Trip to the funny farm

Spring has sprung at the Creech farm!  We hadn't been out to my sister/parents farm in 3 weeks due to vacation and then a week of the flu that took down everyone but me.  Poor Preston missed 4 days of school and threw up about 30 times!  His classmates wrote him get well cards...it was so sweet!!  Once we were finally healthy we went to visit the new babies...the lambs!

 Cameron was a little bit unsure at first!

 It didn't take long for them to become best buddies!

 It also took about 2 seconds flat for Preston to ask if we could have one at home!  I thought they were so cute that I would love to but I think we're not allowed if we live in the city.  I'm sure our neighbors would LOVE us!!!

 Owen has been talking about these lambs all winter and how he will be their shepherd.  He even told the teachers at preschool who thought he was making it all up.  He says he wants to be like David!

 

 Here's the boys on the farm side of the property where a creek is getting pretty full from all the rain water.  My dad is poking Preston on the head with a stick but Preston had no idea he was up there and didn't feel a thing.  Hard-headed, I say!

 King of the mountain!

This is also about 90 seconds before Owen ends up falling over into the creek and his fun is over.  He ended up sitting on the edge of the creek with me in just his skivies.

 "Now that Owen is out of the way, I will fill his boots with water!! (cue evil laugh!)"

 Back at the house, the babies needed to be fed.  I am a pro bottle feeder by now so I fed this one.  I did end up spraying milk in my face which doesn't normal happen when I feed humans!

Here's the King of the Mountain before he was dethroned and stripped of all but his underwear.

The kids have so much fun over at the farm!  We are so grateful to Sara and my parents for allowing us to take part in this adventure without having to do a lot of the work!

Our trip to Destin

We haven't really been to Florida since Sara moved away so I was excited to get to enjoy the beach and the sun again over Spring Break this year.  I was a little bit apprehensive about driving down which took about 14 hours because I didn't know how the kids would fare.  Well, let me tell you, Pinterest came through for me in a big way.  They gave me this idea about writing each child's name on a clothespin.  While you're on the car ride, you clip their name onto the visor and then you remove it if they are acting up.  During that time, you randomly do checks and whoever has their name still on the visor gets something special.  I decided that the kids would get 50 cents every time their clip was still on the visor so I made a sticker chart to show their progress.  They had the ability to earn up to $6 to use towards souvenirs when they got to Florida.  I was impressed by how much the money motivated them.  If you have a road trip planned anytime soon with older kids, I'm sure this will be a hit!

We went down to Destin, Florida with Wes' brother Chad and his family and his sister Amy and her family.  There was 17 of us in all.  This was the place that we stayed at.  It was a wonderful house that fit our families perfectly!  It was in a neighborhood that looked like it was straight out of Desperate Housewives.  We loved being in a neighborhood because it allowed the kids to be able to play things like kickball and baseball without worrying too much about cars.

It's so funny that we all have a two-year old.  They were like the three musketeers, getting into trouble at every turn.  They would follow each other around and sneak snacks from the pantry or from our rooms.  It's rumored Gisele (Chad's 2 year old daughter) may have eaten half of Amy and Jay's chocolate chip cookies.  I also witnessed her eating 4 packs of our fruit snacks!  Cameron would just cruise the kitchen and put his hands up hoping to snag a bag of chips or cheez-its.  They also loved to escape out the front door and head towards the street when no one was looking.  Thankfully we had a deadbolt that we could use that kept them inside!   They are definitely little rascals!  Here's a picture of them giving us a few moments of peace by watching a movie in Cameron's bed.

These boys were the other set of 3 Musketeers that we had.  They are 7 (Canon, far right), 6 (Preston, middle) and 5 (Quinn, far left) and they play together fabulously!  We are so happy to have all these boys!

Getting ready for family pictures

These pictures always make me laugh because if you were there while they were being taken, you would have seen the sheer chaos of bringing us all together.  I'm pretty surprised in how good it turned out!

The view from the beach.

The last night there.  I love my boys!

Wes apparently forgot to smile but the rest of us turned on the charm on his behalf, especially Owen.  

First things first!

Oh how I have missed blogging!  I know there are only a token few of you left who read but I still love to write so I'm going to keep doing it.  We just got back from our vacation to Florida but as I was downloading my pictures from the trip, I realized I had some pretty cute winter pictures to share first!  This is our first winter in Brownsburg and let me just tell you...it was lovely!  We have a lot of trees in our front yard and back yard and when they were covered in snow, it looked like a winter wonderland.  I don't really love snow that much but after this winter, I'm now a fan!

Before I show you our snow pictures, I just wanted to give you a public service announcement;  This picture is why self-portraits are such a bad idea!  A double-chin is almost inevitable when you take it yourself! :)  Owen is our budding photographer...he loves to steal the camera and take lots of interesting pictures of things like carpet, the chair, the floor....you know, the things most people love to see pictures of!  He always leaves an incriminating picture of himself just in case we don't know who the culprit is!

 Onto the snow!

 This was Owens first time making a real snow angel.

 Here's Cameron showing off his giant chompers.  

Preston is ready for his close up!  This is his 3rd winter coat of the season.  He lost the first one...still not sure how that is possible. So I inadvertently bought Preston a replacement coat from Goodwill that ended up being a girl coat...I mean he only wore it to school like three times before I figured it out!  So, this time I went to Kohls to make sure I was buying a boy coat instead of a girl coat. 

Here's a photo I like to look at when all the kids are fighting.  Deep down I know they like each other.  We try really hard to instill a closeness in the family because I really think that friends will fade but family lasts forever!