Cymbre's big show!

Cymbre was in the CARE ballet "Tales of Hans Christian Anderson" last weekend. She danced as a Lily of the Valley in the tale of Little Ida's Flowers. It was a great experience and a great show!


Cymbre with some of her loyal fan base. =)

Cymbre with her friend Rose (a daisy).
They were both rodents last year in "Carnival of the Animals."

A special part of performance week with CARE is the warm ups the whole cast does together. This is one aspect of the CARE experience that really cultivates a feeling of being a close family or team between the kids.
http://www.careballet.org

Fall fun at Meijer Gardens

Trying to get a picture of my kids has become harder than it used to be... but here's one attempt!

We visited the gardens this week with my parents and my little sisters and brother. This outing was actually in celebration of Noah's "gotcha day" or the anniversary of his adoption. He's been in our family for two years now and what a blessing he has been!
Happy Gotcha Day, Noah!!

All the big kids thought these stepping stones were just fabulous and used them as running and jumping stones... until Allegra got knocked down. Such is her lot in life...

Here they all are!
Harmony, Cymbre, Allegra, Noah, Shiloh, Destiny, and Eli
Cute as bugs and just as wiggly too.

Shiloh wants to say...

thank you to SaSa for the cozy Hanna suit,
and thank you to Aunt Stacy and Uncle Justin for the stylin' Hanna hat.
He feels that organic cotton is appropriate apparel for optimal comfort while carrying out all of the mischief he's been planning.

=)

Our deck!!

All the men in the world who love me. =)

These pictures show the deck ALMOST DONE!
It's actually done now (in real time) and it's fabulous!!
THANKS, DAD!!

Photography lesson??

The only way to get a picture of Allegra on her carousel tiger (with Shiloh, of course) was to let Cymbre take the picture. We have some work to do.

Public Museum Field Trips

We've been frequenting the Public Museum of Grand Rapids lately. They have a "Whodunit?" exhibit right now that the kids really like. You get to take a close look at some tools of forensic crime labs and be the detective in a "murder." Cymbre likes the computer that lets you choose individual features to try to come up with composite sketches. We tried to make one of Shiloh but it was really difficult, especially since there were really no baby features to choose from. Eli likes the fingerprint demo. He has simple loops on all his fingers. Cymbre has some whorls. Allegra particularly likes the blood spatter comparisons. Go figure.

We watched a documentary about Apollo 13 recently so this Apollo command capsule (once used for search and recovery drills) was very interesting to the kids. They desperately wanted to go in it.

The gorgeous antique carousel is always a hit. Allegra has even started to enjoy it this year and likes to ride the tiger.

Here they are in "Olde Grand Rapids" with their imaginary provisions from the shops. Cymbre has a crate of milk. Eli has a bag of groceries. Allegra, who loves all things cake and cake related, has a handful of candy.