He's losing all of his teeth!!!

Konnor lost his first tooth on January 17, 2008. He never does anything the easy way. About a year and a half ago, Konnor fell on the floor at school and bruised his tooth. The dentist had to Xray it and it was healing well, but then we found out in December that it was infected. So on January 17 he had to have it pulled. He was so brave. This is a picture of him before his tooth got pulled. He was so excited to bring his tooth home after it got pulled and he couldn't wait for the tooth fairy to leave him money under his pillow. I think he got $5. The dentist said he probably wouldn't lose anymore teeth for another 6 months to a year. Boy were they wrong. He lost his next tooth on April 17. It was his bottom tooth. He was so excited because now when he stuck his tongue through his teeth, it made an 'S' shape.
Then again yesterday he lost his other bottom tooth. He was crying when he got home because his tooth was so loose that he could bend it all the way down, but he was too frightened to pull it. I was trying to convince him when he got mad and turned to walk away. Just as he turned around his tooth came right out into his hand. He was soooo surprised and proud of himself for getting that tooth out. Hopefully he won't loose anymore for awhile, or he won't be able to bite into an apple(which is his favorite fruit).

Makayla at 3 years old.

Makayla is my second child. Sometimes she is the most thoughtful and other times she is the most stubborn. I love everything about her. She loves to help everyone in the family(when she is in the right mood)

Makayla at 9 years old

Recently, Keith and I finished up a bible study called Crown Financial study( It is amazing and you can find out more information if you are interested at mycrown.org) Anyway, besides learning how to be a good steward of everything that God has blessed us with, we also learned that we need to teach our children how to also be good stewards. This involves so much, like taking care of the things they have(i.e. keeping there room clean and picked up) as well as helping your family(i.e. listening to your parents, being kind to one another) and using your money wisely( i.e. Tithing, long term saving, and learning the value of a dollar). Keith and I were stumped. We have known for a long time that we need to have a structured plan of responsibilities and chores and allowances for the kids, but we had never put anything in place because that means we have to stop and plan. We hate planning. But we did it anyway.

We had a funny incident happen yesterday and I thought you may enjoy it. Recently we had put into place a system of responsibilities and chores so that they could earn an allowance at the end of every week. Everyday Gwen and Makayla have to pick 2 chores out of a bucket and Konnor and Carolyn have to pick 1 chore out of the bucket. They are then responsible for doing their chores(with a happy heart of course). Yesterday Makayla's chores were Clean out the car and Sort the Laundry. She happily cleaned out the car and put everything where it belonged. Then she went on to sort all of the laundry into our laundry sorter, whites together, reds and pinks together, darks together,etc.. Before she was done the laundry sorter was overflowing with clothes. She became very frustrated and said, "I can't fit everything in here!!". I said, " Why don't you put in a load of laundry?" She responded with, "That is not my job. My job was to sort the laundry not wash it!" With that she walked into her bedroom.

About twenty minutes later she came back into the kitchen and said, " Mom, where do you want me to put the laundry in the dryer?" I said," Why? Are you doing a load of laundry?" She replied ," The second mile." This indicated to me that she had obviously thought about what our pastor Dan Yeary had been preaching on the whole month of April (His Sermons were titled The Second Mile) and she was ready to apply it. I questioned her, " Where did you hear that from?" She said, " Church." I replied," From Pastor Dan?" She said, " I do listen while I'm drawing in church. I just don't like staring at him the whole time."
I thought this was priceless!! It's neat to see Makayla growing up. She is a true blessing.

Celebrating Earth Day

Today is Earth Day, so to celebrate the day we thought we would do something in our Neighborhood. I think you are normally supposed to plant a tree or something and believe me, our backyard really needs it. But instead I took the kids for a walk around the neighborhood to pick up trash. After a few minutes of convincing that this would be fun, and a few more minutes to get ready(collecting bags, gloves, filling water bottles, etc.......) We finally got out the door. The kids decided to ride scooters which Konnor took to mean "Let's see who can get around the block the fastest." Anyway, after we finally started picking up trash around the block and in the alley behind our house, the kids really started enjoying it. We had a fun time cleaning up. Here are a few pics from our afternoon.

Now they are all hot and sweaty, so we are going to jump in the pool.

Finally. A new post!!!

Today we decided to finally play around with our blog thing (or whatever this is called. I am not used to the lingo yet) Anyway, I think we have a template we like. And we even added a picture in our profile. I am going to try to add a little something on here at least 4 days a week, but we will see how it goes. I know my friend Kelly will be so proud of me.

Well I think I am supposed to write something about what happened in our lives today. This could be a very long blog since it seems like some of our days are never ending and full of exciting events.

Today is a gorgeous day in Phoenix and we went to church early this morning and enjoyed a great morning of worship and study. Gwen and Makayla stayed after church to prepare for their upcoming choir concert on May 18th. Keith, Konnor, Carolyn and I had the priviledge of taking out my nephew Ian to Lunch at Applebee's. He is graduating this year(which I can't believe) and we got a chance to catch up on all the exciting things going on in his life. He is going off to NAU this summer. We are so proud!!! After we bored him with all the details of our College days and informed him on all the ins and outs of College, Keith took him back to our house and showed him how to change the oil in a car. Exciting!!!

While they were working on cars, The kids and I headed out to the pool area for a relaxing afternoon of fun. We are so thankful to be able to enjoy our pool this year.And even though the pool is only 72 degrees, the kids seem to not mind. Konnor loves to soak his sisters, whether it's with the water gun or just splashing them in the pool. Gwen and Kayla love to make up games to play together in the pool. and Carolyn, well...., she is a whole different story. She doesn't really like to get in the water. She just loves to look cute. Her favorite thing is to dress up and walk around the pool, over and over again like she is a princess and the pool deck is her runway. It is so adorable!!! Here is a video from today when Gwen and Makayla were singing under the umbrella. Look in the background for Carolyn.

Cute, HUH? Well, that's all for today. The kids are waiting for their good friends The Hendersons to get home. We'll talk more about them later.