Random Pictures for April

I found this cute little letter from Kelly to Charity the other day while I was cleaning up and I just couldn't resist taking a picture of it. I thought I would respect their privacy and crop out the words that she wrote (it was so cute to see the words from one sister to another at such a young age.... they really do love each other.... a dream come true for me). But I did have to leave in the "Best Friends Forever" part. I love that!

We were watching Charlie and he and Noah were both getting pretty tired. I wasn't sure if Brent and Sarah would want him alseep or not, but I thought calming down and getting quiet would be a good idea. So I got out Noah's and Erika's bean bag chairs and plopped them both down in front of Baby Einstein (one of Noah's new favorites) with some popcorn. They were so cute there together!!! It made me laugh. They sat there for a good 20-30 minutes, just quiet and chopping on their popcorn. Who woulda thought I could slow these two down!!

Whenever I'm uploading pictures onto the computer I run across a few that I KNOW I didn't take. This one for example was taken by someone else. One of the kids, judging by the time of day..... I always get mad at first knowing they've played with my camera without permission, but I still think it's fun to see things from their points of view. Bradley's so handsome!

This was so cute!! The girls wanted to surprise Nate and I. It was one of those warm days when the flowers were out. Don't tell Grandpa that they picked some of his flowers.... we had to have the flower picking talk AGAIN, but lots of loves for the thought too..... so cute.

Here's Brad's owie. Last Saturday the kids all had a meeting with the sidewalk.... I think everyone came out with a battle wound from working in the yard.... Spring must be here.... sort of.

Lukey kissed the sidewalk that day, but apparently the sidewalk wasn't ready for that kind of relationship because she smacked him back!! Poor Luke. He looked AWFUL!!! It came off at swimming lessons yesterday though... the whole scab.... it was disgusting. I need to find something to put on it to avoid scarring.

awwwww

so cute!

another one I didn't take, but I'm so glad they did :) He's such a cutie!!

and another one... one that I'd never get probably :)

And now for cute Erika in her new "Jumpy thing" as the kids are calling it.... She totally loves it!!! Makes us all laugh, especially Luke, to watch her flopping around with a big cheesey grin.

Blog Hopping

Does anyone else just sit and click on links to blogs? going from blog to blog, just reading random things from strangers??? Probably not. But I do. I guess it's mostly just during the sleepless nights where I play binky to Erika. It's about the only thing I can do while she eats nowdays..... who knew I'd have a kid that would eventually not let me do things while they nurse. Every kid is different I guess. Anyway. The other night, while I was doing a little of this blog hopping, I came across a blog post that really struck me. It's had a huge impact on me since then. Now if only I'd copied the link, I have no idea where it was. I wanted to document at least my feelings about it though. I don't know the lady's whole background of course. I read quite a bit of her blog, and discovered she is someone of a different faith, a mother of 2 (used to be three, and I'll get to that), a new baby and she also works. She had a post about laundry since she was showing off her new way of arranging the clothes in her kids' drawers (which I actually tried and LOVE). I wish I was as good at writing out my feelings as she is because now you won't get the full effect of what she said. She told about how when she does laundry, she thinks about each person as she's folding their clothing. What they did that day to make her smile, what they need to work on, how she can show them more love.... all this about each person as she folds and then sets each thing in the pile for that person. I loved this idea and have started doing it. It makes doing laundry so much more meaningful! It can be difficult if you are doing laundry with kids around.... like me.... it's a lot of in and out with it, but I love it. Then she mentioned that she has four piles of clothes now that she had her baby, and LOVES that she has 4. She wished she had 5, but knew that her most recent baby was a blessing and to not be anything but grateful. She had lost a child (I have no idea at what age, or how.... although I think it was some kind of illness), but found a way to be grateful!!! Is that not incredible?!!! I pictured my laundry with less piles and tears just streamed down my face. I cannot imagine my life with less "piles". She mentioned how hard it was to fold his clothes after his death. I so can't even picture that. It makes me so sad to even think about it. I really felt for her. I couldn't help but wish she knew about the Gospel and want to explain to her that she would see her boy again someday. I tried to mention it in my comment, but anyway. I just realized how much I love and need my kids. Each one of them. What a blessing these little ones are in our lives. This woman's example of love and devotion to her children. What a neat mom. I loved her strength. I understand that a blog doesn't tell it all, I'm sure she struggled, but how neat that she has such a good attitude about her new one and is able to look past the hurt for a minute. Sure helped make all my laundry not look like a bad thing. So then I read on a little more and found out that she works. She said something like, ".... in today's world ya gotta keep up with the Jones'...." as her reason why she worked. That made me so sad for her!!! Why? Why do you need to keep up with the Jones' when you could be keeping up with your little ones? Obviously it's none of my business and those of you that work, please don't be offended.... I understand there are extinuating circumstances. But if you're working just to "keep up with the Jones'"..... I feel bad for you. To miss out on these years with your kids unnecessarily breaks my heart for you. I am so grateful that i don't have to. I don't think I could miss out on this time with my little ones. I felt bad for this woman, she sounded like such an amazing mom though.... I really admire her. So anyway, that was one of the blogs I found. I really felt changed after reading it.... doing laundry is not such a pain, and I feel like things are good here. Another blog I read was one of a new mom who recently had twins prematurely. She aleady had a little girl about 3 years of age. She was sick, didn't know how sick, but went to the hospital on a whim to learn that she could die if she didn't deliver her twins then and there. How crazy would that be!!!! I honestly cannot imagine what that would feel like. Knowing your two little ones who you'd grown attached to, would now be brought into this world early, with less chance of survival. I'm sure there's a little worry with twins anyway, since that's considered high-risk. I don't know how she did it. She told all about the emergency c-section, their small weights, all the fear, and the worry. She had had a hard time wanting to bond with them in the beginning because she was afraid that as soon as she did they would go.... I would be the same way I think.... how hard!!! She is an AMAZING mom though.... she sucked up her own discomfort, hardly mentioned a thing about her recovering from the surgery (which I KNOW is not easy) and proceeded to explain how they stayed with friends, drove hours and hours and hours, had to leave their daughter with friends and family, as they visited their two little angels in the hospital and gave them the love that I'm sure a preemie needs to survive. It was incredible to read about. This too changed me a little. I've never had to adjust to something so huge. It's been very rare that I've felt the tugging from two sides, tearing you apart, wondering if you are giving the right kids the right about of attention.... and wanting to be comfortable at the same time. She then told about how she had to bring them home earlier than she was ready (not "had" to, but she was definitely stressed about the fact that she hadn't even had a chance to put up their cribs as they were coming home sooner than they thought.... which was a good thing, just scary). She told about them having breathing monitors that would go off and a few times having to call 911 and take them to the ER for new problems..... anyway, she's just amazing. She had such an amazing attitude through it all too!!!!! I can't even express how much admiration I have for people who go through these kinds of things in life. They're just incredible examples of determination and committment. I love it. It really made me grateful too for the fact that I haven't had to do any of this. I personally dont' think I could. I know that the Lord blesses people in these situations, but still.... I'm too weak for all that!! She's amazing. I really needed these two women's examples. As dumb as this might sound, I've been a little depressed lately. I know that it's manageable, so I'm trying to take care of it without drugs and just relying on the Lord and Nate, and lots of Priesthood blessings and prayer. I've felt really closed in, not really wanting to do much with friends or other people. In fact, I have felt like I don't have many friends, for some reason (don't worry, when I really think about it, I know you're all out there, carrying on with your own busy lives... it's just the downer in me that has that attitude....). But it's blogs like these that really have me smiling and knowing that there is more to life than the things that bug me, and stressing about stress. So much more. I want to be better at recognizing the good things on my own without having to hear how hard it CAN be. But this was helpful. My life is good. I have my family and that is all that matters. It's tough to feel so strongly about something yet have no feeling about it at all, at the same time.... but I think slowly, I will be able to get that back. I love that we are all on this earth together, and that even through strangers (or family) we can be jolted back to reality and learn from others. I love that. To think that one of these people I may never meet, see, or even read about EVER again, but that she's had this huge impact on my life, is just so incredible. The Lord truly blesses us through other people. So I hope this wasn't a completely lame post.... I always hesitate to blog about things, but then the desire to remember it and have it with me forever finally wins.... life is good.... I think I'll go give my littles ones a big kiss just because they're here and I can.

This Week's Things to Remember

1. Erika is a spaz when she eats Sweet Potatoes. I thought she was going to eat the spoon and my hand.

2. If I have my feet up on the bench in front of me at swimming lessons, no matter how many MILLIONS of other seats there are in the spectater section, those two ladies coming to sit down WILL inevitably need to sit RIGHT where my feet are..... note to self: put feet down when you see them coming.

3. Charity told Luke how smart he was at dinner tonight and it totally made my heart sing to watch his little face light up with the validation. I love that my kids do that for each other.

4. Today we spent most of the day working out in the yard to surprise Grandpa when he gets back from his big trip for school. We got a lot done, it was fun to have the kids' help with so much. I like it when we all work together.

5. I was reading some blogs tonight and realized life could be so much worse than it is and I need to end this pitty party and suck it all up and move on...... I know I realize this way too often for a normal person.

6. On Friday, I left my lights on in my car and the battery was dead when I went to pick up the girls from school. My sweet RS President had come down a few weeks ago "to tell me that if I ever need help picking up my kids or taking them to school, to call her", so I did. I hate asking for random help like that, it makes me feel moochy.... but she was so sweet to help, and gave me the book from the RS night the night before... a whole book. All I asked for was handouts. She delivers. Vicki Parsons is my hero. I really wanna be just like her someday. She just amazes me.

7. We got Erika a Johnny Jump up because she loves to bounce when you're holding her. She LOVES it!!! It's fun to watch her in it. If only the doorway could be wider. She has the funniest looks on her face when she's jumping. Cracks me up.

8. Noah was really sick on Thursday. Threw up about a million times. I was SO sure it was going to go around to everyone, but it's Saturday and no one has had it..... course now that I just said that..... it's amazing to me how quickly kids can bounce back from a day like that.... he's all back to himself. Poor little guy.

9. On Friday night Charity and Nate went to Game three of the Jazz Playoffs!! They had such a good time. I will try to remember to get the pictures from Nate's phone.

I fixed it!

Sorry about inviting you all to look at my recipe blog and then having it "private" by accident!! Please feel free to look at it now.... it's open to anyone..... just don't get your hopes up, it's still a work in progress......

The Maynes Family Recipe Blog

If you're like me.....

I have a hard time remembering to check your Private Blogs.
Maybe you do too.
SO I wanted to remind you all (or tell you for the first time) that I have a separate blog that is not private that I
update and link to my private blog.
This way you can keep the updated one on your blog list and
know when I've posted.
It's one more click to get to my blog, but at least then you're not left checking it when I haven't.
Just so you know :)
It's www.cmm2001.blogspot.com.
Thanks for reading!

A house of Order

For the last.... probably MONTH, I have been struggling a LOT with feeling unorganized. My whole life just felt completely out of order. The scripture that says, "a house of fasting, a house of prayer, a house of glory, a house of ORDER...." I don't know the whole thing (or correct order or verse), came to me after a prayer and I considered that the Spirit kind of nudging me to get things back in order. We've been in such limbo lately, and my mind has just been so preoccupied with SO many other things that all the things I had in place to keep my life in order, slowly just trickled away I think. Embarrassing. My home just hasn't been what it once was in ANY area. So I decided to try to get things back in order. I didn't really get a chance to plan what I wanted to do, or map out how I was going to do this, but it is slowly happening!! I'm really happy about all of the changes I've been able to enforce, and implicate. I wanted to document a few of them, just so that I have record that at one point things were in order, just in case this happens again.

So in no particular order:

- Daily Schedule

- Family Folder. This houses our Daily Schedule, FHE assignments (we added a few so that EVERYONE had a job each week), FHE journal (which is new also) where our "scribe" writes down what we did or in some cases, draws a picture of it. It's very simple, but I am loving it. We also decided to structure our FHE a little differently where we will have a sit at home lesson every other Monday, and then on the alternate ones, an outing. We still have our prayers, songs, and thought when we go out, but it's something a little more on the "fun" side. Plus it gets us out. We are now more organized and the kids are able to pick what they want to do for FHE, or a lesson (Brad actually did his OWN lesson.... loved that). And also in our Family Folder is the kids' "Pay Checks" which we haven't actually perfected yet, the kids will be able to earn money doing jobs other than their usual ones, and the amount they do them for will be bid by them.... the lowest bidder gets to do the job.... and the amount will be recorded in their "pay check" to be paid to them weekly (or bi-weekly, we haven't decided. And like I said, we haven't quite finished this idea.... it's still under construction, I'll let you know how it goes.... it's all part of our Family Economy that we would like to have someday). And the last thing in the folder is a paper copy of my Meal Planner. The cover of our Family Folder is someone's drawing of their favorite family night of the year that we vote on each month. The kids loved this idea a LOT for some reason :)

- Meal Planner- I went back to planning out my meals!!!!! I'm LOVING it!! I am actually putting my menu and new recipe ideas on a blog. This way when I find a recipe I like, I just post the link to it on my blog, with labels so that if I am looking for something specific, I don't have to go through the whole thing (assuming it will get really big :)). I have my menus on there with links to the recipes I am using. It's been SO amazing!!! Nate hasn't had to cook dinner for a whole week!!! It's crazy because I now realized how much of my slacking with making dinner came mostly from not wanting to get creative at the last minute, not having the right ingredients to get creative, or just not wanting to even try to think of what to make. It's nice because there are SO many websites out there for recipes.... when I get a craving for something, I google it, and there's my recipe for next week!!! I am actually doing this in 2 week incriments simply because I don't want to go grocery shopping more than that. I have only had a few slip ups this week, with needing to move things around because we had a busier day or evening or whatever, but it's even been working with our evening swimming lessons, I just remember to plan an easy or crock pot meal those days (or soemthign I can prepare during the day)..... I cannot believe how much I LOVE to cook when it's organized like this. We've had some really yummy food too. Nate loves it, I love his compliments, and the kids are actually pretty happy about it too. So if you're interested, it's http://www.christascrazybrain.blogspot.com/, or the link is in my sidebar too.

- along with nice meals we have started nice meal clean up!! THIS has revolutionized my life. Sounds dramatic I know, but it's really true. And sad that we ever stopped doing this (and a little embarrassing). We NOW have SET jobs for each week as far as Setting the table, clearing the table, washing the table, washing the dishes, and drying the dishes. And we are making sure that we do this for EVERY meal!!! It's not just Mom and Dad doing it all now too, so that has been priceless!!! And of course since we are doing it every meal, it's fairly easy. I'm sure many of you are thinking, "wow, you JUST started cleaning up after your meals???" I know. It's crazy!! Tiredness was taking over. But we're back, and it's awesome! I love having an empty sink in the morning. Heck, I love having an empty table in the morning!! It's very helpful with my mood.

- Spider Charts for the boys- this has been in and out of order.... somedays it works.... somedays it doesn't. But I consider it a help. I made little charts for the boys with "spiders" (I drew them) and they just have to do good things to earn stickers to cover up their spiders (brad's are bats actually). When they cover them all up they get a reward. We are working on a jar with lots of different rewards for them to choose from. This was really useful to get Luke to dress himself without me asking him a million times which for me is priceless.

- The girls' blogs. I've already talked about these, but I am feeling really good about them.... they're really fun for the girls, and fun for me to read what they write.

- I have been doing my old schedule of using Monday as my "Cleaning Day" where I get the house back in order from the weekend. It's been a little more difficult since Erika is so much work still, but the few weeks that I wasn't doing it, it was definitely noticeable. I need to plan out my other days as well. I used to have a day for laundry, I would need 2 or 3 now. Bathrooms, deep cleaning on the Kitchen....etc..... but this is a step!

- I organized the clothes again, to keep them in order. We have two closets here, and we've managed to fit the clothing for all 8 of us in them (well, minus the four dressers full). It's quite the feat, let me tell you!!! Nate bought a nice closet rod that helped a lot, we didn't have to duct tape the old one back up.... that was a pain. We now have in the kids' closet: Erika and Noah's on the top left, Charity and Kelly's below that, Brad's on the right. Then in our closet, Mine and Nate's on top and Luke's on the bottom. That has been nice.

- We moved the shelf into the kitchen to hold all the things that were just sitting in the basket... looks so much better!

- Got a bigger garbage can with a lid.... love it.

- I organized my crafting, sewing and scrapbooking stuff in the storage room so that it isn't all just sitting there in the way when you walk in. I'm happy about that.

- I found OxyClean!!!!! This has been monumental!! It gets out all the poop stains (maybe I've mentioned this already) but it's amazing!!! Even the chapstick stains that have been in the clothes for years!!! Love the stuff. And I have a new system to make it easier to remember to soak the clothes, and get them in the wash....

- I have been working out more. Not as much as I'd like, but more. Nate bought us a membership to golds, and it's been lovely. I should go more though.

- I feel like I'm getting more sleep. I don't think it's anything I have any control over, but with Erika eating solids, I think she's sleeping better.... I am too.

- I made a whole bunch of baby food using the crock pot method I found a while ago. She loved the Sweet potatoes, so I just bought more of that, and she liked the squash and bananas. The peas were a no go (surprise, surprise, none of my kids liked them) as well as the carrots.... weird. But it's been so fun to feel like I'm saving money and getting Erika into the right solid foods (unlike usual). I will wait to do the pears, but those are my favorite :)

- Morning Devotionals. It's not really a "devotional" like you would think of because I wanted to start out small and work up to something more spectacular simply because I wanted to get a feel for how well it would work. But I'm really just reading a friend story and then having a prayer together. We've had to skip the story some mornings, but we've done really good at a family prayer in the morning.... this has helped a ton!

So that's all I have time to list today.... maybe I'll think of more and add them. But it feels really good to get this all done. And looking at it altogether like this feels even better. It's nice when things feel organized. I forget how motivating that can be and how much less work it seems I have to do. I like feeling on top of things, and this is a start!!

A New Look

I know what you're thinking, "YOU CUT HER HAIR!!!!???"

But let me just defend myself.

For the last little while I have tried to let Charity do her own hair at least every other day. It's been kind of nice because it's one less thing that I have to do in the morning, but overall it's just not that great of a thing because she couldn't brush her hair out all the way by herself like she wanted (or thought she could). It was too long for her to really work all the snarls out herself. And frankly it wasn't that much easier for me to brush it out and was causing a lot of tension between she and I. So anyway, a few days ago I suggested that we cut a few inches off to make it easier to brush out. She needed a trim anyway and so I figured. She has been off and on with wanting short hair, but most recently wanted long, so I was leaving a lot of this up to her ("knowing" that she wanted it long still). I've received many threats over the years from friends and family (well strangers even too) that if I EVER cut her hair........

So I've been careful not to even really give her the option!

Having said all that, on Thursday I got this amazing coupon for a $5 haircut at Cookie Cutters (they know I won't go there unless they knock off more than half of their regular price, so they email me stuff every once in a while). So we took Charity to get her hair trimmed (plus a little). Well, we get there and I say, "So what are you going to tell the lady when she asks what you want done?" (I thought I'd let her be the big girl she wants to be) and she said, "this much" and holds a chunk of hair right up next to her ear!!!!!!! WHAT????? NO!!!!!! So I said, "really?" That's where you want it cut to?? Do you realize how short that is?" Then I proceeded to try to talk her out of this crazy idea! She got sad, almost crying and challenged me with, "you say that I get to choose how I want my hair cut and then when I tell you what I want you say no!" Good point. darn it. So I turned to Nate for a minute, we talked about how we did NOT want to cut all her beautiful hair off, and then I turned back to Charity for some negotiation.

I do feel that it is important to let her make her own decisions, and really, we won't have much say in these kinds of matters for most of her life, so it's probably something we should start to ease up on. I want her to feel comfortable with how she looks, I want her to feel confident and like how she looks, and I want her to feel like she has some say. I know how fun it can be to get a new look, all the compliments she knows she'll get since all of her friends just got their hair cut (shoulda waited till that had worn off). But she has the most beautiful long hair!!!!! when it's done right. So then I started to realize how often it isn't done right (meaning, not brushed through all the way) She really does a good job minus the fact that she can't comb it out all the way...... So I started to think that shorter might just be better. So we came to an agreement.

Well, it was Charity's turn. She sat down in the chair. The lady looked at me and asked, "so what are we doing?" I couldn't let her cut it all off. So I told her, "about this much" holding up about 3 maybe 3 1/2 inches. She looked at me with wide eyes and I said, "I know right?! She wants to cut more, but I'm not letting her cut it all off, so this is where we've compromised" She seemed flabbergasted that I would cut her hair off and even said, "her hair is SO PRETTY" with the face like, "are you sure?!!" I had to just run off and let her do it because I was seriously almost in tears. Then I sat there trying not to cry while watching Nate get almost teary eyed as well. HE was almost worse than me!!!! "I can't believe it!!!", he says. UGH. He was supposed to be the one telling me, "oh, just suck it up, it's just hair, it'll grow back, come on, she's old enough to decide how long her hair is", but no!! So we sat there and watched the life of that hair on the floor flash before our eyes. (honestly it's not as much as it sounds, as you can see in the picture) but I just couldn't even watch. It made me sad.

So anyway!!!! Here is the NEW Charity. She LOVES it!! I told her I would tell her "I told ya so" when she cried about it being short and she said, "why would I cry about it, I like it?" And I thought, "yeah, I love that about this girl" She's always so sure of herself. It makes me happy to see her happy and really, she looks ADORABLE!!!! It will be so much easier for her to do, it still fits in a pony even. I'm just really excited for when it's my turn to do it, I think it will be a fun length for her. We have talked a lot about when it will be as long as it was again. I told her 3 years. Her hair grows SO SLOWLY that I really think it will be at least that long. It's been very seldom that she's had her hair CUT... Just trimmed, and it hasn't been this short since she was probably 3, so it's crazy to think that it could be at least that many years before it's all back. We'll see I guess. She thought that seemed like a long time too, but she still doesn't care. She's so funny. I know she's anxious for comments and compliments, so if you see her :)...... She's a cute girl. I wish I was as confident as she is. I wish I had the drive that she has. And I love that she is so anxious to try new things. Cute girl.... I'm so glad she's mine.

This week's Things to remember

1. Tuesday when I was driving the kids to school, Charity said, "Mom, you forgot to read a story from the friend!" It made me happy that she had actually missed it.... it's one of my new things and I didn't want it to be something I was only doing for myself. So after a few seconds of thought, I decided to tell them my own story, from my life, to make up for it. I told them about the time I was driving out to Sandy for a mission farewell (this was when I was in college) and I noticed I was almost out of gas. I knew it would be pushing it to not get gas. But it was of course, Sunday and I couldn't bear the thought of breaking the Sabbath. I said a prayer. I asked Heavenly Father to please help me get there and back home safely and without running out of gas so that I would not have to go to the gas station. I knew that he would help me. I wished I had just remembered to get it the night before and I remember wondering if maybe he wouldn't help me just because I needed to learn my lesson about preparing for the Sabbath, but I still tried to have faith. Well, sure enough, he helped me get back to Bountiful, AAAALLL the way up the hill and home. And then even made it so I was able to get to the gas station in the morning without running out. It was a neat experience for me and the kids actually listened and enjoyed it. The reason I wanted to write about this was because Charity in her sweet, newly baptized little Spirit voice, said, "That's amazing that prayer can be so powerful!!" I just loved that and can't get over it. She's such a sweetheart and so enthusiastic about the gospel. It makes me smile.



2. Nate and Brad got to go to the Jazz game Wednesday night. They had a total blast! Brad was screaming (hoarse, but still screaming) when he got home, telling me all about how much yelling he did, and how he got his OWN hot dog, his OWN chips, and his OWN big people drink. I loved hearing about it :). Hopefully I can get Nate to make a post about it, but just in case he doesn't I want to have record of it. He bought his little brother, Luke, a new Jazz hat "so that he can wear it when he watches Jazz games" and the girls got his free pins that they handed out. He also got a free t-shirt at the door which he spilled ketchup on and when he pulled it out of the bag to show me he says, "and this is my shirt!! it has a stainbut you can get it out, huh mom!" LOL!!! No, there was no space between stain and but. He was so adorable about it. And yes, Brad, I can get it out!!! My new Oxyclean obsession. It's been the only thing I can use to get Erika's poopoo stains out. Anyway. I'm glad Nate and Brad got to go on a date.... I really want the kids to get more one on one time (I know I"m always saying this, it's cuz I do)..... hopefully our new plan will work.

3. When I came out of the bathroom this morning, cute little Luke was laying there with Erika in the funniest pose!!! I SO wish I'd grabbed the camera. Erika was laying down in her normal spot, but Luke was laying with his lower half off of the bed, but with his head up on the bed. He had wrapped Erika's legs around his neck so that it looked like she had him in some kind of choke hold. And he was giggling and screaming, "Ewika got me MOM!!! She got me!!!" LOL!!! There is no end to his comedy.... he's just always having fun or making it. I love it. And the look on Erika's face was hilarious. She's like, "What is he doing down there?? sounds funny, but what??" With this half smile. She really does get all giddy when Luke's coming. Like she's wondering what's gonna happen this time :)

These just make my heart melt

Just a bunch of pictures that represent why I do what I do.....

Noah loves to cook :) He's always letting us taste test what he's made even though it's usually "HOt"

Never thought I'd love watching my boys wrestle as much as I do.... I guess once they start giving each other bloody noses and stuff it will not be so fun, but for now....

And sweet little Luke!! The love he has for his little sister is just unexplainable!!! This kid can not get enough of her!! He is always noticing and laughing at all the things she does.... it's so fun for all of us. Feels so awesome when everyone's in on the moment. Like when Erika figured out how to move in her walker.... luke pointed it out and we all got a good laugh :).... (I'm still not sure what was so funny, but it was!)

I had to throw in this picture of Luke's "Weindeews". Is it just my kids or does everyone's obsess over Christmassy type things all year round :) So adorable. And the cutest part was when he asked me, "Mom? Does waindeews have foh wegs??" So that he could get the correct number of legs on his reindeers :)

She's FIVE months already!!!! LOTS of pictures

I guess I should take more variety of pictures, but these are all I got for now. She looked so cute in all of them I couldn't choose. She's been such a doll lately. I love how into life she is. She loves to be sitting up, facing out, toward all the action. Luckily there is some :). She is ALMOST sitting up.... not quite though.... I tried to get a few shots of her sitting up and she kept falling over, so not quite there. She has rolled over a few times, but hates being on her tummy so much we just don't do much of that. She likes to reach out for things and grasp on to them.... I'm not sure she really knows what she's doing once she gets something in her hands, but she likes to do it anyway :) She still cries a lot when she's not being held or played with so she keeps us all busy entertaining her... but luckily there are a lot of us. She is very content with her siblings holding her. I think the smaller they are the more nervous she is, but if she's in the right mood, she's even okay with Noah holding her. She doesn't love her carseat....doesn't love to fall asleep.... doesn't love skipping her nighttime feedings.... and she doesn't love rice cereal anymore, but she does like her walker, her Mommy :), and trying new flavors of foods (and tries to taste more than she should). You can just feel how excited this little girl is for life. She gets so hyper sometimes and all I can think is that she is just kinda jumping for joy the only way her cute little helpless body can. Like her Spirit is too big for it! She has a cute personality. Very inquisitive, very curious, but very much in charge too :) She reminds me so much of Charity it's crazy. We're not sure who's hair she's going to have yet.... it's still almost not even there, but we're waiting! Everyone loves Erika. She has a huge fan-base. We'll see if they ever get sick of her because it doesn't seem like it will ever happen.

look at that HUGE smile!!! I love it!!