Helper

Luke LOVES to help. He almost always wants to help with whatever chores we are doing around the house - putting laundry into the washing machine or dryer, setting the table, vacuuming, sweeping... you get the picture - Luke wants to be involved in the process. Last week we created a 'chore chart' for him. We listed things he can do to help around the house and earn a coin for his bank. Easy stuff like make his bed and pick up his playroom. He was so excited to help and get a coin for his bank that his chores were completed quickly and then several times over that afternoon! We love this characteristic. We're praying that it lasts through adolescence. (praying, not holding our breath) :) 

Helping Daddy mow the lawn

After they mowed the lawn the DeBoer boys came inside, drank lemonade, watched the Yankees and congratulated each other on being such hard workers. Ah, I love my boys.

Mud

When I was growing up my brother earned the nickname King Crud for always, always being filthy - covered in dirt. My children are following closely in his footsteps. Luke is normally sporting dirty knees and dirty fingernails, typical of most 3 year old boys. Elin, however, is quite the Mistress of Mud! If there is dirt or mud anywhere nearby (in abundance in our yard) she will find it, inspect it, taste test it and cover herself in it.

Pops and NeeNee gave Elin a beach ball sprinkler for her 1st birthday. The kids love it but I'm pretty sure that they love the fact that it sprinkles water onto the dirt-filled flower beds creating large quantities of soft, cool, squishy mud even more than the sprinkler itself. They play with the sprinkler for about 10 minutes or so and play in the mud for as long as I will allow them.  

I love how you see the sprinkler in the background of this picture while they are covering their limbs in mud. 

A muddy fu manchu. awesome. 

The second time they were even less excited about the sprinkler and practically went straight away to the mud. 

 I love her mischievous little look in this picture. Classic "I-know-you-don't-want-me-doing-this-but-I'm -going-to-do-it-anyway" type of look. 

And it got worse. Lots worse. 

Apparently Luke thought Elin needed a mud facial but didn't want to spring for the spa treatment, thus creating his own. nice.

 Doesn't she look like some tribal baby? 

Luke wasn't nearly as messy but he didn't have the help of an older sibling to rub mud all over him. :) Good thing Elin is so tolerant!  

They could have played out there for hours. When I finally decided enough was enough and we should get seriously cleaned up for dinner I had to strip them down and hose them off in the front yard (yes, I'm a redneck like that) before throwing them in the tub! The amount of dirt left in the bottom of our tub afterwards was astronomical.

Peek-a-boo(bie)

Elin uses props when she plays peek-a-boo. She no longer will wear a bib, much to my dismay (I always put one on her since I despise doing laundry but she always rips it off! This is one time I hate velcro) Tonight she decided since she couldn't pull her shirt off (she was trying), at least she'd get some entertainment out of it...

 

What? 

Hey! I said no pictures!  

And to prove I do get into a picture here and there... 

Elin's 1st Birthday!

Happy 1st Birthday Precious Elin!

When it comes to birthdays, anniversaries and other 'holidays' (like mother's/father's day, Valentine's day, etc) the DeBoers are not big celebrate-ers. We do celebrate, don't get me wrong, but we rarely go all out. A nice dinner at home (or maybe we'll spring for Chili's!), come cake and a few gifts is a typical birthday celebration. It was no different for Elin's first birthday - at least on her official birthday. 

True to form, Elin was pretty chill the whole time. Luke was definitely more excited than Elin. He struggled to wrap his little brain around the fact that it was Elin's birthday, not his. But the fact that he did get a few small gifts from all his grandparents and was able to eat a cupcake, or two, made it a little easier for him to deal with the fact that it wasn't his special day. And Elin, of course, was happy to share the limelight. 

Luke 'helped' Elin open some of her presents.

 Grammie DeBoer was on skype while we opened the presents she sent and gave Elin her first cupcake to eat/smash. Gotta love technology.

 Elin got a basket of play food from Matt and me - she enjoys taking everything out and putting it back in the basket. 

Such a big girl! Lately her favorite thing to say has been "Whoa". I'm pretty sure she was in the process of saying 'whoa' in this picture - she was probably impressed with my mad cupcake decorating skills. ;)

 She wasn't so sure what to do with all the singing and being the center of attention. 

 It didn't take long for her to figure out that sugar is delicious and that we were allowing, even encouraging her to dig right in. Such a sweet, sticky mess! 

Friends of ours' little girl, Lucy, turned 1 a few days after Elin so we decided to have a combined 1st birthday party (mostly just an excuse to get friends together). We had cupcakes and other yummy treats, some punch, and a few 'adult beverages'. We made some tissue paper pom poms and hung white Christmas lights around the patio - trying to make our backyard look less white trash (I'm not sure that the Christmas lights in May helped that at all, oh well). It turned out pretty nice and we all had a great time. 

 Elin was pretty tired by the time the party rolled around (I don't think she took a very good nap that day) She wasn't sure what to make of all the people singing to her. Lucy wasn't so sure about things either! It was hilarious to watch their faces during the singing of 'Happy Birthday'. The batteries on my camera died just after taking this picture but Liz got the singing on video. I'll have to get a copy somehow.

Happy Birthday to two of the sweetest little ladies we know! We love you!!

Mean Muggin'

Friday, May 11 marked Elin's first birthday! Wow, oh wow, did this year go by in a blur! I was prepared for it to go fast but definitely wasn't prepared for it to go this fast!  Of course, I took lots of pictures but for some reason they aren't uploading onto blogger - frustration. I can get to them on the computer but blogger won't recognize that there is a new file of pictures - frustration. I don't like this new format for blogger either - frustration. SO, in an attempt to avoid further, needless frustration, I am going to put that post on the back-burner for now. Something for all my loyal readers to look forward to. :) 

How big is Elin? SO big! 

Elin continues to show us more and more of her adorable personality. She is still incredibly laid back and pretty chill most of the time but she delights us with her humor and silliness. She is in such a fun stage - I swear, Matt and I can actually hear her brain cranking away full speed as she learns new things every day. She cracks us up with her goofy gorilla crawl. She has mastered this exceptional skill and can maneuver extremely well, and quickly! She's beginning to show more interest in walking - just tonight she took about 8-9 steps between Matt and me - but she's clearly no risk taker (so unlike big brother Luke who wants to jump off the top bunk with the ceiling fan running!). She is her own little person and we simply adore her just as she is. She is such a blessing and we are privileged to be her parents. 

I would love to know what goes through Elin's mind sometimes. Every so often she makes this hilarious face, affectionately referred to as her 'mean mug'. She scrunches up her nose, eyes, and mouth while sniffing quite obnoxiously.  It amuses me to no end. I simply had to capture it on camera - several times. :) 

I'm just not sure where she gets it from - puzzler. 

Easter

 This is a little on the late side, but better late than never right?
We had a wonderful Easter, as usual. We enjoyed an incredible Good Friday service and fabulous Easter morning service at our church. It is always such a joy to be able to worship with such an amazing community of believers, especially at Easter!

 Thanks to Auntie Andrea Luke and Elin were stylin' this Easter! 

I wanted to get a nice picture of our family all 'prettied up' but, as usual, this just didn't work out. The kids cooperated (sort of) so I was able to get a few decent pics of them before meltdown central. 

We had a few friends over to celebrate with us on Sunday afternoon. Most (if not all) of us have no family close by so we tend to become one another's families for such occasions. :) It is such a special group of friends - we are SO blessed to have them all in our lives. What's even more fun is that our kids are all growing up together and becoming good friends as well! The blessings just keep coming!

The kiddie table. 

Pretty sure they all giggled and laughed more than they ate- guess they were just saving room for chocolate and jelly beans! 

Gearing up for the Easter egg hunt

 There was at least one camera per 2 kids out during the Easter egg hunt. I count 4 in this picture, not including the camera that was taking this picture. Gotta capture these memories! 

The Easter bunny ran out of good hiding spots for all the eggs! 

Lucky thing the kids didn't notice Matt continuing to hide some after the kids would find them - mystery of the reappearing Easter eggs!

showing off their loot

 

 We had just reseeded our front lawn days before so there were at least two large piles of left over dirt in the backyard. Dirt piles = irresistible to little boys. We did warn everyone that the backyard was/is a mess and to leave the nice Easter clothes at home. To say that the kids were filthy would be an understatement of cosmic proportions.

It may be gross, but I love how Luke's snot drip cleaned off the line of dirt above his lip. Priceless. 

Shout out to Mark Leonard (pro photographer markleonardimaging.com) for taking these awesome pictures! Thanks Mark!