It's Been Awhile...

Good Afternoon!

The month of May has flown by here at the Carlson house. We have been busy with end of the school year activities, work, karate, and life in general. It has been great, but we are so glad it's SUMMER!

May got off to an exciting start for our family as we shared Caden's Cubs with the children at our church, North Star. The children collect an offering each month for a ministry of some kind, and they asked us if they could collect for Caden's Cubs for the months of May and June. We were honored and humbled to be asked, and of course, said "yes!". We were recently blessed to have a logo created for Caden's Cubs through a woman that works with Alexandra's House (see below), so it was fun to debut that in addition to sharing our mission with the youth of the church. Connor and Kylee shared Sparkles and Carl, and we set up the children's altar using some of our Build-A-Bear creations. So far, the children have already collected enough money for one bear. It is so exciting!

A little bit about the logo. You will see a bear (our symbol for Caden) sitting on an alphabet block. It was important to us that we incorporated all of our children into the logo, so you see the first letter for all of their names on the block. "C" for Connor, "K" for Kylee, and "H" for our newest addition, whom we've decided to name Hadley. Hadley Louise (my middle name). It is wonderful for us to have a symbol for our ministry that includes all four of our little ones.

Speaking of Miss Hadley, she is right on target with her growth, and they are now saying I am due around July 28th. We will most likely schedule an induction about a week before that, so we will be meeting our baby girl in just over 2 months. We are beginning to wash up clothes, and I almost cry each and every time I smell the sweet aroma of the baby detergent. I bought our first pack of diapers a couple weeks ago and almost had a meltdown of joy right there in Target. It's the little things that make me realize how truly blessed we are and we continue to pray, daily, for Hadley's health and continued development.

Now, back to activities of the children outside my womb....

We had our annual family night at Worlds of Fun courtesy of Brandon's company, DST. It was interesting this year because Connor is certainly outgrowing Camp Snoopy as you can tell by his sheer enthusiasm for the train in the picture below. He did, however, venture out and try bumper cars and some other rides that were considerably more fun for him.

The month of May also held a walk to the park for Kylee's preschool class:

Connor's class took a trip to Kaleidoscope at Crown Center here in Kansas City. Brandon had his name drawn out of the hat and was chosen to go along as a sponsor on the trip. Here's Connor playing:

Kylee and I were able to join Brandon and Connor's class for a picnic lunch at Penguin Park after the morning's festivities. It was a fun day!

In the middle of the month, Brandon travelled to Springfield, Illinois for a weekend to test for his black belt in karate. He was successful in achieving his goal, so he is now a certifiable member of an elite club that I know little about, but do have a great deal of respect for all the same. He trained for months to go and demonstrate his abilities, and it's impressive to watch him do his thing. The kids and I stayed at home as there wasn't much for non-karate folks to do on this particular trip, and we were excited to greet him when he returned home as an official first-degree black belt. Connor also tested here at his school and was successful in obtaining his yellow belt, so we've had all sorts of good things to celebrate on that front.

Speaking of accomplishments, Connor decided last weekend that he wanted to learn to ride his bike without training wheels. I think he got tired of our neighbor girls whizzing around him on their bikes when they all ride together. So, he and Daddy made a trip down to a nearby empty parking lot to give it a try (a cul-de-sac is tricky to navigate when one is just starting out!), and Connor took to riding sans training wheels immediately. He felt so proud and is now easily lapping all of us on evening walks as he rides and we make a (very sorry) attempt to keep up.

Caden's garden is in full bloom, so I am hopeful that I can get out there and take some pictures to share with you all. It is so wonderful to look out the kitchen window and see it each and every day.

We hope you all are enjoying your Memorial Day weekend. Stay tuned for more pictures...come back soon!