Big Sister Fun

Last night while we had friends over for dinner, Gracie decided to take the little boys upstairs and keep them occupied. She was very creative and used a paper cake plate and paper clips and stapled construction paper over it and decorated their tambourines with foam stickers.


Gracie I love your creativity and your willingness to help out with the little boys. Everyone was happy and they now have some fun instruments :)

Unfortunately we didn't get a picture before Wesley ripped it open to see what was inside :( It was the thought that counted!

Friendship

Friendship is so very valuable and yet true friendship is hard to come by. In a lifetime, friends come and go, as life changes and we mature, move or get new careers, but by the grace of God you will have a few friends that you know you can always count on.
I love seeing others have meaningful friendships. Not just people you call friends and you might see once in awhile or chat with about "surface" stuff, but real true friends who know you in and out, who are willing to pray for you, to come beside you when life gets hard, celebrate with you when life is good and whom you can trust without a doubt.
This is my parents, Bob and Sharon Suiter and their dearest friends, Dan and Kathy Gonzales. These 4 have been friends for years, and by years, I mean 25+...The four of them worked and lived in community together for 15 years at Oak Glen Christian Conference Center, where they became the best of friends. In the past few years many life changes have taken place, but I think of these 4 like Lucy and Ricky and Fred and Ethel :) God has truly blessed them with each other.
Randomly the other other day Dan and Kathy stopped by my house to catch-up with my folks, where I snapped this quick picture. As I was uploading my pictures, I stopped and looked at this one for a long time and thought about all these 4 have been through over the years and was just blessed by the meaning of true friendship. This is picture of true friendship and I have been so blessed to witness what that means over the years. We love each of you and are so thankful you have one another!

Friendship is the icing on life's cake!
Thank God for your friends today!!!

The number 12

12...Twelve...One dozen...
eggs I used to fix breakfast
loads of laundry I washed today
books we checked out at the library
slices of bread used to make lunch
number of granola bars eaten today

times I needed to referee my kids

number of people our van can hold
It's a very popular number around here, just thought I'd share...

Costco Comments

Nearly every time I go to Costco, some kind shopper finds it necessary to share their wisdom about both the number of kids I have and how full my basket is. I'm not sure why complete strangers find it necessary to share their "wisdom", but I guess 5 well behaved, matching, marching kids is too much for people to handle (hehe!)
Today alone I heard...


Are all these kids yours?

Wow, you don't look old enough for ALL these kids!

Don't you know what causes it?

Are you trying for a basketball team?

Wow, you have your hands full!

Are you feeding an army?

8 gallons of milk? You should get a cow!

What kind of car do you drive? You're going to need a trailer to get all that food home.

Seriously people, 5 kids is not that many! Why does it matter to you how many loaves of bread or gallons of milk I buy?

Now really people, are there not enough great buys at Costco to keep you occupied? If my kids are running wild or climbing the racks, then please feel free to comment, but when they are walking by the cart and happily eating their churros or helping by pushing a second cart, then please keep all your stupid comments to yourself!!!

Does anybody else have this problem? Or is it just me? I try to be kind and think of some whitty response, but I was just irritated today!

Just saying...

Dirk turns 4!

This little guy makes me smile and his laugh makes you want to giggle.

Grady and Dirk are buddies from church and are two peas in a pod.

We all had lots of fun celebrating Dirsk's birthday, thanks for inviting us Courtney and Darrel.

Oh and Court, the cupcakes were delicious!!!

Happy 4th Birthday Dirk!!!

Mission San Juan Capistrano

I love that because we homeschool, we can go on a fieldtrip anytime we want and pretty much everywhere we visit presents itself with some sort of learning. CA history is so much fun to teach and the learning opportunities are endless! We visited the 21st California mission, San Juan Capistrano. The grounds are beautiful and we took a guided tour, so we learned a lot of great things.

Love the flowers throughout the grounds

statue of Padre Serra

This is the bell tower from the outside of the grounds to the south

I thought this doorway inside the great church was beautiful

5 Oates in a row with Momma at the koi pond


I absolutely love this picture

outside the East gate

The crosses throughout the mission are beautiful

A cross statue in the original cemetery


the alter and dome in great church

the architecture throughout is amazingly beautiful! I love the wood against the stone with the bells

We had such a great time, everyone was well behaved, the weather was nice and we learned lots of cool stuff! If you get the opportunity go, it's well worth the $8 :)

Bubbles for breakfast

I love sitting outside in the morning with my coffee and basking in the sun just for a few minutes, usually while the kids are eating their breakfast. Today, I asked Grady what he wanted for breakfast and his answer was "bubbles" (they got bubbles in their valentine goody bags) So bubbles it was...Coffee and Bubbles, what a great way to start the day :) of course I had to grab the camera...

He was so proud of all the bubbles he was blowing, it made both his day and mine. Bubbles aren't too bad for breakfast!