Hope Floats

Nothing is more fun to a bunch of kids than balloons. My kids play with balloons until they are just little bits of rubber with a poof of air in them, and even then they would still fight over who gets to hold the balloon til every ounce of air was out of the once beautiful balloon. Easy entertainment. This mommy had an idea to get a few spring pictures of the kids -- nice ones with them maybe looking at the camera -- to capture how big and gorgeous they are right now. They are growing at such an enormous rate. Nate is always astonished when he sees the girls in new clothes or notices a new pair of shoes. But, HELLO, they have grown out of everything for the summer weather. He commented on Lil Miss's new sandals this morning. Doesn't a girl need one pair of sandals for the summer? Am I wrong? It just happens that we have 4 kids and only one of them is in hand me downs right now. When Lil Miss gets into 3Ts we are set because she will be able to wear all of Gigi's old clothes ...sadness that my "first" baby is all grown up now :-(. But for this summer three of the kids needed pretty much a whole new wardrobe. Rosie has grown 3 whole sizes in the past year. She shot up from wearing a 6x dress at last Easter to a 12 this year!!! YIKES!! So newsflash Nate, a girl needs a pair of sandals for the summer and to clarify Rosie has one pair of flip flops and one dressy pair of sandals to wear for church. A girl just can't slap on a pair of tennis shoes everyday with a dress and call it good. I am not sure we are going to get Bubba out of his Chuck Taylors though for the summer. He is attached to those things and refuses to wear anything else. So this momma when contemplating what to do on our Saturday afternoon decides we are going to have a photo shoot. Nate has been working some crazy hours so he was gone Saturday working, so we NEEDED to get out of the house. With all 4 kids, an afternoon outside at a park sounded like a great idea. So we loaded up the van and headed off...We stopped by Hy-Vee and picked up some balloons for props and for pleasure. The kids were running around and chasing each other and it made this mommy's heart swell to see them playing so nice. I didn't get to take all the photos that I had intended but it was more about getting out and enjoying the weather. Our photo shoot was cut short when one little boy asks "where's the restroom?". Oops. So we quickly packed up and moved out before we had an accident. Lil Miss is at the stage where she does the opposite of what you ask. "Come Here" is out of the question she runs the other way!! When I say "smile" she acts like she didn't even hear me. So pictures of her looking at the balloons it is!

There was this one awesome tree that was the PERFECT climbing tree! As soon as Bubba spotted it he was up in the uppermost branches. The girls followed suit. Lil Miss even got in the action as she straddled a branch that was perpendicular with the ground. The park we went to was spectacular and I need to go back with less of an agenda so I can look at more of the floral gardens they had. The lilacs were all in bloom and smelled heavenly. One of my favorite flowers!!!! I know I say that for almost every flower... but Lilacs are really one of my top 5 favorite flowers.

I think I love balloons as much as my kids. They automatically put a smile on my face. The only thing I don't like is when they go "POP"!This girl is growing up soooo much and soooo quickly. I just want to capture at this moment of innocence and youth. You got to love that toothless smile!!!

The end of our impromptu photo shoot ended up meeting Daddy at Red Robin for some burgers and drinks. It was the perfect ending to a perfect day!! So this is what I think Hope is.... for a day that seemed to drag on and never end all we needed was a balloon to put a smile on our face and give us hope that something fun and wonderful is just around the corner. And it was!!