A new place to look, and APOLOGIES

My new writer's blog is at http://leannwilliams.blogspot.com/ and I posted my first post.  It's nothing big, but just an announcement that I shall be pursuing my lifelong dream of being a writer. I'll be posting there too, as a part of my development. It will not be a place of family news but just for Leann.  I shall still post here for our family news, which leads me to the next part...

Really, really really sorry about not updating this blog.  I have been busy with school and Simon until posting became a huge Goliath of months of pictures and I just was fresh out of pebbles.  SO, I will be posting here, SOON, with a really long slideshow of everything.  You'll just have to slog through them.  Hey, its either that or I won't be able to post.

Leann

Carlsbad KOA and arriving in Fort Worth

I had to throw in a few slides of the kids at the place we stayed in Carlsbad.  Also, Tommy lost his first tooth! He actually was a superhero and yanked the thing out himself.  We had to stay an extra day in Carlsbad for a major van explosion-type repair, but we finally made it to Fort Worth to hang with Jeff, Sharla, and their kiddies.  The other pictures in this slideshow are from Trinity Park.  We WERE going to the Botanical Gardens but they had some special event and the gardens were closed, so we stopped at this park to let the kids play and burn a little energy. 

Carlsbad Caverns

I'll be posting several different slideshows of our vacation over the next few days (I hope).  We took a long vacation to visit family in Texas--- we stopped for a few days in Carlsbad, New Mexico at a KOA.  We went through White Sands National Monument. It is true, the sand is only warm, even though it was hot and baking all day long.  We had a technical issue that erased our pictures, but the best way to imagine it would be to imagine pictures of my kids playing in SNOW. That's how white the sand was.  We did not take any sand because that would be illegal, but the sand fairy somehow put a gallon size ziploc of it into our trailer :-)  To be fair, there was white sand in areas outside the monument, far away from any "don't take the sand" signs.  So... moving on.....  we went to Carlsbad Caverns, which is what this slide show is all about.  Most of the pictures I took of the actual caverns, stinketh, because the caverns are dark (duh, right?) but here are the ones with family members in them.
We were at the caverns all day, with a long hike and then another long hike to get to where they have a nightly bat flight (the bats fly out of the cave en masse... kinda cool)... but at the end of it all, as we were loading up our car, a lady chased me down and told me that she'd been behind us all day in one aspect or another, and that my kids were the most well-behaved, respectful, great kids she'd ever seen.  I of course think my kids are the bomb-diggy, but it was nice to hear.  To tell you the truth, we heard it everywhere we went, even when I thought the kids were acting like zoo animals. 

 Next post will start our fun pictures of cousins and aunts and uncles and long-lost relatives, along with cows, grassy knolls, rockets, and all sorts of other stuff. 

Test post plus one picture

This is only a test. Blogspots is having a hard time posting my stuff. here is a picture of Simon. Trick riding on his rocking horse.  He's been walking for a few months now, and doing stunts like this almost as long. More to follow, IF I can get this to post.

Permanent Title: Catching Up (Feb/March edition)

It seems like all we ever do is catch up. There are a lot of reasons for that, mainly my having to work (which I am "retiring" from July 1), and just the busy-ness of the family, our callings, and the kids' activities. So, without further ado (whining): Joy loves playing with Simon, and is very helpful entertaining him when Mom and Dad are trying to do something: Cousin Ella had a birthday party at the park. Here's Clayton on a monkey bar of some sort... if you look close you can see the mohawk . No, not Faux-hawk, MOhawk. Buddies Joy and Ella Ira and Cousin Jonathan looking at a video game Tilt your head. Here's Grandma Williams swinging with Simon. I have a video of him swinging in a baby swing, but all you can really hear is Mommy saying WEEEEEEEE so it's kind of annoying. Tommy teeter-tottering... again, check the 'hawk. (We decided to let the boys get mohawks, since we usually buzz their heads for summer anyway.) We're trying to get our "shade house" done for our garden. Well, Aaron is.... he gets help from Ira, Joy, or I as we can. Here's Dad and Ira, and Dad and Joy working out there.... Meanwhile, our plants that we started inside, are doing really well.... oh and here's a picture of it coming along..... (it's further along but I didn't see the picture I thought we took in our file...) School had a dress up day for Literacy Week. The kids had to dress up as their favorite book character. Tommy was "Fly Guy" and Joy was Hermione. Not too bad for Mom finding out about having to do these costumes, the night before.....

On Spring Break, we went camping with the whole (almost) Williams clan. Here are some pictures:

Here's Simon wearing the hat that technically still fits Clayton....

The kids found a hill that, well, you can see what they're doing....

Ella and Simon playing peekaboo

Way too many overalls (Grandpa, Uncle Nathan, Daddy, and Simon)

On our hike we found giant rock and put our precious children on top for a photo opp....

Here's the hikers (minus the Mom's who were behind the cameras)

Simon and Cousin Bree played for a while too. Simon loves his cousins!!

Simon has started smiling with his whole face. This shot below LOOKS like a huge smile, but it's really only about 3/4 of his "whole face" smile. I cannot keep from laughing every time he flashes it.

Simon is making a lot of progress. He has been taking steps, he's up to about 6 in a row. He's also feeding himself with a spoon, with just a little help in the scooping up part. Here he is after having taken the spoon (with food) from Mom and put all of it in his little genius baby mouth.

Simon LOVES Scooby Doo. He hasn't actually watched any of them, but he loves throwing them all on the floor.

Here's a little video of Simon playing with the basketball. We are all doing well. Everyone is growing and learning.... soon I'll have more to blog about, Ira is in drama and has a play coming up, and a band concert... Joy is in the school talent show (her New Year's Resolution, good job Joy!) Hopefully we'll be able to actually have a camera going when Simon walks next. Enjoy my little video, I had to shorten it alot to get it to load, but at least you'll see the smile and hear the giggles.

ChristmasHappyNewYearSimonIsSOBig

AKA... catching up. We've been busy. Frazzled. All of that. So here are some pictures... in a slideshow movie. I hope. I don't have the best of luck with uploading movies....