Alone time . .

I am so tired right now . . .long weekend - fun weekend - but long, busy, every moment occupied kind of weekend. But I just had to document my alone times that I loved this weekend. Not by myself - I actually had some "alone time" with each of my children this weekend, and it was so special.

Friday morning, Colby and I went together to the school to help run a 2nd grade election! Each class had nominated some character from a book or movie, made a poster with their picture and listed their "character traits", then everyone in the 2nd grade voted on who they wanted to be the president of 2nd grade. I'm sad to say that "Super Diaper Baby" was the winner (at least it wasn't Sponge Bob Squarepants, who I've always been creeped out by). I was pulling for Rainbow Fish or Ms. Frizzle (Magic Schoolbus). What was so fun was watching Colby get so into his role of handing pencils to the voters, making sure everyone signed in, helping tally the votes, and coming with me to get different classes. He was pumped. Then we finished in time to go grab some Sonic lunch together and eat in the car and chat about our morning. I loved it. I love being with that little guy - he's a JOY.

After the drop off at school, I went to pick up Brady who had been hanging out with his grandparents and Daddy at the "other Vaughn's" house. I took him up to my office to have the PT and orthotist check out his feet. This is one of the perks of working at an outpatient therapy office who happens to have a great orthodics clinic a few times a month. Brady was fitted for orthodics a few months ago due to weak ankles and just a crazy walking pattern - that's my non-technical description. Apparently he has the body of his father and the ankles of his mother. If you have seen both of us, you can imagine why that could present a difficulty for Brady in his coordination and strength! He's been wearing them in his shoes faithfully, and the great news is that he looks AWESOME!! The therapists were so pleased and just gushed over his new arches (they spouted off the names of them, but I can't remember them for the life of me), and were just so proud of his new, muscle toned ankles. ha! That was great news, but what I really loved was waiting to see the therapists and getting to watch our 2 turtles in the office play in the tank - Brady loved them, and I loved chatting with him about them, and hearing his reactions to them. And I just love showing my kids off to my co-workers - it makes me feel so good when other people notice just how precious my guys are! I love being with Brady - he always has some funny things to say that make me laugh out loud - he's my favorite 2 year old in the world!!

Then today, I took Tyler to a birthday party, and our drive there, our shopping trip to get the bday present, and our ride to meet the rest of the family was filled with neat conversation. He's growing up. He reminds me of that fact all the time, but something about the depth of our conversations lately, his perceptiveness, his compassion and his maturity (at least it's increasing?) are amazing me. He was resting his head on my shoulder today at lunch, and started to kind of rub his head on me - I said, "What are you doing?!" He replied, "I just love you, Mom - I just nestling!" Where did he learn that word? And something tells me I better soak up any "nestling" I get because I hear it gets to be not so cool for boys to even hug their moms - much less "nestle" with them? Oh, i hope not.

Anyway, I have a lot more I could say, but I just wanted to treasure up those sweet snaps in time that I had this weekend. Blessings -