A Snowy Day Video

This video might be long and somewhat boring, but I just loved Andrew's reaction to playing in the snow for the first time (this video's from Wednesday). Plus you'll get a glimpse of our snowball fight (the weird "whaaa!" from me in the video is because Nathan pegged me with a snowball!)



For those concerned, I located some "swishy" pants that I'm now layering over sweatpants to keep Andrew's legs dry, I just ordered some baby booties with fleece inserts to keep his toesies warm and plan on digging out some better mittens from the hand-me-down bin. By the time spring comes, all my children should have appropriate winter clothing!

First Snow Day of 2016!

On Wednesday the first round of snow hit Tennessee and the big kids were out of school for the day. The minute I got downstairs and while it was still dark out, Nathan was asking to go outside and play in the snow. So as soon as we ate breakfast and got bundled up, we were outside.

There was not much snow on the ground yet, but that didn't stop us from having fun. 

Sledding down the driveway was a bust with so little snow, but pulling Andrew and a big kid along the front walk was lots of fun.  Nathan was a big help giving Andrew and Sarah a fun ride.

We headed outside again right before lunch to sled at our neighbor's house, which didn't last long but was tons of fun.  Later in the afternoon, we got the call that Brian was on his way home from work.  A while later I got another call - he was on our street but stuck on the other side of the big hill.  So we bundled up and walked out to meet Daddy and while he attempted to conquer the hill in his truck, the kids met up with our friends again for more sledding on an even steeper (read: more fun) hill. Brian was bound and determined to get the truck home; he estimated it eventually took him 10 minutes to crest the hill, though I'd say it was a bit longer.  But finally we were all back home and we were able to play with Daddy in the snow.

First up was some sledding down the driveway, which now had enough snow to make it work. 

By this time Andrew was FED UP with being in the sling and just wanted to get down and GO...

...and he had an AMAZINGLY FUN time when I set him down in an abandoned sled and he got to play in the snow for the first time!  He would reach over and grab at the snow, then bring it into the sled and kick his feet and squeal.  This trip outside I had opted for a less bulky outfit so he could actually move around (earlier he just got angry in his Michelin-man getup), but there was no waterproof component to his clothing.  But no matter, he played until he was soaked through his gloves and pants and socks, and he loved every minute of it!

While Andrew was enjoying himself, the rest of us were having a great snowball fight before heading inside for dinner.  But more fun was to be had the next day...

A Toothy Milestone for Nathan

His first lost tooth!  Its been loose for a few weeks... in fact it was the day that I was taking the kids to their dentist appointment that he came to me and said that he had a loose tooth, so that was December 8th.*  Since then Nathan's been working on it, always glad to eat baby carrots and other crunchy things since that helps loosen the tooth.  But today it was a frozen chocolate chip bar cookie that loosened it enough for him to request that Daddy pull it out.  It was an amusing process!  I have video that maybe will make it on the blog, but to summarize it took a few tries of tying and yanking to get that sucker out... and then it flew up and hit the ceiling and fell someplace on the carpet.  It took about 5 minutes of Nathan, Mommy, Daddy and Sarah searching around on our hands and knees before Nathan found the tooth (that would be a big parenting FAIL to lose the first lost tooth!).

His next course of action was to call both sets of grandparents and Grandmother to tell them his exciting news.  So funny, so sweet and so crazy for him to be big enough to lose a tooth! 

*Actually, he has been telling us for months that he had a tooth loose, then would point to his molar or another random tooh.  Or he would say that his teeth were hurting and that they were probably loose.  But that was the first time I actually saw a wiggly tooth to back up his claims. 

Andrew's One!

I can't believe it was one year ago that you joined our family, that I almost laughed you out while giving birth, that we had no idea what a third child would be like!  You make me laugh and also frustrate me daily.  You never fail to bring smiles to the faces of your siblings and Daddy.  You are predictable in your complete unpredictability.  You are our sweet Baby Andrew!

Just this week you thrilled us by starting signing.  You now are (somewhat reliably) signing "more", "all done", "eat" and waving hi/bye-bye.  You love to nurse ALL THE TIME (seriously like 8-10 times a day).  You do NOT love to sleep, routinely waking up once or twice a night and your sleep varies wildly between 10-13 hours a night.  Naps are a challenge too, since you only take one nap, usually wake up after 30 min or an hour to be nursed back to sleep, and usually only sleep 1:30ish total no matter how long you slept the night before. 

But you are a wonderful car baby - thank goodness with the kindergarten/preschool carpool schedule.  You are the first of our babies to routinely choose to be in Daddy's arms rather then Mommy's.  You love to give me zerberts on my belly which makes me laugh so hard.  You want to do anything that big brother or big sister are doing, of course!  You love climbing up and down the stairs, eating dirt, and walking around behind you new push-and-ride racer.  Your favorite foods are yogurt, sausage balls, raspberries, thawed frozen blueberries and peas and corn, grapes, ham, cheese, sauerkraut, applesauce, spinach from my salads and most meats.  

We love you sweet boy.  Happy 1st Birthday!!

December 2015 Iphone Recap

I decorated for Christmas!  Here's the outside of the house.  I have pictures of the inside, but they may never get posted.  The really wonderful thing was that Gran/Mom was wanting to downsize her accumulation of Christmas decoration right when I was desperately needing more.  So quite a bit of her stash made the twenty minute commute between our houses: the garlands and the bows for the exterior and in other parts of the house, the German ceramic houses that I turned into a Christmas village, our "new" tree(!), extra ornaments and various other Christmas decorations.  Plus, Gran spent a whole morning helping to get the tree up and the mantle decoration started.  Thanks Mom!

Homeschool.  Nathan's sometimes resorts to sitting on the old TV console to keep his work out of Andrew's clutches.  I've got to figure out a better solution there... But! there is a grand development on that front for next year: the new headmaster has been making changes, one of which is to offer a five day option for the early elementary kids!  So I knew right away what I was hoping for (homeschool has just been SO HARD this year, mostly I will attribute that to Andrew), but I asked Nathan what he wanted to do and he was super excited about being with his friends 5 days a week!   

We had some absolutely gorgeous and unseasonably warm days in December, so one afternoon we met lots of church friends at a nearby park.  Here are a bunch of the boys doing what boys do best!  (Nathan's in the blue striped shirt sitting partway up on the right.)

Of course after seeing the Nathan and friends up so high, Sarah wanted to climb up too.  She needed a little help, but she sure wants to try her best to keep up with the older boys!

Before we left, Nathan wanted me to get a picture of him all the way at the top. There was a climbing structure like this at one of the parks in Boston, and it would always make me nervous to watch him climb back when he was Sarah's age.  But now I'm so confident in his abilities I barely paid him any attention.  Although that also be because I was chatting with other moms and trying to keep Andrew from eating too much dirt...

We had a really fun Christmas celebration for our church small group at the Ohler's house.  Paul read the story of the birth of Jesus to all the kids...

... then they did an ornament exchange!   I kind of expected there to be tears from kids "stealing" ornaments from one another... actually, to be honest, I figured it would be a disaster.  But I guess all our good parenting paid off because only one of the kids chose to "steal" an ornament!  Actually, I assume all the rest were too excited about getting to open a present to want to take an already opened ornament. 

Sarah checked this learn-to-draw-fairies book out of the library, and spent one whole evening creating about 10 different drawings.  I was pretty impressed with how well they turned out!

I'm the kind of person that likes to wait to put presents under the tree until Christmas Eve.  That may be because I'm still buying presents up until the week before Christmas, and wrapping them on Christmas Eve... but also at these ages and stages I don't want to be saying "no, no, no" to the kids when they see presents under the tree and want to open them NOW.  And with Fast Crawling Baby around, I wasn't sure how quickly he would turn into Destroy The Christmas Tree and Presents Baby (which actually didn't happen this year!)  But the kids had a different idea about presents under the tree...

Our family spent one afternoon at the lake house with Gran and Pawpaw.  Here's all the rock collectors scoping out the beach that's revealed when TVA lowers the lake in the winter. 

Andrew and I stayed up on the dock.  He loved swinging for a while, but then wanted to get down and explore.  He made a bee-line for the stairs and wanted to climb up and then over the gangway (the sides of which aren't baby/toddler secure yet) and screamed and screamed when I wouldn't let him.  He's definitely strong willed, just like his siblings and many other members of the family!

On Christmas Eve, reading "The Night Before Christmas".

Oh look!  I was there too! :)  And Andrew was already in bed.

One of Andrew's favorite "toys" are the baby washcloths or other small bits of fabric  This particular day it was one of my socks that he snagged when we were sorting laundry. 

Oh, naptime.  I have such a love/hate relationship with naptime because of Andrew's crazy sleeping habits.  This was one of the days that Andrew was sick, so he only made it until about 10 am until he crashed.  But after a 30 minute snooze he was awake, and no amount of nursing or bouncing on my part would lull him back to sleep.  So by the middle of the afternoon, once again he was exhausted but also just rested enough that he would wake up and scream every time I tried to put him into bed.  So I adopted a new strategy - pull the mattress out of his crib and nurse him to sleep lying down (so I wouldn't have to transfer him anywhere after he conked out).  So after a frustrating hour he was finally asleep, and then of course he looked too sweet not to take a picture!

The Oldsmobile is running again!  Brian had to do some more work on it (fuel injection system), so we hadn't gotten a chance to ride in it since we moved to the new house.  But we grabbed our chance right after Christmas after we had dried out from the rain but before the cold weather hit again.  All the kids love riding in the Olds!

I was running errands with just Andrew and he was getting pretty grumpy sitting in the cart.  Turns out he thinks he's old enough to drive instead!

Tie Sunday

Yesterday somehow turned into "Tie Sunday."  Nathan hasn't wanted to wear a tie in months, but came into our room before church excitedly holding his tie from last Easter.  Sarah wanted to join in the fun, so Brian and I told her that she could wear a tie to church if she wanted.*  Then as I was getting Andrew dressed, Nathan asked if Andrew had a tie he could wear too, and astonishingly I was able to quickly find one for him.  So after all that, I had to get a picture of all of them!

Though Andrew is strategically placed to block Daddy's shirt front, I will bust Brian and reveal that he did not choose to join in on Tie Sunday!

*The tie lasted on Sarah for 20 minutes in the house, but as soon as we got into the car she started yanking on it and trying to get it off.  There was fussing and angst and a complete inability to get herself buckled in the carseat due to the torture being caused by that tie!  She ended up replacing the tie with a necklace before we went into church and that turned out to be a much more acceptable accessory for her.

Here are some outtakes with just the kids...

Christmas Celebrations 2015

Whew, I feel like I've been on a roller coaster since the beginning of October, or maybe August since school started?  All the "things" that have been going on - adjusting to kindergarten chauffeuring and homeschooling, then the season of birthdays, with Halloween and Thanksgiving right in the middle, then plowing straight on until Christmas.  We do have one more birthday to celebrate before we're done for a while, which is of course Andrew's first birthday!!  But I don't feel so much pressure with that one because he's too young to have any expectations for the day or the celebration or anything.  So I'm hoping that this new year will give me the chance to slow down with life and will also leave me with a bit of extra energy in the evenings to keep up on the blog.

So of course there's tons of stuff to document and a crazy number of pictures, but I'm going to start with Christmas Eve and Christmas and then work my way backwards if I manage it.  And as much as it pains me, I'm not going to be able to detail everything so that I'll actually get something posted.

On Christmas Eve we spent the afternoon at Nana and Granddad's house, exchanging presents and having a yummy dinner.

It's so fun watching the kids opening presents!

 Andrew halfway understood what he was supposed to do, but finally the big kids helped him unwrap his tool bench. 

Sarah got magnetic dress up dolls and and a simon-says type dancing microphone.  Nathan got this memory light up game which he LOVES, and a laser maze game.  They also got a fort building kid which kind of got forgotten until today when Daddy helped the kids build an "igloo" that Nathan is sleeping in tonight!

After dinner we dressed Andrew in pajamas, then loaded the car in hopes of seeing some Christmas lights on the way home (as long as Andrew wasn't screaming).  We were fortunate - just a few neighborhoods down the road was a fabulous go-all-out decorated house, complete with two-story-tall Santa and snowman blow-ups.  We also had just enough time to swing by another house that had a light show programmed to music before heading home to plop Andrew in his crib, read "The Night Before Christmas", leave Santa a snack of cinnamon rolls and milk and the reindeer some "magic reindeer food".

I only got a few pictures of opening presents the next morning... nothing like an 11 month old to keep you too busy to pick up the camera!  We gave Sarah a doll house and a set of small Disney princess dolls to live in the house.  Nathan got a big Lego set, but we also gave him some super hero action figures, thinking that he would want to play with Sarah and the doll house.  We thought correctly, as you might notice Captain America and Iron Man stationed in the doll house.  Don't be fooled, they aren't sleeping but rather "protecting the princesses".  Andrew was pretty excited about the doll house as well, especially taking out and putting back in the dolls and furniture. 

Nathan working on his first of three Lego sets (one from Santa, one from Aunt Karen, and one from Dad and Mom.)

It was the Christmas of dolls for Sarah.  Besides the doll house, Aunt Karen gave Sarah a baby doll with a change of clothes and Santa brought her a Barbie doll.  The Barbie was named "Peyton" (after a friend from school) and the baby doll has been named both "Mary Ann" and "Peyton" depending on the day.  

This expression of Brian's made me smile, as he's putting together Andrew's present.  I do have to say, I was hit by a stroke of genius at the last minute with this gift.  It was looking like Andrew might not have any presents under the tree from Mommy and Daddy!

Andrew's expressions were priceless when he figured out how his new toy worked! 

The kids had fun pushing Andrew around the house too!

Mid-morning, other family started arriving.  Grandmother, Pawpaw and Gran came first so we could all exchange gifts.  Andrew just seems to adore Grandmother, which just pleases us all!

I love that Gran always likes to be extra festive with her outfit!

Sorry Pawpaw, I didn't get a picture of you, but here's Brian with his new chainsaw helmet!

We hadn't even made it to lunch time, but that was all the pictures I managed to take.  But to recap the rest, Nana and Granddad joined us for a Christmas lunch of pork loin roast with balsalmic vinegar glaze, homemade rolls, Grandmother's roasted squash, and green beans, followed by a host of delicious desserts: boiled custard, two French silk pies, dipped chocolates, pecan bars, cashew brittle, and more.

After lunch, everyone went their separate ways for Christmas afternoon naps.  I crashed; I was feeling pretty terrible from my cough/cold, while Brian stayed up with Andrew who was refusing naps because of his cough/cold - ugh!  But we made it through and the five of us rallied for dinner at Uncle David and Aunt Bridget's house, with more yummy food and more presents to exchange.  It was a jam-packed and fun filled Christmas!