The Wonder Years

Okay, it's been a really looooonnngggg time since I posted to the blog. Months, milestones, birthdays, anniversaries . . . a million things have passed without a word from me on here. I should probably just stop pretending that I'm gonna post more frequently because when you boil it down to a choice between composing something for the blog and sleeping, well, sleep wins every time. Such is life with kids, I suppose.

Anyway, life's been good to us in our still somewhat new small town. It's been happy and full and brimming with adventure. The kids are growing at an alarmingly fast pace at this point: 7 and 4 years old.  My Lord, where did the time (and my babies!) go? Here's some recent pictures of them at a local ice cream shop . . . 

See, I told you. They're big kids now. How on Earth did that even happen? (And yes, Sydney is sticking out her tongue for no good reason in that picture on the right. It's a thing she does now when I want to take her picture. I'm hoping very hard that it will soon pass.)

As usual, there's been a lot of changes for us in the past few months. I've returned to work full-time and Sydney began preschool for the very first time a few weeks ago. She was nervous and doubtful and I expected lots of tears on her first day. Turns out, she LOVES going to school and ran right into the fray of new friends without so much as a backwards glance at me. All the tears were mine (and there were many) that day. It's been great to see her happy and excited to go to school. One day as we were getting out of the car at her school she actually said "Hurry, mommy! I don't want to miss a single thing!" Seriously, I couldn't ask for a more joyful spirit.

Sydney and Kaden had a great summer.

This was a Spring Break trip to the closest beach we could find - a mere 14 hour drive to the Gulf Coast. Not sure we'll be doing it often, but we all loved the gorgeous white sand beaches. Sydney made herself right at home.

This one was technically at the end of the last school year and not the summer but it was worth including . . . Kaden loves riding horses and he gets to do it every week in the Spring with his classmates. Another reason we love this place.

Did I mention she is joyful? This picture is a good reflection of Sydney's general attitude about life. 

And this is something I caught one day when I looked into the backseat of the car:

I love their love

So that's it. That's us right now. And now it's time for me to sleep. :)