we have a seven year old

Sheesh.  I've had these pictures uploaded and ready to post for ever now, and just haven't done the writing.  What a lame mom.

Lucy turned seven......The last birthday for the family for 8 months.  And a glorious affair it was.

Cupcakes for class.  They look kind of nasty here, but there were a cute purple and turquoise - the latest two favorite colors of the birthday girl.

After the singing of the birthday song and the eating of cupcakes, it was time for the reading of the birthday book.  Lucy's teacher, Miss Rinoldo, has the kids draw pictures and write what they would like to give the birthday child.  Then she compiles the pages and makes a book.  The birthday child then reads the book out loud to everyone.  Very cute.

Lucy went crazy, broke with all kinds of tradition, and busted out with "I want to go to Crepes and Waffles" for her birthday dinner.  This, I believe, is evidence of a highly influential oldest sister - not mentioning any names, of course.

Her oldest sister, Maddy (hey, I didn't mention her name in the previous paragraph), made a little dress for Lucy's teddy bear in her home ec. class.  Absolute sweetness.

Cade enjoyed the festivities by drawing a chart showing the correlation between gallons, pints, cups and all that.

Finished!

The chart is now in the kitchen for easy reference.  Handy.

Then Sunday we had some Casa G. type party time.

The "it" gift?  Sour ice breakers - imported, of course.

Ecuadorian tradition is to shove the birthday person's face into the birthday cake.  This is not normally a practice that we as a family or we as a larger, Casa G. family participate in, but apparently Lucy is more Ecuadorian than the rest of us.

She decided to enjoy the fullness of another birthday in this fine land.

Later than evening Lucy got a phone call from one of her closest friends, Shadia.  I wish I would have had a video camera going the whole time.  Hilarious.  They talked (aka: giggled) on the phone for a good ten minutes, Lucy lounging on the couch like a 16 year-old, sucking her lollipop, chatting it up.

Then it was time for some presents.  Boots.

Make up - her favorite, and our least (what was I thinking??).

The following weekend we had her party.  The party was actually supposed to be on the weekend of her birthday but we had a few behavioral issues, let's just say.  The privilege of a birthday party was then earned back (barely) the following week.

She wanted a "fruit" party.  The theme of fruit was based off of her favorite pjs (featured in the photo above).  I was a little uninspired, only out of my typical laziness for things involving our own family, but finally threw up some balloons and tried to make them look like fruit.  I gathered some leaves from outside and stuck them on, then strung them up.

The strawberries were my personal favorite.

The yellow balloon with the big bunch of leaves was an attempt at a pineapple, but I was a little stack in making sure the greens stuck out/up.  Oh well.

I did have fun making a fruit bouquet.

She wanted a cherry cake.  Well, it was sort of a cherry cake..... I really wanted to do a different fruit but I had to bend to the birthday girl's wishes, so a (sort of) cherry it was.  I ran out of space so the stem and leave are a little homely looking.  Okay, the whole thing was pretty homely looking.  I'll just keep the photo small.

The table still looked a little bare, so I threw on a lemon/lime umbrella.  Because, you know, umbrellas are good decorations.

I even (I'm so proud of myself) made some last minute goody bags - printed off some "fruit of the spirit" book marks I found online, "laminated" them (clear contact paper) and stuffed the bags with a bunch of random candy.  Not so random were the little bags of "runts" that Eric brought back from the states.

Mia took on the games division.  She and Cade made a came of "stick the fruit in the fruit basket".  She drew and cut out a basket and the two of them drew and cut out fruit shapes.  The Mia's friend Mia came over and they two of them ran the games.

They also made a treasure hunt throughout the house and outside.  The Treasure was the birthday cake.  So then we ate.

And sang.  Lucy was a little anxious to blow out the candles, so she didn't quite wait until we were done singing.  Eager beaver.

We had cake, fruit kabobs and chocolate fondue, chips and soda.   Lots of good healthy sugar.

The girls all headed up to the roof to eat.

And then, once they were all covered with chocolate and fruit juice and the chip crumbs were stuck to them, Lucy opened her gifts.

The girls managed to stand still enough for me to snap a few photos.  But just a few.

Mia and Mia then led the girls in a rousing game of duck, duck, goose.

Some of the girls refused to play unless we played on the grass, so we moved to the back yard.  And continued on.....

That quickly died out and they went for swinging each other around instead.

The party was only 2 hours long (several parents are Ecuadorian, so 2 hours turned into almost 3, in terms of pick-up).  I don't think I could have handled any more time.

Seven year old girls have a lot of energy.

super reader!

Who would have thought, even four months ago, that this guy would be getting an award for reading?

 Not me.  Not his dad or his sisters.  But he did.  

 The two 2nd grade classes had a special celebration today for a reading challenge they had - five weeks, reading as much as they could.  Cade and three others all read over 1000 pages and got books as a prize.  Someone was beaming.  Actually, two people were beaming.  I was a pretty proud mama.

After the awards, the kids got cake and ice cream in their classrooms.  

 Cade and his best buddy chowed down.

Surprisingly I resisted the sugar fest.

Thats only because we had better chocolate cake at home......

gone to the birds

It has been a bit of a birdy week.  It all started Monday morning as I was sitting on our chesterfield, reading my bible.  I had the front door open, as I often do, to get fresh air (or smoggy air, to be a little more accurate).  All of a sudden there is a little bird flying above me, fluttering madly around.... and of course Nolly is eagerly following it, wishing it would be flying a little lower.  After a few seconds, it flies into the dining room window and falls to the ground, stunned.  Nolly is at it in a fraction of a second, but thankfully I had grabbed a towel and worked quickly to get the cat out of the way and throw said towel on said bird.  I gently scooped up the bird, deposited the bird outside and closed the door to keep Nolly inside.

Now it is Thursday night and there was just a humming bird in the kitchen.  One of the boys, Jesús, was already here for dinner, so he and Eric attempted to catch it.  First Jesús tried to lure it with the hummingbird feeder, but it was a little too frantic.

 It landed a few times, but most of the time it was just fluttering around the light.

 We finally turned off the lights, I got everyone to be quite and it settled down a bit.  Eric managed to get a towel over it and help it find its way outside..... well, he put it outside, I suppose.

Needless to say, Nolly has been a very active kitty lately.  It's fun to be in the Ackermann house!

i love you more

The kids often say that: "I love you more" - when I tell them I love them.  I tell them that it's not possible.  And while I say it somewhat jokingly, as a way of saying that I love them so stinking much, in many ways its true.

I always loved my mom.  She is an incredible woman and I have often referred to her as my hero.  But it wasn't until I had kids of my own that I really got it.  That my love for her became alive, growing.  Being in the reverse role - being the mom myself - made me see how incredibly much a mother loves a child.  Even more, realizing all you do out of love for that child: sacrifices you make, hours agonizing over them - wanting them to grow, wanting them to fall in love with Jesus, the constant prayers.... well, it makes you realize the depth of love and commitment that your mother had for you.  And that just causes your love for your own mother to grow even more.

Love isn't a stagnant thing.  Or it shouldn't be.  It isn't something you just have and then it stays there.  It seems, at least to me, that real love is constantly growing (I should say human love - God's love is so complete and full and deep that it couldn't possibly grow.  It's bounds are already limitless).

And so is our love for Christ.  The more we realize who He is, the more we realize who we are, the deeper our understanding is of what He has done for us, the realization of what He is constantly, currently doing for us, the deeper our love grows for Him.  Human love feeds on Love.  The more Love you see, experience, realize, the more our own love grows.

I feel more "alive" today than I have felt in a long while.  Love, His love is real.  And my love is having a feast.

more teachers appreciated

Since we didn't cover all the teachers for the Ecuadorian Teacher Appreciation Day, we went for the US one.  The kids were a little hesitant - they didn't feel much like making anything, but once they got going, they had a great time.

We made little holders for drink powder to hang over bottles of water..... one for each teacher.  

Mia's:

Lucy's:

Cade's:

Apparently all the teachers were thrilled.  Even though there were small, inexpensive gifts, I think the thought definitely counted here.

Oh baby.....an announcement

So, it is now time for an announcement.  

I have been feeling rather crappy lately - again, yes, but for different reasons than usual.  

This photo of me will help explain (excuse the pajamas)....

Uh, ya - shock and awe.

We are in shock and awe too.

Because of my age and all, I thought it would be best to wait to make an announcement - to make sure everything is healthy and all that.  And then it seemed that it would make it more fun for us to use this method of communication instead of making a bunch of phone calls.

We won't go into feelings and emotions quite yet.  That still needs to simmer a while.

To get me in the right frame of mind, however, I had the opportunity to photograph a newborn.

Little baby Graham - three weeks old.

He was so sweet and amazingly handsome for one so young.

 He was wide awake most of the time, but he finally did sleep.

What a little angel.

 And the happy family: Roberto, Cameron and baby Graham.

They are such a sweet and happy family.  Love them. 

And the cute little heart with the hands photo.....

If that little guy won't get you in the right frame of mind for a lot of photography, what will.  And that is the frame of mind I am in - I have a lot of photo shoots coming up.

Oh, and back to the announcement - I guess I never did formally make it, did I.

I have been extremely bloated lately.

 So bloated, in fact, that it makes me look 4 - 5 months pregnant.  

Gross - looking and feeling.  Not sure what is going on, but don't worry, I'm not that gaseous all the time.

Update:  Let me be perfectly clear - I am NOT pregnant!!!
I apparently have sent my friends and family into a frenzy......

If you want to pass on that "announcement", just tell people to come and visit this blog post.  :o)

Now we are bringing May flowers.

A Time To Plant

Post at Inspired By Family Magazine.