Perfect Neighbors...

When I was a little kid I would ride my bike EVERYWHERE!! We lived in the country and I would ride all over our farm, to my grandparent's house next door, and another eldery couple lived up the road from us. We never had to worry about strangers, really fast drivers, or anything happening to us. Half the time I don't even think we told out parents where we were going. We just took off. It was fun, but I secretly wanted to live in town. I wanted to be able to ride my bike to my friends' houses, go to the park, or spend the day at the pool. In college I lived in a "town" (if you can call Canton, MO a town). I loved having people around. My senior year of college I lived with my sister during my student teaching in Lancaster and later rented a little house. I liked living in town. I liked my neighbors. I liked just getting in the car and running to the store. After 3 years of town living, we bought our house and moved to the country. At first is was hard to me being alone (Gail worked evenings the first year we lived there). I kept busy with my master's classes and school work. Now, I wouldn't trade it for the world. Our neighbors are the best ever. Here are some photos.

Make Up

I'm taking a break from my "catch up posts" to share with you are fun day at home for Martin Luther King Day. We just spent a lazy day at home. Well I was lazy, and Lydia played dress up - ALL DAY!!!

This is what she started with. Eye shadow on her cheeks, a little on her eyes, and a lot of lip gloss.

She was very proud of herself.

I know this is blurry, but it really shows check.

Check out all that lip gloss. It was literally dripping off her lips.

This was about half way through the day. Every time I turned around she was in her room putting on more eye shadow. I kept telling her to not put anymore on, but she didn't listen.

This is the last make up application. After this I put it high up on a shelf in her room (mommy got smart). She was really proud of herself and didn't understand why she couldn't sleep in it.

She more the dress all day to complete the outfit. It was a fun day!

Halloween...

Halloween was fun for us this year. She actually kind of understood the whole concept of going house to house all dressed up. Oh, and she LOVED the candy part. We started with Trunk of Treat at the Lancaster Christian Church for Awana. She had a blast. The theme was Cowboy/Cowgirl. My mother-in-law and I bought candy and had a station. We had a lot of fun watching all the little kiddos go around. I hope that we are able to do it again next year.

Here is Lydia in her cowgirl outfit: western shirt, pink books, pink belt, pink bandanna, pink hat with sequin headband around it, and pig tails.

She's all ready to go!

For Halloween she wanted to be Cinderella. Wal-Mart had these adorable costumes in her size for $20, but I couldn't bring myself to get it. She already had 2 Cinderella dress up dresses at home (which is where the other on would have gone afterwards). So she picked one out and I got it cleaned up (sewed some tears) and that was it. I put real make up on her for the first time and curled her hair.

Look at those eyes!!

Here you can see the dress. By the way, this is the smile I always get when she is DONE with pictures and wants to do something else. It's what she does when she hears, "Come on, just one more big smile."

They lasted for about an hour - if that.

This was the finished Cinderella - My Beautiful Little Princess. Gail doesn't like this picture because it makes her look so much older. I don't think he even wants to think about that stage of her life yet.

Best Friends...

Lydia has 2 best buds. One is her cousin Claudia. They are a little over a year apart, but you can't tell that my looking. Claudia is tall for her age. I hope that they will always be close - like sisters. They love playing together.

Claudia and Lydia in their matching shirts from Grandma Jerri and Papa.

Her other best friend is Faith. These 2 are like sisters. She is of one our friend/baby sitter's (Tina) daughters. Faith is 9 months older than Lydia, but you can't tell that my looking either. Faith is tiny for her age. They get to spend every day together. They are like 2 peas in a pod when they are around each other. I'm glad that they will be in the same class at school together. I think it will make it easier. I also know that Tina is able to attend class parties and such during the day that I won't always be able to attend.

Here is Lydia and Faith at my house. (I have a couple other really cute pictures of these 2 at home that I'll try to add later.)

This is what happens when all of them get together.

Photo Shoot...

We had a surprise 70th Birthday Party for my mother-in-law, Mary, back on October. We told her that we wanted to take some good family pictures around town as our excuse for looking nice. We had the party at the Senior Housing. They have a really nice building there. While we were waiting for her to arrive, I look some pictures.

Actually a decent picture of us.


A family photo.

She is just so cute!!

This wasn't taken that day, but I couldn't resist sharing it. It just screams attitude.

Cutting Wood and Picking up Bales...

We have a wood stove at our house. Yes, it is inside. Yes, it is messy. Yes, it saves a TON of money. The saving of money makes the mess worth it to me. Anyway, we spend several weekends in the fall cutting, hauling, and stacking wood. This was from a weekend that Lydia went to help us and then we ended up helping my brother-in-law stack square bales. It was fun to do these not so fun activities as a family.

Lydia all ready to go. Gum and a sucker are all she needs.

She and Daddy

Supervisor Lydia

Gail, hard a work.

Way to go, Daddy!!

Checking out his work.

Hauling to the truck.

She was proud of her piece of wood.

Not a full load, but enough for one day.

This was after we were finished. She loved it on top of the bales. Uncle Tim had her up there saying Mizzou cheers. It was priceless.

MIZ - ZOU - GO TIGERS!!!

She was up there pretty far.

Day of Play at Mimme's House...

The grandchildren on Gail's side of the family always have called her Grandma Mary. I guess either Lydia didn't like that or she just couldn't say it because she has always called her Mimme. If fact, the other kids have started calling her Mimme as well. I think it is sweet. Lydia loves her Mimme and likes to hang out over there. She doesn't care if she is the only one or not (she may prefer to be the only one because she gets a little more spoiled that way). Here are some pictures of her and her a few of her cousins spending time together and having fun.

Here is Lydia with 3 of her cousins on Gail's side: Colin, Jonathan, and Landon.

Nothing sweeter than a bed of wildflowers and a beautiful little girl.

Take time to smell the flowers.

How precious!!

Farm girl

Colin posed this picture to have the 2 milk cans and Lydia's "body guards".

Playing Mommy

Wearing Mommy's shoes .

Walking around in Mommy's shoes is not as easy.

This child LOVES to wash dishes. I didn't let her for a long time, but them I read on a friend's blog about how she let's her children and how it teaches them the importance of helping out. After that I was SOLD. I don't even have to worry about her missing any spots because she'll wash the same dish for about 5 minutes.