Sleeping Beauty

I went in to wake Ella for church this morning and just had to take a picture. This reminds me of when I was little and I *had*to*have* all 400 of my stuffed animals lined up just so in bed with me. Ella takes it a step further because she also likes to sleep with books under her covers.

We haven't even made it to lunch-time yet

The fun continues. I was in the back curling my hair when Shane came into my bathroom without his diaper saying "Pee" which means he just peed on the floor. Lovely.

Closer inspection reveals he pooped also. It was on his legs, feet and hands.

I stood him on the changing table to clean him and he started fingerpainting on the mirror
Then he started picking his nose.
After his full body baby wipe bath, we set off to find our prize.

I won't post any pictures.

Apparently after peeing on my storage bin that I use for co-op, he needed to have his morning sit-down.

Bill, Jake needs a new mouse for his computer. The laptop is put away so Jake's mouse was just lying on the desk. So Shane took the mouse with him while he did his business.

Then he stepped in his business.
Then he tried to wipe it off his feet.
Then he decided to play with the mouse.

I guess at that point he realized he'd need some help cleaning up so he found me.

I just started laughing as I was cleaning the floor. Ella looked very serious, "Mommy why are you laughing? That's *not* funny. It's gross." Yes, love, it is, but sometimes you just have to laugh.

This morning

Lately, Shane's adventures seem to all involve the barstools. We may need to move them to the basement for a season.

It's Friday, co-op day, and I'm teaching 13 K through 2nd graders about the wonders of the Netherlands so I have some last minute things to do this morning.

It sounded like they were all 3 happily running and playing. Then Hank came tearing into the schoolroom "Mom! Come quick! Shane made a terrible mess!"

I turned the corner to find Ella using dishtowels to mop up the mess and Shane sitting on his barstool happily pushing the water button (which is now locked, thankyouverymuch).

Well the floor did need to be mopped...

Look what I can do!

He's sitting on my lap now looking at the pictures saying "juice, there's juice." (All liquid is "juice" to Shane.) He's also saying "bebee uh oh" He really is so stinkin' cute. :)

Pirates! argh Matey!

Ella and Hank love pretending to be pirates. Shane is now trying to make pirate sounds too. It's really cute. I love this poem by RLS. I can totally imagine my 3 littles as I read it.

Pirate Story by Robert Louis Stevenson

Three of us afloat in the meadow by the swing,
Three of us abroad in the basket on the lea.
Winds are in the air, they are blowing in the spring,
And waves are on the meadow like the waves there are at sea.

Where shall we adventure, to-day that we're afloat,
Shall it be to Africa, a-steering of the boat,
To Providence, or Babylon or off to Malabar?

Hi! but here's a squadron a-rowing on the sea--
Cattle on the meadow a-charging with a roar!
Quick, and we'll escape them, they're as mad as they can be,
The wicket is the harbour and the garden is the shore.

Bill ordered a CD duplicator for church. It came in a big box. The kids were happy.

Ella's Monkey Adventures

Ella got a little stuffed animal making kit for Christmas...the kind where you have the body of a stuffed animal and you add the stuffing. We're big fans of Boyd's Bears in Gettysburg and have made plenty of animals during our trips there so she was very excited to get this.

Fast forward to a commercial she saw where a little girl hid her stuffed monkey in her daddy's brief case as he was leaving for a trip. He emailed her pictures of her monkey's adventures.

Ella thought her daddy really needed to take a stuffed monkey with him to work so he could email pictures to her.

Now Bill *looks* like a tough guy...but if you know him, then you know he's really a marshmallow when it comes to his little SweetPea. He admits to getting some very strange looks from passersby as he took these pictures, but I can tell you the smile on her face when she saw the pictures he emailed was worth any embarrassment he might have felt.

I got these out of order. This is actually on the ride home. One tired monkey after a long day at work.

She saw this and asked, "Daddy, why did you put my monkey in the dirt? He doesn't like the dirt." Bill's reply - "He's not in the dirt. He's lying on a flower because he loves to smell pretty flowers and look at the sun." Very silly, but it made her happy. :)

Morning cup of joe to get the day started.

Hanging out with the fam

Monkey reports that he had a good day but he misses getting his nap. We'll see if goes back to work or not...the extra money would be nice....

And they call him the streak

Shane is a streaker. If he was potty trained, I'd let him run nekky all the time (less laundry!), but he's not so I don't.

Here he is washing dishes in his birthday suit.

Catching up

I loaded my camera software and here are some pictures from the past few days.
I'm sad to report that when my computer died, it took all my photos with it. Thankfully I have the photos I've blogged, but all the rest are gone. I almost cried when we realized it. We'll be more diligent about backing up future photos.

Here is my boy taking a rare nap. Note the rainboots...they're his sister's. She's nearly 2 1/2 years older and they wear the same size shoe!!

Babyzilla at it again. I was in the schoolroom and heard a strange pushing sound and then running water. I peeked around the corner to find he had pushed the barstool up to the sink and was trying to wash his hair. I told him to hold still so I could take a picture to show daddy. He truly keeps me on my toes!

This is Hank's handwriting. He wanted everyone to see that he can write his first and last name. The wavy lines at the top are words to a story. The x's are bad guys shooting each other.

Bill gave Shane and Ella some frozen blueberries as a snack. Seconds before this picture, Shane had both fingers knuckle-deep in his nose.

And no photo post would be complete without our princess in all her blueberry splendor.

One Year

Today marks the one year anniversary of the imprisonment of a pastor in a country called Uzbekistan.

We first learned of him while visiting Prisoner Alert.com. He was the only person featured in his country so we began writing letters of encouragement to him and praying for him.

A few weeks later, I pulled an old edition of a magazine off the shelf to go through with the kids; it's called Kids of Courage, and it is published by The Voice of the Martyrs.

A little girl, who looks to be Hank's age, was featured along with her sisters and mother because their faith remains strong and they continue to reach out the community around them despite the fact that her daddy was arrested and imprisoned for being a pastor. Her daddy is Dmitry Shestakov...the pastor we had been praying for.

Ella was particularly moved. The thought of there being a little girl out there who couldn't hug and kiss her daddy every day was just awful to her. And Ella is the one who consistently remembers to pray for Pastor Shestakov and his family, even pausing during our day to say a quick prayer, "Dear Lord, please bless Mr. Shestakov. Amen."

This anniversary is marked by some sadness. Being wrongly imprisoned for a year, with 3 or more years to go can be discouraging to say the least. He has missed a year of his children's lives. He has missed a year of laughter and love with his wife.

But we know that He who promised is faithful, and we may never know the full extent of Mr. Shestakov's witness...the guards who watch over him may be so moved by his faith that they, too, come to call on Jesus....their families may then follow....with their neighbors as well...his fellow prisoners may join him...we don't know.

But we can pray. And pray we do.

Shane has graduated!

Thursday was a very happy day for Team Machen. Shane saw his gastro dr and she was overwhelmed by how good he looks! And that his labs are all trending back to normal! And he's gaining weight so *he* is trending back to his normal curve!


Sooooo He has graduated from the gastro clinic and we don't need to go back unless he starts having trouble again. (insert Snoopy happy dancing)


The turning point was eliminating corn. We had a few episodes of him eating whole corn and both ends of him volcanically erupted. Pretty gross. After that we didn't let him have actual corn but let him still eat food with corn syrup, corn starch and corn meal (we didn't know that all of these are considered "major corn"). He got a little better but not great.


Then we had a mental lapse and let him eat popcorn. Oh wow. Those diapers may have a scarred me for life. Awful awful mess.


So I started reading and realized we needed to also eliminate corn syrup, starch and meal at the very least. Such a major improvement that I wish we had done it sooner. We're so grateful that we had to get rid of just the major corn because the complete list of corn derivatives (also known as "minor corn")is quite long.


So we've narrowed it down to dairy, gluten, oats and corn... now perhaps he'll start sleeping through the night so I can too. :)

No pictures for now

My puter died and haven't had a chance to reload the camera software. It'll be a day or two until I get a chance to do that. So you'll be stuck with my mindless (and photoless) nonsense until then! :)

Mental health day at school today

We were up late, overslept and then had to rescue Blu. It was way too much work capturing and keeping the kids' attention this morning so we decided to head to the C&O canal and enjoy the amazing weather today. It was 70 degrees with no breeze. Just perfect. Tomorrow is supposed to be just as incredible. It's hard to believe it's January... and I love it!

Obligatory group shot

Cute kid with a bad haircut
Jake just looks tired. I actually pulled the wagon most of the time while he took pictures of trees.
Ella can be found looking at her reflection in the fridge while practicing her curtsy. It's an important skill for every princess.

Pretty girlie

Hanging out with big bro
Formulating a plan...watch out world!
Their faces cracked me up in this one. They all look half crazy.
I think she's tired...

The dog with 9 lives

Blu is Bill's dog...yes he's cute and even has a funny little personality - BUT - he barks a lot and loudly. He also sheds A LOT. Those two things negate his positive traits. Sorry Blu.

He also has a tendancy to run out whenever the front door is even slightly ajar, and he'll knock you right over if you're in the way. Another not so positive trait. And for an old, really fat dog..he can move so don't bother trying to catch him.

He has run along the highway near our house. He has crossed our road just miliseconds ahead of cars. He has nearly been kicked in the head by a horse on a nearby farm. He's gotten almost too close to a pack of hunting dogs down the way. Only he knows the full extent of his adventures, and he's not talking...

Yesterday morning he knocked Hank over as we were leaving for church and escaped. He usually returns home in about 5 hours. When we headed to bed last night with no Blu, we thought this was the end of an era.

Imagine Bill's delight when our vet called this morning. A woman called them and said she had found a dog with a rabies tag from their office. Somehow the connection was made and the vet called Bill.

Turns out he was hanging out at a neighbor's house about 1/4 mile down the road. He was barking his brains out at their neighbor's dog so Mrs. C went to get him. You know he was pooped because he followed her home and slept happily in their garage all night.

The kids and I loaded up the wagon and retrieved Bill's dog. All this before I even had one cup of coffee. I see a pedicure and mom's morning out in my future... :)

Our Morning PE Class...A Wagon Ride Down The Road

The Reunion. Lester was very glad to see him and sniffed him up and down.

One tired, old, chubby dog. You'd think he'd learn to pace himself a little better.

Guess whose nap lasted only 10 minutes today.... and yes he is screaming as loud as it looks, but I still love my little monkey.