Yeeee Haaawwww!

For those who don't know, Aaron and I both come from long lines of farmers. We each have only one or two relatives left who actually still live on or work on farms, but we both spent time on farms as kids, and have lots of family members who ride horses and know their way around farm animals.

Well, living in the city as we do, you can imagine how removed from true farm life our kids are. This is something that we can't do a whole lot about, but we do enjoy opportunities that can remind our kids of their roots when we are able.

Recently, a good friend had a birthday party for her daughter on a family farm. Ben and Molly were invited to attend, and got their first chances to ride horses.

Aaron jumped right on up on the horse, looking quite a bit like his Grandpa Schiltz, and Ben (to my surprise, honestly) jumped right on too! They had a great ride, and both seem to be naturals, though Aaron had plenty of previous experience.


Molly, surprisingly, took quite a bit of convincing, but she did finally agree to give it a try. She enjoyed it somewhat, but let's just say that it wasn't love at first ride! Oh, and the bandana was supposed to be for a "cowboy/cowgirl" theme to the party, but as you can see, Molly chose to wear it more as a "pirate wench" costume.

When the cat is away...

So you know how two-year-olds are driven to do things "by self!!!!"? And how sometimes they are super sweet and want to help with all their hearts?

Well...this is what happens when a driven, sweet, two-year-old decides to put on her own sunscreen while Mommy is busy doing dishes:





And, YES, it is actually diaper cream, not sunscreen:)

You Learn Something New Everyday

Don't you just love it when you can actually see your child's world expanding? Sometimes it is something grand, like when a baby realizes that you are still there even after you have left a room...and sometimes it is something small...like that there is a space between each of your toes, and sometimes you will find treasures (a.k.a. dirt) in there!

Molly has made this amazing discovery this spring, and now can often be found in her favorite toe-inspecting spot...checking to see what might be lurking in there.

Interview with Ben

Several of my friends with kids have been doing interview with their kids, with the intention of repeating the interview each year to see how the answers change. I've been meaning to give it a shot with Ben, and we finally got it done! It is a pretty random set of questions, most stolen from other people's lists, and a few of my own thrown in for fun. Here are the answers, from his 4-and-a-half year old self:)

1. What is your favorite color: “Green and blue”
2. What is your favorite book: “Olivia”
3. What is your favorite movie: “Thomas the Tank Engine”
4. What is your favorite food: “Couscous”
5. What is your least favorite food: “Crunchy lettuce and 'sour cream and cheddar' potato chips”
6. What is your favorite fruit: “Apples”
7. What is your favorite vegetable: “Green beans”
8. What is your least favorite vegetable: “Sweet potatoes”
9. What is your favorite t.v. Show: “Mr. Rogers”
10. What is your favorite song: “Thomas the Tank Engine”
11. What is your favorite thing to do with Mom: “Read books”
12. What is your favorite thing to do with Dad: “Watch t.v.” (Can I tell you how much I love 11 and 12?!!!)
13. What is your favorite game to play with friends: “Play Hide-N-Seek”
14. What is your favorite store: “Walgreens...no Target, because they have that train that is spinning” (In the Christmas season, Target always puts a little train set with l.e.d. lights on display, and he loves to just sit and watch it go round and round. I can't explain the Walgreens, though, we never go there!)
15. What is your favorite sport: “Basketball” (also can't explain this one)
16. What is your favorite Bible story: “My little Bible book”
17. What is your favorite place to go: “Davenport”
18. What is your favorite restaurant: “Noodles and Company”
19. What is your favorite toy: “My model trains and wooden trains”
20. What is your favorite thing to do with Molly: “Snuggle”
21. What is your favorite drink: “Juice”
22. What is your favorite thing to do at school: “Eat snack”
23. What is your favorite thing to do outside: “Ride my bike”
24. What do you want to be when you grow up: “A model train driver because I can still switch tracks...because model trains can go on different tracks too!”
25. What can you do now that you are 4: “I can run faster”
26. Who is your best friend: “Nana”
27. What is Mom's job: “Keep me safe, healthy, and growing well and big and strong so that I can be a model train driver good enough to not do things wrong to the trains.”
28. What is Dad's job: “Keep my love tank full and to make me grow strong and healthy and have nutritious food.”
29. What does Mom always say: “I want to snuggle you”
30. What does Dad always say: “I love you”
31. What is your nickname: “Benjamin Garon Schiltz...Gigi calls me that. And I call her “Gigi buh divi”, and I call you “Mommy bah dahmmy”, and I call Molly “Molly buh waddy””
32. What makes you laugh: “When somebody tickles me”
33. What makes you sad: “When I loose something and I can't find it again”
34. What are you thankful for: “That God gives us strength”
35. What does Mom love about you: “That I am special”

Happy Family!

Just wanted to share a few cute pics from late winter of our sweet, happy family!! Things are far from perfect around here, but it really feels lately like we are in a good zone.

The kids are finally sharing a room, which means there are no kids in our room! Woohoo! And they are sleeping well, most of the time:) But I also think they seem to be getting along as siblings better than ever before. They play together for "real" now, so much more often. By "real", I mean that they will construct play plans entirely independently of a parent, and then play whatever they have thought of, for long periods of time.

I do need to give praise to my husband here for a moment too...I think the reason that I am feeling so upbeat about how my children, and our family in general, are doing is because my dear hubby gave me the weekend "off" last weekend! For the first time since Molly's birth, Aaron packed up both kids (and I really do mean pack...he packed everything for their trip!!) and took them to Davenport for the weekend. All 3 of them had a wonderful visit with Nana and Papa. And as for me...I slept.

And a few other things, like painting the garage, scrapbooking, and drinking tasty wine with friends, but mostly, I slept. :)

Other than the sleep, the most glorious thing about a weekend "off" was the silence...LONG stretches of time would pass without me uttering a word. I never cared about such a thing before kids, but this weekend, it was striking how freeing it was to not be needed by anyone for 48 straight hours.

So, now that the family is home, I am finding myself emotionally recharged, rested, in LOVE with my life and family, and wanting to share these cute pics! Enjoy!



And my very favorite...

Everybody Put Your Hands Up!!

So, funny story...we have been using our ITunes more lately, and have got a nice computer file now of songs we have either purchased or downloaded onto our computer. We are enjoying all of the music we have always loved, and trying to keep up with current music a bit, too. Aaron is continually adding music to the collection, and we are almost exclusively using our computer to play music these days. My, how times do change!

And, with us both having music backgrounds, we play music a lot around here. One thing that we do almost every day is to play a soundtrack of restful songs before bedtime. This used to be a MANDATORY part of every sleeping event...every single nap and bedtime were preceeded by the "sleepy time music". Even while traveling. But now that both kids are getting older, we aren't needing/using such a formal routine for bedtime. And in the days, Ben doesn't nap anymore, and Molly loves to nap so much that she doesn't need the slightest bit of encouragement to get ready to rest...most days she tells me when she wants to go "nigh nigh" and I follow her lead! But still, we play this music a lot.

Now for the "funny" part of the story...recently, I noticed a selection on the ITunes page that labeled "Top 25 Most Played". I was intrigued!

Here was my chance, in one click, to assess our actual listening habits...were we mostly listening to cool, fun music that would show how hip we really are? Were we listening to kids songs WAY too much? What were our top 25 songs of all time?

The results are in:


1 through 24 are sleepy time songs.


And number 25: "Party in the USA" by Miley Cirus.

Uhhh...I don't know what this makes us...but I'm pretty sure the words hip and cool should be eliminated:)

But, I will say the kids do love when Miley sings "Everybody put your hands up! They're playing my song!" Here is a great pic of them rocking out with Dad!

"My Ben!"

Sorry I've been a bad blogger lately. Still need to download a ton of new pics. When that happens, I'll catch you up:)

But in the meantime, here's a cute story I wanted to share.

First of all, let me say that Ben and Molly have been SO SO CUTE and sweet together lately. LOTS of playing together and making up games for each other. Snuggling and singing together, and just generally enjoying each other's company.

It has gotten even cuter in the recent past, because Molly has started to refer to Ben as "my Ben".

So I'll regularly hear: "I need my Ben!". "Where my Ben go, Mama?" "This train is for my Ben."

When she wakes up from a nap, if she doesn't see where is his, she will always ask "Where is my Ben, Mama?"

Such a wonderful time with these two these days!