Someone loves green beans!!!!!

This girl loves food! The first day we tried solid food I was amazed. She sucked down cereal like she had been eating solids for months now. She sucked it off the spoon, chewed, and swallowed. They say a baby is ready for solids when she starts to show interest in watching others eat. This girl watches us like she wants to snatch the food off our plate. If you are eating something and holding her she will grab for it. She has been on cereal for almost 2 weeks so I decided to give green beans a chance today. You know, start with the yucky stuff first. Well... To her, there is now yucky stuff. She lapped this stuff up like it was ice cream. I think she might give Draven a run for his money and be the new eater of the family.
Just wait till she tries the good stuff like sweet potatoes, carrots, and squash.
But she's not getting any of those for a few more weeks.
Sorry BeBe.

Kid update...

I haven't posted in awhile so I figured it was time to update.

Let's start with the oldest.

Draven started driver's ed this week. It scared the crap out of him. After two days of driver's ed he went and took his written test. He passed! And is officially a driver. He is getting a little less nervous each time behind the wheel. In less than two weeks he starts school. My oldest will be a sophomore in High School. HOLY. COW. Next month he turns 16. WOW!
Here he is behind the wheel for the first time legally.

Lillie is doing well and busy as usual. She is now in a big girl bed. She falls out every night and is still getting the hang of it. She loves it, but doesn't sleep very well in it. No more toddler bed.
But the biggest news is she is finally in school! This girl has asked to go to "real" school (not daycare) since she was old enough to talk. The one school I wanted to get her in was full. The enrollment was the week I had Phoebe. It's a first come first serve kinda thing.

I decided to take a chance and call them to double check for an opening. Would you believe it? They had one in Lillie's age group. She will start preschool in less than two weeks. WOW!

Now on to Phoebe.

Or Phoebster.

Or BeeBee

Or Beebs

Or Beeber

Or... Well, I could go on and on.

She had her 4 month appointment. She is now 14 pounds and officially on baby food. We have only tried cereal but she loves it.
No, really. She loves it!
Next week we will start green beans. I've learned to always start with the worst tasting food first. Greens are bad. Babies love the orange! You get them hooked on the oranges and they won't eat the green. I have these kids figured out!

She is now rolling over (one way) and even tries (I flip her back over) to sleep on her belly. She is giggling and smiling at everything. She is still the easiest baby ever. She doesn't cry, she doesn't spit up, she eats like a champ, and sleeps at least 6-8 hours (sometimes all night without a peep) in a row at night. We have a great night time routine. I can lay her in bed at bedtime and she goes right to sleep. I have learned to always put a baby to bed awake. I rock her for a little bit to get her relaxed and then put her in her crib. Her fist goes in her mouth and then she covers her eyes with the other hand (the lights are usually still on so we can put Lillie to bed next).
Sometimes Phoebe joins Lillie in bed for story time.
Phoebe is also learning the joy of toys!
Here she is in her new bouncy swing!
She can hold on to things, reach for them and bring things to her mouth. Her favorite toy right now is a Lillie hand me down Elmo. All babies love Elmo. Maybe it's his color. This one giggles. She loves it.

As for me and Chris... Nothing new. Im babysitting for some extra cash. Chris has picked up a few adoptions for some extra cash. I went to the lake with the kids last weekend. No pics, but we did see 3 foxes in the yard. (my bro has a pic I need to steal)

That's it for now.

All is well at the Hen House.

Free!!!!

Things have been a little tight around the Henry House lately. Today things started to lookup. No, we didn't win the lottery. But we did have a good day without spending any money.

First of all, we heard about battle in the saddle family fun day. I wasn't so sure about it but it was FREE! They had kid activities including arts and crafts and games.

Lillie was excited to go. She picked out her outfit and put on her makeup. No, that is not a black eye. It's Lillie's pretty makeup!
Here we are shooting. She nailed the texas longhorn right between the horns!
Then we did spin art!
Then she posed for a wanted poster... You will see it below.
Then she roped a cow. She got a ribbon for this and a coupon for free popcorn at the rodeo.
Here we are at the rodeo. It was the coolest thing ever!
They shot guns on horseback! It was so much cooler than expected.
Phoebe was very good. She danced and watched the cowboys.
Here's Lillie's wanted poster. Not bad for free!

Then when we got home Chris was with the a/c guy and he fixed the a/c for free! He put the a/c in for free originally because his girlfriend was Chris' client and he was doing a trade out. On top of it all, the girlfriend is going to start cleaning our house for free to pay off the rest of the debt. She actually said... and I quote... "I have always dreamed about cleaning a house like this." I don't know exactly what that means. She is so good at cleaning. She cleaned our lake house and we were amazed! I am so excited. She starts Wednesday.
So, yes... Free is good.
Free is great!

Happy 4th of July!

I didn't take as many pictures as I usually do at the lake. I decided to just kick back and enjoy making memories. Of course I did take some pictures...

Here's a pic of Uncle Aaron after we went swimming off dad's dock. We can't swim in our area because of toxic algae. Go figure. Dad's area is flowing water from the Elk River in to the lake. It is safe in that area but Chris didn't want to take a chance with the girls or Draven so only they big people swam. Uncle Aaron found this snake on our way up from the lake.

YIKES!
Draven was ok with the snake but Lillie was freaking out. I was taking pictures while she was crawling up my leg.

More snake.
We spent the night at dad's house then after a big breakfast went out on the water. Lillie was covered in sunscreen and wearing papa's hat. It was hot out there!
She got sunscreen in her eyes and was too hot. She was very unhappy.
Then we got far enough up the river where we could let her swim and cool off. If you go up the river enough it gets shallow and clear. No blue green algae here. You can see how clear the water was.
Papa resting and watching us play and get nibbled on by the perch.
A foggy picture of me and the kids.
On the 3rd we had papa over for croquet, burgers and fireworks.
Draven looks like he is shooting something out of a sci-fi movie.
Lillie was scared of sparklers at first but then she got the hang of it. You can see that we had to go by a pool since we can't swim.
Lillie having fun with sparkler.
Roman candle fight!

After shooting off our fireworks we walked down to the lake to watch all the other fireworks. They were everywhere! On top of the pretty fireworks there was lightening and sprinkles. Later that night we had big storms.
Chris and I gave Phoebe her lake house kitchen sink bath. She loved it!
I loved it too!
After bath...
On the 4th we decided to go to Noel Missouri to swim in the river there. Noel Missouri is a strange little town but very cool. This place used to be a cool little canoe town. Its a run down but still charming. Lots of old abandon hotels and cabins.

Check out this sign! I've passed it many times but finally decided to take a picture.

Stole this picture off the web of the Elk River in Noel.

Another shot stollen from web. Cute downtown. Much cuter in person. Not much to see but great to just drive around.

A few more web shots below...

Lillie and I swam in the river while Chris read and Phoebe slept.
Hi Daddy!
Lillie told me we were adventurers and exploring her country. She pulled me around the river.
Cheesy self portrait.
One of the last few parks with real playground equipment.
Check out this slide! It was so cool!
Lillie was more in to modeling than sliding.

Daddy and Lil' Dude.
A merry go round at a city park. Did we travel through time?


After our adventure in Noel we headed on to Joplin. Wow. I don't even know what to say. I took a lot of photos but I don't even know if I want to share them. Especially on this happy blog. Lets just say they still need your prayers and support.

On to happier things...

Later that evening we let Lillie play with some more morning glories and then went to the State Park to watch the fireworks. Once again, not photos. Just memories. Amazing memories. We watched the fireworks on a park bench, just me chris and the girls. Fireworks everywhere we could look. Every second you could see multiple shows going all at once. There were probably 10 different shows going on at once. We could see them all. The stars were bright and the moon was gorgeous.

Another lake house memory we won't forget.