I'm Sorry, So Sorry!

**Let me begin this post with an apology to all of you at First Free who really enjoyed the candidate today, because my family may have single-handedly undone the whole kit and kaboodle. I would also like to apologize to Pastor King, because if my chatty clan has anything to do with it, he may never be able to retire from First Free.**

Our day started out with a lovely breakfast and meet and greet of our pastoral candidate and his wife. We've been searching for a new pastor for about 3 years and I think our whole church was excited at the prospect that they may be "the ones." After the breakfast ended, 3 gals had sticky hands and needed a potty break (thankfully, one little lady is still in diapers), so we headed to the ladies room. Right before we entered the bathroom, I mentioned that the lady in front of us (who was also going into the restroom) was the wife of the man who might be our new pastor. The following is the remainder of our dialogue:

Emily or Grace - What, he's going to be our new pastor?
Me - Wouldn't that be neat?
Emily - I don't want him!
Me(trying to think on the fly and not completely ruin our chances at a new pastor) - Oh honey, I know you really like Pastor King.
Emily or Grace - Will we never get to see him again?
Me - Oh, I'm sure we will.
Emily or Grace - Do you think he might come back to visit?
Me - He probably will.

So, there you have it. The damage has been done. I hope you'll be able to extend to us your forgiveness. Frankly, you're just lucky the kids weren't invited to the question and answer session. Who knows what might have been said if they had gotten the microphone! In all sincerity, it is really neat to think that our chatty clan feels such a connection to their pastor. It shows how really special he is to even the smallest attendees of our church.

The View From My Kitchen...Dirt!

Lydia - Look at that mom.
Me - Oh is that some dirt on the floor?
Lydia - It's a bead.
Me - Is it really a bead?
Lydia - Actually, it is a bead. It's not candy. I tried it.

I guess she's so accustomed to dirt in our house that she's not one bit afraid to try it. Upon realizing how funny she was she said, "Are you going to call dad?" She's picked up on the idea that I like to tell him when something super funny has happened. Then when she realized that I was going to blog about our conversation, she said, "I like a blog about me."

The Case of the Missing Sock and Baby News

We left our condo in Sanibel after solving one of life's greatest mysteries...where did Doug's sock go?!? In preparation for our early departure, we had all of our clothes picked out the night before and while Doug was getting ready, his socks were carelessly left unattended. One member of our chatty clan, we'll call her Ydialay, was see sucking on said sock and this was the last time it was seen. When Doug finally decided it was time to put on his socks, there was only 1 left. It's important to note that putting on socks is always the last thing Doug does before leaving the house and this always drives me batty, so this was especially amusing to me. When he discovered his sock was missing he immediately started shouting. The Erickson parents were with us and I'm not sure they've ever seen their son so upset, but the rest of us know to expect this from him on the dreaded days of travel...he becomes TRAVEL DOUG. Some of the phrases he yelled were, "Come on", "GEEZ", "Who took my sock", "FIND IT ", and "I thought we were going to leave early". These were repeated several times with increasing aggitation. I have to mention that several times we asked him if he might have packed it and he vehemently denied any such thing. Also, his parents were scouring the condo trying to help their frantic son. Finally, most of us started laughing hysterically, except for Doug and his dad. His mom kept saying, "I just knew something like this was going to happen." Finally, Lydia (oops, I mean Ydialay) said, "I hid it." We immediately started questioning her concerning its whereabouts and she said, "I don't know." At last she said, "I hid it in the bedroom." So, we went on our quest for the sock. After we had turned the room upside down, she finally admitted, "I'm just teasing," which caused Doug to go into super-spaz mode. With some more urging and time ticking away, he checked the suitcase one more time and voila...the missing sock was found. He rather sheepishly admitted he had found it and we were on our way out. There were no other major mishaps and we arrived back in the frozen tundra safely. We had such a fabulous vacation and this last event left us with some more priceless memories.

In other news, Elise has been changing by leaps and bounds. Since she started crawling, it seems she is unstoppable. She pulls herself up on everything and tonight while we were eating dinner, she was playing with a toy in the family room. After we had been eating for a while, I looked over and there she was in the dining room. She had crawled up the two stairs from the family room into the dining room. All I can say is, "Slow down baby girl." Also, she has been waving, clapping, and tonight she finally said, "Mama" after what seems like months of saying, "Dada." I just love watching our children grow up. It's just amazing how special God made each of them.

Shell Perspective

Today was our last full day in Sanibel. If you've been following our last several posts, you might be able to guess what we chose to do on our last day...shell and swim. I love shelling and these pictures will give some perspective on how much the kiddos do, too.

There are also some other things on perspective that shelling has taught me this week...God sees the big picture while we're bent over staring at our small piece of sandy shore and each shell is made uniquely just like my precious kiddos. Sometimes the daily grind of cooking, cleaning, butt wiping, and other motherly duties can make you lose perspective, but this week made me realize again how blessed I am to be the mom of this chatty clan, how quickly they do grow up, and how much more I love them all the time.

Finally, after an afternoon of Doug and the girls swimming in the rain, we went out for one last time on the beach as a family.

Tonight was some of the best shelling, because evidentaly the tide had brought in the most microscopic shells. I have developed a real interest in these teeny tiny ones. Finding rice shells or delicate wentel traps feels like winning some kind of grand prize and that made tonight feel like winning the jackpot. I could hardly pull myself away, but dinner with the Erickson parents was calling.

We enjoyed one more lovely evening with the grandparents. This trip has been so memorable and the precious time we've had with Doug's parents has made it even better. It was so much fun for the kids and us to enjoy this special place with them. Thanks for all of the fun memories and hopefully we'll get to do it again soon.

Another Day In Paradise...The Final Countdown

Elise woke up today before 7am Florida time and was up for the day. Grace and Emily followed shortly thereafter. Since we were all up so early, I thought I should take the opportunity for some shelling. Does anyone have the number for SA (Sheller's Annonymous)? I offered to take people to the beach, but I only had one taker...Grace the shelling fiend A.K.A. one more shell Erickson. She was so excited to go with just me (can you see my head swelling from your computer screen?). She kept calling it our "private time". This makes me think about making time for this more often. It was so much fun! We just walked and talked (I actually mostly listened), looked for shells, and held hands. On our way back to the condo, we decided to skip our hearts out. There's something about skipping that makes you feel about 6 years old again...I highly recommend a good skip once in a while.

Later in the morning, we all went out for some more shelling. These are a couple shots of the big girls frolicking in the waves.

After some more pool time, we ventured over to the trailer park for some bird time. They had several macaws, parrots, morning doves, love birds (not just Doug and I ;) ), and other creatures. This was a picture of one of the residents named Fred.

Some of the birds talked. One of them named Lola kept saying, "Hello", "I'm across the road", and "Slow down" when cars would drive by. Another bird would say, "I don't wanna. I'm a grown up." It was really funny. I was waiting for one of the other birds to belt out, "Shut up" to the ones that wouldn't quit talking.

Elise tags along on all of our excursions, since she really has no choice. This is a sweet shot of her with her daddy while visiting the birds.

This vacation has been just lovely. I'm so sad to see it winding down. How often do you get to just spend time enjoying those you love, without much work to be done? So, I will try to really soak in our last full day in Sanibel!

A Long Walk

As our daily adventure, today we decided to make our way to the lighthouse at the end of the island. The last time Doug and I were there was 7 years ago, and it was just the two of us then. We started out thinking we could make it round trip in about 1 1/2 hours, but we way underestimated the time it would take for us as a family of 6 now...more like 2 1/2 hours. It was fun to achieve this accomplishment, though. Another bonus for making it to the end was finding the ice cream shop we would enjoy after dinner (more on that later). Anything for ice cream! :)

After our long walk, it was time for a cool down in the pool, and I mean COOL. I even ventured into the water today and so did Elise. I think the girls are really getting to do almost everything they could desire.
Tonight after our dinner out at Schnapper's we enjoyed our homemade Italian ice cream at Pinocchio's. Doug and I each had Dirty Sand Dollar, Grandma and the girls had Cookies and Cream, and Grandpa had Sanibel Krunch...YUM! What a great way to end a great day.

Ding Darling

This is not about a song or an affectionate name for a loved one, but a national wildlife refuge we visited this afternoon. We went hoping to see alligators and birds, but we were only able to find the latter much to the disappointment of some little girls. Unfortunately, none of the alligators were in the mood to cooperate, but we did see one other creature of interest. Can you guess what's in the following picture?

Here are a couple more pictures of our group at Ding Darling.

Several times during our adventure I heard, "I'm bored. Can we go home now?" At one point I responded, "I remember being bored several times when I was a kid on vacation." I guess it's generational. Also, upon arriving at home Grace emphatically stated, "I don't EVER want to go to Ding Darling again." RIP Ding Darling.

Hermit and Lisa

We have now acquired two new babies as family members...Hermit and Lisa the hermit crabs. They were accidently taken while hiding in our tiny shells. At first, Grace said to me, "Mom, you shouldn't have made me take this shell. It's alive." It didn't take her long to get over this and claim them as the newest members of our family. However, at this very moment, Emily just informed me that Lisa might be dead and we would have to hold a funeral. RIP Lisa. There's still a slight possibility she might make it, but in this family...NOT LIKELY!

Great Odors and Great Fears

It was another beautiful day here in Sanibel and the shelling continued.

Along with the increasing number of shells comes and increasing stench. Each time we leave the condo and come back the odor overcomes us. This is just a small representation of what we have collected and it's only day 3 with 4 remaining. I totally saw this coming when we were back home and tried to persuade them to do otherwise. I told them that there would be so many shells in Sanibel and that we should try and collect only the most beautiful shells, but what I didn't realize was just how beautiful they would ALL be! ;) It's so much fun to watch them enjoying this daily activity.

Lydia is also enjoying herself here, but one thing we didn't expect was her great fear of the ocean (excuse me, Gulf). She also loves to indiscriminately collect shells while trying to avoid the water at all costs. Fortunately, she trusted me when I told her I would protect her and the shelling continued.

Starfish Phenomenon

According to the Erickson parents, each year in Sanibel there is something new that washes ashore in droves. This year it happens to be the Thin Starfish and the girls are just in awe.

Doug actually found the first one this morning while walking on the beach and we thought it was so special.

However, by later this afternoon the beach was littered with them. That didn't matter to Emily and Grace though. They still thought each one was special and desired a new home back in Minnesota. Well, that's actually how they feel about all of the shells. Today Emily said, "I think we've found all of the butterfly shells in Sanibel." She might just be right. :)

In addtion to combing the beach for various shells, we spent some time at the pool. Although it wasn't all that warm, the girls left the pool reluctantly at 4:00pm for the "adult only" swimming time, which they totally did not understand.

So as not to leave out the littlest member of our family, Elise has also been enjoying her time in Florida. She was carried on the beach this morning and also spends much of her time motoring around the condo. She starting crawling January 8th and pulled herself up on the 10th. Now that she has these new skills, she loves to put them to use.

A Few Things About Age

Well, you can see I got stuck in October again. We are currently on our first day of vacation in Sanibel, Florida. Spending quality time together as a family always provides some memorable moments. These are just a couple quotes from the bigger girls today about age.
"You always have an age no matter where you are. Until you're 100 and then you probaby don't have an age anymore...you just die." -Emily (In response to hearing that a boy in the airport was 7)
"Well, 3 is your age and you've got to stick with it" -Grace (In response to me telling Grace that it was hard for Lydia to be 3, because she was knocking our game cards on the floor)