Making Ana smile

 Adriana Mae Vander Hart. A stinker when it comes to pictures...

Me: "Anie, smile!" And her smile.

 Me: "No, a real smile! Come on!" Her smile.

 Me: "Ana! Stop! C'mon, a real one!" And her smile.

Me: "Adriana Mae! A REAL smile!" And finally a good picture!

40th Birthdays!

 Two certain people have had their 40th birthdays this month. I won't say their names, but they're in these pictures...

 I'll say too, that the man's birthday was before the lady's.

 That means he's older. MUCH OLDER!

 'Cause you know, two weeks is a LOOOONGGG time.

 He's reeeealllly old!

And today, now is she. (Not mentioning any names..)

Ana, Minte and a Big Wheel

Ana and Minte both love Ana's big wheel. What better way to share, than to ride together?? Course, in just a minute, Minte's gonna push Ana off and take himself for a ride!!

Minte learning English!

We all love to practice English with Minte. In fact, he practices it all day long! We are constantly asking him to say this or that and help him understand how to say words in different situations. And he loves copying! He is catching on so fast to words. These words in the video are all ones that he can say by himself in the right situation!

The Bird Sanctuary, Part 2

 One of the awesome birds we saw at the bird sanctuary. It's just amazing to see their gorgeous feathers! Wow! So beautiful!

 Another cool bird. Basically the entire cage silo thing is full of beautiful birds with an attitude problem! :-) Sorry about the bars blocking the picture!

 We had such a great time! It was fun to spend time with our cousins and see and feed wild birds at the same time. Random thought- Did you know that swans suck the corn from your hand? It makes some of the skin on your palm rise a little. Kinda interesting!

 Alli, Jess, Ethan, and Ana posing for pictures afterwards. They love to play together. Just yesterday Ana and Ethan were laughing really hard about something that they did together a long time ago!

Our family! One of our first kinda family pictures with Minte. We're just missing Dad and Luke!!

Like I've said already many times, we had a great time!

Brothers Forever.

One of the pictures I took in the field. I LOVE this picture! You can totally see the responsibility and pride in Ethan's face as a big brother and can almost hear Minte's protesting squeals!!

I've been having fun messing with this picture and trying to make it look cool, but I can't figure out how to show you!

Minte's Birthday Party

A while ago, we celebrated Minte's birthday! It was a lot of fun! He had his first icecream, cake, and opened presents! He has only opened presents once before when he was helping Luke with his! He did pretty well.

 Here he is in his new car! He had a great time that day playing on the driveway with his cousins and siblings!!

 Here he is saying, "Bye-bye!" as he takes off. With Dad pushing him!

"Oh my word! I got FROSTING on my finger!!!!!! TAKE IT OFF!"

Two year old Minte with some of his cousins!

Happy Birthday, Minte Baby!

Here is a video of Minte blowing out his candles! Too cute! We had practiced a couple times before, so he knew what to do and didn't want to stop!!

Catching up!

I started loading more pictures from the bird sanctuary, but decided I didn't have enough time this morning to wait for all of them. So instead, I'll talk. Or write. Whatever.

1. Minte went for x-rays yesterday. The doctor thought that his leg might be falling out of his socket when he starts limping and stuff after we put him down after holding him. We don't know the results of the x-rays yet.

2. Yesterday we went to a nearby park, (my absolute favorite park), and we saw a couple days old fawn!! All by itself!! It was lying under a tree by a bridge over a stream on the nature trail. It was SO cute! It had the skinniest face and it was watching us. The park ranger says it happens all the time! For all of you who hunt deer, I can't see how you can kill them after knowing that they are such adorable babies!!! :-)

3. Ethan got stung 3 times yesterday at one time in about the same spot. And at the park. He was screaming!!!!! Poor Mom was on the other side of the nature trail and ran all the way back. Then Minte started screaming himself! It was not a fun ending to a day at the park!

4. Dad had his 40th birthday two days ago. We didn't have a party, but DID have brownies, played basketball, had a treasure hunt for him to find his presents, and had lots of fun! Mom's birthday is on the way!!

5. Lucas has gotten business for his lawn mowing business. A lady down the road, and our aunt.

 I think I'd better go now. I'll write more soon!

The Bird Sanctuary, Part 1

You may have noticed that I'm not the greatest at sharing RECENT pictures on this blog. The reason is that our pictures get filled up on the computer and since I don't know how to put them on the computer, they stay there for a while until Dad switches them. I've been getting such new pictures, though, that it's hard to go back and do some I haven't done. But now that I've gone on and on about this, here are my bird pictures from about a month ago!!

 This swan is really pretty!

 Some geeeeeeese.

I love this picture since you can see the swan's long neck under the water! He was pecking the bottom for corn.

 A baby goose!!!! It was SO cute. It was just peep, peep, peeping the whole time! He had a hard time keeping up with his parents too!

 Feeding the birds. They came running, walking, waddling, whatever. The geese and swans would usually scare away the ducks!! They made a hissing sound!

 On the side, they have some cages full of birds with broken wings, legs, etc. In other words, they have birds that no longer can take care of themselves in the wild. Most of them just stared at you, but there was one poor hawk that was trying to get out! That was really sad! (Ethan in red, Jessi in pink, Ana in pink and black coat, and Alli in blue).

 Looking at the birds. That's Mom, Ana in front of her, Ethan in the red, Aunt Jody is in the blue and her girls arein front of her, but you can't really see them.

 There were a lot of places to feed the birds!

 A mute swan! My favorite!

 A really neat, huge Bald Eagle. Most Bald Eagles are really gorgeous!!

And in these cages they had amazing birds with gorgeous feathers and features!!! They were really neat!

 I'll give you a picture of one of those birds! More to come in another post!

                     

Prayers

Please be praying for Minte. Some of you may know that he walks sideways on his foot with it facing outward. This was something we thought could be fixed with therapy.

However, now Minte is having more trouble. After being held for a short time or sitting in a seat, he is not able to put any weight on his leg. He either immediately falls to his knees to crawl around, grabs tight to your arm to help him stand, or limps really bad. This can last for just a few seconds or for a few minutes. He doesn't seem to be in any pain. Dad wonders if it may be numb and he can't walk because he can't feel his leg. Either way, it's very scary to watch him!

He also gets these random cramps or something in his limbs. He will run crying to someone showing that something hurts and it seems to help when we rub it hard. When we stop rubbing, he cries and pulls our hands back to his "ow". And then after a while, he goes off to play

When he is not having these problems though, he is running around, skipping through the rooms, jabbering nonsense, and just being a normal, healthy two-year old.

Min is going to the doctor tomorrow for a check-up and Mom plans on mentioning his problems to the doctor then. Please pray that the doctor will know what it is, that it's not something serious, and that it won't get any worse and slow this happy little guy down!!! Thanks a  lot!

Cake and ICECREAM????

Minte's first taste of cake and icecream at his birthday party. And his reaction...

BLUE frosting?? You think I'm nuts?

Cake WITHOUT frosting is best! The funny thing is he used to not like chocolate so we didn't give him chocolate cake. But yesterday and today he eagerly ate up dark chocolate brownies!!!! I guess the dark chocolate part makes all the difference!!! :-)

Soccer Pictures

 Having sports in the family began when Luke was pretty little and playing t-ball. I played soccer for a tiny bit, but soon stopped to my parent's relief! Lucas continued playing baseball the next few years until I started basketball in 7th grade and he decided to follow me. So we began as a baseball family, then a basketball family, and then when Ethan and Ana played t-ball, a baseball and basketball family. But NOW Ethan has decided to play soccer. So the last few Friday nights have been full of soccer games.

 As he is with most sports he tries, Ethan was really good.

When he actually hussled down the field and followed the ball, he did a great job. He could kick hard! He  made 3 goals in one game!

 I don't think his team lost a game!!!!!

And there he is- Ethan the soccer player, making a goal. He says he wants to play next year too.

Ring around the Rosy

This is one of Minte's favorite games. He loves to fall, (as most kids do!), and will fall right in the middle of the rhyme! He squeals when Lucas falls down with a boom sometimes!

Check out this bird!!

This bird was at the bird sanctuary. He, (or she), was pretty mad at me, but I found him very amusing. He looks like a lion and shakes his "mane" in anger in between pecks at the fence that's holding him back from attacking! I never knew such a bird existed and loved annoying him. Sorry this video is long!

Thoughts of a Purse Snatcher

"Hi! I'm Minte! I love purses! I even know how to swing it over my shoulder when I walk."

"After snatching a purse, your next step is to hide in another room."

"This is where the fun begins! Now you can get into it!"

"This certain purse has some kind of beady, stringy thingy in it. This is kind of interesting..."

"Not interesting enough. Let's see what else is in here!"

"AHA! SUNGLASSES! My favorite! I'm going to put these on upside down just to see how they look..."

"Wow! What a fun time I had! Now I must look cute and innocent, (with sunglasses in hand), so I don't get in trouble! Have I ever mentioned how much I love you, Emily?? Aren't I sweet???"