Flashbacks and Moving Forward...

So, I was downloading some new pics and realized I had a skipped a chunk of time and because I don't want us to forget these small moments I have added them in. The next several shots fall somewhere between late March and mid April of this year. I call this section...Flashbacks :)

Drew being all manly in his bright, pink Cozy Coupe. The life of being number 3.

 Luke and Ben are outside every night playing some kind of sport. Lately, Ellie has joined in! Some favorites are bball, soccer, baseball, football, and hockey.

 Before Drew started walking on his own Luke and Elle would make a Drew sandwich and play choo-choo train around the house. Drew thought he was pretty cool.

 With Luke at school and Drew still loving his morning naps, Ellie and I have our girl time.

 She loves to paint, draw, color....She will spend an hour at the table creating and being her artistic self. Her fine motor skills are so in tuned that in all of her coloring pages she stays in the lines and of course they are filled in with all different colors of the rainbow!

 This girls hates, absolutely hates to admit that she needs a nap. Most days we skip nap all together because it makes night time at 7:30 so much easier. Every now and then though her body needs it and she will just crash.

 Big News! The Morin nursery has officially been dismantled!! Ellie has her new, big girl room in the green room and the boys are now all settled in their own room. Both rooms are done and we love it! We were going to wait until Drew was ready for a big boy bed but this girl was ready for her own space. It feels so natural for our home to be this way. We love it. And I love saying, " It's in the boys' room." 

 So sweet. 

AND a mommy bragging moment...That is a french braid in her hair! I can finally do it after lots of practice... I was never very good at the whole hair thing.

School fair at McGregor Elementary! We had so much fun walking around with the Farrand family to each event. Ben and Luke volunteered at the Slap Shot room for an hour shift. Afterwards, we picked up pizza and ate at the counter, right out of the pizza boxes, while looking through each of their prize bags.

 Luke has been working so hard at his nightly reading. We are so proud of him! 

And this brings us back to date...Memorial Day weekend!

Our baby is SIX!!!

Luke is  6 years old!!! He has outgrown the pages of his baby book. He will be going into a new school year not as a "new" student but as a confident second year scholar. His favorite specials are PE and Media. He is a reader and practices his nightly reading with his bag of books. He hand wrote all of his birthday invites and thank you's this year! His favorite books is this Dino picture book series...Dino-Baseball, Dino-Basketball, Dino-Soccer, you get the picture. He loves anything that is wrapped around competition. He loves to win and we are working on how to appropriately "lose" a game. He loves all Detroit/MSU/UvM teams and sports. He checks the scores and stats each morning on the ESPN app. He loves to play sports and is never nervous about trying a new sport or game. Right now his favorite sport is baseball and he loves to play Monopoly Jr. and Sorry. He loves to play with his sister. She calls him her Prince Charming and they still think are getting married one day. He is done sharing his room with Ellie and he is now roomies with his brother. He still kisses me on the lips and loves to cuddle on my lap. He is a kiddo who still needs his sleep and loves the mornings over the evenings. He is my morning guy. His favorite way to fall asleep is having me scratch his back and he always requests me to sing Amazing Grace. He thrives when given a purpose and ticks in this way as his Dad. His best buddies are Ayrton, Jackson, and Vaida but still says that Ellie is his best friend. Happy birthday, sweet Luke!! We love you!

We had a mini family party the night before his birthday... Our party of 5.

Dino-Baseball from Papa and Gma!! Look at that smile :)

All 3 celebrating together!

AND Dino-Swimming!

Lukey thanking Drew for the Lego set he got him.

Our big guy!

Waking up on his birthday morning...Jacque pancakes before school! 

Off to school for the first time as a 6 year-old!

Luke got lucky that his birthday happened to fall on a Friday and it was a 1/2 day of school that day. So we were able to have his birthday party that night starting at 4:45 at our local bowling alley! Luke and Elle have gone bowling a few times with Ben, when Ben has filled in for someone on Auntie Megs and Uncle Chad's bowling team. Luke has been telling us all year that this was where he wanted his birthday.

This was the first year we celebrated with just Luke's friends and not our own friends and/or family...Little man is growing up and doing his thing.

Birthday crew from left to right...Mayer, Elle, Zaydee, Jackson, Mikey, Luke and Drew, Ayrton, Jason, Andie, Charlotte, and Vaida!

Everyone was actually really into bowling! They bowled for about 45 minutes straight, stopped for some pizza, and then finished up their 15 minutes of lane time.

These two...Can you even handle it? At 3, these cuties are inseparable.  

Luke, always a number guy, checking out his stats.

Our 3 bowlers...They are pretty cute. We just had to be careful of Drew not getting his fingers smushed between the bowling balls. 

Luke wanted a Detroit Tiger's party this year!

Wow, Luke. You turn 6 and now you have a pose?!

After the party, Luke was able to invite Ayrton to come stay the night. They came home and all 3 of them, including Ben, didn't even step inside. They were off playing baseball and basketball.

Next up, opening all of the new toys, shooting Nerf guns all around the house, popcorn and TMNT shows, and finally asleep at 10:30ish. They were up at 6 am and outside by