Jeff's company has an egg hunt every year for the kids. They had the Bunny and real live bunnies.

Sean wasn't too thrilled with the Easter Bunny and kept his eye on him to make sure he stayed at a safe distance.

Callie was too old to participate so she helped Sierra.

Hi all. It's been a while since I've posted. Time flies even when you're not having fun.
I had hernia repair surgery on the 3rd and spent one night in the hospital. It was much more painful than I had psyched myself up for, but I am over the worst of it now. I am feeling better everyday. We've been blessed by cards, food, thoughts and prayers.
I am trying to get plenty of rest so that I do not have a relapse of the mono that I've had which I found out about shortly before surgery. My doctor thinks I may have had that since November but had a relapse from not getting enough rest. My mom is staying here when Jeff is working because I cannot lift over 5 lbs for a while. A gallon of milk weighs 8 lbs. I can drive though, thank goodness.

The kids are doing well except for what appears to be spring allergies. They are doing okay with mamaw "ma" being here. Sean understands that mommy's tummy hurts from where the doctor fixed it, but Sierra doesn't quite understand why I do not pick her up.

Callie is still having practices for the ice show. They will be performing the weekend of Apr. 21-23. They will do the show 4 times so it will be a busy weekend. Jeff will be busy working that week and that Saturday for inventory. She is looking forward to seeing her outfit. The outfits are all handmade by a woman who does them every year. There are over 140 skaters performing this year, from toddlers to adults with varying skill levels. This is Callie's 3rd year to be in the show but she took last year off from skating.

Sean and Sierra were playing in a laundry basket earlier. Here is a pic of them.

Sierra still has some trouble finding her mouth, but it doesn't hurt her appetite at all!

Spring Break Pictures.
Callie and Sean enjoyed some play time in the snow today before it melts. Sierra was coming down with a cold now so she didn't get to go out.

Spring? Spring arrives today but we are expecting what they are saying might be the worst snow of the season tomorrow. Keep in mind, this would be like our only 2nd real snow since winter began. Callie is on spring break and enjoyed some time outside with the neighbor kids yesterday. Imagine the look on her face when I told her it is supposed to snow. She has a couple of friends who went south to Florida for the week. I said that at least maybe she'll get to wear her snowboots one more time. :) Sean has only worn his once this year. Unfortunately, he is coming down with a nasty cold... sneezing and hacking cough all over the place. He and I have been up since 6:15am today. Callie and Sierra are sleeping in.

I am still sleep deprived following a 2-day trip to Illinois for a Hearts-At-Home Conference with some ladies from church. It was a great conference and I feel closer to God and much more equipped to be a better mom and wife. Over 6,400 women attended the conference at Illinois State University. I am looking forward to going back next year if I can.

Early signs of spring near our front door. I love to see crocuses when they first bloom. The threat of snow later this week will probably chase them away. We are thankful that the several inches of rain we have received in the past 6 days was not snow! Our backyard and front yard look like a swamp right now. Spring is near.

I don't have very many digital ones of Heather and her family and I couldn't even find one of Eric. Most of the ones I have of them are 35 mm. Usually things are a bit wild when we're all together, so the camera doesn't come out often. The kids go at about 100 miles/hour. These first two were after a long evening so the kids were pretty worn out.

Keagan is on the left. Clayton is on the right.

Heather sees a resemblance between Sierra and Clayton. I have thought so also for some time but thought I was the only one. There are some Schneider/Christopher genes in them after all.

Here is Papaw with Keagan and Clayton.

Keagan and Sean enjoy playing together. Sean thinks Keagan is the greatest.

Sierra took a brief time out to show me her "cut" (cup). She kept a mouthful of milk as she said "cut". One difference between Sierra and Sean is that Sean likes to lie down and drink his milk. Sierra likes to drink hers on the run. Another difference is that Sierra is a very good eater. She eats 3 or 4 times more than Sean does on an average.











At the right, Sierra is studying a "Baa-baa" (baby) on the side of a pampers box. She loves babies and thinks all children within 1 ft of her height are babies. She went right up to a little girl at the library who was about 3 yrs old and gave her a hug. She's not quite as friendly with adults but she does have a strong attachment to her big sister Heather.

Sean's favorite joke this week (he even understands it) -> "What is a baby's favorite constellation? The big diaper!"

A face that only a mother could love? If you couldn't guess, this is Sean's "mad look". He shared it with me as I told him what was going to happen if he did not finish eating his food so he could get more apple. I then asked him if I could take a picture of him looking like that. He agreed and then I showed it to him and asked him if that looked pretty. He said no and then he finished eating his food without complaining. Too funny.

Sierra is going through a phase right now with books. All she wants to do is look at books, carry them around, pile them on your lap and have you read them to her. Her attention span on most of them is about 10 seconds, but she will sit through some of them all the way to the end. She will even read them to herself in the van.

She recently captured Callie's attention for some snuggle and reading time. Books happen to be high on Callie's priority list as well. When she is not reading books from the school library, she is begging us to take her to the public library. She's afraid that she will run out of something to read. I suggested spending some of that energy on her math but all I got was a funny face. :)

Sierra said her first two word phrase tonight... it was clear as day. She was pointing at the refrigerator and grunting so I asked her what she wanted... she replied "string cheese". I said, "You want string cheese?" and she replied in her high pitched voice "Uh huh" with a big nod. Sure enough, she ate the whole thing. Sierra is a better eater than Callie and Sean combined. She will even eat celery.

Another catch up post. Sean got some "My First Craftsman" tools for Christmas from Maw and Paw and now thinks he can build or fix anything. He got a new train table set for Christmas and he helped his daddy put it together with his tools. Here's a pic of that.

His latest thing is to jump off of anything he can climb onto. Notice the hair during his freefall. :)








Sean got a new haircut this past week. We bribed him with two suckers if he would sit still and not cry. He showed a lot of maturity with this haircut. The last couple of haircuts were real adventures because he was afraid. This one actually turned out well because he was so good for it.




Sean was having a serious conversation about tigers and bears with his daddy the other day. I couldn't resist taking some shots of the expressions on his face as he talked.

I'm falling behind in blogging so I am going to try to catch up with a few posts. Here are some pictures from Callie's belated birthday sleepover party. The girls had a good time. Callie had an ice cream cake. Keagan spent the night as well and slept on Sean's top bunk. The girls surprised us by pestering the boys and playing hide and seek with them.

Sean loves climbing into Sierra's crib when she wakes up in the morning and spending some time bonding and playing before I get her out. This morning, he had a lincoln log with him and I heard him hitting the bed with it. I took it away and told him it looked like he had hurt the bed - there was a dent in the area where he was hitting it. I went downstairs to get something and when I came back up... Sean ran up to me and told me he put a bandaid on the bed. Not believing him, I quickly went in Sierra's room... and sure enough, there was the bandaid. He had gotten a bandaid from the bathroom and put it right on the boo-boo. Of course, I had to keep a straight face and lightly scold him as I went to retrieve the digital camera. I hope this makes you smile. Have a great weekend!

Sierra already likes dressing up. She tried on Jeff's shirt and walked around for a while with it on before beginning to complain about it being too long and heavy.















We had a busy weekend with birthday parties and an anniversary party. The kids were completely worn out from running around all day.

Sean is coming down with a cold this morning. He keeps screaming "KLEENEX". He requested Toy Story in the VCR even though he has boycotted it recently because the "toys come to life" and they "look like scary spiders". I told him to let me know when it gets to the scary part and I can forward through it. I think that will be the scene in Sid's room.

Callie is a good big sister (most of the time). She and Sean do fight a lot but I think it's partly because they both have strong-willed personalities. Here's a pic of the two of them snuggling on the couch watching tv. Callie got 3 shots yesterday in the arm. She was not a happy camper. She had agreed to take the flu shot but when we arrived at the health dept. (kids vaccines are free there) they said she was due for tetanus (ouch) and they also recommended the meningitis vaccine at her age. She was a real trooper but her arms are very sore today.

Sean is sporting his new outfit here with his bad hair day (hadn't combed it yet). Maw got him this outfit for Christmas. He was proud of the suspenders.

For those that might have wondered.. yes, we were saddened and disappointed by the premature ending of the Colt's super season. It just wasn't meant to be. Maybe next year!

And for those of our family and friends who live away from us, here's a new tidbit that might interest you. For the first time ever, we will begin observing daylight savings time in April. Yes, we will be joining almost the rest of the nation that move their clocks around twice a year. It was finally decided this week that we will observe Eastern Time (the same as New York). This will be a major adjustment for us come April so keep us in your prayers! I can't say we are either happy or unhappy about it. I think it might be challenging to get the kids to think about bedtime in the summer when the sun is still up until almost 9:00pm. Time will tell. Overall, I think we'll like having later daylight in the summer. I guess it's just a good thing we don't play golf or do exercise in the mornings.

Hello everyone. We are doing well at the moment. Callie was sick earlier this week but has rebounded quickly.

Jeff has been working long days. So much for thinking he'd get home earlier with his new job. :)The only difference is that he goes in much earlier. I've been working around the house, so nothing too exciting to report. Sean and I started back to Bible Study Fellowship this week. We go on Wednesdays. Next year, Sierra will also be able to go with us when it starts in September.

Callie had a very good report card for the last nine weeks. We are very proud of that. This week she's been studying hard to learn all 50 states and their capitals and I think she has mastered them. The test was today and she said it was easy!

Sean has been enjoying watching Polar Express. A lot of his pretend play now involves the train. We were at the grocery store the other day and he shouts "Get us the blazes out of here!!" - a familiar quote from the movie.

Sierra is talking more and more all the time. She has quite the sense of humor also. The only thing is that she is so shy, very few people get to see this side of her. Here are some recent pictures of her.

Happy New Year to everyone!
We got a lot of rain recently and were able to capture God's promise by camera. Looking out our front door, we could see the beauty of a rainbow.
Sean said "It is a sign", showing that he remembered his Noah lesson from Genesis at Bible Study Fellowship.

Merry Christmas from all of us!

Callie recently celebrated her 11th birthday. Her favorite gift was the 5th grade clue finders software. It's a sneaky way for mom and dad to get her to work on her math! :-)

I'm also including a pic with little brother Sean... he's looking at her so lovingly, you would never know how much they fight.

Friday night.. hanging out and staying warm while Jeff is stuck late at work. Inventory is tomorrow so maybe after that we can see him after he catches up on his sleep. Here are some pics of the kids I took tonight as they've enjoyed each other's company. We got between 6 and 7 inches of snow yesterday and last night. Sherry had fun shoveling today.. not really, but it was good exercise. :-)
Have a great weekend!

We had a nice day trip for Thanksgiving this week. It was great to see most of our family. We've been busy working around here the rest of the weekend.
Sierra had a fall today and connected her forehead with the bottom of the tv. It turns our stomachs to look at the bruise. It was definitely the worst goose-egg I have ever seen... being over 2 inches wide. Here's a pic I took while she was eating. I think we are lucky we didn't have a huge gash requiring stitches. You can see the line on her forehead from the edge of the tv.

Here are a couple of pics from Thanksgiving evening.

Sean couldn't wait to go to Granny's this week. We had to run some errands on Wednesday and he thought we should just go on to Granny's afterward. I had to explain that we couldn't leave Callie and Daddy. :-)

At the right, Sean is enjoying Charlie Brown's Thanksgiving with great-aunt Karen.

Here are a couple of close-ups. Thought I'd show one without the huge bruise on Sierra's head.

Hello. It's been a busy couple of weeks. Jeff just got a promotion at his job. He is looking forward to the transition. We are looking forward to earlier hours even though it means getting up earlier. It will be nice to see him come home before dark. We have not even discussed whether we will be traveling for Thanksgiving. I think we are in denial that it is only 8 days away.

Please keep me and my strep throat in your prayers. It came back this week so I am on antibiotics again. The doctor said that sometimes it can go into a carrier state. I think it was hanging out in one of my yucky tonsils.

Have a good week!

Fall photo shoot.... we enjoyed some very nice weather on Saturday and I took some pics of the kids. We were a little behind on 1-year pics for Sierra and 3-year pics for Sean and we skipped school pics for Callie this year since they are overpriced and you have to buy before you see them. I think hers turned out great.

Sean wasn't too thrilled about sitting still for his - can you tell? He used to be such a ham for the camera but now I have to shoot him on the run to get anything. If we try to get him to pose, he looks everywhere but at the camera.

Sierra loves being outside and just loves the slide as you can see. Enjoy!

Sean loves to play outside. Here are some of my favorite pics I took the other day.

Above right, Sean is carefully examining a lady bug.