer and Aaron (SIL and BIL) have had one for a few years and Lance's parent's have had one forever. They've always gone camping for a week in the summer and we've only ever been able to go down for the day. Last year was our first year to camp, too. Fun family memories and traditions my kids will always remember.

We had a lot of fun. Here are some of the highlights.

The kids LOVED the playground and me spinning them as fast as I could on the "spinner"

How many kids can you fit in a tree? (Aaron's nephew joined us for 2 days)

Too stinkin' cute!

We fed geese every day. The kids were almost brave enough to let them eat from their hands.

We fished from the bank at our campsite and everyone caught a lot of fish!!!!

Mmmmmmmm. S'mores!

Since we've been back, I've been busy starting a home business. That is why I haven't been able to blog every night. I've been busy. More to come on that in the next few days. Now it's time to get ready for our last camping trip of summer. We're going to the Buffalo River next week before school starts the next week. The kids can't wait. Hope asks everyday when were going to the Buffalo Wivah. :)

We are so excited for this week of camping. It was a working camping trip for Lance last week. He went to work everyday. But this week, he's off and we can't wait to have all that time with Daddy!