A robot

Ellie and Amelia were playing just now behind me here in the basement, as I work at my desk. I hear them starting to argue - Ellie wants Amelia to wear this certain dress, but Amelia is crying that she wants it off because it's "itchy." Finally, Ellie gives up and kind of rips it off her and hits her. Amelia comes crying to me...

Mom: Ellie, you didn't need to hit her.
Ellie: But I wanted her to wear that dress.
M: I understand, but you can't make her wear the dress. And you shouldn't hit her. You need to apologize.
E: And she won't stop crying.
M: I know. It's annoying when she whines and cries, but hitting her doesn't help. When you get frustrated, you just have to walk away.
E: Ok. But I wanted her to wear that dress. I wish she was a robot, so that she did whatever I wanted her to do.

Oh, Ellie -- if only all our kids were robots so we could get them to do what we wanted them to do!

Kids Dancing

If you haven't set up an account on Pandora.com yet - it's a great free site to create your own radio station. Billy recently set up a "dance music" station for the kids. Here are some highlights. I wish I had a program so I could cut and edit the best parts. (yes, I know, I need a Mac). And you'll notice that Jack is more into picking on Ellie than actually dancing. Oh, those little brothers!

A couple of tricks

Here are a few highlights of some things that Evelyn is doing. Blowing kisses, saying "all done" "bye-bye"

Princess Amelia

Amelia was dancing to Disney Princess music today - and I got these shots of her sitting in the window. It was fun to play with the image to get the cool coloring. #1 - i need a better program to do more, and #2 - i need more time to do it.

Not to be left out

Amelia didn't want to be left out of getting her picture taken too.

Many faces of Evelyn

Billy took this series of pictures of her the other night. Certainly some keepers!

Always a gun ... or a sword

True to his species, Jack never fails to make a gun or a sword out of anything. Here is the latest gun that was made out of some lego-type blocks.

Ellie's Ouch!

We diverted a trip to the ER this week by trying out the Mercy Urgent Care clinic in Ankeny. On Wednesday evening, Ellie was at our former neighbor's house playing with their daughter, Lauren. The two girls took the dog for a walk. Lulu decided to take off, Ellie decided to not let go of the leash and tripped. The retractable leash swung back and hit her in the forehead, splitting it open.

After consulting with our new neighbor, an ER nurse, we decided to take her in to see if it needed stitches. A scar on a boy = cool! A scar on a girl = more makeup. Five years from now, I didn't want to regret not taking her. So, instead of possibly waiting hours at Mary Greeley in Ames, we checked out the clinic south of us. It went well! Very clean, very quick, and very nice staff - not to mention, much cheaper.

She ended up with glue instead of stitches. Which means two of my kids have been glued in the past couple months -- good thing for the invention of that stuff! It should heal nicely -- we'll see a year from now how the scar does.

Going Crazy

We have a saying here at our house ... "going crazy!" Go figure. Here is the context. I'm dressed in something other than grungy clothes, my hair is done, and I look like I'm headed somewhere. A child will ask, "Mom, where you going?" If I happen to not be going somewhere, I usually respond, "Crazy."

Last night, we didn't have any plans - just supper with the two little girls because the big kids were at Tony's. Amelia asked, "Mommy, where are we going?" I responded, "Crazy." Because we weren't actually going anywhere and I was feeling a little crazy with my busy day.

About an hour later, at supper, Amelia was falling asleep in her food. I asked if she was tired and she said yes. Billy picked her up take her to bed and she cries out, "No, I don't want to go to bed, I want to go crazy!" I thought Billy and I were going to pee our pants. It was so funny. And then she kept saying it. "I want to go crazy. I want to go crazy." She thought crazy was a place, and that I was going there -- and she wanted to come too." Oh, sweetheart, you go crazy with me everyday!

Jack's Growth

About six months ago, we were a little concerned about Jack's learning - specifically his letters and numbers. The kids knows every superhero and Transformer name, but to recognize a letter in his own name was nearly impossible! We worked with him at home, we even looked into getting him a tutor. The kid could just not retain the information he was learning.

Luckily, in just the past few weeks, he's starting to get it! I'm so relieved! He excels at every other "subject" at preschool, and I didn't want this one hiccup to hold him back. He still struggles to say the name of the letter, but visually he knows it and can associate it with something. Like "J" - "That's in my name!" So we just have to ask what his name starts with ... he thinks about it and then figures it out. "J! It's a J!"

He's also really starting to do well coloring and drawing pictures. He drew a really cute one of Gma Barb and Papa Denny sitting together outside on a bench. The one above is a picture of me -- in case you couldn't tell. I believe the top reads "mom" or my name possibly.

Also, a fun little blurb I had posted on Facebook. Jack and Evelyn have become quite the little duo. She is always thrilled when he comes home. And he does a wonderful job of playing with her and trying to keep her occupied. The other day when I picked Jack up from school, he asked, "Mom, where is Evelyn." I replied, "We are going to go get her." He said, "That's good, because she's my sweetheart." Awe. What a nice big brother. We'll see how long it lasts!

The Feud

There is a nearly constant feud going on in my house between Amelia and Jack. They want to play together, but somehow manage to rarely get along. (Here is one of those rare occasions when they built a "ship" together.) Amelia knows every button to push of Jack's, and the exact time to push them. Billy says that that is a girl thing. They are both at the age of struggling to share, so that too plays a large role. And she loves copying him. Both with what he says and does (watch the video). He hates it when she is "coughy-ing" him.

Amelia has not napped since Thanksgiving, so they are both up in the afternoon playing together. But unfortunately, there is always fighting and making messes on their end, and punishing the kids on my end. I certainly miss my quiet afternoons of nap times!

Evelyn's 1st Birthday

"What is that?!" We made sure she didn't touch the flame.

"Anyone want to share?"

"This is delicious!"

She's no longer a baby, right? I hope not! Because I love all her cuddles. Evelyn Bernice turned 1 on Sunday, February 7th. Her well-check appointment the next day went okay -- except that we found a double ear infection. Her first. She weighed 18 lbs. 10 oz and was 28 inches long. Which is the same as Jack and Amelia were at their 12 month checks.

We had her birthday party on Saturday -- most of my family was able to be here along with her sitter. She did a great job destroying a creme-filled cupcake.

She is was not walking at the time of her birthday ... and still isn't. Billy claims that she took two steps yesterday. I'll believe it when I see it. Any day I try, she's not at all interested. She does walk along things, crawls like a champ, and maneuvers up and down the stairs. But she's too scared to stand alone!

Let's see what else.... she is still a mama's girl. If I have busy days that I am not able to spend much time with her, she gets pretty whiny. She loves to scream -- usually for joy, but sometimes for attention. She also is pretty keen on her big brother.

Her favorite pastime is getting into the cupboard under the sink, or playing the toilet. Two places we are always trying to keep her out of. But it never fails, the kitchen is unmanned, or the bathroom door gets left open.

No really words yet. She'll say "ba-ba" for a bottle, but we are nearly done with those. "ma-ma" and "da-da." I think it's fun that she blows her nose and drinks out of a straw.

She's so polite

While I was eating lunch, Amelia came up and asked,
"Can I have some of your Cheetos?"
I replied like every good mom, "What do you say?" Hoping for a 'please.'
After a moment of thought, she says, "Give me some?"
"Ah, no. What do you say?"
"Give me some!"
She didn't ever get it. I had to coach her to ask, "May I please have some."

Hairdo

Amelia woke up with this hairdo the other morning. I'm not really sure how this happened, usually her hair looks pretty normal in the morning. It's completely inappropriate, but I can't get the scene from Something About Mary out of my head.

Amelia gets burned

At the beginning of the month, I started running on my treadmill regularly, so I've been leaving it out. I always flip the switch to turn it off, and sometimes even unplug it. The kids have not known where the switch was -- and so I've felt pretty safe leaving it out. They have been told over, and over that it's not a jungle-gym, it's not a toy -- even though they insist on making it a rocket ship, race car, or something else everyday.

Between Lilah and Ellie and Jack, they managed to plug it in, flip the switch, and put the key in. Of course, it's the little kid standing by that gets hurt. Amelia ended up with a small 2nd degree burn on the top of her hand. She favored it a bit today, but didn't ever really complain. So I guess it just looks worse than it feels.

Hopefully the big kids learned a valuable lesson last night ... mom makes rules for a reason!

Videos of Evelyn Crawling

If you didn't know, you can trip while crawling. This is what it looks like. But like a champ, she gets right back up again!



If they had a crawl sprint contest around here, I think she'd win!

Jack's "emergency"

On the Monday after Christmas, we were in Arkansas visiting Billy's dad and family, and Jack decided to give us a little bit of a scare. He and the girls were be-bopping around Grandma Marie's house and Jack fell. I didn't know it because there was no crying or anything. They come into the kitchen and tell me that Jack is bleeding. Thinking it was nothing much, I take him into the bathroom to get a band aid and instead I see quite a bit of blood. And blood in Amelia's hair ... that's when I had to ask Billy to step in. I was starting to get a little light headed. (yeah, yeah ... I'm a wimp)

After a quick look, he decides that stitches might be needed. We pack up quick and head to town. Luckily, there was a walk-in clinic still open so we didn't have to go to the ER. The nurse decided stitches probably weren't necessary ... so she glued and bandaged him up and we were on our way in less than 10 minutes. Free of charge and he even got a free personal pan pizza from Pizza Hut for being so brave. Which he did earn, because he didn't shed a single tear or whine a bit. Tough kid. We went and got him some ibuprofen and the pizza and headed back.

This is a picture taken 4 days after -- the bandage fell off. Looks pretty good, but I'm sure there will still be a scar. Amazing that you can split your skin that bad by just falling on the floor.

Photos from Christmas '09

Merry Christmas from all of us!

Ellie didn't get her High School Musical Alarm clock for her birthday, but Santa came thru!
She was very patient ... and then very excited! Yeah, we'll see about that on Tuesday morning.

Jack asked Santa for some Star Wars gear.

Santa brought the little girls a fun musical toy. Kind of like karaoke for toddlers. Hmmm... I wonder who picked that out?

My crew on Christmas Eve. This was our second year enjoying our Christmas Eve with Tony & Jana. We went to church together at 5pm -- I asked Santa to be his first stop and he arrived while we were gone. After church all ate dinner together at our house -- seafood and pasta! Then opened gifts together. It's such a blessing to be able to spend Christmas Eve together as a family! The kids will cherish it always.

Princess Amelia got LOTS of dress up clothes this year. Which she will enjoy for many years to come. They are all a little big right now, but I know she'll still have fun putting them on and taking them off.

Sir Jack! Jack is so easy to buy for. I think because he's the only boy, and also he just loves to do everything. Legos, dress up, army men, guns, swords, action figures. You name it -- this kid is into it. And he plays with them all! They don't just sit and collect dust. He's so fun to buy stuff for.

Billy and Evelyn. This is like one of the best pictures of Evelyn. She's so hard to capture on camera!

Grandma Barb with Amelia - she is the one that made us all wear silly hats to open gifts.

Papa Denny with his new Bobber Cooler for the pond.

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.