cutest kids EVER!!!

not much to say... no time to write... our 2 week vaca in Ohio has been great. we always get the kids pics done while we're here since they all have a birthday in the summer.

I dislike, really dislike, picture day. I love the results though... here are a few of our favorites :)

 

 

 

chores are such a chore

I try to teach them to do chores, but somedays It's just easier to do it myself and not listen to the constant whining. Actually, Andrew is a pleaser and does chores as fast as he can. Audrey takes a little more pushing.

Today, they each had to do their morning "list" (make bed, put pj's away, brush teeth) then they had to put their clothes away. I've never made Andrew do this! Today, I seperated his clothes into piles: pj's, undies/socks, pants, swim trunks and then I hung up all of this shirts and put them away. He was mad, he wanted to show me that he could hang up his shirts! I then seperated Audrey's clothes and told her to go to it. 60 minutes later she's begging me to help her hang her shirts. I hung one. She then started whining and asking me to hang them up for her. Uh, no. She THEN told me she'd give me some of her money if I'd do it. Goodness!!! Uh, no, I don't want your money, please finish your clothes.

There's a lesson in there, I just haven't had enough coffee to teach it.

Oh, and those are even the chores. We've run out of time to actually do any chores! Andrew emptied all of the trash upstairs... he's done. Audrey's now brushing her teeth.

sooo many babysitters...

Well, it's the same sweet girl most of the time.

I'm training for a 1/2 marathon on April 2nd. I've never had to hire so many babysitters to train before. People have asked me (including Philly) if I'm going to do a full marathon again. Actually, Phil asks me WHEN I'm going to do it. Well, maybe once the kids are in school, all of them. Finding the time for the long runs each week is hard enough, and the long runs for a 1/2 are just over 2 hours. The long runs for a full could take 4 hours!

Then, throw in a sick kid every once in awhile. I was running in the dark last night b/c Jack had some seriously runny diapers all day long. I'm pretty sure the amazing workers in the gym childcare would not have appreciated that one. So, here I am with a flashing red tushy (I didn't grab my headlamp), running through the neighborhood, scaring construction workers as I turned corners.

The kids will be cared for by the gym this saturday, the only day you can drop them off and leave the premises. I just hope they don't need me b/c it could take awhile for me to run back... still unable to break the 10m/mile mark :)

sooo many babysitters...

No pictures...

Today was the last day of a gym class Andrew has been taking for a few months. On the last day, parents are allowed to watch for the first time. I didn't have my camera. Oh, my poor 2nd and 3rd children. They will not have 1/3 of the pictures that Audrey had of these momentous occasions. And, yes, the last day of gym class is momentous...

Audrey had a little production last week at her school. Her kindergarten class sang a song and talked about love and what it means to them. I had my camera, the battery was dead. Luckily, I had our little hand-held video recorder and it was fully charged. So, we recorded the memory! I'd rather have still shots, but the video does have Andrew in the background asking why we are here. Oh... sweet boy.

I need to keep that camera in my purse, at all times, unless I'm charging the batteries.

Christmas Letter 2010

Years in the past, Phil has composed a wonderful Christmas letter to accompany our Christmas card. This year, we realized that posting the letter on our blog may be a better idea!!! That way, if people are wondering what we're up to, they can check it out. If people aren't interested, well, they should probably be removed from our Christmas card list... but we won't go there right now ;)

No, really, we love getting Christmas cards and letters from our friends all over the US (and actually around the world!!!)... I love reading the letters, it's helps me feel less disconnected from the friends we've made as we've moved (or as they've moved... it's not always our fault!!!). We meant to get our cards out early this year because we've moved so much in the past 2 years, but, well, they're still sitting, waiting for me to address them :) Oops...


We didn't send out Christmas Cards last year. There was a lot going on, a whole lot of craziness!!! To take a step back in history we have to go back to December 2008 when Best Buy, Phil's employer at the time, offered buy outs to their employees (early retirement packages, as Phil calls them). Well, it was such a great deal, Phil got pretty excited about the prospect of a change, we he took it.


Our house was already on the market since I was pregnant with baby #3 (Jackson) and the house was getting a little snug. Then spring 2009, the house sold. We couldn't exactly buy a new house, Phil didn't have a job!!! It's pretty funny to think that we were then - pregnant, unemployed, and homeless!!! Wow, we put a lot of faith in God... a lot. Sooooo, all of our worldly possessions were moved into a really big storage facility and we moved in with my mom and dad in Ohio (I bet they never saw THAT one coming!!!).


To whiz through 2009:

- Phil (and my dad) golfed a lot.
- Phil ate a lot of Buffalo Wild Wings (He claimed that they have wifi and he was job searching. I believe he just ate wings and watched endless reruns of sports center).
- Phil traveled up to the twin cities quite a bit while he continued searching for a job
- I had a baby (Jackson James was born June 23rd... a whopping 9# and some odd ounces... the biggest baby in the nursery!).
- Phil (and my dad) still golfed a lot.
- Phil started looking for a job outside of the twin city area.
- Phil starting having much more 'luck' with his job search, much to my dismay :)
- We vacationed in Mexico with some awesome friends (our awesome family split the duty caring for three kids).
- We traveled to Austin, TX and Bentonville, AR to check out two job offers that Phil had.
- Phil moved to a bachelor pad in Bentovnille, Arkansas to take a job with Sam's Club - we are not a part of the Wal-Mart empire!
- The rest of the family and I decided to stayed in OH until we had a real house to live in.

Now, 2010... the hilarious, amazing, faith building story continues...

We quickly learned that living apart wasn't all that much fun. We'd gone house hunting a lot... really, a lot. We bid on a short sale in Bentonville in November, a house we really loved. We didn't quite realize the length of time it would take two banks to approved the short sale of a house (the owners had two mortgages). Who knew, when a bank (or two) is going to lose money on the sale of a house, they take a long time making that decision. So, we packed up all of the worldly possessions a family of now 5 can accumulate while living with parents for 9, yes 9 months (yep, I bet they really never saw that coming!!!) and we moved into Phil's two bedroom condo/bachelor pad on January 31st. Audrey was enrolled in preschool, Andrew was enrolled in a Mother's Day Out program (it's like flexible childcare), and Jack and I went to the gym a lot... it was a small condo.

The end of February, the short sale was finally approved. The end of March we moved into our new home, a few weeks shy of the 1 year anniversary of the date we moved out of MN. Crazy. God was doing some amazing things with our family... Sweet Jack was 9 months and had never slept in a crib!!!


Gosh... yep, we live in Arkansas and are beginning to make some friends and really settle in. Audrey started Kindergarten this year, Andrew's in preschool, and Jack goes to a Kid's Day Out program (same idea as a mother's day out... cooler name though!), and I work at that said preschool/kids day out!!! Yep, I got a little stir-crazy when Audrey started school.... so I'm working a whopping 10 hours a week while the boys attend the same program. It's great!

Audrey - 5 1/2 (my half birthday is January 1st!!! A very important point in the mind of a 5 year old). Tried soccer this year (I wouldn't say she was necessarily successful, but had fun) and takes swimming lessons at the Walton Life Fitness Center (everything down here is wal-mart). She's having fun being 5.


Andrew (or Drew) - 3 1/2 and smart as a whip... what does that mean, exactly? Smart as a whip?? hmmm... he's a jokester, loves getting laughs out of us, loves being crazy. We've had to stop calling him a train wreck because we were worried he was trying to live up to it :)

Jackson (Jack) - 18 months and nuts too. He's learning from his siblings. We did take a trip 3.5 hours away to Little Rock's children's hospital to get a nickel removed from his esophagus when he was 11 months... a shining day in mommy-hood. He's jabbering up a storm and quickly went from walking at 14 months to running at 14.5 months. Gotta keep up, right?


Hmmmm... what else... Oh, Phil. He works, a lot. Really. He does something at Sam's club around their entertainment and office products. He calls himself a DMM. I don't know what that means. I'm sure he's told me, I just don't remember. He's in the land of merchants. He's always looking at numbers. He wants me to buy all of our kids Christmas presents at Sam's club (apparently, kids toys are in the entertainment category... ). I love him and he's loving his job, that's all that matters, right?! He's happy at his job, I'm happy staying home (for the most part).

Oh, please, please, please come and visit us. The fall and spring here are amazing! I was shopping yesterday w/o a winter coat on!!! Lovely weather. Summer was miserable... really miserable... then we found a pool and started to enjoy it a bit more. It's HOT in the south in the summer. Of course, it's COLD in the north in the winter, right?! I guess it's just a trade off... the reason the retired crowd migrates back and forth???


I think that's probably long enough. If I missed something, shoot me a comment and I'll fill you in.

All of the Shellhammers wish you all a very, very Merry Christmas. God has been so faithful... we pray you have a wonderful 2011. As the kids would say... Happy Birthday, Jesus!!!

One for the record...

Oh my... to set the stage, Audrey left her lunchbox SOMEWHERE yesterday. She doesn't know where, just somewhere. Awesome. In my anger, I told her she'd be packing her lunch in a paper sack today. In retrospect, I knew she had no idea that was a punishment. She'd probably think it was cool. AND, I don't have any paper sacks. Huh, punishment failed.

Today, while eating snack:

Me: Audrey, what'd you have for lunch today?
Audrey, thinking: Uh, what you packed me.
Me: Audrey, think really hard before you answer that again... what'd you have for lunch today?
Audrey: Mom, I ate what you packed me!
Me: Audrey, watch your attitude when you answer me... you left your lunchbox somewhere ysterday, I didn't pack you a lunch today.
Audrey: Mom, I ate what was in my lunchbox today. Carrots and peanut butter, salami, I bought a milk.
Me, thinking: well, I guess I'll watch for signs of food poisening... great.

Crazy little girl... ate yesterday's lunch. I guess I'll be more explicit next time: Audrey, I didn't pack you a lunch today. Please buy a hot lunch, OK?

Soooo obedient, when she wants to be :)

Look, Mom, I dressed myself!!!

And, yes, I DID let him leave the house like this. If I remember correctly, I bargained with him later in the day to take off the muscle shirt. He does these things because he knows I'll laugh and roll my eyes. He will continue to do these things to continue to get laughs and rolled eyes. I feel sorry for his teachers in the future... they will be wrapped around his little finger. Sooo cute and funny and darn frustrating :)

she won

Audrey must have thrown an elbow to beat her little brother to the BIG 4-wheeler. And, yes, this IS on her Christmas list ;)

g-ma, g-pa... can I get an upgrade?

I have so many more pictures to post... I ran across this one today and had to get it out there. It was sooooo funny. It's the smallest 4-wheeler EVER and he was so happy.