Kara's Korner

A Monkey Trade

2011-11-24T09:30:00.001-08:00

Last night Ryan traded his green cuddly monkey, that he has slept with since he was 6 months old, into the box and got a stuffed monkey. The neck on the monkey cuddly was stretching off of the blanket part, and it was about to fall apart. Plus, as he gets older I didn't want his special thing to look so babyish, so I thought it was time to trade it in.

Here he goes putting the green monkey cuddly into the box.

His new monkey (actually a chimp as Barry has informed us) looks like Curious George. I convinced Ryan not to call him George because he has a friend named George that we play with. So his name is Bongo. Ryan loves that he's a full monkey with arms and legs... but no tail because he's a chimp.

His was really excited about it, and ready to sleep with it, until time for sleep actually came. Then he wanted the green monkey, but he was gone into the box "because he was old" Ryan said.

Bongo ended up sleeping at the end of the bed which was actually a blessing when Ryan woke up at 2 am throwing up. Yes, our Thanksgiving feast will be greatly pared down because not only is Ryan sick but so is his dad today.

But even though Ryan is sick this morning he hasn't cried for green monkey like I thought he would. That's a good thing because he's already in the trash can in the alley.

It went so well, that we let Alyna pick an animal this morning on Amazon.com to trade for her bear cuddly. She picked a plush white dog. I'll let you know next week how that trade goes.

littlest singer

2011-09-26T15:42:00.000-07:00

Alyna sang her first recognizable lyrics to a song when she was 15 months old... I thought is was remarkably cute and smart of her to sing "row row row bo" over and over again.

But Kellyn, who is very verbal already, is only 13 months old and sings multiple lines of multiple songs.

"buh rou rou rou" (while rolling her arms in a circle)- wheels on the bus go round and round
"bee bee bee" - horn goes beep beep beep

"row row row bo" - row row row your boat

"upa buh buh wa" (while opening and closing her hands) - up above the world so high (from Twinkle Twinkle)

"a face, ooray" - face will surely show it, if you're happy and you know it shout hooray

:E-I-E-I, ah ah" - E-I-E-I-O, and a dog says "ah"

She also knows where her eyes, ears, mouth, belly button, hands, and feet are. She's a sweety too, and loves to laugh and be tickled.

It's amazing to watch God's development plans for each child as they differ. Each child seems to have talents that also compliment their personalities. I look forward to seeing all their talents develop further over the years.

fall clothes

2011-09-22T13:10:00.000-07:00

Grandma may remember an outfit Alyna wore at Christmas when she was 15 months old, playing on the slides outside... it's a long sleeve white shirt with pink and green hearts all over it, and a green fuzzy hooded vest over it. Kellyn wore it today and looked so cute.

I also realized on Monday that the capri pants Alyna was wearing were starting to look more like bermuda shorts. I looked at the tag, and they were 18 month size (she's so skinny). So after washing them they became Kellyn's and she wore them yesterday. Alyna had a little trouble with that at first but finally relinquished them to her sister's wardrobe when I told her she had lots of capris but Kellyn needed them.

Kellyn is also about to outgrow the really cute shoes I just bought for her 2 weeks ago in Austin... I guess I should have gone up a size, but she needed some to wear right now.

We're having a gorgeous fall day today with a high of about 70 degrees, a cool wind, and lots of cloud cover. I love when seasons change and the kids get to wear things for the first time. Ryan and Alyna looked super cute this morning in their new light-weight zip-up hoodies I found on clearance at Target earlier this summer. Alyna's is chocolate brown with a pink sparkly stripe down each sleeve. Ryan's is royal blue with a yellow car on the left side.

I feel very blessed for the clothing choices we have for our children.

big kids now

2011-09-19T20:07:00.000-07:00

It's very different only having one toddler, even though I still have twin 3 year olds. With Ryan and Alyna I always worried they would take off in different directions and one would get hurt. With just one toddler I can keep an eye on her more closely, and her siblings are now old enough to know what they should and shouldn't do. That doesn't mean they don't often need assistance or supervision, but it's at a different level.

Kellyn is walking all over the place, and falling often right now. She's testing her balance and strength daily. She now giggles and eagerly complies when I put her shoes on because she knows we're going outside or away from home. She's always eager to go out that door. S

Alyna and Ryan are acting a lot more like preschoolers now and have lost that toddler look altogether. I'm working with them a few times a week with worksheet pages on colors, shapes, patterns, etc. They love when Mommy is the teacher and we do "school" at the big table. Last week we got out a bucket of coins and counted pennies and quarters. They liked playing with the "moneys". We also use some online educational tools for preschoolers. I also use their toys to have them find things of certain colors and shapes. Their newest favorite activity is painting with water colors. They actually don't make as many messes with it as I was expecting, aside from the occasional spilled water cup.

We recently visited my cousin's family in Keller, TX, and my brother's family in Austin, TX. It was a wonderful trip, and also very tiring. The kids loved playing with their cousins all week, and Ryan didn't even want to come home.

The smell of fall is in the air as the temperatures are finally starting to cool off, at least at night. It's wonderful to be able to play outside with the kids without worrying so much about the heat. I'm looking forward to the fall as it gets physically easier to take the 3 on outings since Kellyn is walking now. It is such a blessing to watch my kids grow and explore their world.

Road Trip TIme

2011-09-02T09:25:00.000-07:00

We leave tomorrow for Kellyn's first road trip. We flew with her to Tennessee in March, but she's never done a trip more than a 2 hour drive away for shopping or appointments in Lubbock or Midland. I suspect she'll be as good a traveller as her siblings who love to go places, and only occasionally get so tired of their car seats that they start screaming about it.

I took some of toys over to a friend's house this morning and brought some of their toys home with us to take on the trip. With those "new toys", and the DVD player in the van, hopefully the trip will pass quickly.

We're off to the Dallas/Ft Worth area first (about 6 hours away) to visit my cousins, aunt and uncle, and some old friends for a few days. Alyna's been asking to go to the zoo all summer so, weather permitting, we will go to the Ft. Worth zoo on Tuesday. After that we'll have nap time in the car as we drive the 3 1/2 hours south to Austin. We're staying with my brother and his family through the weekend, and plan to also spend some time with Barry's brother and his wife while we're there.

Ryan and Alyna are very excited about spending time with their cousins, and that includes my cousins' kids whom they've never met before. We also plan to have their 3rd birthday party while we're in Austin, it'll just be a few days early.

Pictures and more descriptions are sure to follow after the trip...

Other News:

Now 1 year old Kellyn is walking all over the place, except when I put shoes on her. And she's gotten her 4 front teeth in last 4 weeks. Fun times...

Alyna is starting to understand math concepts like that a $20 bill is bigger than $1 bill. So smart.

Ryan is still not pooping in the potty very often despite being pantless all week at the house... not sure what to try next.

Happy 1st Birthday Kellyn!

2011-08-18T07:50:00.000-07:00

Kellyn loves singing, especially "Happy and You Know It" and "God Made the Big Round Sun". She even does most of the motions along with Mommy, except when other people are watching of course. She loves reading books, but is very picky about which one to read next. She also loves to play with her brother's cars much to his dismay. Kellyn loves to play outside, and cries when you take her out of a swing.

She's toddling around, but still working on being able to walk everywhere. She loves visitors, and has some speical friends at church that she goes to immediately and never wants to leave.

We love her more than any other 1 year old girl in the whole world.

This is serious

2011-08-09T22:15:00.000-07:00

I was on duty in the nursery during the worship service the week before last and was talking to Kellyn who was playing a toy. Alyna, who was playing with a baby doll, came around from behind my chair and said, "You're waking my baby up." Then she balled her fists in front of her and said in a stern, serious voice, "This is serious."

I laughed and played along with her, hushing Kellyn. And the scene repeated itself several times as Kellyn wouldn't stop making loud, happy noises playing with her toy.

Tonight I finally remembered at dinner to tell Barry about it, and he laughed and asked her, "What does serious mean?"

Alyna replied, "Mommy was waking my baby up, and that was serious." Again she balled her fists in front of her and used that stern voice, and we just laughed.

She's quite the little drama queen, and loves to dress up in her fairy dress and princess tiara.

Baby's Name

2011-07-22T08:08:00.000-07:00

Alyna's baby finally has a name, instead of just being "baby".

Meet "Amy".

Amy... as in "A for me" which is what Alyna always says when she sees the letter A somewhere because A is the first letter in her name.

I kept asking her what her babies name was and what her favorite name for a baby was, and she just kept saying "A for me". So we decided A-Me was a good name.

Chichen Itza

2011-06-29T13:44:00.000-07:00

Our tour of the Mayan Ruins at Chichen Itza picked us up on our hotel early on Tuesday morning. It was a nice big chartered bus and wasn't close to full. It was about a 2 hour drive inland to the ruins. Our tour guide was Rafael. He was witty and knowledgable, and we learned a lot about the Mayan culture and ruins from him.

Chichen Itza actually means "at the mouth of the well of the wizard". You can imagine that any source of water in that area would be a valuable asset to the people who controlled it.

The large temple is the centerpiece of the area, surrounded by other platforms buildings, and structures to create a wide city center. The temple has 4 sides representing the 4 seasons. Each corner has 9 platforms corresponding to the 9 months of gestation in the birth of a child. Each side has 90 steps, with the 91st step being the top platform, to represent the days in each season. Each side is also aligned perfectly north, south, east, and west, according to the poles of the earth. And all this was built without use of any modern tools. In fact, scholars have no idea how they managed to build it.

When our guide was asked about the Mayan calendar ending in our year 2012, he responded that the Mayan people didn't mean for that to indicate the end of the world. They understood that life comes in cycles and seasons. Mathematically they came up with some 5000 plus years when creating their calendar. That signaled a changing in life cycles, or a significant event in the life of the people after that. It didn't mean the end of the whole world. Phew.... I was scared there for a moment.

The serpent head and jaguar appear as symbols on the structures and in their writings.

The skulls in the picture above are on the walls of a large platform. This platform is wear the king would display the decapitated heads (impaled on sticks) of enemies or slaves as a warning to any who would try to cross him. He would do this at times when visiting peoples were coming for trade or for games.

Yes, games. The ring in the picture above is in a large rectangular field with a high wall and ring on an opposite wall as well. The object was for the two teams of men to get the ball made from a rubber tree through that ring without using their hands. The legend has it that the winning team would then be given the "honor" of being sacrificed to the gods. I'll take the losing team any day...

The acoustics were amazing in there. Each sound echoed off the four walls bouncing around and around. And you could whisper at one end and be heard clearly all around.

These are some well preserved hieroglyphs under a ledge on one of the walls in the games arena.

Much of the Mayan culture, religion, science, mathematics, and architectural knowledge is lost to us today because the Catholic church burned many of their manuscripts in an attempt to wipe out the paganism. I think that's why much of what we see and hear about them is just the savagery that was part of their survival as a strong people. They are a people of peace now, and the crime is very low where the Mayan descendants live.

nuestros excelentes vacaciones

2011-06-19T12:51:00.000-07:00

Barry and I just returned from a 5 day trip to the Mayan Riviera (near Cancun, Mexico). We left a little after 7 am on Sunday and arrived in Cancun at 7:30 pm. It was so much less stressful traveling without our kids. Bathroom stops took only a few minutes as opposed to 20. We were very tired and both had headaches by the time we arrived at our hotel.

Our room was luxurious, and there was even a couch on the balcony that was great for enjoying our ocean view.

The shower was a rainfall shower dropping from above you in the middle of the large walk-in area. Our only complaint of the room at all was that it took a long time to get any hot water to the shower, but it wasn't a big deal because once it heated up it felt great and never ran out.

We spent a lot of our relaxation time on the private beach, just reading and enjoying the sounds of the waves. We even received wonderful massages in a hut on the beach where no noise machines or cds were needed to induce the relaxing atmosphere.

The picture below is of us inside a cabana (Bali bed) on the beach one morning. It was only about 80 degrees but the humidity made us sweat because we aren't used to it where we live. There was a nice breeze the whole time we were there though.

I just had to take a picture of the sand tractor for our son Ryan. It went by a couple times a day raking the sand and collecting the seaweed.

It was a beautiful All-Inclusive resort called Azul Sensatori, and we didn't have any bad experiences or bad food while we were there. We did learn quickly that you have to be on guard because it is such a high tourist area and everyone has a "deal" for you. You just have to learn when to take advantage of it and when to walk on by.

The building our room was in was adults-only which was nice because there weren't any kids running up and down the walkways, and there was one whole pool that was adults only too... but every time we saw a family out at the beach or in the restaurants we always said how much fun our own kids would be having. They have a kid pool with shallow area, water slide, and other water squirting apartuses, as well as an indoor playground building with toys for all ages, and playground on the beach. So we definitely will be going back with our kids, hopefully next year.

(Note: On Tuesday, we visited the Mayan ruins at Chichan Itza, but that deserves it's own post in a couple days)

And We're Off

2011-06-11T19:47:00.000-07:00

Grandma and Grandpa are here... and Barry and I leave in the morning for a resort outside Cancun, Mexico for the next 5 days. We're very excited, already tired, and ready to go... hopefully.

The morning will not be fun since the kids don't know we're leaving yet... but they are in loving and capable hands while we're gone.

Circus Day!!!

2011-06-05T07:00:00.000-07:00

On Saturday we drove to Lubbock, TX to see the Ringling Bros. and Barnum and Bailey circus. It was lots of fun, and very tiring.

We left our house at 8 am to drop Kellyn and all her pariphanalia off at a friend's house for the day. Mrs. Paul and Mr. John were happy to play grandparents to our "perfect" baby girl for the day (their words, not mine). I think she had lots of fun, and she was sound asleep in her crib at our house when we got home last night.

We left our city at 8:30 and made the almost 2 hour drive to Lubbock with one potty break stop. I'll say right now that Alyna and Ryan both did very well using the potty all day long, with the exception of Ryan's two poopy episodes. He still won't do that on the potty most days. But even on the long drives they stayed dry.

Our first stop in Lubbock was their favorite park. It has a big fortress with winding staircases, ramps, and slides. Of course Ryan and Alyna both spent about 20 minutes on the swings as well. By the time we left the park at 11:30 (our time) for lunch, it was already 90 degrees, so I was glad we had done that first.

We ate at our favorite place to eat with the kids, Rosa's Tortilla Factory. It's our favorite because it's fast, naturally loud, and our kids will actually eat the food.

After that we went to a used tool store for Daddy to buy a new router he needs for building his very own arcade cabinet in the next few months. Then we killed 20 minutes at Barnes & Noble where Mommy visited the bathroom with assorted company 4 different times.

Finally we made our way to Texas Tech's campus arena for the circus show. Alyna and Ryan were both very excited to see the elephants.

At the pre-show, we watched the clowns jump ropes, dance, etc. The kids got circus temporary tatoos on their arms and tried on some glittery costumes.

We found our seats and Ryan looked through the program. They had never been in a big arena before, so just watching all the people was enough to keep them busy until the show started.

We enjoyed the usual circus snacks... cotton candy, popcorn, and fresh squeezed lemonade. All outrageously priced of course.

Ryan actually fell asleep in my lap just before the part he'd been waiting for... the motorcycles. It was also the loudest part of the show just before the finale. I was very glad we hadn't brought Kellyn with us.

We decided against fast food for dinner, and ate at Johnny Carino's, bringing 3 boxes of leftovers home with us to eat for Sunday lunch. Yummy! The 2 hour drive home was uneventful, especially since the kids were engrosed in finishing watching "Monsters Inc." and then "Cars".

I was very proud of the kids' behavior all day. It was an exciting adventure for us.

Just an update...

2011-05-21T16:59:00.001-07:00

I haven't posted in a while, but everything here is going fine. We had a long weekend visit from Nana and Aunt Robyn, and a visit the next weekend from Uncle Joel. The kids all love when people come to visit because they get special attention during that time.

As the school year finishes for many families, our MOPS (Mothers of Preschoolers) group is also finishing up it meetings. We've got just as many activities planned for the summer though. There's a music class on Tuesdays and a story and play time on Thursdays. Fridays will still be park days when the weather permits.

We're super excited about plans to see the Ringling Brothers and Barnum and Bailey circus show in Lubbock in a couple weeks.

This weekend I've been working on photo books on Snapfish.com. I finally finished the one for Kellyn's first 2 months, and now I'm going back and doing books for our Europe travels from 2007.

It's fun to look back at pictures and remember the good times. It helps me remember to photograph as many of these precious moments with my children as I can.

Some Spring Pictures

2011-04-28T09:04:00.001-07:00

Happy Easter!

We had an easter egg hunt with some friends at the park on Good Friday. Ryan is the kid at the top of the photo (above) standing by the stroller. He had absolutely no interest in picking up the eggs. Alyna picked up about 6, and then she was done even though there were several just lying at her feet.

Kellyn's first time in the big bathtub... 8 months old. Right after I took this picture both Ryan and Alyna joined her in the tub. They actually saved their splashing and wrestling for when Kellyn got out.

Splish, splash... we've already had some 90 degree days...

Kellyn gets her own little pool this year... she loves to sit in it and play with her toys.

Picnic Fail... but it was fun anyway

2011-04-13T12:24:00.000-07:00

Yesterday we called a service to have our yard sprayed for weeds (because they get so bad in our area). They said it would be 2 weeks... and then the guy shows up at 9:30 this morning. The spray is animal and kid safe once it dries, but I still don't like the kids to play in it for a couple days after the spray because Ryan still puts things in his mouth that he shouldn't.

The kids had been playing outside for a while and didn't like it when I picked up all their outside toys and made them come inside. So I figured we better go have lunch at a park so they could run off some of that 2 year old energy.

We go to the park on Fridays at lunch time a lot, and I usually just hit the Wendy's drive thru and put some chicken nuggets and fries in their cup holders to eat while we drive to the park. Then when we get there they play while I eat my lunch and feed Kellyn hers.

But since we ate at McDonald's yesterday, I didn't want to do yucky fast food again. So I took a container with ham, turkey, and chunks of cheddar cheese, and another container with strawberries and bananas slices.

It was the perfect spring day weather for the outing. Warm and sunny with a nice soft breeze blowing through the trees.

The kids immediately went to the swings, and I put Kellyn on a big blanket with some toys in the shade of a large tree nearby. A school group had left just as we pulled up, and we were the only ones at the park. I pushed them on the swings for a while, and then went to feed Kellyn her bottle while they played on the slides.

The picnic part didn't work out so well. Ryan only wanted to eat the cheerios that are Kellyn's little finger food snack. Then at one point while I was looking over at Kellyn, ALyna tried to step over the container of meat to reach for a strawberry, and she tipped all the meat onto the blanket. When I had laid the blanket out I realized that it had dog hair all over it, and then our meat did too. The kids all kept fussing because the bugs were buzzing around their heads if they stayed still for too long.

Then some friends showed up. I had put out on Facebook right before we left that we were going to the Harry McAdams state park, but I didn't really expect anyone else to meet us there on such short notice. I've met Kelly and son George through the MOPS program and also the Friday park playdates. George is just a couple months younger than the twins, and they seem to get along really well. Ryan always comes home from MOPS talking about playing with him.

So the kids played for a while, and then we all walked over to the pond to throw some bread to the ducks. We did that until the kids started wandering too far away from us and then we headed back to the playground.

Alyna and Ryan were exhausted and cranky by the time we got home which was right at their normal nap time. After quick potty stops they both climbed in bed. Kellyn had fallen asleep in her car seat, so I just brought the carrier inside the house and put it in her room. She woke up just a few minutes ago and I moved her to her bed.

I sit here under the cool breeze of a ceiling fan, looking out the big window at the red flowers, pink roses, and green trees. I can faintly hear sound from the lullabies playing in the kids room, and I feel supremely blessed by God.

Doing well so far...

2011-04-07T08:01:00.000-07:00

Note: We currently only have 3 pair of underwear in the 18 month size that will stay up on Ryan's hips. The Cars underwear I bought to entice him are size 2T and just fall right off. I've ordered more of the 18 month size, but they aren't here yet, so I'm working with 3 pair for this week.

Monday: quickly went through all 3 pair of underwear and went to pullups the rest of the day, no successful potty trips

Tuesday: our outings day with Ladies Bible Class and lunch, so I put him on the potty several times but we just used Pull-Ups

Wednesday: peed all over underwear and the floor mid-morning, peed in his Pull-Up at nap time, mid-afternoon I saw him start to wiggle and put him on the potty... success. Wore Pull-Up to church and stayed dry. Peed at home before bedtime. = 2 pees in the potty

Thursday (today): woke up wet, put on "dinosaur" underwear, saw him start to dance around snack time... Success again. He had peed the slightest amount before making it to the potty, but at least it didn't end up as a mess on the floor.

It's working. Of course, then there's the pooping issue...

We did it, Hooray!

2011-04-04T06:13:00.000-07:00

I'm calling Alyna officially potty trained.

She wore panties all weekend, except for overnight, and didn't have any accidents. And the only accidents she's had in the last 2 weeks were when we were out and couldn't make it to the potty in time, but she had told us before-hand.

At Opryland hotel she told us she had to go potty, and I started following signs to the restroom. We got in there, pulled down her pants and her pull-up, and oops there she went. She held it while we were looking, but I just couldn't get her up on the toilet in time.

The nice thing is that she only pees in her pull-up overnight probably 2 nights a week. The rest of the time she wakes up to use the potty in the early morning and then goes back to sleep.

This week I'm really starting on Ryan.

beautiful spring day

2011-04-01T12:24:00.000-07:00

It's 82 degrees outside, and the first beautiful rose just opened up this morning on the bush outside my picture window. We had a playdate at the church this morning with 3 year old Cole so that his mom and I could work on the upcoming ladies day ToDo list. I took the 3 kids at Wendy's, and then to the park for more playtime with lots of other moms and babies/kids.

Kellyn conked out on the way home from the park, and the twins have finally given in to nap time. I didn't get much sleep last night but the sunshine energized me so I don't want to go take a nap now. I'm going to have some "Me" time, and stream the Dave Ramsey show on the internet.

Home again...

2011-03-30T08:03:00.000-07:00

Home is such a great place to be...

We were all very glad to be back in our own beds on Monday night after flying all day. The kids had fallen asleep on the way home from the airport, and went straight to bed. They even slept in past 7 am in the morning which was wonderful since they had been waking up at 6:45 central time all week.

We had a wonderful time in my parents full house. 3 infants, 4 bigger kids, and 8 to 14 adults made for a noisy but wonderful family reunion.

We had planned to the Nashville zoo on Friday, but the weather didn't cooperate. Instead, we had lunch at a Japanese steakhouse where they cook in front of you, and then we went to the Opryland hotel. When we walked in the door Alyna said, "a jungle," as she pointed ahead of us. She did figure out quickly that it was a jungle without animals and was quite disappointed by that. Ryan just wanted to climb every set of stairs we came to, and there were a lot of them.

Friday night Barry and I went to dinner and the bookstore by ourselves. It's always enjoyable to finish a meal without having to share it, or get up to change a diaper.

On Saturday we did a photo shoot to get pictures of the whole family, the individual families, me with my siblings, the cousins, and the cousins with the grandparents. Of all the children to meltdown we never would have suspected it would be the 2 year old girl who loves to pose for the camera. Alyna just did not want to be there that day, and threw fits the whole time. I had to be the one holding her and forcing her to face the camera in the family photos. Candy was the only thing keeping her in place during the pictures with just the kids. After we said we were all done, she was perfectly fine again.

Saturday night my siblings and I and all our spouses went to dinner at O'Charley's. We don't see each other very often as adults, and it was a nice time to renew our adult friendships with each other.

Sunday for lunch we had a room reserved at Christy's 6th Street Restaurant and Cafe in Columbia. It was a wonderful place for the occasion, and they had a great home-style cooking buffet with roast, mac 'n cheese, mashed potatoes, salads, and more.

I was also able to do some shopping on a couple occasions and returned home with much needed new dress clothes.

We're still exhausted from the trip and the overcast skies here on Tuesday didn't help that, but the sunshine today is encouraging me to get things done.

To grandma's house we go...

2011-03-22T17:50:00.001-07:00

We fly out on Wednesday morning for Grandma and Grandpa's house in Tennessee (my parents). It's supposed to rain most of the week, so some of our plans may change, but it will still be a good time of our family all being together.

Grandma and Grandpa
My older brother, his wife, and 2 boys (11 and 8)
Our family of five
My sister, her husband, and their 6 week old baby girl
My brother, his wife, and their 5 month old baby boy
2 of my aunts and their husbands

That's 14 adults, and 7 kids (3 of which are infants).

Many of us are actually staying at the grandparents house... at least until we decide we need to do otherwise.

Grandpa is saying it's an invasion, but of the best kind.

You know a kid is sick...

2011-03-17T12:04:00.000-07:00

You know a kid is sick when they won't eat anything and they don't argue with taking another long nap.

Kellyn had a stomach bug on Tuesday, throwing up several times and having stomach cramps throughout the night. Wednesday she was feeling better except that she hadn't slept or eaten like normal, so she was just out of sorts. She seems all better today except for the diarrhea hanging on.

Alyna didn't eat dinner last night, didn't want a bedtime snack, and went to sleep saying her tummy hurt. She talked in her sleep last night, which is something I do when I'm stressed or not feeling well. She woke up with a 100.5 degree fever still saying her tummy hurt. She laid on the couch watching TV all morning. At 10:30 am she finally ate some mandarin oranges, but I think that gave her some stomach cramps. She fell asleep on the couch during a movie and I moved her to her own bed around 11. She woke up at 12:15 and cuddled with me in a chair. I moved her to the couch at 12:45 so I could put Kellyn and Ryan down for a nap. As I took Ryan to bed, I saw her eyes drooping, so I carried her to her bed again for another nap. She didn't fuss at all about it. I did make her drink some water before laying down because I'm worried she's getting dehydrated. Poor thing...

Better this week than next, and at least I got some sleep last night. Tuesday night with Kellyn I didn't sleep much at all and never for more than an hour at a time. And of course this week is the one that's important for Barry to work overtime and even work the weekend because he's in charge of the big software turnover at the plant.

I just pray it runs its course through everyone before Tuesday, because we fly to Tennessee on Wednesday.

Sunbeams from Heaven

2011-03-11T12:16:00.000-08:00

Today is definitely a day to play outside. There's blue skies, lots of sunshine, a slightly cool breeze, and a high of 76 degrees. Being at an elevation of 3500 feet above sea level, our sunshine is very direct and hot year round. I realized this morning when we were outside at 9:30 am in shorts and t-shirts that I didn't have any sunscreen to put on us. We stayed outside for about 45 minutes.

When Kellyn woke from her nap we trekked to the grocery store to buy items for our congregation's food pantry. We took them up to the church, changed diapers and made a potty stop, and headed off again for lunch at the park.

In the drive-thru I ordered a burger for myself with no onions and no pickles, and Alyna said, "I don't like tickles." 2 year olds are so funny.

We met several other local moms and their young kids at the playground. I pushed Alyna in the swing for probably 20 minutes, while Ryan ran around and played in the bark/dirt with his new friend "George".

I borrowed sunscreen from one of the moms, and I'm hoping the kids didn't get burned, especially Kellyn. I had her in the umbrella stroller facing away from the sun with a hat on, but her legs were in the sunshine the whole time. I actually think that if anyone is sunburned, it's me.

tough stuff

2011-03-09T10:46:00.000-08:00

It's hard to wait on things to go your way especially when you are 2 years old, and especially when you're always waiting on your baby sister.

Ryan had several melt-downs this morning as he repeatedly had to wait for Mommy to finish something with Kellyn before doing something "very important" for him. During her morning bottle he wanted a rice rusk for a snack. During her lunch time bottle I made the mistake of saying that when she was done I would fix their lunch. So he stood beside me and whined that she was done for the whole time. Then during Kellyn's baby food lunch he dropped one of his cars into a hole in a taped up diaper box. He had to wait until she was done so that I could get the scissors to open the box. Ryan was not happy at all about that.

I know these are actually good lessons for him to learn about delayed gratification, but having a constantly screaming 2 year old today is wearing my nerves thin.

"Teach me LORD to wait, down on my knees, 'till in Your own good time, You answer my pleas..."

getting close

2011-03-08T07:17:00.000-08:00

We're all well again after a long month of one person being sick after the other. Kellyn is eating even more than before her RSV, and back to only waking up once at night. I think she's in another growth spurt which means by the end of this month she could be a 7 month old in 12 month clothing. She's already wearing the clothes from when Alyna was learning to crawl and pull up on things.

2 weeks from tomorrow we fly out to Tennessee to see my parents. All of my siblings and their families will be there for that weekend. There will be 10 adults, 4 children ages 2-11, and 3 babies (1 to 6 months old). Fun times. 2 of my aunts and their husbands, and 1 of my cousins are also joining us for family time that weekend. It will seem really quiet at home after having all those people in an 1800 square foot house. 13 of us are actually sleeping at that house for 4-5 nights too. We'll see how that works...

I've got my packing list mostly done, but the time is approaching quickly. We bought the kids their own adjustable size headphones for this trip so they can more easily watch videos on our video MP3 players. At least I'm not flying by myself with the 3 kids this time.

barefoot in the back yard

2011-03-01T13:35:00.000-08:00

Yesterday morning I could not persuade Ryan or Alyna to put shoes on to go outside to play. Apparently if the temperature is over 65 degrees and the sun is shining, shoes are a burden even though the dead brown grass is prickly. In fact, this morning while it was still about 40 degrees, Ryan had to stand on the porch for a couple minutes barefoot and without a jacket before he would agree to put them on. Now he's happily playing outside in the sunshine, without shoes on, while he waits for Alyna to wake up from her extended nap. They are definitely kin to their grandma who grew up on a farm in Missouri, and still prefers to go barefoot.

Kellyn is mostly feeling better from her RSV. She's developing her jumping skills in the jumperoo, and reaching to play with more toys each day. Her breathing still rattles in her chest some, and she still coughs after drinking fluids. We're keeping her home for a couple more days.

Her 6 month stats from last week's dr. visit: 17 lbs and 7 oz, 25 1/2 inches. She's getting to be a hefty weight to carry around for long periods.

stuff and RSV (edited)

2011-02-25T06:02:00.001-08:00

Our keyboard was broken, but the new one arrived today. The few Facebook status updates I'd done this week were in the Kylo web browser with a keyboard you use the mouse to point and click. It was painful to click every letter in even a few sentences or to log into a site.

Please pray for Kellyn. She has RSV which is a respiratory infection that is serious in babies. At this point she doesn't need the hospital.

It started with the same cold Ryan and Alyna had last week, but they got better in about 3 days, and hers had hung on for 5. She started wheezing and not eating as much on Wednesday which is what worried me. I took her to the doctor, and sure enough, it's RSV.

The doctor said that as long as she can breathe and is drinking enough to have a wet diaper she is fine to stay at home. If she goes more than 6 hours without a wet diaper we have to go to the hospital for fluids. Right now she seems content to drink about 2-3 oz (half her normal bottle) at a time. So we've been giving her half a bottle every couple hours instead of her normal feeding schedule.

Tuesday and Wednesday nights she had woken up every hour or two, and she didn't nap well during the day either. After just one dose of medicine and one breathing machine treatment, she only woke up 2 times Thursday night. I changed her wet diaper and fed her a few ounces each time and she would go right back to sleep. She has also taken long naps today which I know will help her body fight this off quickly.

Ryan and Alyna are being their normal 2 year old selves. They start whining when I have to pay so much attention to "baby sister", but they love her long naptime in the morning because Mommy plays with them. This morning we played hide and seek. Alyna especially liked to count and then seek, and Ryan liked to hide with me. They were taught this game by their older friends Madison and Casey who come over to play frequently. Ryan and I would crouch behind a big chair or the ottoman and there were lots of screaming giggles when Alyna finally found us. It's a good thing Kellyn is a sound sleeper back in her room.

Alyna has started to protest her afternoon nap... yet she sleeps for an hour and a half to two hours. Ryan is always ready to go down, but only sleeps a little over an hour, and when he wakes up and sneaks out of the room he gets some precious Mommy cuddle time all by himself.

Kellyn's big new thing is to give kisses... (germs and all)... She grabs my face with both hands and plants her open mouth on my cheek and says "ahhhh". Then I turn and kiss her cheek and say "ahhh". She does it repeatedly until something else distracts her. Such a sweet girl...

I should also mention that 2 weeks of waiting on a part for a dishwasher (because they ordered the wrong part the first time) is really killing my motivation to cook. I just want to eat out and not have constant pile of dishes to wash, but I can't even do that because of sick kids...

I thank God for all my blessings and hope to persevere through the trials.

too much at once

2011-02-17T08:06:00.000-08:00

Sometimes too many things happen at one time and chaos reigns for a few minutes.

It's 8:30 am and Kellyn is crying because she's hungry. She is also because she is tired from waking up an hour earlier than normal after going to bed half an hour late. Her crying escalates as I prepare her food.

Just as I pick her up to go eat, Alyna informs me she needs to poop. So I put Kellyn back down and take Alyna to the bathroom and get her situated. Since there's no telling how long it will take, I go ahead and take Kellyn to her high chair. She's crying so much though that she won't eat.

So Kellyn is now crying very loudly, Alyna shouts that she pooped in the potty and needs me to come wipe her, and Ryan walks up and says "yuck" showing me his messy hands. Apparently a toy ball mysteriously landed in the bowl of yogurt and he got yogurt all over his hand during its retrieval.

UGH!!!

So I leave the crying baby, and take Ryan to the bathroom with me. I turn the water on for him to rinse his hands off while I wipe Alyna's bottom and get her situated. I finish washing Ryan's hands, give Alyna her sticker, and finally return to a screaming Kellyn.

It takes a pacifier, diaper change, and some songs to calm Kellyn down enough that she would actually eat something. Then she went down for her nap without much of a fuss. Poor girl...

new (old) toys

2011-02-14T09:11:00.000-08:00

It's lots of fun every time I pull out a toy from the twins days as babies and get to see Kellyn learn to play with it too. This walk-around table was one of their favoites, and will definitely be one of Kellyn's favorites too.

Her first time in it... and she's up on her tip toes trying to move around.

And of course the twins found a way to make it fun for everyone...

Long night

2011-02-13T09:40:00.001-08:00

Last night was one of many long nights we've had juggling 3 kids under the age of 3. At least when a child is sick I can understand it... not that it's any easier on my body.

We've all had colds this week, and I thought we were all getting over it, but Ryan's cough became progressively worse throughout the day yesterday.

Last night he coughed a lot at bedtime of 7:45, and went to sleep only to wake up again at: 9:30, 11:10, and 12:09. When he didn't stop coughing by 12:30 Barry moved to the couch in the living room and I brought Ryan into our bed so I didn't have to get up every time he needed to sit up and cough or take a drink.

We had a humidifier running right beside the bed, rubbed vapoRub on his chest, and let him eat spoonfuls of raw honey at regular intervals. He didn't have any fever, but we did give him a little tylenol to help with the pain in his throat. The poor kid just kept coughing until after 2:15 am.

He finally fell asleep for real around 2:30, and Kellyn woke up at 2:40. It took Barry 20 minutes to put her back to sleep, only for her to wake up again at 3:40. I fed her and then she seemed wide awake and just wouldn't fall asleep until 4:30. She wasn't really crying, just fussing enough for me to have to keep going in to sooth her a bit every 5-10 minutes.

Then I got to sleep until 5:19 when Ryan woke up coughing again. He coughed off and on until Alyna and Kellyn both woke up at 6:30 am.

Kellyn Sits Up

2011-02-09T08:43:00.000-08:00

I can't believe that at only 5 months and 3 weeks old Kellyn has started sitting up on her own. She's still learning how to lean toward things without falling, but she's made great progress just since yesterday. She seems so ready to go run and play with her older siblings. I don't want her to grow up too fast, but it's exciting every time they hit a new developmental milestone.

Alyna thinks it is pretty cool that the baby is sitting up... just wait until Kellyn starts crawling.

School zone

2011-01-31T11:14:00.001-08:00

Kellyn's toys are fast taking up space in the living room... see...

The big kids needed more space for their big kid activities. Since we plan on doing preschool and at least the first few years at home, I decided to create a "school zone" early.

The cabinet keeps art supplies and play-do out of reach on the top shelves, and other activities like hand puppets put away from sight.

The sling bookshelf is easily accessable to the little hands, and the other bookshelf is nice for placing preschool activity toys like puzzles, shapes buckets, stacking toys, and alphabet toys.

The table is just their size and great for all their activities. We still need to purchase little chairs for it, but for now they are at the right height to stand for the activiites anyway.

Today's preschool activities during Kellyn's morning nap included puzzles, coloring, naming shapes and colors, and finally playing with balloons. I always have to give them the exact same color balloons or they'll end up fighting over the same one.

After those activities I did my 22 minute pilates workout. Barry and I are wanting to take a beach vacation by ourselves this summer which means I've really got to get working on getting back into shape. It's really good motivation...

Reading Memory

2011-01-28T08:13:00.000-08:00

I wrote a small blurb for my friend's blog about composition for his OSU students. Here's what I wrote:

I was 4 years old in my first memory of reading Dr. Suess' "The Cat in the Hat". I was sitting next to my mother on the couch in the living room of our small house in Dallas, Texas. I knew how to read all the "at" words, but had to sound ou...t others. There were other little books I read in my pre-K school. The one I remember was titled "Matt the Rat". I only remember it because my older brother Matt hated that I kept saying the name of that book over and over again. These memories make me smile, and make me anxious for the days when I can share these moments with my own children.

To read the other narratives on reading memories and Jeff's conclusions on the matter, visit his blog:Three Literacy Narratives

PottyFest

2011-01-27T08:14:00.000-08:00

The month of January is PottyFest at our house. The photo above was taken this week while they were watching "Elmo's Potty Time". We have the 2 small potty chairs, and then we have inserts for the 3 toilets in our house that make them small enough for the kids to sit on comfortably.

Today Alyna is wearing her Minnie Mouse panties (not the first time), and has peed in the potty twice. She finished her sticker sheet this morning so she got a piece of candy.

Ryan has been blocked about actually peeing in the potty. I've been giving him a sticker if he even sits on the potty for me, and I've been telling him for the last week that if he actually pees in the potty he'll get a piece of candy. This morning, he actually did pee in the potty after sitting on the little potty for 10 minutes and then moving to the big potty for the next 10 minutes. Hopefully this means the end of his mental block. He was so happy to finally get his prize.

Kellyn of course isn't potty training, but she definitly has a working digestive system. She often has 4 wet or messy diapers in the hour after she eats, and they are not the kind you can ignore until later.

Alyna and Ryan are starting to interact with Kellyn more in a playful way. They get down and make faces at her or tickle her. Kellyn looks for them every time she wakes up, and watches everything they do.

Kellyn's 5 month stats

2011-01-18T15:46:00.000-08:00

Kellyn is 16 lbs even, and 25 1/4 inch long ...

She's in 6-9 and 9 month clothes now. She's outgrown almost anything that just says 6 months on it. She seems to outgrow a size in about 6 weeks. I'm just glad we have lots of hand-me-downs from Alyna. We did have to buy a pack of long sleeve onsies and a couple outfits in the 9 month size because by the time Alyna reached that size it was summer weather. But we have warm and cold weather clothes for the 12 month size when Kellyn gets there this spring.

The doctor said Kellyn is quite advanced in her sitting skills. Her balance is very good and she can almost sit up on her own already with just a hold of your hand for when she starts to lean or reach for something. The doctor also said her mouth was very strong as the tongue depressor was bending in Kellyn's mouth as the doctor tried to look at her throat.

She talks, sings, laughs and plays like a happy, healthy little girl. What a blessing!

Dry Day

2011-01-16T19:03:00.000-08:00

By George, I think she's got it... Alyna stayed dry all day today.

Alyna went potty on her own initiative several times yesterday. Once I was in the kitchen and she ran in saying, "I peed." I looked over and she didn't have any pants on, and upon inspecting the potty seat I found she had in fact gone pee in the little potty chair all on her own. Hearing "I do it myself" a hundred times a day lately has finally paid off.

She wore the same Pullup from 6 am all day today until right before bed when she finally pooped in it. That was going potty at the church building, and even coming in from outside to pee too. She had been trying to poop in the potty for several hours before bedtime because she knew she needed to, but she just couldn't do it. She'll get that eventually, but I'm just so proud of her today.

I'll probably put her panties on her tomorrow since we aren't going anywhere, and we'll see how that goes.

Ryan's really been trying, but something is blocking his progress and I'm not sure what. He sat on the potty chair for 20 minutes today without peeing, and when I left the room to take care of Kellyn he stood up and peed on the floor. At least he came and told me it was "wet". Then he sat on the potty 3 different times this afternoon and evening for at least 15 minutes each without peeing. He really wants to do it because he wants a prize for getting all his stickers... but his body just doesn't seem to cooperate. Poor guy, he was so upset that Alyna got her prize again and he didn't.

Expanding waist line

2011-01-13T15:43:00.000-08:00

Thankfully...it's not mine. ;D

I've actually had to let all of Ryan's adjustable waist pants out a couple notches on each side so he's no longer on the very smallest notches. He hasn't really gained much weight, but he doesn't seem as scrawny as before. The regular waisted pants in his length still fall down on him unless we flip the waistband over. I think it's just healthy growth up and out. His waistline hadn't grown out since he tuned 1.

We actually attribute his healthy expansion to the change in our vitamin selection for the kids. We switched to a whole food multivitamin that has no sugar or artificial color. (Not whole foods the store... but vitamins that use whole foods in their production.) We also added a Greenz vitamin to his regimen which is really what we think did it. It's a mixture of broccoli, kale, spinach, etc. that he never gets in his diet. There's also an immune boost vitamin he takes some days, and he didn't even get sick the last 2 times that Alyna and I did.

The down side of these new vitamins is that Alyna hates them, and I don't blame her. They smell pretty bad, but Ryan asks for them like they are candy.

scheduling

2011-01-12T08:33:00.000-08:00

My day seems to never end as I care for 3 kids under the age of 3... Duh! Right now, this is a rare moment where both twins are satisfied doing their own thing and Kellyn is napping... so I'm going to blog a little.

We've reached the stage where Kellyn's schedule is quite predictable each day with long awake periods and long naps. I love it.

Sundays, Tuesdays, and every other Thursday, we have regular morning outings to go to. I try to make sure we're always home for afternoon nap. Here's our schedule on the days we stay home.

6- 7 am - twins wake up and come crawl into Mommy's bed. Alyna goes on my right side, and Ryan on my left no matter which order they come in at.

7 - Alyna usually says "I'm done with bed" so we go open the curtains in the living room and I put their yogurt on their picnic table. This 5-10 minutes is "Mommy's computer time" and then I let them watch a show or sometimes movie while I eat breakfast, clean up the kitchen, and start the laundry

8 - Kellyn wakes up anywhere from 7:45 to 8:30. She nurses, and then plays at her various toy stations (play mat, jumperoo, bouncy seat). The twins finish watching their program and then have free play time.

9 - snack time, Kellyn also gets a snack of baby food these days to help her nap better

9:30 Kellyn's morning nap (earlier if she woke up early) - Twins activity time: coloring, play-do, practicing ABC's, shapes, and numbers. We're getting a membership to Starfall.com for the year so we can enjoy the rest of the activities they have to offer. It's computer animated learning programs for ABC's, numbers, shapes, colors, basic math, phonics, and kids songs.

11 - I try to get the twins lunch ready before Kellyn wakes up from her nap and wants to eat again. If I'm having a bad day the kids will get to watch another show after lunch so that I can actually eat.

12:30 - start getting all three kids ready for afternoon nap time. The kids always sit on the potty first, so it's more than just taking them in there.

During nap time I often take a nap myself since I rarely get a full night's sleep. Other times I do some cleaning, budgeting, blogging, or something fun on the computer.

2 -3 The kids wake up from their naps at varying times and start to play.

3:30 - afternoon snack for all 3 kids, more play time

4:30 - this is the hardest part of the day when I'm alone, becuase while I'm trying to make dinner for all of the big people, Kellyn needs to eat more baby food for her dinner

5 - Kellyn takes her short evening nap while we eat dinner and clean up the kitchen

6 - Kellyn takes another bottle (yes, she eats a lot which is why she's in 9 month clothes now at not yet 5 months old). Some nights she gets a bath right after this bottle too

6:30 - Bath time for the twins on certain nights. Other nights we Skype with grandparents, play a game, or watch a movie.

7 - bedtime snack for all 3 kids. Usually cereal with milk or applesauce. Kellyn nurses again before going to sleep. This is also a hard time when Barry's not home to help.

7:30 - all 3 kids get in bed.

7:45 - Alyna ALWAYS gets up to go potty again, even if she actually peed 15 minutes before, so Ryan sometimes tags along

8 - if the kids aren't staying in their beds we shut their door with the childproof doorknob cover on the inside. We have to do that every few weeks or so for a few nights

8:30 - ahhhhhh, quiet time

Oh, and of course this didn't include all the diaper changes for Kellyn and potty trips for the twins that may or may not produce the desired results.

A couple months ago I was reading in my Bible where it says that the older women should teach the younger women to be busy at home... well... at this stage I don't have a choice in the matter.

Expressions

2011-01-08T09:09:00.001-08:00

I feel so blessed by my three precious children through all their different expressions and phases.

Ryan, our sensitive and cuddly guy, is also the funny one in the family. He's starting to make jokes about things, and always loves for us to turn his crying into ticklish laughter. Right now his jokes are in the form of pointing to Daddy and saying, "Mommy," and then pointing to himself and saying, "Daddy". He thinks it's really funny to mix up people's names. He also likes games where he pretends he is stuck somewhere.

We have known that Alyna is a little bit of a drama queen since she was 2 weeks old. We have so many wonderful pictures of her full face expressions of her as a baby. Last night she was sitting on the potty mad at me about something, and I was sitting on the edge of the bathtub talking to her about it. I looked over at Barry standing in the doorway and he just started laughing. He said we had the exact same furrowed brow expressions on our faces, and this must be exactly what I looked and acted like at that age. Alyna also makes lots of the same pouty faces her Aunt Krista is infamous for. She and Krista actually had face making sessions with each other in Boston, and it was really funny to watch. Of course, Alyna's big laugh and smile are full enough to make up for the other, not so nice, expressions.

Kellyn is quite the talker and singer these days. Often we'll think she's fussing on her play mat, but when we get over there she's all smiles and just kind of yelling at her toys. It will be interesting as she grows this year to see how her play style fits in with the twins. Kellyn also will sing back at you when you make sing-song coos with your voice. She also likes to be startled slightly, and chuckles when we play peek-a-boo. At church on Wednesday evening she refused to sleep through the devotional even though she was really tired. She wanted to be standing up in a lap so she could look around at everyone making those funny faces while they sing. She was making big mouthed faces back at them.

Learning

2011-01-05T12:31:00.000-08:00

Alyna and Ryan are both learning at such a fast pace these days. Now that Kellyn's schedule is a more predictable during the day, it's easier to plan my activities with them. On the days we're home I use Kellyn's morning nap (1 1/2 -2 hours) to do more preschool type activities now.

Yesterday we did coloring, playing with play-do, and the alphabet zoo on Fisher Price's website. Coloring and play-do activities always involve Mommy drawing/making letters for them. The alphabet zoo is set up so that they can press the letters on the keyboard themselves and it says/shows the animal with that sound.

Today I added in a singing time with them and Kellyn while I fed Kellyn her morning baby food. We've started her on just a little bit of fruit in the mornings and evenings because she's just always so hungry during the day. It has really helped her nap longer. We sang, "God made the big round sun", "Jesus Loves Me", "My God is so big", and "Oh be careful little eyes". Alyna was doing amazingly well following along with the motions to the songs. Ryan just giggled and played on the nearby rocking toy.

During Kellyn's nap we spent a while on Starfall.com going over the letters U through Z. Then we used the website's little program to discover the process of planting, watering, and then watching a flower grow. I printed some color sheets for them from the site. Then we took the baby monitor outside with us for play time. It is a gorgeous day and Ryan didn't even need to wear his jacket.

Alyna can count items from 1 - 10, and Ryan is trying hard to catch up on that. He really wants to be able to do it too. He knows all his uppercase letters now. Alyna is really working on the sounds of the letters.

Here's what she says for some of the letters every time she sees them: instead of "for" she says "a"... we'll work on that some day:
A for "me" (meaning Alyna)
R for Ryan
D for Daddy
M for Mommy
K for "baby" - she still refuses to say Kellyn's name but she knows the K is for her
H for Henrey (our dog)
T for Tessa (my sister's dog)
P for Papa
G for Grandma
N for Mommy... oops I have to correct her and say N is for Nana

And her first sight word is G-O that's "GO". She can also tell you all the letters in her name. Yesterday when she saw a lowercase "n" she said "n for me" because it's in her name. I'm just a little proud, can you tell?

Ryan is ever the sweat-heart. He still loves to give kisses to his baby sister and put blankets on her. It's no wonder the girls at church dote on him so much.

We're really working on the potty training now. Each of them has a chart up with spaces for stickers. When Alyna pees in the potty she gets a sticker. When Ryan even sits on the potty he gets a sticker because he's been fighting me so much on it. When they fill in all the sticker spots they get a special piece of candy. Each of them got 3 stickers this morning, and Alyna was dry that whole time. As soon as Ryan is more consistent with sitting on the potty I'll only give him stickers when he actually pees too. It took a over a week to fill in Alyna's first chart and get her prize, now she's half-way through it on the third day. It's almost time to challenge her to the next level.

Family time

2011-01-01T14:45:00.000-08:00

Grandpa and Grandma Lee from Tennessee came to visit the week of Christmas. We had lots of fun with them. Barry and I went on a date, and the gorgeous Christmas day weather we went to the park.

Christmas at our house

2011-01-01T14:30:00.000-08:00

Ryan and Alyna were lots of "help" in decorating for Christmas this year.

For 2 year olds they actually did really well not taking things off the tree or getting into the presents after being told not to a couple times. It was nice to have everything out this year.

A few of the presents included a 2nd doctor's kit (we will keep both), Tinkerbell and Cars blankets made by Nana, tricycles, saucer chairs (so they'll stop sitting in Kellyn's bouncy seat), and musical toys for "Kellyn". Lots of other neat stuff too of course...

Nana Love made very special blankets for all the kids. Alyna loves her Tinkerbell blanket, and Ryan can't go to sleep without his Cars blanket. They are on their beds to sleep with. They got blankets at their birthday too with these characters which are now designated to the living room for movie times.

Kellyn received a beautiful, soft blanket and matching stuffed animal (yes, Nana made the lamb too). She's a very talented lady.

...isn't she just precious. At 4 months old, Kellyn's first Christmas was very special. She got several knew board books all her own that haven't been chewed on by her siblings. She loves looking at the pictures and now is starting to reach to turn the pages. She's really starting to play a lot more too. It won't be long before she's turning over.

Boston Adventure: Part 4 (Homeward)

2010-12-28T09:19:00.000-08:00

I actually can't remember which night it was, but we let the kids open the Christmas presents from Uncle Adam and Aunt Krista. Ryan got a play tool set, a "Tex" car from the movie Cars, and another Mater car to replace the one we thought he'd lost at home. Daddy eventually found the other Mater in the bottom of one of his shoes. Alyna got a doctor's kit, and a Tinkerbell activity set. Within 15 minutes of opening the two kits, Alyna was making sure that the pieces didn't get mixed up. All the doctor's stuff had to go in the blue case, and all the tools had to be in the orange case.

It was a longer day to get home on Monday, but it was very similar to the ride there. The kids knew what to expect more, so it was a little easier to go through security and walk down the aisles of the plane until Mommy said to stop.

I woke up at 4:30 am (EST) to fed Kellyn, then got myself ready and made sure everything else was packed away. We woke the twins up at 5:45 to change diapers, and gathered all the last minute items like the white noise machines. Alyna laid side-ways on the bed looking out the door into the living room while Ryan was being changed. Then she asked very clearly, "Uncle Adam, what are you doing?" when she saw him picking up suitcases to take outside. That was the first time I mentioned to them that we were going bye-bye on the planes again to go home. They got excited.

Neither slept on the ride to the airport at 6:30 am. We said goodbye to Aunt Krista, made it through security, ate breakfast in the food court, spent 15 minutes in the family bathroom, and made it to our gate with plenty of time to spare. Once again I passed Kellyn around when I needed to take care of Ryan and Alyna. They both fell asleep at different points on both flights. We had a 2 1/2 hour layover at DFW so we ate lunch, played at a play area, and visited the family bathroom 3 times to change 3 different sets of poopy diapers. (Better there than on the plane.)

We were all very excited to Daddy met us at the baggage claim in Midland. We ate dinner nearby and drove an hour and a half home.

We spent the rest of the week recovering... and putting up Christmas decoration. It took about a week for the kids to start sleeping past 6 am our time again.

Boston Adventure: Part 3 (Museum and more)

2010-12-24T08:01:00.000-08:00

Monday was a lazy, stay home day at Aunt Krista's house. Alyna found a new favorite movie in Stuart Little. I don't think she understood most of it, but she kept asking to watch the mouse movie.

Tuesday we bundled the kids up and braved Boston's chilly Atlantic wind to head downtown to the Children's museum. We made it out of the house with the 3 kids by 10 am, and had a great time.

Kellyn actually slept most of the time in her stroller or was content to look around. That left Aunt Krista and I to help the kids explore the exhibits. We didn't even make it to the 3rd floor because there was so much to do on the first two floors.

We spent lots of time in the first room we went through teaching science lessons using golf balls. There were lots of ramps to roll the balls down to see what would happen from different heights. The circle ramp (pictured below) was a favorite because they could watch lots of balls go down and around.

Note to moms: wear short sleeves and sweaters to a children's museum so you can remove the sweaters for the water room. They got their sleeves all wet, though thankfully that was about all. They didn't even WANT to go into the sandbox which was just fine with me.

In the Kindergarten room, they both spent their time right where I would expect them to be. Alyna was mostly in the section marked for Creative Arts, and Ryan was over in the Math and Science area. Alyna spent her time playing with magnets and organizing shapes and colors onto 4 squares. Ryan drew with markers on the white board and loved turning the gears that interlocked together (our little engineer in the making).

In the toddler playroom, Ryan discovered a huge train set that kept his attention for over half an hour. Though he looked into the other areas, this is all he did the whole time, and he cried when I made him leave.

Alyna found a room with a play house, kitchen, and lots of baby dolls. She played with the shopping cart to collect food, and rang the door bell on the house repeatedly.

We headed home about 2 at which point the kids all fell asleep in the car. They even slept another hour when we got home too because they were so worn out from all the walking and exploring.

Wednesday was another lazy, home day. By the afternoon, Krista's dog was a little irritated at the twins constantly bothering her while she tried to nap so the dog went to visit a friend dog down the street for the afternoon and evening hours.

Thursday we went shopping for clothes for Kellyn, took Aunt Krista to a doctor's appointment, and ate lunch out.

Friday we stayed home again... love having lazy days in between the busy ones, especially with a little baby.

Saturday we did more shopping and visited Uncle Adam at work. He is a manager at a Walgreen's store, and had a Santa there to take pictures, but Ryan and Alyna wouldn't go near him. Oh, well. We also spent about 15 minutes looking for the Lightning McQueen car I mistakenly let Ryan take inside with him. It was in my diaper bag... after looking all over the store.

Sunday we went to a mall with a play area while Aunt Krista looked in a couple stores. Ryan tried to take another boy's shoes because they had Lightning on them... we may have to get him some of those next time. We ate lunch and went home for nap time. We worshiped again with the Quincy house church and had a good time with them again though several people were out of town.

It was a funfilled week, and a great time for them to get to know their "Unco Anam" and "An Kissa" who live so far away.

Boston Adventure: Part 2

2010-12-18T15:33:00.001-08:00

Saturday we played around Aunt Krista's house all morning

After nap time walked down the street to her best friend's house for Krista's baby shower. She is due in February with baby Madison. It was wonderful to meet all of her friends and share that special day with her.

Ryan kept his new favorite toy close by... though we did have to hunt for Lightning McQueen a few rare times when he'd play with another toy.

On Sunday we went to a local mall to eat lunch, play at the play area, visit the pet store, and get supplies from Target.

We worshiped on Sunday night with the Quincy Community House Church. It was a special experience to worship with the group. The two 2 year olds certainly added a new level to their experience and Aunt Krista eventually took them and the 1 year old upstairs to play. We shared communion and dinner before heading home.

We Skyped on the webcam with Daddy that night, and they also took a bath in the big whirlpool tub. Each night was a little easier to get them into bed, but they still would ask to go home to their own beds.

The Boston Adventure: Part 1

2010-12-18T08:09:00.000-08:00

We left the house at 7:30 in the morning and with the time change driving into Texas, checking bags, diaper changes, feeding Kellyn, and going through security, we barely made it onto our 11:30 am flight to Dallas.

Security was by far the toughest part of the trip both ways, but not because of the newest measures we've been hearing about. It was just tough to get shoes off, bags off, Kellyn out of her carrier, the twins out of their stroller, walking through the metal detector, calling the kids to follow me, and then putting everything back together again. It took 15 minutes just for us to go through. They also tested the breast milk bottles I had in Midland, but didn't seem to care about them in Boston. What does that tell you about the security?

As we walked onto the small airplane, Ryan realized Daddy hadn't come with us and started crying his name. Everyone on the plane seemed to think this was very sweet. I pulled out his monkey cuddley, and a new Lightning McQueen matchbox car for him... and he seemed to forget everything else. That Lightning McQueen stayed attatched to his hand all week long. Alyna got a new My Little Pony and several new coloring books for the trip. She was also glad I brought her baby doll and her "Find Elmo" book for her to look at.

Alyna sat in the single seat by the window by herself and I sat across the aisle from her next to Ryan. They both did very well and Kellyn slept pretty much the whole time. I got a can of juice from the flight attendant to split between their two sippy cups.

We had a lunchtime layover in Dallas so we went to the McDonalds where they also have a few toys for the kids to climb in/over. They didn't actually eat anything, so I just packed up their nuggets and took them to the next flight with me.

The 4 hour flight to Boston was as good as it could be. A nice lady named Jennifer helped me down the ramp and to our seats with the kids. They kept trying to sit in available seats as we'd walk by them, but we were at the back of the plane. Jennifer said she had 2 small children of her own (though not with her) and if I needed any help to let her know. During the takeoff, I fed Kellyn a bottle and changed her diaper, then passed her to Jennifer when we were in the air. She held Kellyn for over an hour because she fell asleep. I put "Mater's Tall Tales" on the IPod for the kids to watch, and Alyna fell asleep. Ryan actually watched Mater twice through and then got down on the floor to play with his cars. Everyone was willing to help watch the kids for a minute while I took a trip to the restroom, and took Alyna potty too.

At the end of the flight Kellyn was flirting with the older gentleman on the aisle a row behind me. When Ryan started acting up and not wanting to sit in his seatbelt, I asked if he would hold her. He gladly accepted, and even sang, "Old McDonald had a turtle?" to her and put her to sleep. He held her for the landing, and I could keep Ryan entertained and in his seat.

It was after 7 pm (EST)when we met up with Aunt Krista and Uncle Adam in the Boston airport. We got our luggage, went to dinner, and almost immediately upon arriving at their house started putting the kids to bed. At this point Ryan started pointing to the door saying, "bye-bye" repeatedly. After that long day he wanted to be home.

We're Home

2010-12-14T05:00:00.000-08:00

We made it home safely on Monday evening. I got up at 4:30 am (EST) and we left Aunt Krista's house at 6 am (EST). Our 2nd flight arrived in Midland, TX a little after 4 pm (CST), fed Kellyn, ate dinner, and drove 1 1/2 hours home to New Mexico arriving around 7 pm (Mountain time). Long, long, day...

Full trip report at a later date.

We're off

2010-12-02T06:34:00.000-08:00

Friday is the big day. The adventure begins at 7:30 in the morning (mountain time) with an hour and a half drive to the Midland, TX airport factoring in an hour time change to central time. We'll check in, say goodbye to Daddy, go through security, fly to Dallas, eat lunch, and then fly to Boston arriving at 6 pm (eastern time). Please pray for safe and fast travel for us.

I've got a front carrier for Kellyn, a double stroller for the twins. We'll stuff our coats in the basket of the stroller except when we have to leave it to be gate checked. Alyna and Ryan each have a small backpack for their own toys, coloring book, change of clothes, cup and snacks. I've got a large backpack for all our extra things, and a small diaper bag that will fit under the seat for the immediate needs.

I'm so excited to see my sister and meet all her friends up there.

Side Note:
Kellyn had another growth spurt last week and at 3 1/2 months old she weighs 15 pounds.

I looked back at my archived blogs, and at the twins' 6 month checkup they were just shy of 15 pounds. Kellyn feels so heavy to me, and she is already starting to look snug in some of the 3-6 month clothes. It was already fully spring when Alyna got to 6-9 month clothes, so Kellyn may actually need an all new wardrobe soon. Even at only a month apart the hand-me-down system doesn't always work.

Happy Thanksgiving

2010-11-25T12:29:00.000-08:00

Alyna and Ryan sat for 20 minutes licking the freshly made whipped cream off the beaters.

We are so very thankful for our blessings this year. At the top of the list is Kellyn's arrival as a happy, beautiful baby girl in August. Ryan and Alyna are growing into such wonderful children who love everyone and love to learn. Barry is blessed with a good career which allows me to be at home with our young children. And while we may not love the city we live in, we defintely love all the people we know. It is a wonderful blessing to have lots of substitute grandparents, aunts, and uncles to mentor our children in God's ways.

We are also quite thankful to not have company for this holiday this year. This will be the first time since the Thanksgiving we were in Europe in 2007 that we haven't had anyone here (that includes the Christmas holidays as well). We love when we do have family visiting us, but it's also nice to enjoy just being our small family of 5 as well.

Thank you for reading this... you are my support system and I love sharing our lives with you.

Every month counts

2010-11-23T12:59:00.001-08:00

It's amazing how much kids learn in a month's time.

We all know how infants change rapidly each month. Kellyn this month is interacting with her world so much more. She wants to sit up in your lap to look around, and she loves to watch her siblings play.

But I've been surprised lately at how much Alyna and Ryan still change every month. It's getting easier all the time to communicate with them. They are learning to follow directions, and to form complete sentences when they are speaking. They love to learn new things.

Sometimes I work with them on pronouncing a new word or someone's name. Last week Ryan learned to say "monkey" very clearly. This week the word blanket has gone from "bet" to "bayket". I figured out just today that when Ryan asks where "Whining" is he's saying "Lightning" meaning his Lightning McQueen car.

Alyna called from across the house yesterday, "Mom, where are you?" I chuckled because she sounded so grown up. Every time you sigh or say, "ouch" she asks "Are you okay?" It's so cute that she shows such concern for those around her.

Ryan knows many of his letters now, but doesn't respond to questions about them like Alyna does. Alyna can tell you many of the lowercase letters now along with the capital letters. She looked at a lower case "d" today and said "Daddy", because d is for Daddy.

She often says pieces of the alphabet repeatedly though she'll skip letters. She gets "A, B, C, D" easily then skips around a bunch until "W, Y, Z, now I know".

She does the same with counting to ten. Right now it's: 1, 2, 3, 7, 9, 10

Alyna knows what the computer mouse is and the remote control so she can bring them to me across the room while I'm nursing. Ryan and Alyna both love to take Kellyn's empty bottles to the sink for me. When their drink cups are empty they will often go put them on the counter by the refrigerator so I can refill them.

I am so thankful for every day that they grow and learn. God's blessings are overflowing in my house this holiday season.

picture updates

2010-11-20T07:23:00.001-08:00

Kellyn is now 3 months old. She interacts a lot with everyone, cooing and smiling. She reaches to hit and grab toys, but her favorite thing to do right now is watch ceiling fans. It's fun to watch her as she stares and talks to the fan as the shadows move across the ceiling above her.

Ryan actually shares his most prized possession with her as a blanket. This is his monkey cuddly that he sleeps with and carries around when he's not feeling well. He loves her so much.

Alyna and Ryan are loosing that toddler look and looking more like little kids. It's fun to watch them grow.

Yucky

2010-11-18T05:21:00.000-08:00

We've got a nasty stomach bug going around our family this week. This is actually the first one we've had since the long before the twins were born. The poor kids didn't even know what was happening since they'd never thrown up before.

Ryan got it first, on Monday afternoon, and he got the mildest case. He threw up a couple times, and had a few yucky diapers on Tuesday.

Alyna and I both got it worse on Tuesday night. Alyna was fine by morning, but I still have some symptoms hanging on even now. I didn't eat anything until Wednesday night. I'm just trying to stay hydrated.

The poor kids are going crazy because Barry and I are too tired to do anything with them. He was just coming off night shift on Tuesday so his lack of sleep was evident yesterday. He hasn't gotten the bug yet, but odds are he will in the next few days. Hopefully since Kellyn hasn't gotten it yet she will be fine. She would have been exposed when I was since I'm breastfeeding.

One of the hardest parts for me is still trying to nurse while sick. Even to pump the milk is a chore of sitting in one place for a while. I learned how to feed her while lying down because of it. She looked at me really funny at first until she figured out that the food was there so it didn't matter that we changed positions.

Today's thoughts

2010-11-12T08:50:00.001-08:00

As we approach the Thanksgiving holiday I always feel so blessed by the LORD to be where I am today.

It's an extra windy fall day here in southern New Mexico. Barry's at work all day (12 hours shift) and I'm home with the kids. There's a couple errands I could run, but I don't know if we'll do it today or not. Ryan awoke with a constant cough, and as I mentioned before, it is really windy outside.

I've already got 2 loads of laundry waiting to be folded, and about 3 more to go. I got a little behind on it this week.

Beef stew is in the crockpot for dinner, and the dishwasher is unloaded.

Alyna and Ryan woke up at 6:30 and are having a pajamas morning, and watched a movie because I knew they wouldn't go outside to play this morning. Kellyn is in the swing about to take a nap.

This afternoon, their new friend Madison is coming over to play with them. Madison is in 7th grade and just moved here in August. She and her 5th grade sister, Casey, are absolutely wonderful with the kids, and come over a couple times a week just to play with them. They'll even change diapers or take them to the potty without being asked. Since they live about 5 blocks away, it's a perfect situation. They're family attends our congregation, and we get along really well with their parents too.

Alyna loves having them over so much that last night before dinner she kept asking for them. She'd say "Mad and Cases?" over and over again.

P.S. Only in New Mexico would the Thanksgiving meal bags we give out from church include bags of rice and pinto beans. LOL!

Booked

2010-11-10T09:19:00.000-08:00

We're doing it. I'm flying with the 3 kids to Boston on Friday, December 3 and returning on Monday, December 13. I'll be there for my sister's baby shower on Saturday which I'm really excited about. We'll miss Barry's really rough week of work and when we return home on Monday he is off work until Thursday.

We have one stop each way at DFW where we should have enough time to eat lunch, play, and change planes.

So I've been busy making sure we have warm clothes and a few new toys/coloring books for the trip. While it is in the 30s here at night, it was 80 degrees here yesterday during the daytime. We haven't needed more than a sweatshirt yet.

I'm excited, and the next few weeks will be very busy.

A Test Run

2010-11-06T19:33:00.000-07:00

Next month Barry has a week of work that will be longer and harder than any of his usual shifts. He will work 3 long days and then 3 long nights. I'd rather not even be here with the kids that week, but none of my family or close friends live with-in close driving distance. So I either have a 8+ hour drive by myself, or a couple plane rides. Neither is appealing with the 3 kids, but I'm also just anxious to travel somewhere. I've been couped up in this town for 4 months now, and that's very unusual for me. I really want to go visit my sister in Boston that week.

Barry's worried that a plane ride with the 3 kids will be so rough that I'll regret doing it. I think a long drive would be even worse. My biggest challenges with the 3 little ones are parking lots and public restrooms. At least in the airports they are usually bigger and clean, and you don't have to cross a parking lot to get there. So.....

I realized that if I really want to do this I need to prove myself first by taking the 3 of them somewhere other than just to the church building and friend's houses. So off we went today on a short road trip (Barry was sleeping for night-shift anyway).

We got a late start because Kellyn slept from 9 pm to 9 am straight. So by the time I fed her, dressed her, and got everything loaded it was a little after 10 am. We drove an hour and 40 minutes to the Target in Odessa, TX. Everyone traveled wonderfully. Kellyn didn't start crying until 10 minutes away when she decided she was too hungry to wait any longer. I gave her a bottle as I wheeled in the cart across the parking lot.

The main goal was to buy coats and backpacks for Ryan and Alyna and look at or purchase some other small items. It's such a warm season here, that they didn't have many actual coats out. I found one I think will work for Alyna that is a fuzzy pale pink and lined with fake fur. I didn't find one for Ryan. I'll have to visit a couple local stores in the next week or two to find one for Ryan. Since we aren't out in the early morning or late evening it's not an urgent matter.

Alyna picked the Tinkerbell backpack and sippy cup over Disney Princess. Ryan got a Toy Story backpack because there weren't any Cars motifs available, but did get a Cars sippy cup. We don't use sippy cups a lot except when we go places, but the ones we have are leaking. We found the backpacks in the luggage section where they discovered the rolling backpacks. Ryan was instantly zooming around with Lightning McQueen from Cars, and Alyna took the Disney Princesses (in the absence of Tinkerbell) for a stroll. I let them take them along to the next few stops. We filled the cart with a couple long sleeve shirts for each of the 3, and next-size-up shoes for the twins.

We went back to the toy section to look at the tricycles. There was only one without security bindings on it that they could sit on, so I had to supervise them taking turns. (This was a test to see if it would make a good Christmas present... and I think it passed.) When it was time to put it back on the shelf, Ryan was reluctant to dismount.

When I turned around from putting him back inside the cart, Alyna was gone. I walked to the end of the aisle and looked around but she was nowhere in sight. I turned to a couple other moms with kids and carts and asked if they saw a 2 year old girl pulling a suitcase. I started calling her name and walking toward the baby section across the path. After a very long minute (or so), one of the other moms called out that she saw her. Alyna was right back on the aisle with the tricycles. She must have gone down and back around one of the next aisles to find me again. It was a very scary moment for me.

After a bathroom stop where Alyna actually used the potty, and checking out at the register, we went to Chick-fil-a. We stayed there for over an hour because it had a great play-place. I fed Kellyn her 2nd bottle right before we left.

I also realized that Ryan has developed a fear of public restrooms. I had to pick him up and carry him in both times. I think it's because he hates the hand dryers. The one in the Target restroom was used 3-4 times while we were in there and he screamed his head off. One of the workers said she'd wait and use the towels in the staff room so he wouldn't cry again. The Chick-fil-a bathroom didn't even have a dryer and he screamed and tried to crawl under the stall door several times. I hope he gets over that soon.

All the kids napped on the drive home, and once again Kellyn started crying about 10 minutes away. I guess that's here limit.

So I made it. It's not quite like an airport and long plane ride would be, but at least it didn't discourage me from it. Now we have to decide about the plane... hmmmmm

Crazy Tuesdays

2010-11-02T12:51:00.000-07:00

Tuesday mornings we attend Ladies Bible Class at our congregation, and there's a paid nursery worker to watch Ryan and Alyna play in the nursery. Another 2 year old, Mia, usually comes too, and they get along very well together.

Class starts at 9:30 so we have to be loading up in the van by 9:10 just to make it in time with all the car seats to fasten and unfasten even though it's only a 7 minute drive. This morning at 8:55 I was finishing up getting ready and thinking that we were all set to go a little early when I looked over and saw that Ryan and Alyna were still in their pajamas. I hadn't even picked out clothes for them yet, so I had to rush around to get them changed in time to leave.

We weren't late, but it wasn't the easy pace I thought I was achieving...

At the very end of class we heard screaming coming all the way down the hall from the nursery. I couldn't tell if it was Ryan or Mia... so Mia's mom and I both ended up going down there to see what was happening. It was both of them. Mia was throwing a tantrum because she didn't want to put her shoes on, and Ryan was crying because he didn't understand why Mia was upset. He's such a sensitive guy, and was a little tired today from waking up early today.

We went to lunch with a bunch of ladies where Ryan ended up in our preacher's wife's lap... because she had chocolate cake in front of her.

Kellyn slept through most of class and lunch. When she woke up at the end of lunch one of the ladies held her and fed her some of the bottle. Then she gave me a special treat... a blowout poopy diaper. It leaked up the back onto her shirt. I didn't have an extra shirt with me because I switched bags this morning, so she got to wear a blanket for coming home.

The 3 kids all napped at the same time for almost an hour... that was some nice quiet time.

After nap, and snack (applesauce) we all went for a walk. I carried Kellyn in our baby carrier on my chest. (It's like a backpack but worn on the front.) I decided that instead of pushing the double stroller that I would pull the kids in our 2-seater wagon. The polling place is only 2 blocks away, and they enjoyed the ride to the fire station. The ladies at the tables were happy to talk to Ryan and Alyna while I filled in the bubbles on the ballot. Kellyn had fallen asleep by then.

As we exited the fire station we stopped at the fenced in park next door for about 20 minutes. It's a small play area with a tunnel and slide in the shape of a fire engine. Ryan ran to the back gate and looked at the fire engine, and watched a digging machine help some men move rocks.

On the way home we stopped to visit our neighbor Mrs. Smith who just adores them. She brought a basket of stuffed animals into her living room for them to play with. They made all the animal sounds for her as we talked.

Our outing didn't end there. We loaded up into our van and went to the drive-thru of the bank for some cash and picked up dinner on the way home.

I'm hoping the kids will all sleep really well tonight. Kellyn seems a little out of sorts from the strange schedule of the day. Tomorrow we stay at home all day until church at night. It will be nice...

up to speed

2010-10-15T13:34:00.000-07:00

We got our computer back with a new hard drive installed on Wednesday afternoon, and it's been crazy trying to find time to re-install all the programs we use frequently. But today the kids are taking a longer nap than usual, so I have a few minutes to upload some recent pictures.

Kellyn's first smiles have been precious... and hard to catch on camera.

Ryan and Alyna both love to get down and play with Kellyn. This has also been the cause of many time-outs as they learn how to be gentle around a baby.

Ryan is saying "shhh" because she's sleeping.

He still fits... kind of...

Alyna loves to practice being a Mommy. She's a very good helper with everything too.

computer issues

2010-10-06T12:21:00.000-07:00

Just so everyone knows... we're all fine... we are just having computer issues.

The hard drive crashed on our main computer last week while I had a bad cold and Barry was on his work shift. So today we took it to a repair shop to see if the tech can fix it or he will replace the hard drive for us. It's frustrating because this is the 3rd time the hard drive has had problems, and the computer is only 1 year old. We do thankfully have backups of all our pictures on an external hard drive.

We've plugged our old computer in now, but it is very slow. I don't want to even mess with uploading pictures from this one.

Kellyn is growing so big already. She is 7 weeks old and is already outgrowing some of the 0-3 month clothing, but the 3-6 month stuff looks really big still. She's starting to give smiles now and coo at us. It's a precious age.

As is typical of 2 year olds, Alyna and Ryan are learning new things and testing boundaries every day. Alyna recognizes almost all of her uppercase letters now and is working on the sounds. Ryan is ever the little boy, eating everything he finds and climbing anything that will be still.

I hope the computer is fixed soon so I can put up more pictures for you...

2nd Birthday Pictures (and update)

2010-09-25T09:47:00.000-07:00

It's been really busy in our house the past 2 weeks. Nana and Papa were here to help celebrate the twins birthday on the 15th (and Barry's too). They left on Friday morning, and then my brother Matt and his family arrived from Austin that evening. Ryan and Alyna love playing with their cousins Sean (11) and Joshua (7), so it was a very loud and active weekend.

They left on Monday morning, and Barry was on day shift at work... so this was my first week home alone with the 3 kids. They kept me so busy I barely could find the time to eat or go to the bathroom. We survived the week. I did almost have a breakdown on Wednesday and called on a friend from church to play stand-in Grandma and take the twins for half the day. It was a much needed break after the twins kept us up every couple hours the night before. I think they are just now adjusting to having and now not having all the company here.

Kellyn starting to interact with us more, and reach toward things she sees. Ryan and Alyna always want to kiss her, hold her, and play with her.

Here are pictures from the birthday party with Nana and Papa. We had an ice cream cake. They got lots of books, some stuffed animals, and other assorted small toys. Alyna got a kitchen setup with dishes, and Ryan got a basketball hoop. They both love both of those toys.

Triple Birthday

2010-09-15T07:35:00.001-07:00

Happy 2nd Birthday to Alyna and Ryan... and Happy much older birthday to my wonderful husband Barry.

It's amazing to see how much can change in a family in just 2 years. Barry and I went from no kids to 3 kids in that time and so much has changed in our perspective on the world. Alyna and Ryan have learned so much this year and have definitely lost that "baby" look.

They are saying more words and sentences every day. They are learning their colors, shapes, letters, and numbers. Both of them can pick out "A" and "R" all over the place. Alyna also knows E, O, K, and sometimes other letters. They are great big siblings and very loving toward the new baby in the house. Alyna loves to hop like a bunny everywhere she goes, and Ryan still climbs on anything we'll let him. It will be a challenge to have two 2 year olds at one time. They are both already very opinionated about what they want to eat, play with, and do during the day.

Barry works very hard to provide everything our family needs. We don't enjoy his shift periods where he is gone most of the time, but we all treasure his long off periods when he is around all the time. I love having him as my husband and parenting partner.

I pray God's blessings for many more years on our family as we all grow older, and hopefully wiser.

3 week update

2010-09-13T17:18:00.000-07:00

I'm tired... but that's to be expected. At 3 1/2 weeks old, Kellyn is an easy baby. She eats well when she wants to eat, and sleeps well when she wants to sleep. She still sleeps for long stretches at night as long as she's eaten enough during the day. 2 nights this week she's gone for 8 hours between feedings and I've woken her up at about 5 am to eat. Of course, we've also had a couple nights like last night where she just won't settle into that deep sleep until around midnight and keeps waking up every 20 minutes or so for various reasons. Kellyn has baby acne really badly over her neck and face right now, but there's not really anything we can do about it but wait it out. It's already getting better on her forehead which is where it got bad first.

Alyna and Ryan seem to be having lots of trouble sleeping right now. They had small colds last week, and I think both have the last few teeth pushing into their mouths too. They keep waking up way before 6:30 am (their usual time) and taking much shorter naps than usual as well. It makes for 2 whiny almost 2 year olds during the daytime.

They are both talking a lot more each day. Alyna is working on full sentences like, "I need help" (to get up into the booster seat), and "I ready go play." It's nice when I decipher a word like "pie" into "play" because knowing what she wants takes a little bit of the frustration out of my day.

3 of the 5 members of our househole have birthdays on Wednesday, September 15. Ryan and Alyna turn 2, and they were born on their Daddy's 30th birthday... you do the math. Barry's parents are still here, and since Barry is working a lot this week, we actually did their birthday party last week. I'll post pictures of that later. I figure I had this whole week to work that out.

Kellyn is crying... gotta go feed my littlest munchkin...

Changing of the Guard

2010-09-04T07:20:00.001-07:00

Grandma Lee left this morning to fly home to Tennessee... Nana and Papa Love arrived last night and are here for about 2 weeks.

(Nana is on the left, Grandma on the right)

It was great having my mom here for so long. She did so much to help with the twins, the baby, my recovery, the housework, the cooking, and the cleaning. I'll miss having her here. Alyna couldn't quite pronounce "Grandma" so it's been coming out Mamaw. They really got used to how she did things, so hopefully the transition isn't too difficult. I'm sure it will be more difficult for me than for them.

Pictures This week

2010-08-31T08:56:00.000-07:00

We attempted some family photos in the back yard this morning... but it didn't go so well. Ryan ran away, and as Grandma caught him she bonked him on the head with the camera. So he has a nice goose egg forming above his left eye in the picture. Then Alyna wanted to hold Kellyn, and then she was just done. We got some funny candid shots, but nothing worthy of the living room wall. Maybe we'll try again next week.

These pictures were taken on Sunday morning when Alyna and Kellyn wore matching dresses to church for Kellyn's first appearance. Alyna thinks that was a pretty neat idea.

And Grandma sure does enjoy snuggle time with her new granddaughter...

Kellyn's First Week

2010-08-26T09:41:00.000-07:00

Kellyn Brooke is a sweet and beautiful baby girl. She always looks around when she hears noises to see who is making them, and doesn't seem to mind her toddler siblings playing and screaming right next to her. She eats well and sleeps really well too. At only a week old, we usually have a 4 hour block and then 6 hour block between feedings at night. I'm amazed at this, and have enjoyed having the extra sleep. This does present a challenge during the daytime though because she wants to eat more often to make up for the lack of night time feedings. So we are flexible and watch for signs that she is still hungry.

Grandma gave Kellyn her first sponge bath at home... she squalled the whole time. She seemed to enjoy it the second time around though.

Kellyn actually has enough hair that it has to be washed and rinsed well or it gets oily.

I am nursing Kellyn, but sometimes pump into a bottle which she takes quite well. This gives her Daddy a chance for some special one on one time.

Ryan and Alyna enjoyed having Grandma and Daddy around all week to play with them. Barry returned to work on Wednesday, the 25th.

Alyna likes to look at the "Where's Waldo" books with her Daddy. She can even find Waldo by herself sometimes now. She has a lot of focus for not even being 2 years old yet.

Grandma made a really cool tunnel with 2 dining room chairs and a sheet.

Welcome Kellyn Brooke Love

2010-08-21T10:56:00.001-07:00

This was me on the morning of Wednesday, August 18.

Kellyn Brooke Love was born at 9:29 am, Wednesday, August 18, 2010. She weighed 7 lbs 2 oz and was 19 inches long. The first thing the doctor's said before she was even out was, "Look at that full head of hair."

She was perfectly healthy, and joined her Mommy in the hospital room a few hours later for her first meal. She eats and sleeps well, and always wanted her Daddy to hold her.

We took Kellyn home on Friday around lunch time.

The big day arrives

2010-08-17T13:35:00.000-07:00

Today I had my final Dr. appointment and preop visit to the hospital. Tomorrow, Wednesday, I'll go to the hospital at 7:30 am to deliver Kellyn Brooke by c-section. Grandma is here to care for the twins while Barry and I are at the hospital. And if all goes well, we'll all come home on Friday.

That's about all that's on my mind right now. I'll try to post pictures and this weekend. Please pray for our doctors, and our health this week.

P.S. I did think of something else...

Alyna has named her baby doll... "She". We think it comes from our saying "Where is she?" all the time so she associated "She" as the baby's name. And now every baby Alyna sees she says "She". Funny toddlers.

Sleep re-arrangements

2010-08-14T12:27:00.000-07:00

Alyna, the toddler who already wants to do everything herself (or at least try), has finally decided that nap time is better with someone to sleep with.

When Ryan was sick a month ago, she threw a fit several times when he would come climb into her bed. So he stopped doing that. We've been having issues that past couple weeks with Alyna throwing tantrums at nap time and bed time. She doesn't want to lie down in her bed, and gets up repeatedly.

Thursday at nap time, Barry finally gave up and just brought her out of her room after 25 minutes of a tantrum after Ryan had already fallen asleep. I took her into my bed, and she went to sleep almost immediately on his side of the bed. We slept there for 2 hours, and Ryan was still asleep in his own bed. I definitely don't want to make a habit of this because after the baby is born I won't always be able to nap with her.

Friday at nap time she kept coming into the hallway and we repeatedly put her back in her bed. Finally we shut the door fully and she cried, but stopped eventually. About an hour later she awoke crying and when I went in I found that she had actually been at the end of Ryan's bed. I think she was disoriented when she woke up and fell off the bed. Then neither one would go back to sleep.

Today I again told her to get back in bed several times, and even took her into the bathroom for a small swat on the leg so that she knew she was in trouble. I then heard Ryan and Alyna talk and play for the next 30 minutes, but we decided that as long as they were in the room, that was ok. Sure enough 40 minutes after the initial nap time tuck in, all was quiet. I waited 10 more minutes and then peaked in the room. Alyna is curled up on her bed on top of her pillow in the corner of the bedframe and the wall, and Ryan is lying in the middle of her bed on his back. His head is on her pillow and he's covered with her sheet.

Well, whatever works. I just hope it lasts past the hour mark today.

Update: Nope... Alyna woke up at 1 hour, and was upset that someone else was in her bed. Ryan stayed asleep where he was, so I removed her from the room. She used to be the one who wanted the 2 hour naps and Ryan would wake up after an hour, but not this week.

7 days and counting...

2010-08-11T07:14:00.000-07:00

This time next Wednesday (if not before), I'll be meeting my baby Kellyn... I'm very ready to see if she looks like Alyna.

I was very uncomfortable trying to sleep last night, but feel pretty good this morning. I just get tired very easily these days so I have to sit down and rest often.

Alyna always takes that as her cue that it is time to read a book or color with Mommy. Ryan usually joins us for a while, and then roams around and makes trouble. He's gotten in trouble the past few days for coloring on the walls, floors, and furniture. We're still working on what "paper" is and isn't.

I'm just hoping the rest of the day goes as smoothly as the first few hours this morning have... but with 2 toddlers, that is a lot to ask.

hanging in there

2010-08-09T16:44:00.000-07:00

We've hit the 38th week of the pregnancy. The official due date is still 2 weeks off (Aug 23), so I'm really hoping to hold off delivery until the scheduled day next Wednesday (Aug 18). I at least hope baby Kellyn will wait until after Saturday night when my mom arrives. It will give me piece of mind to know I can leave for the hospital at any time without having to first arrange child care for my current little ones.

We almost went to the hospital last Wednesday night because my contractions were strong and 5 minutes apart, but after an hour and a half of lying down they finally slowed down. I'm just glad Barry was home that night because I couldn't do anything but lie there.

This week is all about just making it through. We had a play-date this morning, and it was really good to catch up with the mom. Her little boy is just 4 months younger than the twins so they had fun together.

Tomorrow we have a play-date at the church's nursery with several other 1-3 year olds. That's been a good place for us to play this summer about once a week. It's air conditioned, and a safe environment where I don't worry about them running off from me. They are faster than I am right now...

Wednesday and Thursday are quiet days at home... hopefully... while Barry sleeps for night shift.

Then Barry is off for the rest of the weekend. Unless I'm in labor, he'll drive to Lubbock on Saturday afternoon to pick up my mom from the airport... and then the real countdown to Wednesday morning begins.

Alyna's First Hair Cut, and more

2010-08-06T17:46:00.000-07:00

Alyna did so well during her first hair cut today. She woke up from her nap, and I told her we were going to go see Miss Esther and let her play with her hair. She seemed okay with that idea. It helps that Esther attends church with us, helps in the nursery sometimes, and is in our Life Group.

The cut was mostly to even out the layers in her hair where it grew at different speeds from the time she was a baby.

Alyna sat in the big chair (on a booster), and the drape was bright pink with butterflies all over it. She was very still, and didn't get scared. She did have a curious look on her face as Esther placed some of her hair on the counter for me to bring home as a keepsake. After the cut, she sat through a blow dry and even having the ends curled under. She was rewarded with a piece of chocolate, and getting to meet Esther's dogs.

This is Ryan throwing a tantrum because he saw his night time cuddly go into the washer.

Alyna loves to try on shoes... even Daddy's.

In this picture you can kind of see how scraggly her hair was from growing out as a baby.

Getting Help

2010-08-06T09:27:00.001-07:00

Grandma was here for the first week of July, but when she left things just started to pile up. Clutter, uncleaned bathrooms, sticky floors, tall grass, weeds, out of control bushes... etc. With all the reorganizing and swapping of rooms in preparation for a new baby, everything was feeling overwhelming for Barry and me.

So we've hired some help, and are very grateful that it fits into our budget to do so.

July was an unusually wet month here, and we've also been running our sprinklers when it doesn't rain because we're trying to get new grass seed to grow in some of the dead spots of our really large yard. We have a .4 acre lot. So for right now, we have a local teacher/coach mowing and weed eating our whole lawn every week. As school starts and fall approaches it won't be that often.

This morning as they mow, Barry is resetting sprinkler heads and trimming bushes and trees. He'd be out there all day today and tomorrow if he were doing everything himself. Now he will have time to spend with his family before he starts his next shift, and the lawn will look nice too.

Every 2 weeks or so, we are having a housecleaning service come in. It's been worth it so far. By the time I do the dishes, and pick up all the toys and clutter... I'm don't have the energy to clean the floors and bathrooms. Now it at least gets done before it becomes a health hazard.

As one of our friends said... we are also stimulating the local economy by employing people. Mostly it feels nice to not stress about cleaning the tub with a 9 month pregnant belly. It's hard enough on me right now just to take care of the kids all day.

My mom will be here in about 1 week to stay for 3 weeks to help with the kids and the new baby's arrival. After that, Barry's mom will be here for about a week and a half, and then we'll have other company come through to see the baby throughout the following months.

Morning Change Up

2010-07-31T07:17:00.000-07:00

This morning started strangely. Ryan and Alyna started making noises and talking to each other around 6:30. I went back to sleep, and awoke at 6:50 as they came out into the hallway. Instead of coming to get me though, they headed out to the living room to play. I got up and got dressed to come out to check on them and start the morning.

Usually they plop in front of the refrigerator first thing, and beg for their breakfast, and then want to watch a video.

This morning I found Ryan by the back door, and he really wanted to go out and play in the water left in the little pool. I tried to tell him it was too cold, and we had to eat breakfast first. He whined and cried because he really wanted to go play outside.

They ate their yogurt for breakfast, and were still clammoring to go outside. Since they both needed new diapers anyway and still had their pajamas on, I just put swim diapers on them (without clothes), and we headed outside. I figured the water would be cold and we would come right back inside. It was only a little after 7 am, and the sun wasn't even fully up in the sky to warm things up. Ryan actually splashed in the water quite a bit, and Alyna waded in it some. They played at the water table, and dumped water from buckets into various places. Oddly enough, Alyna got cold first and came to snuggle in my lap wrapped up in a towel. We were probably out there for 30 minutes before they were ready to come inside.

They've been playing happily with various toys for the last hour now. Alyna had fun putting on Barry's work boots and trying to walk in them, and now she's diapering her baby doll. Ryan built a neat tower with the Megablocks, and is now playing with a car. I've been so impressed with his building skills the past couple days. I expected to have to build things for him to knock down, but he actually likes to stack the blocks, and gets mad when Alyna knocks them over.

It's fun to watch them learn and grow...

...Dressed for church. Alyna in her pretty pink dress, and Ryan in his new Cars shirt.

Feeling Blessed

2010-07-26T09:45:00.000-07:00

As I said on Facebook recently, I made the trip to WalMart on Saturday morning with the kids... 8 months pregnant pushing a double stroller and pulling a full cart. I got lots of comments on having cute kids, a question about where I got the stroller from anther twins' mom, lots of sympathetic looks, and even a "bless your heart."

I ended up in the same checkout line with the twins mom I had talked to earlier in the store. She had several other helpers with her, so we got to chat a few minutes. She asked how far along I made it before delivering the twins and was surprised when I said we had made it all the way to 9 months and they were perfectly healthy. Her story was quite different.

She was pregnant with triplets, and started going into labor at only 20 weeks. They held her off until 25 weeks at which point the babies are just barely viable outside the womb. She lost the little girl, but the two boys survived... staying in the hospital for more than 4 months. The two boys are now 17 months old, though I had guessed they were just 11 - 12 months old. She said one of them is still on breathing treatments at night, and they both are really far behind developmentally. They aren't really even crawling yet, and one had obvious eye problems.

Also last week, two of my friends from college, Tim and Amanda Allen, had their infant son (I think about 4 months old) undergo the second heart surgery of his young life. He is doing well today and they should be able to take him home by Thursday. Praise God for that!

I am constantly reminded of my blessings when I hear other's stories. I am already 36 weeks pregnant with Kellyn which gives her a great chance of being born at this point without any health issues. I have 2 healthy twins toddlers who are developmentally on track.

No matter the stresses in my life right now... I feel very blessed. God has been good to my growing family, and I pray for his blessings to continue.

Baby Countdown

2010-07-21T06:18:00.000-07:00

... 4 weeks and counting ...

Because we are at a rural hospital, I've opted to have another scheduled c-section. Of course, if she decides to come before 39 1/2 weeks, then we'll do it then, but other wise, the date is Wednesday, August 18.

The nursery looks a lot bigger with only one crib in it. I still have to rearrange the furniture in there a little. The twins really like their big room with big beds.

We bought our first packages of newborn diapers at WalMart this weekend, and another box of wipes for her room. It's amazing that with all the baby things we already have, we still seem to have bought a lot of things for this baby: a second MP3 player dock for playing lullabies in the rooms, another white noise machine, new lap pads, a new changing table pad, etc. We also bought a car seat cover in pink to replace the cover on Ryan's old car seat.

I'm already having contractions, and sometimes they get close together when I'm tired or doing too much walking. This happens especially in the evenings, so we just can't plan to be anywhere after nap time these days. I'm really having trouble sleeping at night. Everyone says that's just your body preparing to take care of the baby, but that stinks. I'd rather be well rested when the baby comes.

As uncomfortable as I am right now, I really hope Kellyn waits the 4 weeks.

The Skinny

2010-07-19T02:37:00.000-07:00

For those of you who ain't down wi'd it, the "skinny" be a dope, phat word for brief information about something.

Skinny is also a word we often use to describe Ryan. He still wears 6-12 month shorts unless they are the more expensive adjustable waist shorts on the smallest adjusted size. Every time we think Alyna is catching him in height he has his own growth spurt and stretches taller, but his waist and hips never seem to get wider.

This week at the doctor's office he was measured as 33 inches tall and only 21.2 pounds. I asked the doctor on our way out if he was concerned that an almost 2 year old only weighed 21 pounds. He said that as long as he eats normally, is healthy, and is active, then they don't do anything to fatten a kid up.

It's the same thing we've been telling ourselves and everyone else for the last year. He's normally very active, and eats as much as Alyna who only weighs about 26 pounds herself. This week is the first week in his life he's had to go to the doctor for an illness.

We've been very blessed that both Ryan and Alyna have had nothing more than normal cold/flu symptoms before. I think he this time it became more serious because he was also growing and cutting more teeth at the same time, so his immune system was just overloaded. He is back to his normal bright eyed, smiley self now, though he still gets tired faster than normal. (A week of not eating normally will make anyone a little weaker.)

Where Is?

2010-07-16T05:54:00.000-07:00

Many times a day Alyna will turn with her hands in the air, palms up, and say, "Where is?" What is she asking for... her baby doll. She's always leaving it in different places so we often have to have a baby hunt.

I haven't named the baby doll yet, because I think that should be something she gets to do when she's older. Grandma said that no matter what Alyna names her, she'll always be thought of as "Where Is."

Yesterday, "Where Is" was missing all day. I picked up toys in each room, did lots of laundry, looked under beds and in boxes, but I couldn't find her. It was really sad.

Last night we were playing in baby Kellyn's room, for a change of scenery, and I remembered they had been playing with her chest of drawers the previous day. I opened each drawer, and there was "Where Is" in the empty middle drawer.

I closed it and asked Alyna, "Where is your baby?" Then I pointed to the drawer. She giggled and went to look. Oh the happy face was precious when she saw her baby in there. She put other things in that drawer while we were playing, but not "Where Is." She took her to bed with her last night too.

TWO:
Alyna's other new skill this week is knowing when there is 2 of something. I'm not kidding. It's not something we've been trying to get her to do, she just does it. I've always counted with them since they were little, and if I give them a snack for each hand I say, "You have 2..."

A week ago I gave her two stickers and while she started to play with them, she looked up and said, "Two." Barry's and my jaws both dropped, and I told her she was right that she had two stickers.

She has continued to do this all week when there are two of something. Crazy smart girl...

Big Beds Update

2010-07-13T13:09:00.000-07:00

Ryan and Alyna continue to sleep just as well, or better, in their big twin beds than they did in their cribs. There have been some interesting/funny times already though.

We played the "Look, I'm out of bed" game yesterday. At nap time, I was awoken after less than an hour by two happy smiling children. They both walked right into my room, happy and ready to play. (Usually they sleep for at least an hour and a half.)

I put them to bed about 15 minutes early, and it took me more than 5 minutes to get Alyna to stop coming to the door and trying to escape the room. We usually leave it cracked, but to stop her, I had to shut the door. She cried and then stayed in bed after that. Ryan can actually open the door, but Alyna hasn't quite mastered it yet.

Yesterday early in nap time, and then again this morning at 4 am, I had to go in because Alyna was crying out "Mama" and coming to the door. The problem... Ryan had crawled into bed with her. The poor guy has had a fever since Saturday night, and we found out today it is strep throat. He just wanted someone to cuddle with I'm sure, but Alyna would have none of that. That is her bed, and she doesn't even want Mommy to lie down in it with her. Ryan has always been the cuddly one. Alyna likes hugs, but then the hug is over and she's done. She's definitely her mother's daughter.

Because of Ryan's illness, we've had a couple rough nights being up a lot with him. It's actually nice to be able to lie down next to him in his bed to comfort him.

Vacation: Days 6-7

2010-07-11T09:51:00.000-07:00

THURSDAY:
In the morning, our entire crew rented a party boat to go out on the beautiful water of Table Rock Lake. Barry, Aunt Krista, Uncle Matt, Sean, and Joshua all took turns tubing. It was lots of fun.

Ryan got fussy after about an hour because he wanted to play in the water, so his Daddy decided he should try out the tube. By the time the tube got out away from the boat, Ryan was crying too much to even try it, so they came back in. It just wasn't what he had in mind.

Alyna fell asleep in Grandma's lap (just as she had the day before on the Safari tram).

Since Ryan and Alyna didn't get to play in the water the way they wanted... we went to a swimming pool until lunch time. It was such a great pool for the kids, with a sloping entrance, that we went back after nap time again.

FRIDAY:
This was by far the longest day of the trip... going home.

We said goodbye and left the resort, taking Grandma with us, at about 9:30 central time. We drove all the way home; arriving at about 1:20 am.

We did stop in Oklahoma City at my friend Charissa's house again for about an hour to let the kids play. It was great to catch up with her in person instead of just online.

Vacation Day 5

2010-07-08T20:30:00.000-07:00

WEDNESDAY:
Everyone piled in the two minivans and drove up near Springfield to visit the Wild Animal Safari Park. There were definite pros and cons to the visit, but overall everyone though it was worth going. Of course, outings like these are always more fun when you have kids along.

While waiting for the guided tram tour, we saw some animals in the gift shop and in cages up front. Ryan kept wanting to go back in to see the monkey.

The loose billy goat followed us right out of the cages area and through the gift shop... the attendant just shrugged and said that was ok. He was sort of a pet around there I guess.

All 4 of the grandkids were amazed at the sight of the different animals, and my nephews had fun feeding them from the open air tram. Where there would normally be windows were just bars, so the taller animals would actually stick their heads in to be fed.

We then ate a deliciously large meal together at Lambert's Cafe... home of the throwed roll. They actually come around asking who wants a roll, and when you raise your hand, they throw one to you. Ryan thought this was a great idea and kept raising his hand. Hilarious...

Wednesday night we had a family devotional and my aunts joined us for that again. Our family loves to sing, so it's something we enjoy doing together whenever we can.

This was the day Ryan decided he really like blueberries. Between afternoon snack and bedtime snack his Aunt Krista and Grandma probably fed him a whole container. His diapers that night and in the morning were evidence that he'd had too many.

Some of the family stayed up to play games that night (and most nights), but sadly I was always too tired by the end of each day. (hmmmm ... I wonder why...)

Vacation Days 2 - 4

2010-07-08T19:47:00.001-07:00

Branson... well, we were actually staying at a resort on Table Rock Lake, about 12 miles south of Branson, MO, but it's close enough to just call it our Branson vacation.

The resort was a huge area, and our family had 3, 2 bedroom condos for all of us. My parents shared one with my sister and her husband. Barry and I had another with the twins, and my brother and his family shared the third. It was great because they were all next door to each other and we went back and forth a lot, but then we all had our own spaces too.

SUNDAY: night we all arrived in the evening, checked in, shared dinner and the Lord's supper together, and retired to our rooms. Everyone had traveled far that day and was tired.

MONDAY:

Barry, the twins and I had breakfast at a resort restaurant with my sister Krista and her husband Adam. It was good to spend that time with them, and they are always helpful with the kids. We then headed to the playground where we met up with other family members and played until lunch.

We had grilled hamburgers for lunch, and we all ate together. Some of our extended family joined us for lunch as they had decided to vacation in Branson at the same time so we could spend some time together. It was so good to see my mom's 2 sisters, 1 of their husbands, and 1 of my cousins. None of them had met the twins before.

Ryan became really attached to his cousins... if he ever got fussy, all we had to say was that we'd go find Sean and Joshua, and he was anxious to go.

After lunch we took Ryan and Alyna and their cousins to the pool by our building to swim for about 40 minutes. They loved it, but we knew it was time to go take a nap when they started putting their heads down on their Aunts and Uncle's shoulders.

The kids took a long nap, and we actually had to wake them up so we could leave to go to the Dixie Stampede dinner show. It's written and produced by Dolly Parton, and includes lots of country cooking, loud music, and a horse show. We had lots of fun. The kids did really well until the last 20 minutes when Alyna started to cover her ears from the noise.

TUESDAY:

We had thought about taking an outing on Tuesday morning, but there was so much to do at the resort that we didn't need to go anywhere. We went down to a small pond area behind the arcade to feed the fish. Both the arcade and fish were a big hit that morning.

Our kids favorites are the driving games, of course.

That afternoon, Grandma babysat all the grandkids while the rest of the adults went to a show. We chose the "SIX" show which is put on by 6 brothers, and the every sound in the show is made vocally, acapella, and done live. They performed everything from the Beach Boys to U2 to Motown hits. It fit our family's love for music perfectly, and I was very impressed with the quality of the show. I was also glad the kids weren't there because it got very loud at parts.

The sibling couples then all went to a local steakhouse for a good meal, and then to a 50's diner style restaurant for dessert. We were all stuffed.

Vacation Day 1: Friend's Twins' Birthday

2010-07-06T06:03:00.000-07:00

We left on a Saturday morning, with Grandma and Grandpa's help, at about 7 am (Mountain Time). We drove all day to Oklahoma City, stopping whenever it was needed. For lunch we had a picnic at a rest area so the kids could run around for a while. I love Texas rest areas because they are so nice.

We checked into our hotel at around 4:30 pm (Central Time), changed the kids into water clothes, and headed over to my friend Charissa's house. She was my best friend and roommate from college. We haven't seen each other since I was pregnant with my twins, and that weekend was the 1st birthday of her twin boys. It's a great bond we share by both having twins so close together.

We ate food, watched them open the twins' gifts, and joyfully talked as all the kids played in the water toys.

They're big kids now

2010-07-05T09:27:00.000-07:00

Side Note: We had a blast during our week long vacation in Branson, MO with my family. I'll post pictures about that later. But first...

I realized last night that I officially don't have babies anymore (for 6 more weeks anyway).

We rearranged the guest room over the weekend. The twin beds that were together are now on separate walls, and we removed the box springs. We moved Ryan and Alyna's clothes into a dresser in the new room. All afternoon yesterday we played in that room as we moved things around, and we were sure to keep calling each bed "Ryan's bed" or "Alyna's bed."

When bedtime came, Ryan was fussy and anxious. He knew something was just not right because we kept saying "your room", but it was a new room. When we finished reading books in their beds, Alyna laid back in her bed with a big smile on her face. She was so proud of herself for getting to sleep in a big bed.

Ryan was crying. It wasn't an "I don't want to sleep," cry. It was a "What's going on, this is scary," cry. So I sat by his bed for about 5 minutes, stroking his head and telling him how proud I was that he was sleeping in a big bed. It didn't take him long to calm down, and I left the room.

Within 5 minutes it was completely quiet, and both were asleep. Alyna won the award for falling off the bed first... about 30 minutes later. We heard little cries until about 10 pm, but they'd be asleep whenever we went to check on them. They slept solidly all night (to my surprise). Ryan woke up at 6:45, and was already off the bed when I got in there, but I'm not sure how long he had been off the bed. We left the room and let Alyna sleep another 15 minutes.

They both smiled a lot this morning when I told them how proud I was that they slept all night in their big beds in their new room. But they are both fussy today. It's a combination of being home from vacation and changing rooms all at once. We wanted to do this move while Grandma is still here to help me this week.

Hopefully nap time today will go as smoothly as bedtime did.

(And Ryan has peed in the potty 2 times this morning.)

Wrestling match on Ryan's bed...

Cute story

2010-06-24T08:11:00.000-07:00

I remembered this story last night sitting at church. Last week was so busy with VBS and recovering from VBS that I forgot to post it.

One of the twins friends at church is Cole. He is 3 now, but is only about 14 months older than they are, so he was in the cradle roll class with them until he turned 2. Since they were tiny he has called them the babies, and he still does. He sees them at church and says, "Hi babies." It will be interesting to see if he stops that once they move into the 2-3 year old class with him in September.

Anyway...

Cole's older sister (a teenager) passed this story on to me. Last week as they were headed to the Wednesday night VBS program they told Cole that he needed to be good and stand up and sit down when we said to.

He said, "I'll stand up when the babies' Momma says to stand up."

It took them a minute to figure out who the babies' momma was... it's me. I'm the "Babies' Momma".

3 year olds are so much fun...

She wants what she wants

2010-06-22T06:32:00.001-07:00

Alyna asserts her preferences throughout the day. I try to give her 2 choices on things so that she picks an approved item (like snack), but it doesn't always work that way.

On Sunday morning, I got them out of their beds, and as they were playing in their room I went to the closet to pick out a dress for Alyna to wear to church. Last week she wore a pretty blue sundress with little pink fish around the bottom. It was the first time she had worn it because she has a closet full of dresses we received as hand-me-downs from a friend of Aunt Robyn's. So I pulled out a brown dress with polka-dots and said, "how about this one." Alyna shook her head "no" and pointed to the blue sundress. I said, "We wore that one last week. How about this one?" as I picked up a green dress with cherries on it. She shook her head and said, "That," as she pointed to the blue sundress.

I decided it wasn't worth arguing over, and she wore her pretty blue sundress to church. The only people who even knew she'd worn it the week before were those whom I told the story.

Her preferences also extend to which Pull-up she wears. She actually prefers the "Cars" and "Toy Story" Pull-ups over the pink Princess Pull-ups. It's not too surprising since those are 2 of her favorite movies at this point. We've watched some of the princess movies, but they don't capture her attention just yet. It also isn't too surprising since in my baby book it says that my favorite toys were my brother's cars. She's a lot like her mother, I guess.

She has become quite attatched to her baby doll that Uncle Daniel and Aunt Katelyn bought her for her 1st birthday. She picks it up and carries it around a dozen times each day. She puts it in buckets and boxes as a bed, and give her lots of hugs. She hands the baby to me or Daddy to hug, and then expects us to give her back.

She gets upset when Ryan picks her baby up... that's her baby doll. Of course, he gets upset when she plays with his Lightning McQueen car so it's all fair. They share most everything, so it's good for them to have a toy that is their own.

vacation time

2010-06-21T08:30:00.000-07:00

Vacation time doesn't quite mean the same thing once you have children. I still do pretty much the same thing every day regardless of whether Barry is on vacation or not. His 2 weeks of vacation starts today.

We're just staying home this week. He has to adjust back from his night shift schedule, and then we have things to do around the house and yard. I'm hoping we'll fit in a trip to the pool with the kids at some point this week. They really enjoyed it last time we went.

Thursday night my parents will drive into town. Friday we'll pack, and Saturday we will drive off to Branson, MO. I'm so glad my parents will be along to help us out on the trip. I don't think I could make it otherwise.

Saturday night we'll be staying in Oklahoma City where my best friend from college lives. I'm excited to meet her one year old twin boys, and for her to meet our almost 2 year old twins. We haven't seen each other since I was pregnant with the twins.

In Branson, we'll be staying at a resort with my parents, brother's family, and sister and her husband. 2 of my aunts (Mom's sisters) and one cousin will be staying nearby, and we'll have a mini-family reunion. We'll see a couple shows, and go to the Springfield Safari Park, but mostly we'll just be together swimming and playing.

We'll stay there Sunday through Friday and then head home again. My mom is accompanying us home too, and will be staying with us for that week. That will help me a lot since Barry has to go back to work, and I know I'll be worn out after the drive home.

Skinny boy problem

2010-06-18T20:50:00.000-07:00

My skinny boy has presented a new challenge... he's too skinny for the smallest Pullups size. They stay on just fine, but he has too much room to mess around with them.

Here's what I mean:
The past TWO days in a row, Ryan has come to me fussing to go potty around 8:30 or 9 am... so we go. He sits there for 10+ minutes, and doesn't pee. It's not a big deal, and I take him off the potty. 5-10 minutes later, he has pulled "it" out, and peed all over his shirt, shorts, and the floor.

I guess I'm just not letting him sit there long enough, and I'll have to go back to using plain diapers so I can tighten the waist. He really loves the Cars Pullups though, so it's a major motivation for him.

Other times he fusses, we go, and within 2-3 minutes he pees... so it's not that he doesn't know what's going on. I don't know what the deal is at that time in the morning.

VBS Rainforest Adventure

2010-06-17T06:07:00.000-07:00

This week was our VBS at church, and we had a blast. It was a rainforest adventure, and I helped teach a lot of new songs as well as singing all the songs the kids always love. I didn't have to be the narator during the assembly time this year which was a big relief. I just helped with the songs, and taught the new songs in the music class.

The songs that came with the program were great because the chorus parts were the exact words of the memory verses each day. Then there were fun songs about the rain-forest and following Jesus.

My co-teacher for the music class is 5 months pregnant with twins, so we laughed at ourselves a lot doing all the kids action songs and getting really tired. The funniest was when we'd sing "Hip-hip-hip-hippopotomus, Hip-hip-hooray God made all of us" while swinging our arms down by our stomachs to be big like hippos. We were already big enough...

Ryan and Alyna were in the nursery again this year, and the workers took them around to the different activities during the day for short times. They would come to music class with the 3 year olds and sing songs with us. On Monday, they both ended up in my lap because they didn't understand that Mommy was the teacher. On Tuesday and Wednesday they were both content to sit in the helpers' laps.

Nap times were off a little this week because Alyna would fall asleep on the way home. Tuesday, I made the mistake of letting her sleep for about 20 minutes on the couch, and then she didn't nap at all when Ryan took his 2 hour nap. However, they made up for it all on Wednesday. I (myself) took a 2 hour nap, which means that they slept for about 2 hours and 15 minutes without stirring. It was bliss.

Wednesday night after dinner I asked Alyna if she wanted to go bye-bye... and she actually shook her head, "No." That's a first. Neither one really complained when I put their shoes on to go to church for the wrap-up, but everyone commented that they looked tired.

It was a long week for all of us.

In all Cuteness

2010-06-09T07:55:00.000-07:00

This morning I put on the movie "Beuaty and the Beast" for the kids to watch for a while. A little ways into the castle scenes Alyna gasped, looked around, and then ran over to the snack table to retrieve her teapot and teacups. She recognized them as being Mrs. Pots and Chip in the movie.

The "Turnaround, Fall Down" game is even more fun in the baby pool.

Weekend of Firsts

2010-06-07T07:32:00.000-07:00

First Garage Sale
We had our first garage sale at our own house on Saturday. We'd done one up in Washington with some friends, but we hadn't done one on our own. When we called to place an ad in the paper, all the space was full. Because we're in a good location (1 block from 2 major streets), we didn't have a problem with lack of people anyway. Lots of people were out driving around looking for the sales because so many were listed in the paper. We had our first customers at 6:30 as we were pulling some tables onto the driveway. We had a steady flow until about 10:30. By then it was 100 degrees, and only 1 person came that half hour, so we closed up at 11 am... because it was just too hot. We were glad we hadn't posted times in the paper or anything.

We got rid of a lot of clutter we've collected over the years since we'd both left our parent's homes. Books, clothes, vases, baskets, candles, massage pads/tools etc. Our criteria was that if we hadn't used it in this house (3 years), it should go. Our storage rooms are no longer overflowing which was the goal since there's a baby on the way.

First Scorpion Sting
At the garage sale we sold ice cold bottled water and sodas to the hot customers (and made a profit too). The cooler was sitting by the kitchen table on Sunday morning, and Ryan flipped open the drain on it. Water gushed everywhere so I grabbed a couple towels by the back door that we use outside or when our dog is wet.

As I rearranged a towel to soak up the water, I felt a sting like I had a thorn in the palm of my hand... only it got worse and worse. I looked down and there was a scorpion. I screamed for Barry, who came and squashed it with a shoe as I continued to scream, "Ouch." It hurt a lot.

I ran my hand under cold water while Barry tried to look up what to do on the internet. We found some things, but weren't satisfied so we called the New Mexico poison control. The lady was very helpful telling us what symptoms in the next couple hours would indicate I needed to go to the hospital. Otherwise, you just clean it, and apply an antibiotic and cortisone cream to it. An ice pack helped keep the stinging away until it was at a manageable level. It still bothered me throughout the morning, but by the time we all woke up from our Sunday afternoon naps, I was fine.

The lesson is that clothing, bedspreads, and shoes need to be shaken out before being used at this time of year. Scorpions go find a new den about this time every year.

Ryan's Potty Training Successes
Sunday night before bed, after I'd already put on their pajamas and night time diapers, Ryan started pulling at his shorts. I put him on the toilet in my bathroom (with an insert), and he actually peed.

This morning after breakfast at 7 am, they both sat on the potty chairs. They'd both already wet their diapers just since waking up, so I didn't expect much. We put pullups on this time... and went on with the morning. I've been trying to take them to the potty about every hour, but it was about 8:30 when they both started to fuss. I took them both to the bathroom. Alyna had wet her pullup (which doesn't upset me at this stage at all), but Ryan was still dry.

Ryan peed in his little potty while Alyna sat on the big toilet. But then he reached inside and touched it... so we washed his hands before putting on the same Pullup he'd been wearing. I had to put the little potty chair on the back of the toilet while I got Alyna off the toilet and into a Pullup , and then could dump Ryan's pee.

This is one complication twins bring to the whole potty training exercise. They really like to sit on the big toilet, but always want to do it at the same time. And they always seem to want the same book during that time too.

Alyna's had quite a few near misses lately... a lot of times she'll tell me she needs to pee, but does it before we get her on the potty. Once this weekend, the flowers on her Pullup faded (to indicate wet) just 3 minutes after she got off the potty where she had sat for at least 5 minutes.

Ryan's favorite part of the potty is flushing the toilet, and waving "bye bye". Alyna's favorite part is getting to wash her hands afterward.

Fun Stuff

2010-05-25T07:32:00.000-07:00

Ryan's favorite new game for Mommy to play is "Oh no, I'm stuck". I give him a kiss on the cheek, but my lips get stuck to his face. I have to zerbit (Bill Cosby's term) him to get unstuck. He laughs, and wants me to do it again and again. He's such an affectionate little boy and is always giving Alyna hugs and kisses.

Everytime we get in the van now, they throw a fit if they don't get to play up front for a few minutes first. Most of the time I just plan for 5 minutes ahead to give them that time. Ryan loves to drive, and Alyna messes with all the knobs on the air and radio controls. When we finally get in the driver seat we have to check that everything is set back to normal: hazard lights, wipers, a/c temp and speed, sliding door controls, etc. Sometimes when we aren't going anywhere I just let them play in the garage and the van for extended times. It's good that they like to do this because Barry and I need to prep for the garage sale we want to have soon.

They love to sit on the potty, (usually right after I've gone). The biggest problem right now is that both of them always want to sit on the big potty at the same time. We have 2 little potty chairs, so I make them take turns for who has to sit on one of those. I plan to start taking them more regularly this week, and we'll see how that goes. Barry is off for the next 5 days, so he'll be here to help with all the bending over that it entails.

Alyna was fascinated by her pink pullups with Princesses on them. I put a bunch of boy and girl Pullups in a box in the bathroom, and... well...

Alyna then piled them all up together... she's my little organizer

while Ryan decided to climb... no surprise there.

Update: Upon being asked, Alyna put the pile of pink Pullups back into the box. She's such a good girl.

Feelings

2010-05-21T07:28:00.000-07:00

This is one of those mornings where I feel like putting away all the toys that require any help/assistance from Mommy. When Barry starts a shift after I've had a couple nights of very little sleep, I feel very cranky. Two toddlers constantly wanting my attention seems overwhelming.

They are playing with some of Barry's old transformer toys, and whenever they become mis-shapen, I have to fix them. That's about every 2 minutes. The shapes cookie jar also requires assistance because they can't always get it to fit in right. Mommy even has to be sitting right there on the floor for Alyna to do her puzzles even though she has them memorized and can do them herself.

The reason for the lack of sleep is that both twins have molars coming in, and sometimes wake up at night and scream. They usually go right back to sleep, but it's enough to wake me up every couple hours. The past 2 days, Ryan spiked a fever of about 102, and was very fussy and uncomfortable. It's not fun when you don't really know what's wrong. His temperature is back to normal today, but he's still fussy.

BUT... I also feel blessed.

I'm officially in the 3rd trimester with Kellyn. Aside from normal pregnancy fatigue and always being HOT, everything is going well. Nights where the twins let me sleep all night long, I usually feel great the next day.

This week I took the screening for gestational diabetes, and it was negative.

My thyroid levels, which were irregular during the twins' pregnancy, were also normal.

Cleaning Out

2010-05-12T07:12:00.000-07:00

As we keep cleaning out closets and our guest/storage room... we keep buying new things too... it seems we'll never make any headway.

But it is a nice feeling to decide to sell or throw away things that made the move here from Washington 3 1/2 years ago, but we haven't used since. I think we'll attempt a garage sale on June 5... if we can get it worked out by then. Our storage rooms are overflowing.

The guest room is starting to look more like a kids room than a storage room. Most of the clutter is out of the closet, and the rest should be able to follow during or after the garage sale.

The plan is that the guest room that already has twin beds will become the twins room in July. That will give us about 6 weeks to get them used to that room before the baby takes over the nursery.

Garage sales are a lot of work... hopefully it'll be worth it. I know we'll end up donating a lot to the clothing room at church, or to the Salvation Army. That's fine, it just needs to be out of my house.

recent stories

2010-05-05T08:29:00.000-07:00

Ryan the Flirt:
We went to lunch at a local cafe yesterday with the ladies after Ladies Bible Class. I put in our order and took Ryan back to our long table. He turned around and headed straight toward a blonde teenage girl sitting at a table with about half a dozen other teenage girls. He lifted his arms to be picked up, and she got a wide eyed look on her face. I was about to stop him, but then said, "Go ahead, if you want to." She picked him up, and in typical Ryan fashion he dug his head in to cuddle on her shoulder. There was a collective "Ah" from the group of girls. I just smiled and turned around to get the high chairs situated. They asked his name and how old he was, and he was passed to at least 3 other girls arms as they deposited their trash and prepared to leave.

The Ants Go Marching:
We've discovered a great activity for staying in the shade of the porch on hot afternoons... watching the little ants crawl around. Alyna was the first to notice them the other day, and now we look for them all the time. She gets on her knees, and tries to put her finger on them. She calls them "Ace". Ryan joined in the fun of tracking the ants yesterday too.

Dirty Knees:

Sunday morning Alyna wore really pretty pink dress to church (a hand me down from someone Nana and Aunt Robyn know). It came with a matching duster coat that is pretty long on her right now. Since the wind was still cold in the morning, she was wearing the coat too.

I had Ryan out of his car seat at church, and was holding his hand teaching him to walk across the street to the building. Barry was carrying Alyna at first, but decided she could walk too. She went about 3 steps before tripping on the dress, falling on the asphalt, and scraping her knees. (I think having her hand up to hold Daddy's hand on the one side lengthened her coat on the other side.)

We found the church's first aid kit, cleaned the scrapes, and put a band-aid on the one knee that looked like it needed some coverage as she played in the nursery. She didn't cry, but she was just a little upset.

The funny part came on Monday night. After wearing pants all day, she got in the bathtub and noticed her knees. She took the washcloth and tried to wash the scabs off. I tried to tell her that it wasn't dirt so it wouldn't come off. Tuesday morning she did the same thing when I put her shorts on her. Every time she saw her knees she would try to wipe them off. Silly girl...

Ryan Climbs Again:

This is the first pile of boxes we moved out of the guest room to put out in the garage. Of course, Ryan thought it was a cool new playset we made just for him to climb on.

Week 24 of Pregnancy

2010-05-03T05:34:00.001-07:00

Here's what the Mayo Clinic says is going on with baby Kellyn this week:

Week 24: Real hair grows
Twenty-four weeks into your pregnancy, or 22 weeks after conception, your baby is regularly sleeping and waking. Real hair is beginning to grow on his or her head.

By now your baby may be slightly longer than 8 inches (210 millimeters) from crown to rump and weigh more than 1 1/3 pounds (630 grams).

With intensive medical care, some babies born this week may be able to survive.

It feels good to be at the point where our modern medicine could help my baby survive if she were born any time from now on. It's never a good idea to deliver before 34 weeks unless necessary, but at least some of the maternal fear is subsiding.

Her kicks are getting stronger, and sometimes make me wince or gasp. I feel very blessed that our family is growing again this year. Alyna and Ryan play very sweetly with our baby doll and I know they will be a good big brother and sister.

Spring Pictures

2010-04-30T15:55:00.001-07:00

Daddy time:

They love to play in the back yard. Ryan carries handfuls of rose petals everywhere.

The water table is one of their favorite things. We just have to wait for days that are warm enough and not too windy. I'm sure it will be a daily activity this summer.

Preferences

2010-04-23T09:37:00.000-07:00

It should come as no surprise to anyone that Alyna now wants to pick which shoes she wears when we go somewhere. She also wants to feed herself most of the time, and is doing a very good job. Sometimes we have to help her get the food on the spoon/fork, but then she very carefully gets it to her mouth.

She is very much left handed. She tries things right-handed, but always goes back to the left after a couple times.

At McDonald's the other day the twins wanted to play at the air hockey table after watching the bigger kids do it. Miss Karen held Ryan up, and I held Alyna. I put her hand onto the stick (or whatever it's called) and we hit the puck. She then pulled her hand away and reached out to grab the stick with her LEFT hand. Oops, I forgot.

Barry read an article that said it is highly common in twins for one to be right handed and the other left. I guess Grandma or Uncle Matt will have to teach her to tie her shoes.

Alyna also usually wants to choose what she has for afternoon snack. I've started to pull out 2 boxes of things and let her choose.

I know it won't be long before her personal preferneces spread to her clothes and hairstyles.

Baby Girl's Name

2010-04-19T17:35:00.000-07:00

Our baby girl's name is:

Kellyn Brooke Love

Kellyn is a combination of Kelly Lynn. We saw it on a baby names website under the Scottish heritage names. Barry and I both really liked it the first time we saw it, and it stuck. Since Alyna also has the "lyn" part, it seems fitting for our next little girl.

We had a list of about 10 middle names that sounded good to us, so that part was harder. We kept going back to Brooke because it sounds really pretty and isn't a mouthful. ...And we all know how important it is that the first and middle name flow well together off Mom's toungue.

When one door closes...

2010-04-17T07:19:00.000-07:00

...I pray that there are no little fingers in the way.

Ryan can know turn the knob and open the doors on the bedrooms and bathrooms. Alyna thinks it's great because she loves to shut the doors, and then Ryan can open them again... repeatedly.

We have 2 safety door stoppers, and today I ordered 4 more. I'll just have to leave all the doors open from now on to avoid finger injuries.

We also have to quickly do something about the garage door and front door before he gets strong enough to open them. He can already turn the deadbolts on both doors because they are actually below the doorknob for some reason.

The excitement never ends...

spring reorganization

2010-04-15T12:51:00.000-07:00

I don't feel like spring cleaning is the term to use because we haven't even been keeping up with the regular cleaning lately. We have been reorganizing though.

While Grandma was visiting we moved all the towels and linens out of the hall closet to use it as storage for the many buckets of toys the twins have. We were trying to use the rack for the buckets, but they just dump everything out and climb on the rack. So the closet at least keeps more of the toys out of site and we can rotate them better.

The towels and linens are now in our hallway bathroom closet that had a bunch of empty space... I still need to finish throwing out lots of almost empty shampoo and lotion bottles in there.

Barry built himself a workbench in the garage to hold his tools and project supplies. The bench part with lower shelving is finished, but he still has to attach the upper shelf and pegboard for hanging the tools. On Monday, he also cleaned out the garage of a couple month's worth of cardboard boxes and project waste.

I've finally managed to go through the twins clothes and box up everything that's too small or long sleeved.

We found bedding to use for the twins room when they move into the guest room this summer. Ryan's bedding is brown stripes, and Alyna's is a cream color with brown flowers and some turquoise accents. (And they feel a lot nicer than the Wal-Mart sheets that were on the beds.) The walls are already a rich brown color, so we haven't decided whether to repaint the room or leave it as it is.

Side Note: As I'm typing, a bird just landed on the new bird feeder we attached to the picture window the other day... wish the kids were awake to see it...

We still have a long way to go cleaning everything out of the guest room to turn it into the twins room this summer. The nursery will stay the way it is and be the new baby's room. We also need to go through the storage room in the garage and decide what can be sold or thrown away. Barry has agreed to sell/donate all of our many boxes of books... except those with sentimental value or that are classics.

It feels good to start putting things in order for the arrival of the new addition...

Easter Weekend Pictures

2010-04-12T10:11:00.000-07:00

On Easter Sunday, Alyna wore her foofiest, prettiest dress... bought by Nana Love a while back. She wasn't too sure about all the lacy layers at first, but seemed fine after about 10 minutes in it.

Grandma (my mom) was here for that week...

Here are some other cute pictures from Grandma's visit...

It's A Girl!

2010-04-07T15:21:00.000-07:00

I'm now 20 weeks pregnant with a baby girl!!!

We've always said that we didn't care which gender this baby was, but that since Alyna is so social and always wants someone to play with her, it would be nice for her to have a sister.

And she already plays peek-a-boo just like Alyna...

We don't have a girl name picked yet, but we have a short list... so we'll figure that out soon. Everything is going well so far, and we just pray continued blessings for our baby girl.