It’s here people….. ice cream time is here!! To be very honest, the ice cream place by our house is open all year (yay!), but we generally don’t walk up there until all the snow is melted. Takes a while in Ohio….

Yesterday, was the first trip. ALL 4 kids came with me, none able to withstand the lure of blue cosmo, cookies n cream, or that peanut butter banana smoothie. I love…. LOVE when I can get the 4 of them to go somewhere with me. Especially because now, the clock is ticking. The oldest is counting down the days until she flies the coop for college, having them all together after that is going to be a lot less frequent.

So in honor of our togetherness, I forced encouraged them to smile at the camera as I tried to snap some candid moments around the ice cream table.

They are THRILLED

Most of the time, these are not amazing pictures. It is impossible to get them all to look at me, or smile, at the same time…or at all sometimes. But I keep them, because I am that emotional mom who likes to think back and start crying sometimes when I reflect on how much each child has grown/changed over the years….. I think they like it when I cry….

I am also that embarrassing mom who likes to save these pictures, and them bring them out and show everyone how much they’ve grown or changed since last year, or years ago.

For example, I just so happened to remember that just last year…. we were sitting around a table at this very same ice cream place, and I also made them asked them to smile nicely for the camera…

last year

Isn’t that so cute!!!  Can you believe Jenna FINALLY has hair? Can you believe how long her tongue was/is??

People, I live for this stuff. It’s what I do.

Christmas then…..

Christmas now!

See what I did there??

I know one day, I’m going to miss having all these kids under my roof. (I keep telling myself this….) So I do my best to keep a record of the times they actually LOOK like they are getting along, as they grow up, and before they grow away.

sniffle.