No More Diapers!

...for a few weeks anyway.

 

Over the last two weeks I finally decided I was ready for Alex to potty train.  He's been showing readiness for a few months, but an important factor for potty training success is Mommy readiness!  He's done great.  All three of our kids have now potty trained during the month before turning three.  I'm happy with that; it's been an easy age to do it at.  Each child has been different in the steps it took to master it, but it's been really quick and easy with all of them.  The key is definitely waiting until they are ready.  :)

 

He's having an occasional accident, but it's not every day, and he's independent with everything except wiping (why does this child have to gag at his own bodily functions???).  So I'd say he's potty trained.  Yay!  It's been nice not changing diapers for the last two weeks.

 

That's my big boy! 

Snow Day

We had another snowfall last Friday, so we had an actual snow day.  It was a great excuse to be lazy, especially since I wasn't feeling very good. 

Alex consented to wear a hat and gloves this time, so he FINALLY had some snow time.  The kids played outside for HOURS.  Fun fun. 

Caught in the Act

We've had two hilarious bits of mischief recently.  The first was while we were enjoying a visit with some friends.  The adults were rather engrossed in a board game around the kitchen table while the kids were playing.  Eventually someone looked up and across the kitchen to see these two little mischief makers helping themselves to some early dessert!  The best part is that they had borrowed a chair from the table we were sitting around without anyone noticing, and then proceeded to do this in our full line of vision.  They actually managed it a second time minutes later too.  So funny!

The other bit of mischief happened a few nights ago.  I heard some splashing in the bathroom, so I went to check it out.  This is what I found.  When I questioned Alex he told me he was washing his hands!

Baby Update

We had another ultrasound last week (sorry no pictures) to check the baby's progress.  There is a little concern because her ?renal bladder? is slightly enlarged.  This is the part right underneath the kidney that collects the urine before it goes through the ureter.  Anyway, it will probably go away on its own, but they are monitoring it.  We'll have another ultrasound in three weeks, and then they'll check her again at birth if it still appears enlarged then.  Odds are high that it won't pose a problem.

We also found out in the ultrasound that she is already 4 1/2 pounds, and a few days ahead for growth.  That sounds about right for our babies; they've all been slightly larger than average, but not much.  I'm expecting another 8 pound baby.

Right now she's hanging out in the breech position; thankfully we have some weeks to go.  I've been doing some inversion exercises to encourage her to flip.  I'm really crossing my fingers on this one.  The fact that we live in a day of advanced medical practices relieves my mind a lot on this.  I'm not worried about whether or not she and I will be fine after the delivery; I just really don't want to experience my first c-section.

Otherwise I'm feeling fine (considering I'm big and pregnant).  I've been extra tired in the evenings recently, but this has been another healthy pregnancy.  I really have nothing to complain about.  I am getting very baby hungry.  I've avoided pulling out the baby things so far, because I know that I will feel super impatient once I do.  Three more weeks and then I'll allow myself to prep everything.  :)  I can't wait to hold this little girl! 

Ballerina

I've decided to wait until after the baby is born to sign Annie up for dance lessons.  Her desire is so strong, but I feel like it makes sense to wait since there is no way I want to be committed to a class during the month of April.  She has accepted this quite well, and is content to practice by watching old dance recitals from my childhood for now.

 

I love watching her dance.  She won't let me teach her anything for real, so she just copies the old recitals as she watches.  She is totally IN THE ZONE when she does this and it's adorable.  She's also insistent on watching the ballet numbers.

Valentine's Day

For Valentine's Day last week we celebrated by hosting a little party.  It was a totally spontaneous decision resulting from the fact that I didn't want to take my kids to deliver valentines.  This way we didn't have to go anywhere, and we had more fun.  :)  I'm glad we did it.

 

We had a fun combination of ages for this party.  Between two homeschooling families and several little kids who aren't in school yet we had a blast.  My friend's oldest two kids helped with our activities.  She refers to them as Uno and Dos on the internet, so a big THANK YOU to Uno and Dos for helping me out!

 

We had a hands on treat: fruit pizzas.  I baked the cookies the night before, but the kids (and moms) put their own toppings on.  Yum!  Here are most of the kids at the table enjoying their snack.

We also decorated bags and exchanged valentines.  Here are some fun pictures of all of the kids at the end of the party.

It looks like someone is telling the dog to get out of his face in this last picture.  :)

I invited all of the moms to stay for the party, so I also enjoyed the chance to visit with them.  Thank you to everyone who came!

Kids Say

Alex appeared in the living room one day pushing the doll stroller with a baby doll in it.  He was excitedly exclaiming, "Baby came out of your tummy!  Baby came out of your tummy!"

My kids have a knack for inventing their own words.  I love their use of 'ish'.  Things are often 'darkish', 'pinkish', and 'purpleish'.

Logan while playing Taboo was trying to describe the word 'judge'.  He first read the clues on the card (we give him that handicap), "Trial, courts, sits..." to which we asked, "Do you know what this means?"  His response was, "Yes!  He does a pumpkin race!"

Part of Annie's prayer, "...and please bless Mommy to go to bed safely and to not land on her baby..."

Annie, "I'm a medium kid."  When I asked her to explain this was her response, "I'm yittle and big.  Yeah!  That's medium!"

Alex, "Mom, you big!"

Annie out of nowhere, "Dad, you're not PREGNANT!"  Jim, "Where did that come from?"  Annie, "I just thought of it!"

Logan, "Maybe the pregnancy after this one you'll have triplets!"  Me, "That would be hard."  Logan, "Well I'm a big brother.  I could take care of one, maybe two!"  Annie, "And I could take care of one and Alex will be big enough to take care of one!"

While looking at animal pictures Alex pointed to a picture of an elephant and said, "Mom, that is you."

Family Time

We've really been enjoying our family time during the last few weeks.

 

We've had a LOT of frigid weather that has kept us indoors.  Church was even cancelled because of freezing rain one week!  That day we played hide and seek, Jim's version.  The 'seeker' is rolled in a blanket; then instead of counting he has to untangle himself in order to start finding.  (Funny side note:  The only other time we've had church cancelled because of ice conditions, we did this exact activity and I blogged about it.  That was October of 2009.)

Obviously it actually takes some time for the kids to get out.

Another cold morning, we had a pajama day.  We've actually had several pajama days; it's been too cold to go anywhere.  Yay for homeschool!  Annie had some super wild hair for a few days, despite attempts to tame it.

A fun family home evening activity; we played Taboo.  The kids were HILARIOUS with their descriptions.

Annie was so cute sitting with Jim.  These kids love their daddy.

Jim helped Annie some when it was her turn, but Logan was totally on his own.  He was REALLY cracking us up.  I laughed so hard my stomach hurt.

Yet another evening, Logan was thrilled when Jim said he'd do Legos with him.  Of course, that meant that everybody pulled their Legos out.

The snow that we arrived home to melted in a couple of days, so we were excited to have a good snowfall last week.  This was a very heavy, wet snow.  It would have been perfect for skiing.  :(  Next year, next year...

Anyway, the kids have been out in it several times.  They actually just came in from building snowmen.

These pictures are from the first day.

Annie and Logan were super excited to play in it, so we had a semi-snow day as far as school went.  They played first, and when they decided they were done we had half a school day.

 

Alex was really excited about the snow, too, but he refused to wear adequate snow clothing.  At one point, I actually had him in his boots, snow pants, and coat (after a big battle), but he refused his hat and gloves.  So this is what he did the whole time Annie and Logan played.  Poor guy.  He has yet to play in this particular snow fall.

I don't know how they came up with this stunt, but this was another evening activity recently.  Jim was flipping the kids with his legs.  Here you can see Logan flying through the air.

After the Kids Are in Bed

I remember as a kid thinking that my parents had fun after I went to bed.  I guess now that I'm an adult I know what I wasn't missing out on.  Here you go kids; this is how exciting Mom and Dad get after you go to sleep.

 

We suck air out of mattress toppers.

It's pretty impressive what a vacuum can do.

We watch the dog sleep.  The kids probably would have found this funny, though.  His feet were constantly twitching; I think he was running in his sleep.

And mostly we go to bed ourselves.  The end.

Home At Last

Our vacation was so great that it felt really good to be home.  My first thought when we walked in the door was, "I really like my house.  Aah!"  In the weeks since, I have felt recharged for life.  I'm cooking again (sad to say, but I wasn't cooking much in the weeks leading up to our trip), I've been totally on top of the housework (even putting away laundry!), and our daily school time has been fantastic.  That break was so good for me.

 

We came home with a whole box of junk food leftover from Christmas.  I had to take a picture of this one because it was so funny.  That Reese's package had TWO peanut butter cups in it.  They were huge!  They were ten times the size of regular Reese's cups.  He also had a mega sized (10x again) Snicker's bar.  My brother wanted that one, though, so we didn't bring it home.  Jim took his Reese's to work to share.  :)

We arrived home to lots of snow from three weeks previous.  Our very first task (before unloading the car even) was to shovel that crust.  The kids couldn't wait to play in it, so that was one of the first things they did.

Our first Sunday back at church, I received SEVERAL comments that I was finally looking rather pregnant.  I guess that's what happens when you go on vacation for so long.  I took a picture, though it's now four weeks old.  27 weeks

We had several Christmas presents that were still in their packages for one reason or other, so we spent some time that first week back opening and enjoying our new things.  One of Annie's unopened gifts was a make-up kit that my mom gave her.  It has real eyeshadow, nail polish, and lip gloss in it.  Thankfully most of it is lip gloss.  :)  It also came with two barrettes and two plastic rings.  We finally opened it during that week, and made Annie feel beautiful.  As you can see, she looks no different, but she sure felt dolled up. 

Evidence

Logan and Annie have been sneaky a few times recently with Jim's phone.  We'll discover hundreds of picture and videos that they've taken.  Some have actually been really hilarious, and we find it funny that they leave their evidence behind without realizing it.  Nevertheless, they know they aren't supposed to play with our phones.  I'm really good about knowing where my phone is at, so I was surprised to find some interesting pictures on mine one day. 

 

Sorry kids, you left some evidence.

Belated Christmas Vacation Post

After I wrote the previous post, my mom sent me a bunch of pictures from our trip, so I wanted to add them.  It's taken forever because our computer was out of commission for the last three weeks, so here I am catching up again.  :)

 

Cute Annie.

This is that picture of when Alex fell asleep standing up.

Sunday

This one is from Christmas; I don't think I posted this one before, but I could be wrong.

Here are some extra aquarium pictures.

I like this one.

Based on our hair color, you'd never know the three of us are siblings.  People say we look alike though; I just have a hard time seeing it.

Last, here are a couple more from Casa Bonita.

Now my Christmas vacation posts are officially done!