Muddy Gage Kennedy

This past weekend I changed Gage's clothes 4 times and had to give him 2 baths! I just have to bite my lip when he comes to the door and says "look Mama I'm all muddy!" Thank goodness that we have a door that you can enter from the outside right into our master bathroom and walk right into the shower...I guess God knew what I was doing when I built this house b/c I sure did not know I would have 3 boys 5 years later! Let's just say that this door and shower gets used a lot for muddy little boys. I just laugh, roll with this punches, start another load of laundry, and remember that they had TONS of fun getting this muddy.

Let's Go Fly a Kite...

On the way home from school this past week Carson told me that he needed a spiderman kite. I remember that at school they have a Kite Day and learn all about kites and fly them in the afternoon...it's a BIG deal at school. So I told him that I would look at Wal-Mart when I went later on in the week. Well...I found some for $1.00 so I could not resist. Of course I was going to try to keep them hidden until I was ready to fly them, but they were helping bring groceries in and found them right away. I held them off until the next morning...Saturday morning we got them out, put them together, and headed out to fly kites. Nana and Slick (yes, that's what we call Brad's dad) showed up on the 4-wheeler and Slick helped me out! He was really good at it too!

Gage got into kite flying...after I would work to get it up in the air! He was so pumped up and was telling us all about how his was way up in the air. I love this picture b/c he is so "into" it.

Slick, Carson, Nana, and Toby kite flying! See Gage in the background continue to fly his!

Brad did break away from finishing up building the young chicks a pen and attempt to fly the kite. Let's just say he went back to finishing up building the chicks pen quite quickly. We all just laughed at his efforts poor things...but it was very comical! I guess you just have to know Brad!

Kite crashed and I took the opportunity to smile with Carson before I attempted to get it back up again. Slick and I fly the kites for a good long while...a good $2.00 well spent...lots of good family!

Here are our kites when we got them way up in the air...superheros and spiderman!

Our Friday Night...

Meme was staying a few days in the hospital due to have a horrible stomach bug and almost getting dehydrated. She is much better and is home now as I blog. But every other month we go out on a date. SONBEAMS is a wonderful ministry and such a blessing to our family. They watch all of our boys for 2 1/2 hours while Brad and I have time to ourselves. So we started out the night by going to see Meme. Carla and Sam were visiting her also when we got there.

Meme and Gage have such a connection. Gage loves Meme! He also loves to play games on my iPhone and Meme just loves to watch him. She is quite amazed at his gaming skills and she wishes she new more about the games so she could help him! They are funny to watch because they are both just having the best time and visiting with each other. Moments that I love to just step back, watch, and smile...

Since Meme's birthday was the next day we decided to pick her up some flowers. I of course had my kids add a special touch to it. I wrote her a card and then gave Gage the markers to color and decorate. Then I just taped the card to the cup that we were putting the flowers in. She loved it and really loved that Gage colored her card. Toby was more interested in the potted plant that Carla and Sam brought her.

Sushi...it is our favorite meal to have together. We take full advantage of our date night! After we drop the kids off...there is no discussing kids again until we pick them back up...that is the rule. So we visit about stuff about US...yes about US! We have fun picking our a new menu item off the sushi list. (I guess I need to say a little thanks to Nikki for getting me "into" sushi because this is what we do now when we are on a date...it's always sushi first!) Brad picked octopus this time and it was really yummy! You can see it on the plate it's at the bottom to the left of the green wasabi. Afterwards...we do different things...Christian Bookstore, Lowes, Wal-Mart, Target...yes very romantic I know but hey atleast we are spending time together...just us!

Amy (one of Carson's teachers at school) said that she did not see much of Carson most of the night. We have been there for several months now and Carson (my social butterfly) has make some connections and just runs off to get involved with them. We found him playing in the teen room with a friend when we walked in. He was not too happy when we had to go home. Next we went to get Toby...he was with a teenager walking around just getting all the attention and loving it. They said he was just a sweet little boy and enjoyed keeping him.

Last we picked up Gage...we walked in and he was there singing with several teenage boys. He was the life of the party...as usual! I guess they pulled out the stickers b/c he had no less then 5 on his shirt when we got in the car.

Next stop before we headed home is also part of the ritual of the "date night"...Hot Frest Krispy Kream Doughnuts! YUMMY!!! We all get one that we want then order a dozen to take home just for fun! Such a fun night and everyone had a great time! Thanks SONBEAMS!

I hate tornadoes!

We woke up (well Brad did) in the middle of the night when our weather radio went off. Brad turned the TV on and checked where the tornadoes were. He felt we were safe so went back to sleep. We got up our usual time 5:40 and jumped in the shower to get ready to head out for another day of attempting to teach today's youth at school! Our phone rang at 5:55...Carrie wanted to know if we had gotten a call that school was cancelled. We had no idea what she was talking about b/c our lovely automated school answering service has not called our house. Well after jumping out of the shower and making several phone calls...then finally the TV announcing it...school was closed due to all of the bad weather in our county. We immediately started calling friends that we knew were in the possible line of that horrible tornado...they were all ok but there was lots of damage. We waited for all the boys to wake up and eat breakfast. Then we packed the truck and headed out to help friends salvage what they had left.

This was our first site of tornado damage. This church was leveled to the ground...lots of our friends attend this church. They are very upbeat and plan to still have church in their parking lot on Sunday morning...remember church is NOT a building...church is the congregation.

This is the house that Brad helped salvage all that he could from. He was there all day today. We (me and my wild boys) played in their front yard while I also watched 2 others so their parents could help load trucks to haul away the salvaged stuff before the rain started back again later today.

This family has a story to tell of how Jesus had His hand on them! Let me share...Their 6 week old little boy woke up about 1:20 and started crying for his 1:30 bottle. Mom got out of the bed and was comforting the baby while Dad went to the kitchen to fix the bottle to bring back to baby. When Mom was comforting baby she heard a loud noise and also felt horrible pressure in her ears. She ran and got daughter out of her bed went back and grabbed baby from the bouncy seat in their room and dad met them in their TINY hallway right outside the master bedroom. Seconds later...around 1:30 the tornado hit and this is the picture (above) that I saw when we pulled up this morning to help. This family escaped without even a scratch! WOW What does God have instore for them? is what I keep asking myself. They sat there in the dark because they had no flashlights or anything with them. They could tell by the lightening and thunder that the master bedroom had no ceiling...except the sky! They just sat there for a while and then the Pastor next door came to check on them because his house had been damaged too. He took them all safely to his house until daylight. The wall where the master bed was up against was now laying across their bed. If this little baby had not woken up and started to cry...more likely than not...this little 6 year old girl would be the only survivor at this house. Praise the Lord! I have chill bumps everytime I think of this...

Brad and I are always amazed at the strengh that a tornado has...look at these pictures of how a tornado makes these pine trees look like toothpicks...just snapped and twisted them in half!

the church that has nothing left but their front steps...The boys and I left Brad to continue to help load belonging. We headed home and went by the church that was destroyed.

This is Brandon's church. Brandon is 7 years old and is Carson's big buddy. His daddy was helping Brad load belonging this morning and I was watching him and his sister KK while everyone was loading things. We started talking about tornadoes, how they form, what they do, what they look like...just a kid-size discussion ALL about tornadoes. Brandon said "Ms. Amy, I hate tornadoes!"

The Zoo with 6 kids!

Ok...so Brad went on a fishing trip and when he goes away...I feel the need to fill my calendar to have FUN and not just sit around this house with my boys...let's go have an adventure is my philosophy! So my friend who is also named Amy said she was in for whatever adventure I came up with. I suggested the zoo! I love the zoo and so do kids. She kidnapped her 2 neices and her nephew for the day. We started out with a bit of car trouble...I had a low tire light on. I called Chanel who owns the local tire shop I use and told her I was on the way with a van full. They checked and inspected my tire and found 5 puncher marks and just changed out my tire for a new one. But the whole process took about 45 minutes and they had to jack up the side of my car that the messed up tire was one...They kids were GREAT the whole time...thanks to Amy for bringing animal crackers!!! We started our adventure by heading to eat lunch at our favorite stop...McDonalds!

Carson and Gage was so proud of themselves because they could climb up on the dinosaur eggs!

My sweet Toby is totally coming out of his shell these days! He is getting very active and crawling like a mad-man! He is constantly saying...dadadadadada and nanananana! Gotta just eat Toby up!

The zookeeper was feeding these 2 elephants when we got there and it was so fun to watch them. He was throwing whole apples and oranges! One elephant even reached out his trunk and took the orange from the zookeeper!

Carson was being silly and said "I'm gonna take a nap"...then Gage and Gage decided to climb on top and everyone got tickled! Funny boys...

Ok...Toby LOVES monkeys! There are several different cages all over the zoo with different monkeys and each time we would get close he would point his finger at them and start grinning and then smiling real big.

Gage decided that Avery needed to get out of the stroller and give him a turn because he had walked most of the way and he was pooped!

We asked a cute little couple to snap our picture because we of course had to have an entire group photo or the adventure was not complete! Front: Carson and Gage, Back: Madison in Amy's lap, Avery, Toby, Gage, and me. We were so tired when we got back to the van...but we had such an awesome day.

What comes 1st...the chicken or the egg?

In our spare time on the farm and a fun little hobby Brad and I have started incubating eggs. It is very fascinating if you have never done it before. The eggs small side up are put on the egg rotater. Close up the incubator and then you leave it alone for 10 days. After 10 days you open the incubator and turn off the lights in the room. Use a candlelight (special light) and put it up against the egg. If the egg glows it is not fertile. If there is a big blob mass in it then it might possibly hatch! So throw out all the non-fertile eggs and close the incubator back up. Then wait till day 18 and take all of the fertile eggs off the egg rotater and set them in the incubator on the wire bottom ready to hatch. You can hear the chicks in the eggs a few days before they hatch peeping...I am serious! I did not believe it until I heard it the first time. On day 21 they will hatch. The chicks are very wet and weak when born but after about 12 to 24 hours in the incubator they are ready to get out and put under a heat lamp. They will find the water and food and immediatley know how to scratch like chickens do and back up and look for food.

This is our first americana chick to begin to hatch out of the egg. It peeped for 3 days before it finally hatched. It is a blonde chick. This has been such a learning experience for our boys. They help collect eggs from the chicken coops, feed them, and water them. They know that you have to be very careful with them b/c they break easy. We put them in the refrigerator and eat them when we are not saving them to incubate. We also sell them to friends and a local business for about $2.00 a dozen. The yolk is very golden yellow and rich in flavor.

A few hours after the chick hatched.

Don't really know what happened to our first batch of eggs this year. I think it was too humid for them. But these are the 4 chicks that we have and we are incubating right now and on day 4 now.

Ok...this is an interesting photo I know. But we were frying wild turkey last weekend and we got our first double yolk egg. It was a HUGE egg before we cracked and Jeffery said "I bet it will be a double yolk" I said..."well let me get my camera"!

Gobble Gobble Gobble...

Oh joy...it's turkey season. This week Brad has been every morning since we got home from vacation. First 2 mornings he got birds! So of course I have to photo graph each kill. I feel that is it my job as wife of the hunter I guess. As Brad quickly reminds me...he has provided food for the family.

First "kill" of the season. Gage was very interested in all of this...he will be such the hunter like his daddy.

Gage got 2 magnifying glasses for his birthday...he is very "into" these things. He said he is going to look for deer tracks when he takes it outside to play.

For the 2nd turkey of the season, all of the boys were up and it was killed on our place to I had to get the family photo with "the kill."

Wow...I never thought I would be taking pictures like this of my wonderful husband and 3 awesome little boys. But it is our lifestyle and we have such a great time here on our farm. I would not trade my life for anything in the world. I love all 4 of you soooo much...

We love Chuck E. Cheese

It has become a tradition when we are in town we always have to go to Chuck E. Cheese and Sylvia (aka YoY0). My boys love this place...not the pizza but all of the games. It is such a treat for them to get to play here. We also have to pick up a new shirt when we are here so we can always remember our experience to Chuck E. Cheese.

Very serious about this. He has been asking for weeks to go to Chuck E. Cheese to play racing car games. Brad said that he is really good at them...there were some boys there that he was racing against and actually beating some of them. He played this game no less that 25 times!

Toby driving Chuck E. Cheese around...

Gage loved talking to Chuck E. Cheese and all of his friends...we did it about 5 times!

Thanks YoYo for taking us to Chuck E. Cheese. We love this place and love that we get experience it with you! We love you!

Playdate at our cousin's house

Brad's first cousin lives about 1 mile (literally) from where we were staying. We called them up and asked if they had plans for the evening. They did not and Mamaw and Aunt Dean were even over there visiting them too. We all had such a great time eating pizza and visiting. The kids had such a great time playing together.

Carson, Ella, and Hannah playing hide and go seek...Gage is seeking.
Ok...so we don't have babydolls around our house. Gage was so surprised that this baby cried. The first time she started crying...this was his reaction. He was loving it! Ummm...can't you tell.

All of the wild youngins...Hannah, Toby, Carson, Ella, and Gage

Ella and Gage were getting so tickled at what Brad was doing to make them smile for the picture.

First Cousins...

Brad, me, Kristi and Jeff

Carson loves his Mamaw. He kept giving her tons of hugs.

ImagineIt! Children's Museum

While we were at that aquarium Carson kept asking me to go to the Children's Museum to play for the trains. I told him very sternly "do not ask me again, we are going to look at all the fish and enjoy it and then we will talk about the children's museum." So...we were eating lunch at the aquarium and about to go thru Ocean Voyager (the big underwater tunnel), Carson turns to me as says "Mama I have been really good and looked at fish, can we go to the children's museum now?" I smiled and said "ask your daddy" b/c I did not know if Brad was really up to it. Well Carson turns to Brad and asks him the same question. He smiled at him and said "give me 5 man." There was the biggest smile on Carson's face. He was patient and got what he wanted and here is what he got to experience!

They had a farming section...the boys loved driving the tractor.
Carson and Gage had fun here...they would pull the flats up on the inside and then load groceries up and put them down the roller ramp and then load them all up again. Carson said that Gage was his "workerman". HA

This was neat and right up Brad alley...building stuff!

This is the coolest stuff...moon sand! It is like sand but also like clay. You can mold it but it doesn't stick to your hands and it is not gritty. Gage love this section and we stayed here for about 15 mintues and make tall towers.

THIS is where Carson first fell in loved with trains 2 years ago. He still remembers it and everytime we visit Atlanta he asks if we can go to the Children's Museum to play with the trains.

Gage is my budding little artist! He loved the painting section of the museum.

My boys right before we left. We are bad...we took the picture THEN told them we had to go. I would have never gotten a good picture if we would have told them before b/c you should have seen them after we told them we had to go. They loved this place...as any kid would!