Evelyn Laughing

I guess the room was darker than I thought -- so it's not very easy to see. But you can hear her laugh and it's so great! She also has the hiccups, so it's not the sound going out in your computer!

Merry Christmas!

Just getting this started -- our Christmas letter will be posted here soon.

A Princess

If you ask Amelia, "Who are you?" She'll say, "I'm a princess." Ask her, "Who is Evelyn?" She'll respond, "She's a crabby." Ellie is a princess, Jack is a boy, and sometimes I'm a princess too . She's very much into the Disney Princesses right now. She'll play dress up quite a bit, and she's asking for princess music to be played too. The video is a night that Billy put some princess music on for her to dance.


Also, the other night she saw that I was putting my coat on and she asked me where I was going and before I could answer, she said, "Are you going crazy?" Sometimes when the kids ask where I'm going, or what I'm doing, I'll say I'm going crazy. It was funny to hear her say it.

Birthday Party

Billy and I gave Ellie a bean bag for her birthday. The box was so big that I wasn't going to wrap it - and it won't go thru a door frame. So I thought the best way to give it to her was with a scavenger hunt. Here is the last clue (of 4) and her finding it. It was a hit! The girls all loved being able to do the hunt thru the house.

The party was a big success. Supper, presents, scavenger hunt, cake, spa treatments, decorating dipped pretzels, and movie. She invited her two besties, Cousin Lilah and Neighbor Ali to sleep over. Old neighbor Lauren came over to help with the spa treatments. I think this was much more manageable than an afternoon with a bigger group of 7-yr olds!

Evelyn 9 months

Evelyn making a zerbert on the ottoman. I could not stop laughing!



Evelyn started clapping yesterday. Here is some video feed of her just being so silly today. Clapping, shaking her head, and I'm not sure where the "raise the roof" came from. Probably Kindermusik!

Ellie Turns 7

Can you believe it - my firstborn is turning 7?! Gabrielle "Ellie" Nicole has grown into quite the little smarty pants. And I mean that in both the nice way, and the not so nice way! First grade is going very well for her so far this year. She's excelling in all of her work; earning an O "Outstanding" in Spelling and S+ "Satisfactory" in Social Studies, Science, and Math. She's also made huge improvements over last year in her behavior and following rules. Overall, her teacher's conference was very positive! We are very proud of her.

At home, on the other hand, Ellie's behavior is like the Iowa weather. It changes very drastically from day to day. She has her "helper" days - where she loves to help me pick up (rearranging closets & organizing drawers), plays with her little sisters, and overall listens very well. Then she has her "attitude" days - where everything has a comeback ("i know!" "i told you so!" "ah - yeah"). Last, and my least favorite, her "wild" days - where she increases the energy level of all the kids in the house to crazy. She doesn't listen, she wrestles, she runs, she's nuts! And this gets the others going too and it's just mass chaos here.

I've known since this child could crawl that she would have a spirit that would want to fly -- and I've tried my hardest to not squelch it. But giving it direction can be very challenging some days! She's an awesome kid with a thoughtful heart, and I pray that God continues to help me lead all her enthusiasm and energy in the right direction!

Happy Birthday, Ellie! Mommy loves you, your beautiful blue eyes, and your toothless smile.

Fall Family Pictures

We weren't successful getting one of all 6 of us -- but individually, they all look great!

Amelia continues to be funny

Parent journal, so I don't forget the sweet, funny stuff!

The other day Amelia was naming some body parts on her head. She went thru the whole list; nose, ears, hair, etc. When she finished, I pointed to my eyebrows and asked her what they were. She thought for a moment ... smiled ... thought some more. Then finally she grinned and said, "Rainbows!" What a thoughtful, observant response!

Amelia was pretty sick last week with a high fever. She didn't have many symptoms except for the fever for three days. She didn't eat much and was pretty down and out. We didn't push her to eat or anything telling her it was okay because she was sick. Now that she's all better when we try to get her to finish her food or do something she doesn't want to she says, "I'm sick."

We also got rid of her pacifier this week. We were down to just naps and nights, but with her being sick, she had it most of the day for 2 days last week. By the weekend, I was fed up! She would wake up in the night crying, "Popeye, I can't find my popeye!" We were getting up 3-4 times a night to help her find that stinkin' thing! So Sunday, we threw it away!

I told her, "I threw it in the garbage, and it's gone. You're a big girl now, with big girl panties and you don't need a pacifier anymore. Evelyn is the baby, with diapers and pacifiers and bottles. You are the big girl, right?!" She agreed, but has asked for it each time she lays down, but has NOT gotten up in the night crying for it. Awesome!

Comparison

Evelyn - Sept 2009 - 7 months

Ellie - June 2003 - 7 months

I'm SO excited - I found a disc with all the old pictures I thought I lost. Doesn't that just make your day! I thought I was missing the first two years of Ellie's life! I really wanted to look at some pictures from when she was the same age as Evelyn. I think they share some features -- what do you think?

He's going to kill me for posting this!

My husband can totally take you!

A couple of potty mouths

So ... I feel pretty confident that this bad language wasn't from listening to me or Billy. We are very diligent about not swearing in front of the kids. We only get in trouble for saying "stupid" sometimes. I suppose between school, friends and tv - they are bound to pick up some naughty words. Part of life, I guess.

A couple of funny stories -- that Billy witnessed - but I missed firsthand. He said it was hard to control his laughter on the first one. The kids were both corrected and told that these were not nice words and to not use them again. We'll see ...

Billy took all the kids down to Sportsman's Warehouse last Friday while I was at work. He needed to get a few supplies before taking Jack out in the boat the next day. Somewhere inside, at some point - they passed a large, mounted fish. Jack shouts out, "Holy shit, Daddy, that's a big fish!"

Then, two days later on Sunday morning, as they were getting out of the van for church, Ellie told Jack to leave his jacket in the van because otherwise he'd forget it inside. Billy said, "Well, you have your jacket on. Why don't you leave yours in the car too?" She replied, "No, I'm wearing mine because it's freezing damn cold out here!"

Oh my --

Remember this?

This is what our view looked like when we moved in!

Now we are getting to see bulldozers, dirt movers, and excavators!

This is a full shot today of one dirt hill. Such a wonderful sound that occupies my ears all day long! Actually, it is fun to see the work done, and it will be neat to watch how it all changes over the next two years. The new high school is due to open Fall of 2011.

And another one's gone ...

Top tooth #2 fell out during school yesterday. And uh-oh - the tooth fairy didn't come last night! Ellie said she tried to wait up to see if it would come and then she fell asleep. But she still didn't come. I told her that that was why. Because 1. she tried to stay up to see her, and 2. she didn't have the tooth in a container for the tooth fairy to put any money in.

Always, always have a back up plan!

Later note: the Tooth Fairy did make it. She paid extra and left a nice note.

Evelyn biffed it

Evelyn is getting very close to crawling! She's going from the sitting position to moving forward to being on all fours. It won't be long. Yipes! I've got to baby proof the new house - which includes the new stairwell.

The other day I had her sitting by the front door - so she could play with her toys and look outside. She decided she wanted to get closer to the door, and fell on her face on the threshold. This was the mark it left. Oops! A couple days later it's all gone - no harm done.

Potty Training

One of the worst jobs of a parent is potty training. It's time consuming and whether you are working with a kid that wants to do it or not, it's messy! Amelia has been doing extremely well, I really shouldn't complain. Well, and I'm not really complaining. She probably would have been done if I would have started working with her 6 months ago, but with a newborn, that was nearly impossible!

Funny story today - she was supposed to be napping in my bed, but I heard her foot stool being pushed around upstairs. I went up to find her getting a washrag. I asked if she peed in my bed, and she said no. And I turned around and she had peed on the floor (the wood floor, thank goodness). I missed the puddle when I walked by by like inches! And she also had a turd in her panties (a hard one and easy to dump and flush, thank goodness). I'm SO grateful that this was not done in my bed! And I'm just giggling because this is not the first time she's peed on the floor and taken it upon herself to clean it up. What 2-yr old cleans up their own mess?!

I can't wait until this task is done. But only a few months rest before the next one starts.

Little Sisters

Amelia lovin' on Evelyn

Evelyn's Bathtime

Evelyn loves bath time!

Trying out sports

Am I old enough to have a kid this big?

Ballard Varsity Squad - here I come!

Ellie & Ali - BFF

Ellie is continuing to try out some sports this year. The only way I could get her to do either was to make sure that our neighbor, Ali - who is her best friend right now - was doing them too. They both did the Ballard Cheer Camp the first week of school and they are on the same U8 soccer team too (which I maybe played a small role in setting up). Too bad I don't know a lick about soccer!

It's working out great so that Ali's mom, Sara and I can help each other out with the girls and carpooling. Cool neighbors rock!

Learning to build

Jack has now reached the age of Legos! I remember my brother being so big into Legos and building stuff all the time. I bought Jack a set of small K'nex on clearance last week to see if he liked them. He's had some bigger building stuff and had always done well, but I was really happy to see how well he did with this smaller set and making his own stuff. I'm the type that always just makes what that pictures show -- he was much more creative. Thank goodness!

And another one bites the dust

Ellie has now lost tooth number 3 -- it's her first top tooth. Our neighbor actually pulled the nasty thing out for her after soccer practice. It was just hanging by a thread. Thanks, Sara! I'm not sure if I could have done it. Ironically, Evelyn seems to be getting the teeth in as Ellie is losing them. I need to have a talk with the Tooth Fairy about this.

A Little Southern

Amelia spent a week in Oklahoma a little over a month ago. We didn't see many significant changes, except this!

I love you

We have a little thing we do here at our house with the kids ... we say,

"Guess what?"
They respond, "What?"
"I love you."

And they've started catching on. So sometimes now, when we say, "Guess what?" they just respond, "I love you." We don't get the "What?" in there much anymore. It melts your heart, and it's fun to see Amelia catching on already too. Oh, and she's our little comedian - here's a glimpse at her funny faces and being silly. This is ALL her too -- she's not mimicking me.

Amelia loves Pork Butt

Do you think we like to barbecue 'round here?

Little girl in a big body

Little Miss Evelyn is not so little! At her 6-month appointment earlier this month she ranked in the 65 percentile in both height and weight. This is a first for this mom. Most of my pip-squeaks are in the 10-15% at this age. I had to break out the 9-month sleepers for her. She also got her first two bottom teeth a few days ago. She's not crawling yet, but she can get around. She rolls, pivots, and creeps to get to where she's wants to go.

She started going to a sitter 4 mornings a week for a few hours. She's loving the attention at my friend, Malissa's, and is thriving on the routine. I am loving 12 hrs a week with no kids!! I'm hoping to devote all of this time to my office, but I'm still playing catch up on everything around here from a busy, busy summer!

Big girl in a little body

Amelia is such a little peanut - which we've known for quite awhile. But I'm reminded now as we start to get fall/winter clothes out. Let's see - she turned 2 back in May, so you'd think she'd fit into 24mos/2T clothes this fall. So far, that's not working out. Most pants are just falling right off of her, and are about 2 inches too long. But I'd like a break from last winters clothes, since it's quite possible Evelyn will be wearing them the first of the year. We are predicting that she will pass Amelia in clothing size.

On the bright side, she has been working on potty training the past month and is very successful at this point. She's wearing big girl panties now everyday (which doesn't help the pants issue, since a diaper could help hold the pants up!) and doesn't have too many accidents. I love what this is doing to my diaper budget!

A couple of funny Amelia sayings: "Sleeping Judy" - Sleeping Beauty
"Jingle Bells" - Tinker Bell

First Day of 1st Grade

1st Grade, Aug 20, 2009

New shoes and a new outfit! Kind of chilly this morning, needed a light jacket.

Air guitar!!!!!

New haircut

Back of the new hairdo!

Ellie started 1st grade today. She has Mrs. Raineri (rhymes with canary) and is very excited to start back! Nicole came over yesterday to give her a new haircut. It turned out very cute! I think this will work well for the school year ... hopefully not look all nasty by the end of the day. We can still put it up, but it won't be a necessary part of the morning routine.

I hope she feels okay today - she was up twice last night complaining of a sore throat and an ear ache. And yesterday she had hives. I guess we are starting the school off in the right direction with some virus germs! But she was up and dressed before my alarm even went off - so to keep her home would have been devastating!

While you were out

Here is the mural that was painted on Ellie's entire southside wall. It was painted by a friend of ours from church, Candice Smock. It's beautiful and the colors are so vibrant! It matches the comforter set I found online with the Paris cityscape.

Rest of the mural - I can't get it all in one frame.

Dresser before - stained and messy

Dresser after

Room before - plain walls, no curtains

Room after - still needs to finish painting.

This week Ellie is staying at Grandpa Dennis & Jane's. So I've planned to get her room all done for her while she's away. I started today by getting one wall painted - and a friend is coming to paint a mural this week. I'm also going to paint her dresser, make curtains, organize, hang things on the wall - the whole bit! I'm very excited to take some video of the process and then her reaction kind of like how they did on the TLC program, "While you were out!" I always loved that show. I'm sure she'll be surprised!

Some other photos

Jack with some serious "bling!"

Pampered Chef Amelia

Amelia: "Cheese!"
Evelyn: "Oh my!?!"

My 4 kids

It's rare to be able to get all 4 of them to stand still for 2 seconds to get a photo of them. And as you can see, Amelia didn't really want to be a part of it. I love Evelyn's expression here. I snapped four shots as quick as I could - and this was the best one.

1/2 Birthday!

Enjoying some homemade ice cream!

Evelyn had her 1/2 birthday on Friday, August 7th. As we parents always say - "Wow! That went fast!" She's a pretty delightful girl. She's starting to get better at playing on her own. She's not sitting up on her own yet, so I think she is just tired of the belly and back thing. She's ready to have a different position. If we sit behind her she does pretty well.

We started solid foods last week and so far she's liked everything we've given her. Sweet potatoes, carrots, applesauce, pears. Billy gave her mixed veggies tonight. Amelia HATED fruit, so I'm glad that Evelyn likes them and we can keep the variety.

She's really rolling a lot -- and putting her in one place in the room does not mean she'll be there a minute later. She'll roll all the way across the basement to get to wear she wants to be. She can be very temperamental though, as most breast-fed babies can be. She doesn't like to be away from mommy too much. I'm anxious to get her to a sitter 12 hrs a week when school starts. She needs the time away from me and with someone else besides daddy and her own house. I like my kids to be comfortable being with new people and in new places. So like when you take them to the church nursery they don't freak on you!

I'm amazed!

Amelia "reading" Dinosaur Roar! to Gma Barb on the way to Joplin, MO

I am just amazed each day at how much Amelia excels at things. She was an early talker -- putting full sentences together that most anyone could understand before 18 months. She's really picked up her colors this past few months (which Jack has really struggled with), and yesterday I was shocked at how many shapes she knew. I was drawing them on a pad and she just zipped them right out: square, triangle, circle, star, heart. I stumped her with hexagon though!

Billy shared this cute story with me tonite. Jack and Amelia were in the basement playing together and watching some TV. Billy heard them arguing and started to come downstairs to see what the rucous was about. This is what he heard:

J: "Amelia, the Grinch is not green!"
A: "Yes, he is!"
J: "No, he's not! He's red."
A: "I'm going to go tell my daddy! Daddy, the Grinch is green."
B: "Jack, sorry buddy, but Amelia is right. The Grinch is green. He has a red hat on though."
J: "Hmph!" (arms crossed - mad face)

Uh-oh. I'm a little worried about his self-esteem. Will the little smartie-pants sister that excels in colors, shapes, and other things make him feel stupid? Hopefully it just makes him try harder this year in preschool.

Bedtime

Since I'm gone in the evenings a couple of days a week, I miss out on the bedtime routine with the kids. Billy does a pretty darn good job getting all four to bed on time and has some nice routines with the kids. I was recently informed that he tells Jack each night, "Now, don't be tootin' in bed!" And Jack just smiles and giggles. But tonite when Billy said it Jack asked, "Why not?" Billy responded, "Because you'll blow the roof off the house."

Can you imagine what sort of picture when thru that little 4-yr old boy mind of his?

Chicago Trip

I took my usual July trip to Chicago for The Pampered Chef National Conference. I really look forward to this trip each year. It's a great time to re-motivate and it's an awesome girls trip in a fantastic city. We are so lucky to be close enough to drive - which makes it a quick, inexpensive trip.

This year was quite a honor for me because I was asked to speak at a workshop for the first time. My workshop topic was on booking shows. My co-presenter and I received great feedback - so hopefully that means it wasn't too bad. I just received a cd recording of it in the mail this week, and I'm anxious to give a listen.

I also received stage recognition for earning Top Sales in the company in Top Performance Cluster. I was also excited to be in the Top 10 in Sales and in Recruiting in the McMillan Downline - which is out of nearly 500 consultants.

I've been so blessed to have a great year! Thanks for letting me "toot my own horn!"

Photos to share

Amelia thinks she needs to be the baby sometimes. I find her playing in the bassinet. Yes, we still have the bassinet up. We lost the bolts to the crib in the move - have been hoping they'd show up. They haven't - we've ordered replacements.



Not sure where she picked this up - but it was so cute, I had to share. She really did say it in context too -- she slipped and said, "Whoopsy - daisy!"

Ellie did a day-camp in Zearing in June with her cousin, Lilah. There were only 4 kids in the class, so they received quite a bit of attention. They had a blast learning about bugs and rocks and other nature-y stuff. The last day they invited the parents out for a show. They created invitations, programs, costumes, the whole bit. Ellie was the star for one skit - the sheep from Pixar's "Boundin'."