The HerdKeeper

well not exactly. I love the little mispronunciations that make my children's innocence so beautiful . Melaina is so proud of herself that she is a cheerleader. She is part of Upward Cheerleading. It is a fantastic program. So day in day out day after day we hear drivel it pass it we want a basket. too cute.

These are my babies! They love to have their picture taken. Aliyah, Lydia and Noah. My middles are Ben, Josiah and Melaina. They are my energetic bunch My middle bigs are Rebekah, Donny and Annah. This group are my biggest helpers. They do the bulk of the chores and are always on the look out to make a buck doing extra work My big bigs are Samantha and Emma. Samantha works outside the home and is gone a lot and Emma well she is 15 and to busy being social for much else right now.

We finally got snow on Thursday and it was beautiful. The kids sledded and snowboarded and played till they couldn't move another muscle. God kept them safe and brought all my adventurers back home at dark o'clock.

While I was getting dressed on Sunday morning and brushing my teeth and "painting the barn" Lydia kept taking things off the bathroom sink. I would remove it from her hand and say "That is not for you". The last thing she grabbed was a small round brush and she immediately took it to her hair. The next thing I know she is whimpering and saying "this is not for me". The hair brush was tangled in her hair. I untangled her hair and she happily wandered off to another adventure.

That is the number of hamsters we have been through since Christmas. It was believed that the first hamster died of post traumatic stress disorder. It was handled a lot and died. So we bought hamster # 2 and we did not pick it up, we fed it, watered it, he (we are assuming) ate from our hand, we petted him but did not pick him up. Ben went to feed him. He started off his morning conversation "Wake up little buddy, I have your breakfast". Then came the tears. It is at moments like these that being a mom is tough. The whole family would like another pet. This spring we are looking into a dog, chickens and bunnies for now we have an empty cage and a 9 year old disappointed boy.