The Little Things Thursdays: #102

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Welcome to The Little Things Thursday!!

If you are new, we like to take a minute to look back on the little things that brightened our week. So often we get busy and forget all of the things that we enjoy as we go through our daily lives. This is an opportunity to stop, remember, and enjoy those things! Nothing is too small...in fact, the smaller the better! That's the whole point! If you have a blog, leave a link in a comment below! If you don't blog, I'd love for you to participate by leaving a moment in a comment anyway. Ready?

1. I Can't Keep Up

Well, I think it's pretty obvious at this point that I can barely keep up with life. How sad is it that I sometimes go a full week between posts? I try REALLY hard not to, but sometimes....I just can't get to it. *sadness* And because of that, there is a BIG backlog of posts that need to be written. Hmm...I just need more hours in my day! Mid-February through the end of March are particularly hard as it's our busiest time of the year between birthdays, our anniversary, taxes, prepping for the semi-annual multiples consignment sale (so. much. work.) and trying to keep up with my job AND the kids and a house. Eh, who am I kidding? The house is definitely not kept up at this point.

Anyhow, because I have the same number of hours as everyone else, we are just going to go with it. Thanks for hanging in there with me!

2. Back in January, We Went to St. Louis

So today's Little Things Thursday is really all about our trip to visit the kids' great grandparents in St. Louis a couple of months ago. I haven't blogged that adventure yet, and it NEEDS to be officially recorded for posterity. So it's a BIG THING that is taking over Little Things Thursday. And I'm okay with that.

Back in January, we did something pretty daring. We decided to load the kids up in the car and make the trek to St. Louis for the weekend.

Ellie, Elijah, Caleb, and Abby

It may not seem very daring, but it was our first trip with the kids, and it made me nervous. Mostly, I was worried that sleeping on the floor in sleeping bags wouldn't fly with them. BUT, we wanted to give it a try, and figured they would learn to cope being out of their beds if we gave them a chance.

The kids did well on their first car trip. The longest they had been in the car before that was about an hour. So even though Abby decided that she was "STUCK!!!" about an hour from our destination, we still considered that four hour (5 hours if you count the McDonalds pit stop) drive a success!

And once we arrived, the kids had a ball! Great-Grandpa and Great-Grandma (Sean's grandparents) had picked up some coloring books, crayons, and reading books for the kids to play with. They also let us have the run of their entire basement apartment, which was so nice!

 Ellie and Great-Grandpa

Great-Grandma and Sean

Then it was time to bed down for the night. Oh...that first night was rough. The kids had fun backpacks, but even though we made a big deal out of how great it was to go "camping" with them, it just wasn't met with much enthusiasm after the first 5 minutes. I finally rubbed all of them with sleepy essential oils and put Peace & Calming in the diffuser. It took until about midnight, but we finally got them all to sleep. Thankfully, the next night was much easier! I think we just had a little learning curve there that hopefully we won't have to deal with again in the future. It's always hard to deal with changes, especially for little ones.

Clockwise from left: Ellie, Abby, Caleb, and Elijah

Saturday morning, we woke up and the kids had breakfast. At this point, the adventure was back in full swing and very exciting! They played inside and outside all day long, and Sean's cousins, Christian and Gabriel, came over to keep them occupied as well. I also had the fun opportunity to jump across the state line to Illinois and teach an essential oils class for a few women that afternoon. And Sean held down the fort and made sure everyone stayed out of trouble.

That evening, Sean's Uncle Matt and Aunt Lisa came over to hang out with us for dinner (Christian and Gabriel are their kids). It's always so fun to see their family when they come to town. I'm glad we could come their way this time! I'm also always impressed with what nice young men Christian and Gabriel are! They were very kind to all of our kids who were running around everywhere.

Clockwise from left: Ellie, Abby, Christian, Elijah, Gabriel, and Caleb

The next morning (after a much better bedtime) we headed to church with the great-grandparents to meet some of the people who have been praying for our kids since we were pregnant. The sweet people in that church have only seen pictures, so I think they enjoyed seeing the real life versions of our kids. Lol!

After lunch back at the homestead, we loaded up to drive back home. 

Elijah, Caleb, Great-Grandma, Abby, Great-Grandpa, and Ellie

Us and the brave grandparents who put us up for the weekend!

And then we managed to stretch the adventure just a little further by stopping for blizzards halfway home. There were no arguments from the kids on that account!

Abby, Caleb, Elijah, Ellie, and Daddy

It's somewhat empowering to know that that first road trip is behind us. We survived and had FUN! Yay! We are thinking about potentially trying a road trip to New Mexico to see my side of the family this summer...16 hours in the car...are we crazy? Haha!

And I think we will have to head back to St. Louis at some point this year as well. Abby has been asking repeatedly to go see "Gwampa and Gwamma." :)

Now it's your turn! What Little Things brightened up your week? Link up your post in a comment below and make sure you come back next week to play again!

This post may contain affiliate links. For more info, please see my disclaimer page.

This post may contain affiliate links. Thank you for supporting our family and blog!

Welcome to The Little Things Thursday!!

If you are new, we like to take a minute to look back on the little things that brightened our week. So often we get busy and forget all of the things that we enjoy as we go through our daily lives. This is an opportunity to stop, remember, and enjoy those things! Nothing is too small...in fact, the smaller the better! That's the whole point! If you have a blog, leave a link in a comment below! If you don't blog, I'd love for you to participate by leaving a moment in a comment anyway. Ready?

1. I Can't Keep Up

Well, I think it's pretty obvious at this point that I can barely keep up with life. How sad is it that I sometimes go a full week between posts? I try REALLY hard not to, but sometimes....I just can't get to it. *sadness* And because of that, there is a BIG backlog of posts that need to be written. Hmm...I just need more hours in my day! Mid-February through the end of March are particularly hard as it's our busiest time of the year between birthdays, our anniversary, taxes, prepping for the semi-annual multiples consignment sale (so. much. work.) and trying to keep up with my job AND the kids and a house. Eh, who am I kidding? The house is definitely not kept up at this point.

Anyhow, because I have the same number of hours as everyone else, we are just going to go with it. Thanks for hanging in there with me!

2. Back in January, We Went to St. Louis

So today's Little Things Thursday is really all about our trip to visit the kids' great grandparents in St. Louis a couple of months ago. I haven't blogged that adventure yet, and it NEEDS to be officially recorded for posterity. So it's a BIG THING that is taking over Little Things Thursday. And I'm okay with that.

Back in January, we did something pretty daring. We decided to load the kids up in the car and make the trek to St. Louis for the weekend.

Ellie, Elijah, Caleb, and Abby

It may not seem very daring, but it was our first trip with the kids, and it made me nervous. Mostly, I was worried that sleeping on the floor in sleeping bags wouldn't fly with them. BUT, we wanted to give it a try, and figured they would learn to cope being out of their beds if we gave them a chance.

The kids did well on their first car trip. The longest they had been in the car before that was about an hour. So even though Abby decided that she was "STUCK!!!" about an hour from our destination, we still considered that four hour (5 hours if you count the McDonalds pit stop) drive a success!

And once we arrived, the kids had a ball! Great-Grandpa and Great-Grandma (Sean's grandparents) had picked up some coloring books, crayons, and reading books for the kids to play with. They also let us have the run of their entire basement apartment, which was so nice!

 Ellie and Great-Grandpa

Great-Grandma and Sean

Then it was time to bed down for the night. Oh...that first night was rough. The kids had fun backpacks, but even though we made a big deal out of how great it was to go "camping" with them, it just wasn't met with much enthusiasm after the first 5 minutes. I finally rubbed all of them with sleepy essential oils and put Peace & Calming in the diffuser. It took until about midnight, but we finally got them all to sleep. Thankfully, the next night was much easier! I think we just had a little learning curve there that hopefully we won't have to deal with again in the future. It's always hard to deal with changes, especially for little ones.

Clockwise from left: Ellie, Abby, Caleb, and Elijah

Saturday morning, we woke up and the kids had breakfast. At this point, the adventure was back in full swing and very exciting! They played inside and outside all day long, and Sean's cousins, Christian and Gabriel, came over to keep them occupied as well. I also had the fun opportunity to jump across the state line to Illinois and teach an essential oils class for a few women that afternoon. And Sean held down the fort and made sure everyone stayed out of trouble.

That evening, Sean's Uncle Matt and Aunt Lisa came over to hang out with us for dinner (Christian and Gabriel are their kids). It's always so fun to see their family when they come to town. I'm glad we could come their way this time! I'm also always impressed with what nice young men Christian and Gabriel are! They were very kind to all of our kids who were running around everywhere.

Clockwise from left: Ellie, Abby, Christian, Elijah, Gabriel, and Caleb

The next morning (after a much better bedtime) we headed to church with the great-grandparents to meet some of the people who have been praying for our kids since we were pregnant. The sweet people in that church have only seen pictures, so I think they enjoyed seeing the real life versions of our kids. Lol!

After lunch back at the homestead, we loaded up to drive back home. 

Elijah, Caleb, Great-Grandma, Abby, Great-Grandpa, and Ellie

Us and the brave grandparents who put us up for the weekend!

And then we managed to stretch the adventure just a little further by stopping for blizzards halfway home. There were no arguments from the kids on that account!

Abby, Caleb, Elijah, Ellie, and Daddy

It's somewhat empowering to know that that first road trip is behind us. We survived and had FUN! Yay! We are thinking about potentially trying a road trip to New Mexico to see my side of the family this summer...16 hours in the car...are we crazy? Haha!

And I think we will have to head back to St. Louis at some point this year as well. Abby has been asking repeatedly to go see "Gwampa and Gwamma." :)

Now it's your turn! What Little Things brightened up your week? Link up your post in a comment below and make sure you come back next week to play again!

This post may contain affiliate links. For more info, please see my disclaimer page.