Brief Editorial...

Well, serves me right for not checking this often enough to notice the most recent post...but finally doing so has prompted this brief appendix that certainly must accompany the previous message. Yes, I had to figure out how to hack into our own blog to do this, but here goes:

Upon receiving our diploma from The Ohio State University, I was quietly alarmed at the apparent typographical error that riddled the text. To the common person, only one name appears on the documented proof and transcripts associated with our completion of coursework at Fisher. I, however, will always see two names and want everyone to know that the name Brandis Leigh Smith deserves to be printed just as much, if not more, than does David Nathaniel Smith in connection with this accomplishment. True, I was the one sitting in the exam room for Advanced Strategic Analysis, but she was the one acing subjects that have real significance - Raising 3 Miraculously Wonderful Children - for example.

My infinitely tolerant, compassionate, and patient wife has completed (by modest estimation) 74, 460 priceless and credit-less hours over the past 8 1/2 years compared with my paltry 220 or so credit hours that have warranted the recognition marked this past June. She both figuratively and literally worked through this experience with me, as evidenced of her willingness to grade papers with me at all hours of the night (yep, she didn't sleep all that much either).

To my wife, who never gets any time off - to say nothing of all the quarter breaks I had over the past few years - I extend my congratulations and eternal love. I absolutely could never have made it through any of this without your love, support, and tireless, selfless service for our family. You're the best, and that drives me to be a better person everyday.

-DNS

Graduation Day!

Well I am so incredibly excited to finally be posting this, after 8 1/2 long years of incredibly hard work and no sleep, Dave has graduated with his MBA!!! Words can't even begin to describe how proud I am! I can't believe how much Dave has accomplished, despite all of the challenges of being an extremely young father. I feel like we did it. We beat the odds. We rose above the life we initially chose and made a better life. I am so grateful that the man I married has been so dedicated to me, to our children, to his career, and to his education. It has been hard, VERY HARD, and there were certainly times where I wasn't sure I could handle another bedtime alone. I don't know how he survived on no sleep all these years, working full time, and school full time, but he has maintained a great GPA (he'll probably be embarassed if I tell you what it is, so just know that it's great!), he has always recieved promotions and awards at work, and his kids and wife still adore him. Good job, hunny, I'm so proud of you! Thank you so much!

These are our friends, Christina and Ryan, whom we spent many fun game nights, dinners, and park outings with. They became our family in Ohio. We love them so much and are really going to miss them! I am glad that with our free flying, we can visit LA and Dallas easily :)


These are our friends Jim and Mallie. They are awesome. Mallie saved my sanity so many times! We had some great shopping trips and fun park days with the kids. I miss her already!!

So anyway, I am so extremely proud of my amazing husband, and I am very excited to enter this new chapter of our lives where he doesn't have papers to write or team projects to work on. I guess now it's finally my turn!

Happy Birthday to Jax!

We had a great celebration in honor of Jaxon's 6th birthday this year! Since it was our last weekend in Ohio, we decided to invite our favorite families to come to the pool with us. It was totally casual and relaxed (I was not about to throw a formal party 2 days before moving..). It was a really great time! This is a pic of Jax with his best buddy, Jeremy. Those two are going to miss each other a lot. I have a feeling that primary is going to be a lot quieter now that these 2 aren't together...!

Jax was incredibly lucky this year because he was able to have grandma and grandpa Smith and Adrie, Annie and Daniel there for his special day! He selected a skateboard cake this year, in case you can't tell (I know, not my best work, but it tasted AWESOME!) He got more presents than he'll ever know what to do with, and was especially thrilled about Lego Star Wars! He had a great day, I can't believe he's already 6. He's such a little stud-muffin! He has the girls lining up to marry him already. Luckily he'll be really rich because he's going to have about 6 professions: a builder, a teacher, a guy in the pit crew (only because mommy won't let him be a race car driver, and the pit crew is the next best thing...), a baseball player, and a doctor. But then he also tells me that he wants to be a girl so that he doesn't have to work, like me. I gently remind him that my job is quite hard and I don't get paid any money. Maybe he can just have a job where he works from his home. He likes that idea a lot! I love my Jaxon, he is such a character, always keeps us laughing. He is such a fun kid. I am pretty blessed to have him in my life!

Our little gymnast!!

I have been wanting to post these pics for a month now!! I had Araleigh in a little toddler's tumbling class and it was the cutest thing ever! She LOVED it! I think her 3 favorite things had to be the bar, the donut, and the "spiderman". She really loved dangling from the bar and putting her legs "together, apart". She thought that was pretty cool. Now anytime we go to a park with a bar, she points and looks at me with those huge blue eyes and says "toge-er apar?" The hardest part is getting her to let go, she'll hang on there forever!

The "donut" is this big cushy cylinder that the kids loved to climb in and out of. And in...and out...and in again...and out...what, it's circle time? Oh, well I'll just get back in...and back out...and maybe in again... well, you get the idea. The teacher had to remove it from the room on several occasions. I don't know what is so enticing about a big foam circle, but apparently it's "the place to be".

And finally, there's the "spiderman". Araleigh's teacher was helping her this time, but she can do it all by herself. And she does. All the time. She spontaneously feels the urge to be upside down, so she'll go to a wall, or the couch, or whatever happens to be closest to her, and she'll do "upside-down". It's pretty funny. She'll be very good at yoga someday.

So, anyway, that was our fun gymnastics experience! I'll probably do another class with her this fall, it was really fun! She would get soooo excited when we'd pull into the parking lot, and scream "class! yay! class!" I was sad when it ended!

A little catch-up...

I know, I know, it's been like MONTHS since my last post and I am sure you are all anxiously awaiting more updates and pictures. Well for now I'll start with soccer - I wanted to put up some better pictures on a sunny day (yes - we had one of those).

The boys finished up soccer on May 16th. They had such a fun time! Traeden was "goalie of the year"! They both improved a ton over the 8 week season, it was really fun to watch them progress. Araleigh loved cheering them on as well. I had to put this picture up, it is the only time in her entire life that she has actually left her sun glasses on for more than 3 seconds!

And, finally, I had to share this picture 'cause I think it's awesome! We had those Lo Mein noodles with our dinner the other night, and my clever boys used their artistic abilities to spell out their names. Take note these were crunchy noodles. I think my boys are pretty funny, they keep me laughing! I'll post more soon, I hope, I have a lot to update, but I am in the middle of moving!

The boys have been in soccer for a few weeks now and they are doing great! I have been really impressed with how much they have worked hard and improved!! They are really good sports, too (they don't get that from me, unfortunately...). Traeden has really enjoyed being goalie, and he's really good at it. He gets to play the other positions as well. Jax's division doesn't play positions yet, it's just a mass of kids following the ball around the field! It's fun watching them play, and even Araleigh loves cheering them on! Of course, it has rained EVERY game!!! It can be perfectly beautiful all week, but I guarantee it will rain on Saturday! Jaxon is really funny, he plays pretty well overall, but if there's mud on the ground, forget it! He does not want to get muddy! It's funny, he tries to be so careful and does this hilarious little prance around the field! We have explained to him over and over that it's okay to get muddy in soccer, it washes off! But he still doesn't want to. Who ever heard of a boy who hates to get muddy?! Crazy kid! But I have to say, My proudest moment as a mom came the other day, and not from how many goals my boys were scoring. The day started out nice and sunny, so we felt safe to leave the jackets at home...oops! Of course, 10 minutes into Traeden's game it started pouring on us! I was smart enough to keep the umbrella and a few fleece blankets in the car, so I ran over and gave Trae a blanket while he was waiting on the sidelines. My proudest moment was when Traeden looked over and saw that his friend was also freezing and soaking wet and jacket-less, so he went over and shared his blanket with him. I was glad to see that I have a little boy who notices others and is considerate and willing to share. I must not be doing too bad of a job, right? Of course, I don't take that much credit, he is just a really awesome kid by nature. But it made me smile. :) The forecast for this Saturday is NOT showing rain so far, so maybe I'll be able to get some better pictures...!

Our little house in the prairie, I mean land of Lincoln

I know that I have been terrible at blogging lately, I apologize! Life has been pretty busy these past few weeks! We somehow survived another winter quarter, and are very excited about this final spring quarter with a much lighter work load! Yay! I have a husband sometimes! :) Since our big move is only about 5 weeks away (!), we have been endlessly searching for a home, and we think we found a pretty great one! We only went through about 25 homes this time, so it feels like quite an accomplishment! (Last time we moved to Illinois, we went through 100+ houses and felt like we settled for a good house in a crappy school district.) We found an awesome little old cape cod home that is in an incredible area only about 15 miles north of the city! We are pretty darn excited about it! Here, I'll show you:

It needs some work (yay!) and it looks small, but it's actually a pretty good size and it has this awesome huge yard! It has plenty of room for any visitors, too (hint, hint)! And you know you all want to come visit Chicago! Can you tell how excited I am? I can't wait to move on and feel "settled", whatever that feels like! Do people really live in the same place longer than 2 years?? I don't know, if we do stay there too long, I may need to change the name of my blog, which I felt was pretty clever... any suggestions? The kids are really excited, they keep asking us why we have to wait until June!! I ask myself the same question... Anyway, now that we have this time-consuming adventure out of the way, I hope to do more frequent postings, so we'll see! Until then!!