We had a lot of fun carving pumpkins. Don't worry, the kids did the scooping, we did the carving.

Andrew was the last to go and so Zane and Luke had to assist.

OOO...Dirty hands from scoopin' out the seeds.

Zane was taking his job seriously.

Olivia did really well.

HAPPY 4th BIRTHDAY BOYS!

Can you believe they were born 7 weeks early and weighed less than 5 lbs!

3 lbs 15 oz -Luke

4 lbs 2 oz - Zane

4 lbs 5 oz - Andrew

Luke eating his Thomas Cake

Zane digs right in to his race car cake.

Andrew had a Handy Manny cake. Olivia prefers the ice cream.

Luke is driving the gator. Andrew is shot gun with

Olivia and Zane in the back. The humidity

has made Olivia's hair so curly!

TADA!! It's stained..finally. Mark worked really hard

and we had lots of help.

Olivia rubbing the lion cub's belly at the Toledo Zoo.
We celebrated the house being done by going
to the zoo this past weekend.

We were cleaning up the yard and piling up pieces of

leftover wood on the firewood pile. The gator came in

really handy. The boys worked really hard.

We went to the Toledo Zoo and had lots of fun.

This picture is for Grandma Joan who hates snakes.

Luke and Zane helping to push the Gator and Andrew

up a little hill. Team work. Team work.

Playing Grocery Store is so much fun! Zane asked me if they could

use real food from the pantry to put in the shopping cart. I agreed and later

heard Luke say, "Is this on sale?" Zane's reply was, "It's on my list."

The flashlight Zane is hanging up was the 'beeper' and Luke was the Beeper Lady!

Olivia was handing Luke the groceries and Andrew was the bag boy.

The past weeks we have been busy staining the exterior of the house.

No, Zane is not really staining! He's only in training to help in another 4-5 years.

He wanted to be on scaffolding like Daddy and

he even paints with this tongue sticking out-like Mark.

Zane and Andrew liked putting water in buckets and using a little brush to help 'stain.'

Photo taken at Hocking Hills-Old Man's Cave. Luke got his hands in the water

every chance he had. Here, he climbed out on a limb so he could splash around.

Hope you are all having a fun and safe Summer!!

Zane, Luke, Andrew and Olivia enjoying the

cool water at Grandma and Grandpa Bockey's Pond.

The boys are finished with swimming lessons at the YWCA.

I think Luke is going to be the swimmer of the group.

Olivia especially loves to hold on to our hands and jump into the water.

Andrew on the slide at Smiley Park in Van Wert.

All the kids would rather climb UP the slide than slide down.

Olivia in some tall grass 'eating clover' like a bunny rabbit.

I don't think she can smile any bigger than that!

ZANE- The Tree Hugger. Zane is climbing Grandma Joan's apple tree.

He's like his Dad always wanting to climb and be a dare devil.

We planted some trees a few weeks ago and had to dig up worms to plant with the trees.
Luke was scared to touch them at first. I kept saying, "They don't bite, just pick it up."
Mark noticed and pointed out that I (Mommy) wasn't touching them. I said, "It's Luke's job."

Andrew on his tricycle. It was getting dark but he insisted on wearing them.

Cousin Hunter gave all three boys some of his old sunglasses.

We are too cool!

Zane, Andrew and Luke

at the party for Nick and David

who are finished with their service with the Marine Corps.

We are so proud of them.

Dr. Olivia:

Now accepting new patients.

Doll babies, dogs, kitties and teddy bears accepted.

More house pictures-as requested

This is in our bedroom. The saying is actually a vinyl sticker from Uppercase Living.

In our bedroom. This is what I see when I lay down at night. This ceiling took hours-in the middle of July- to stain! I love looking at this ceiling before falling asleep at night. I think it's beautiful with all the angles coming together.

Standing in the living room at the bottom of the stairs.

We ordered the rod iron online and made the steps and handrail ourselves.

The piece of wood trim in the center is actually covering up about a 2 inch gap in the drywall.

The gap is there to allow for settling. In a few months we'll have to adjust the settling jacks that are situated throughout the house.

some house pics

This is the inside of the dining room. The table is under the lighting fixture. We've really enjoyed having a 'real' table to sit down at for dinner.
We had this picture taken this past fall by Ellen Oberle in New Haven, IN. She is wonderful. She specializes in children and natural light. In 20 minutes we had two poses of the family, one of the boys, one of all 4 kids as well as individual pictures of each one.

This is the north east corner. Downstairs is the boys' room and our room has the upstairs balcony. The other night we ate pizza out on the balcony. It was fun-a little chilly but a nice view.

This is the south side where the dining room is located. Photo taken last summer. Now the yard is seeded and has straw all over it-except for the areas where the wind blew it off. :)

Luke, Zane, Olivia and Andrew. This picture was taken at the Newport Aquarium. It was a lot of fun. Andrew was so excited over every little thing. Zane wanted to count everything. Luke went with the flow and loved getting his hands in the shark tank and looking at the frogs. Olivia wanted Daddy to carry her most of the time. The fish were impressive but when asked what they liked the best-they all agreed that the escalator was the best part. Go figure.

That day was also the first time we ate in a 'real' restaurant (Bob Evan's) with all four kids and two adults. The odds weren't good, but they did very well and hung in there-Mom and Dad that is...

The First

This is one of my favorite pictures of the boys. Luke, Zane and Andrew.

Hopefully I can update the blog more often than I did the website! Pictures of the new house will be coming soon. We are so glad that they are not sick anymore. We had multiple rounds of kids getting sick. Not sure which is worse-one sick at a time, but having to still take care of three kids that are loud and all over the place or all of them sick at once and being on constant guard with the 'puke bucket.' Our house is finally back to normal.

"Normal" for us is pretty chaotic and loud but we wouldn't have it any other way. When we are in public with the kids we usually get comments like, "You have your hands full. Are they all your's? You poor thing." Mark likes to mess with people. When someone asked if they were triplets, he simply said, "No." and they walked away! I usually have the fault of making eye contact with people and then they stop and start talking. My comment is usually, "Yes, they are a lot of work, but alot of fun, too"

Every child is a blessing and we were fortunate to have a three for one deal! It has been such a privilege to see them grow into their own 'little person' and especially to see how they interact with each other-ever since they were babies. The interactions have changed from goo-ing and tapping to talking and wrestling. Olivia gets in on it too!