May, William and Mimosa trees

The month of May has zoomed in bringing the end to the college and high school semesters. And oh my goodness, next week Owen will officially be a junior in high school. Wasn't it last week I was fretting like crazy when he began as a freshman? It will always be unbelievable as time races past me so fast! As of this moment I have four work days left to complete my first full year, and with that, summer begins. I don't even want to think about how quickly summer will speed by, as fast as a blink, and I'll be back at it. But I do have a couple of GAP munchkins I'm gonna miss like crazy this summer. But after the last few days, clearly the closer we get to the last day, it's apparent the children are donzos with school.

In the last few months my social calendar's been brimming with wedding and baby showers but after May 26th, it'll be wide open. But no worries about boredom, because I expect to spend some of the coming summer watching baby William grow, while photo documenting as much of the growing as possible. Up to now with the several hundred pictures taken, we've wallpaper documented his every sleeping position. Well done us. Last Friday night he made an appearance at his grandparent's house, and a flurry of 15 people showed up for a viewing. It was quite the spectacle to see. It's possible that eventually he'll have to travel to Granny's house under the cover of secrecy. The child has little chance of his feet touching the floor until he's about 12 years old.

Diapers, they need a changing.


That's the most awake I've ever seen him.


What a cutie.


Still not a fan of the flash.


Some fans.


But other than William, to date, the most interesting news I have to pronounce at my house is, we now have a box turtle in our life. John and Owen rescued it Sunday out of the middle of the road and brought it home. Once in the yard, it immediately went into hiding and took us a day to find it. I'm almost certain it's spending most of the day looking for an escape hatch. And not surprisingly, Addy's not a fan. Which brings me to an Addy story from last week. As I've stated here before, Addy HATES the mailman. HATES. Each day she stays at the ready to run to the living room window, which is near our mailbox, so as to freak out and bark like a crazy dog.

I'm talking maniac lunging at the window to make her presence known. She's broken multi windows doing this. And I'm now convinced the Basset hound next door sends her a signal when he sees the mailman coming, so Addy can spring into action. It's clear to me the two dogs are working in tandem. Well last week Olivia had to come fetch me from a meeting and she brought Addy with her. And on our way home, as the three of us were coming down our street about 100 yards from our house, Addy, with her obligatory dog head out the window, spotted the mailman leaving our driveway. I could see her nostrils flare as she saw her enemy and she ran from side to side in the back seat assessing her best mode of attack. Sidebar: Addy's had the misfortune of stepping on the automatic window button causing her head to be stuck in the window. It was a very traumatic experience for her. One she hasn't forgotten and ever since, she's always extremely careful about the window. But this day she cared not, instead, she turned her head sideways while shoving it into the closing window with the hope she could get the hated mailman. It didn't work. I'm happy to report the mailman made yet another escape. He never seems phased by her behavior, but I'm convinced has reported her as a crazy dog. I don't expect the two will ever live in harmony.

I know I still have much to blog about. I haven't done Easter or the birth of William or the trip we took to Corsicana recently. I've had zero motivation, and with peeps in town for viewing the wee babe, I haven't had time for it.

Carrie came.


And Uncle Austino came bearing soccer gifts. The hat is Manchester U stuff.


But, instead of blogging about Easter and such, I'm going to give a little peek at what we did last week. As always our Sunday afternoon rides are continuing, but last week I had the idea for a surprise involving all the girls. Now while Lindsey was still gestating, the car riders would stop by on Sundays to check out the belly, but since William's now outside the tummy, it makes for more people to see! Anyway we kept it a secret from Lindsey and even caught Lydia on the street corner coming in from out of town....and I'm not kidding.....and off we went, 11 of us, packed in like sardines. When we pulled into the driveway, Lindsey and William were outside waiting, and when I rolled the windows down, there was a collective sigh of 11 awwww's as we saw the baby boy. It made for a fun moment. OF COURSE we documented it. And before anyone has a cow thinking we took the child for a non car seat ride, just calm down. We did not. We just hung out for 20 minutes while passing the kid from peep to peep, and then left completely happy to have seen the boy.

He doesn't look too happy to see us here.


A Lion King moment.


Are there seat belts in the rear of my car you ask? Of COURSE there are!


OK, there really isn't. But I was VERY careful.


That's not Willie's soda.


That's not the same photo, but he's hard to cull pics of.


How cute is he?


What's that he's doing?


Clearly he's think sleeping.


A little troubled in this one.


But all ended well for the little man child.


Another stellar photo of the boy.


Then the other day I was coming home from Wal Mart and I rounded a corner and saw the loveliest Mimosa tree in the late afternoon sunlight. So I ran home to grab my camera.









And in that moment it reminded me of the house at 212 and hot summer nights thick with the smell of honeysuckle, and homemade peach ice cream at ice cream socials, and quilts, and slamming screen doors and Gran walking to the barn to put his chickens up, and cantaloupe from his garden, and the attic fan at night, and late night summer car rides and Six Flags in the hot summer sun and Mollie's pink gingham dress, and window air conditioners and Grandma's petunias, and Nina's plaid dress.

All sweet memories.

And here's to new ones for the next generation.