Cousinship?

If you and a friend enjoy a friendship, can you and a cousin enjoy a cousinship? I think that should be a word. :)

I thought about calling this post "Cousin Love" but it didn't seem quite right. Of course my kids and their cousins love each other, but it's too bad there isn't a better word.

This is my 100th post, and I'm glad it can be a little tribute to the special bonds that exist in this youngest generation of our extended family.




































This last pic was taken as B&H were loading their van to drive home to Virginia. We had just copied the pictures from their camera to my computer and these 3 cuties were looking at them. I love how kids smile at pictures of themselves. :)



Hooray for cousins!

Beach Day

We had beautiful weather while my brother's family was here. The day we went to the beach was windy, but other than that it was perfect!

First sprint to the water (well, boys sprinting and girls just taking it all in for a minute):



Lots of sandcastle-making fun:











Stopping to have lunch, after which Lincoln fell sound asleep:







Anndra with a mouthful of peanut butter sandwich:



Uncle Ben attempting to get a beach ball game started with the kids (didn't last long - too windy):



Meanwhile, the two littlest cousins loved blowing and catching bubbles:



More digging in the lovely wet sand:





Boo with attitude:



After Lincoln woke up, he and Natalie were inseparable:



They would run out to the water....



then sit and let the waves wash over their legs for a while....



then run back to the sand...



and lay on the sand to warm up... then do it all again, over & over.



Natalie also showed Lincoln how to write in the sand. I thought it was marvelous that they could interact so easily and carry on conversations all throughout these activities even though they are almost 3 years apart. Thanks for being such a great big cousin, Nat!

Burying Parker in the sand:



When I tried to take pictures of Anndra, she wanted to put sand on the camera - so I told her to put it in my hand instead and she thought that was a fun little game:







Our cousins got to have a second beach day on their way out of town, but we're sure glad we got to go with them for this one. It was a lot of fun, but what made it even better was sharing it with them.

Awesome Visitors

We had a wonderful visit with two of my siblings the week before Easter. My sister & her family drove over from Alabama and my brother & his family came down from Virginia. With 10.5 kids (if you 'count' Jessie's bun-in-the-oven) and 7 adults (Kelli came up from Orlando) our house was a bit crowded - but I don't think anyone cared because we were too busy enjoying our time together.



We had to get creative with sleeping arrangements (for example, one night we had 5 sleep on the trampoline). But I thought it was sweet how willingly my kids gave up their beds for their cousins:



Of course we had too much fun to cover in just one post, so be watching for more to come. I'm just so thankful that my family loves us enough to come all this way to see us (poor B&H had to suffer through spring break traffic on BOTH ends of their trip). We loved having all of you as our guests - come back any time!

Answer, Winners, and Parker stuff

Thanks, everybody, for playing this little game. The correct answer is: a Lincoln bite. He sank his little teeth into her skin because she wouldn't give him a toy he wanted. Poor girl. Obviously we're working very hard on the No Biting rule in our house right now.

It was really easy to tell it was Lincoln's teeth at first because each little mark was dark purple. Then a few hours later when the area had gotten red and puffy, I took those pictures (to show Todd when he came home from work).

So, although no one guessed that Lincoln was the culprit, we do have 3 winners for guessing a human bite:

my cousin Shari

Todd's mom

my mom

Also, my sister Erika was half right because she guessed that one of Anndra's brothers caused it.

In addition, I'm going to award prizes to my sister-in-law Heidi for the quickest response... and my dad for the most original guess (allergic reaction to pig starter - ha, ha, good thing we like her chunkiness).

I'm going to tailor each prize to the recipient (for example, oatmeal cookies for my dad). So be watching for a little something to come in the mail.

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When Lincoln and Anndra are not busy learning that biting each other is wrong, they are happily cheering their big brother on at his activities - including:

SOCCER



He's in all green because this practice was on St. Patrick's Day.




CUB SCOUTS

Food Drive




Litter Pick-up