Ellie's Birth Announcement

Now that she's almost 3 months old (tomorrow!), here's the birth announcement I sent out. Don't feel bad if you didn't get one - I sent it mostly to people who don't read my blog. Some of them hadn't seen any pics of her & some didn't even know she'd come! And some I got back in the mail because I sent them in clear envelopes again & they didn't all go through the machine nicely so I got a nice little note from the post office asking me for an additional 20 cents for special handling! What a bunch of crap! It took me a couple weeks to get those ones back out! So I have to admit - I'm a little proud of myself for these! Of course I couldn't have done it myself - thanks to Jen for the great photos & thanks to photoaffections.com for the idea that I totally ripped off!

for the birds

"We think the birds are hungry because they are tweeting."
Callie's response when I asked why they had dumped half a box of crackers on the lawn!

highlights

My life seems to be going a mile a minute right now! I have a busy day (by my standards anyway, not most people's probably!) today so I shouldn't even be doing this! Here's what we've been up to:

• Date night (with Ellie) to see Indiana Jones. Ellie gagged really loud & threw up a ton & the people around us were saying eww! Caught it mostly with a bib but it soaked through & was dripping down the theater floor! Then she pooped out both legs (hadn't had one that bad yet!) but since there were only 30 mins left & we weren't on an aisle I put a diaper wipe between us to shield me from further injury - I already had poop soaked through my jeans! Thank goodness they were a really dark rinse! Other than those things it was a great movie! :)


• Got a new camera! FINALLY! I've been plannin on buying a DSLR for a year & 1/2 but couldn't decide what to get & had cold feet. I finally took the plunge & got a Nikon D40 & so far I LOVE IT! And all I've used it on so far is auto!


• Jackson wore underwear all last week with not too many accidents! It's amazing that one day he's too scared to poop in the toilet & the next (well almost next) he's wearing underwear full time during the day! He's even stayed dry the last 2 nights! Awesome!


• Jeremiah taught Jack to pee in the backyard! I really am fine with this except that now Jack won't hardly keep his underwear on once he gets outside! And on Friday Callie came inside to let me know that Jack had pooped on a rock! I went outside to check things out & Jack was standing at a corner of the shed & I just didn't see any poop where he was standing. I soon discovered I was standing in it! Disgusting! I got it off my shoe but there's a green stain on the flagstone!


• Callie is dancing & prancing around the house to the point of ridiculousness! We sing the "Family Prayer" song every night just before having family prayer & she'll ask me to start over singing so she can dance. It's like that all the time. She can't just sing a song, she must dance! :) She's getting ready for a dance recital this Saturday!


• Ellie has started getting quite vocal! She is doing lots of squealing & babbling! She has the happiest smiles. I feel so fortunate to have another sweet happy baby!


• Drained & refilled the hottub & set up a new little pool for the kids on Friday & Saturday & the whole family played outside. I got my first sunburn of the summer!
  
• Callie had her first ever primary activity day on Saturday morning & she loved it! They wrote letters to missionaries & played a game. She brought an extra cookie & bottle of water home for Jack.


• Date night to buy food storage stuff! Jeremiah came home from a meeting a week ago & said it was time to get serious about it. We had a few things, but this past week we bought some big metal shelves & a year supply of some things. We've got a ways to go.


• Today's our 7th anniversary! We can't believe it's been 7 (wonderful) years!

Today I have a mountain of laundry to fold & put away (the worst part), a home to tidy up, an anniversary dinner & dessert to plan & make, probably a trip to the grocery store, and fhe to plan & have, so I'm out of time!

Our Big Boy!

Eventually we're going to have to stop giving Jack candy bars every time he poops on the toilet! :) A couple days ago I sent him in his room to put a pull-up on & he came out instead with underwear on & he stayed dry after that & even pooped on the toilet - twice! And yesterday was the same! (He's showing us his muscles & sweet pirate tatoo here!)

We read the Berenstein Bears & the Messy Room the other night before bed & Jack listened really well that time! As I was getting to the last page he said he needed to clean up his room (which wasn't too bad) & he got up & started putting things away! It was great! We had to make him stop cleaning so we could have prayer & put them to bed!

Jeremiah took Jack on his first father/son campout last weekend! Jack talked about getting to go the whole week before & was totally excited about hanging out with his daddy! Jer thought it would be fun for them to sleep out under the stars in the bed of the truck but Jack ended up keeping Jeremiah up all night because he was scared! Of course Jer's having Jack show his muscles again! Must be a guy thing!

Jack is so cute in the mornings (besides most other times too)! We've said before "It's sunny out today!" so now Jack says every day "It's the sun of the day!" Someday I'll record him saying some of the funny things he says because his voice is just so cute & funny! He also asked me a question the other day while we were having dinner & when I didn't answer because I had food in my mouth he asked me again so I answered anyway. Then he says to me, "Don't talk with food in your mouth mom! It's rude!" A cute thing that he does is that if he's saying the prayer before a meal I'll tell him to say, "Please bless the food," or our breakfast or whatever meal & instead of repeating it verbatim he says, "Please bless the macaroni & cheese & oranges," or whatever food we're eating!

One Happy Girl!

What a happy happy baby Ellie is! She greets me each morning (yes, she's sleeping though the nights! more often than not anyway!) with the happiest smile & she's really starting to find her voice! Sometimes I can tell she's trying hard to figure out how to make that sound again, & sometimes she gets them out & lets out just the happiest little shrieks! She's SO cute & sweet!

More great stuff!

First I'd like to say that squid soap sucks after all! The red dot only lasted a few days. Now the ink's all dried up so it's just soap w/out a dot. The kids prefer to use the honey scented soap that I got from WalMart that's supposed to look/smell like the high-end stuff from B&BWorks. It smells more honey-ish but it's nice. Jack likes to put it on & have me pretend to be Pooh Bear & eat him! :)

But here's something I'm STOKED about!!! Seriously almost deliriously happy about! Most of you won't appreciate this like I do because you probably live in an area where you can actually go to these stores whenever you fancy, but I have had to succumb to online shipping charges so this makes me so happy I could dance! Introducing "Shopping made simple!" Shop one store or four and pay only one $7 flat shipping rate. How brilliant is that?!!! I don't shop at BR or Piperlime so I don't care about those 2, but I'm pretty dang excited about the others! Totally brilliant!!!


Okay, here's the other new thing I think is totally cool! del.icio.us! Check out the clip on social networking- I can't imagine you won't think it's awesome too!

Cook for President!

This was the first time we watched American Idol (thanks to Jonny) & I'm stoked that David Cook won! Hooray! Archuletta was great too, but Cook has the personalilty (or even a personality at all!), and I think he's a better perfomer & is a better rounded. Either way I'm sure they'll both have record labels soon! So is Archuletta gonna take a 2 year break from the pop world to serve a mission???

Callie's Birthday List

A compilation of wants (some real, some not):

- wheelbarrow (Weird, I know! We have a kid-sized winnie-the-pooh one already but she wants one that she doesn't have to share with anybody. I told her we share because we love people & we can just share the wheelbarrow!)

- Princess coat

- Princess bike

- camera

- big girl bouncy seat that makes music (She like's Ellie's)

- very own real phone - pink all over just like mom's

- Ariel radio (and she said I need to get online to find it)

- very own workbook to do all by herself - a princess one

- a swing like Ellie's that makes music

- a picture of her when she was little & young

- a butterfly puzzle (from Lakeshore Learning Center)

- a raven game that doesn't have any raven on it (I think she just means a game. she saw this one at the store & thought it looked awesome:)

- Pink Lego set

- Princess Bella Dancerella
- skates
- Tub time foam activity set

- a doll stroller

12 on the 12th

Monday, May 12th: (and yes, my children stayed in pajamas all day!)

I'm not normally up before Jeremiah goes to work, but Ellie woke up around 7 to eat so after I fed her I made breakfast for the first time in a LONG time! Up until a few months ago I would make Jeremiah breakfast every Wednesday morning. Occassionally on other mornings too, but Wednesday was the guaranteed day. So he was pretty happy to have a good breakfast this morning!



Callie likes to sleep late like a "teeny-ager" as she calls them. She's very often the last one up in the mornings. I woke her up finally to eat her waffle that was waiting for her. The rest of us had already finished breakfast!



Jackson is waiting for me to change his poopy pull-up! I'm glad he thinks it's such a fun thing for me! At least it's usually just only once a day in the morning.



Callie dances & prances everywhere, all the time! One day she asked if I was as good of a dancer as she was. She didn't believe me when I told her I was so I danced to a song that was playing. She was in complete awe & thought I was absolutely amazing (thank you very much!)! But even a little later she would do a move & then ask if I could do it. Most of the time I told her I couldn't and sometimes she'd say, "Come on mom, it's easy! You just do this!" and she'd give me instructions! :)



Jack is so good at doing things by himself. He loves to read & it's very common to find him sitting or laying quietly "reading" books!



Just one of the many things on my to-do list! I finally fixed the track for the drawer to go back onto (of course I caused more damage that I had to fix in the process), but I still need to sand & repaint the dresser. I'd had the drawers sitting out for a few days though needing my attention. That's what happens when you spend $40 on a craigslist dresser instead of $800 on a new nice one! But I do love the scallop trim at the top of this one -isn't it adorable?! I plan on refinishing it in a shabby green or white. Someday. (I've already had it for a year I think!)



I got baby toys out of storage for Ellie so Callie had a great time rediscovering the fun things that peek-a-blocks do!



Ellie loves her swing! And I love that she loves it! I'm actually feeling good about myself because I have made a point so far to not just leave her in it all day, although lots of times she'd probably let me! She gets plenty of tummy time, bouncy seat time, & mom's arms time while she's awake.



Jeremiah called around 6 (the time he normally comes home) and said he'd be another 40 mins to an hour! It seems like this is getting more & more common. I'd tried really hard to have dinner ready when he walked in the door so we went ahead & ate without him. Can you believe I cooked?! Okay, I didn't really. Thanks to Stouffer's! We had a pretty yummy "rigattoni with chicken in a basil pesto sauce" dish.



The kids play outside every day & they were especially dirty so a bath was definitely necessary! These bath paints didn't work at all! The only thing they ended up doing was tinting the water. Oh, and Jack took the lid off the yellow & set it on the side of the tub, where it of course got knocked over & almost the entire bottle ended up on the bathroom rug which I had to rush to the sink to make sure the dye got rinsed out right away!



Our family night lesson was on listening so for our activity we played this "Listen-and-Learn" game that I got from WalMart for $4. I highly recommend it! It comes with a cd and these bingo-type cards. The kids listen to the different sounds on the cd & put the marker on the animal (or bug) that made the noise. There is no winner, and it's a fun activity that we've played several times since I got it last week. They love it!



Callie asked if they could watch the cookies bake. Sure! They sat here for at least half of the bake time. That's a long time for a 2 & 3 year old to just sit! I've had major cookie issues! No matter what I do my cookies always seem to turn out flat with crispy edges. Wendy and I have been making the exact same chocolate chip cookie recipe for almost 7 years and her cookies always come out of the oven nice & round. A couple weeks ago I ate somebody else's choco chip cookies that I LOVED so I got her recipe & again, mine came out really flat while hers were plump. What gives? I bought brand new baking soda, hand-mixed the cookies when I combined the dry w/the wet, & I even sifted the flour. I don't know which one of those things made the difference this time or if it was a combination, but after years of flat cookies I finally had a round one closer to what I desired!!! I was ecstatic! They were the best cookies I've made in a LONG time - maybe ever! Anybody have any feedback on what I could be doing wrong to always (except this once) end up with flat crispy cookies?! It's been driving me seriously nuts!

This is why they say to never leave your child unattended!

This is how I found Ellie after switching my laundry.




This is how I left her!



What a tricky girl! :)

Gobble Bag

Jeremiah tripped on some toys & caught himself but broke a dress-up shoe in the process. He was super annoyed & told Callie that he was going to take away her toys if she couldn't keep them picked up since he tripped on them. Shortly after that Callie tripped on a pair of Jeremiah's shoes & said that I needed to take them away from him because she tripped on them since he'd left them out! :)

The cleaning of the toys really is an issue around here so inspired by my friend Liz's gunny bag, we got a gobble bag. Much bigger than a pillow case! It's a collapsible laundry basket! The first couple of nights the threats of bringing out the gobble bag worked like a charm! The 3rd night Jack had made a huge mess & Jeremiah was about to get the bag & Callie was just sobbing as she was trying to pick up toys & Jack was just having a good old time playing. I told her to just pick up her things & then Jack's toys would be the one that got gobbled up & that immediately stopped the tears & perked her right up. That's ended up totally biting me in the butt! Now she evaluates which toys are worth cleaning up & which one's she's okay with having gobbled. She's said more than once, "That's okay, it can just go in the gobble bag until Monday" (the day the gobble bag gives back the toys). She's even volunteered a few things for the gobble monster to snack on! First of all I think we need to follow Liz's gunny bag more closely & make them earn the stuff back (I should have reread her post before I started the whole thing). But I wonder how many toys the gobble bag will eat up before they really care!

Cool Stuff

We got a new computer several weeks ago & I'm so glad to once again have the full version of Outlook instead of Outlook Express! I haven't used Outlook since I was a working girl & the version we have now is even newer than what I had, so I was STOKED to discover the RSS directory function in Outlook! My friend Janelle shared her discovery of Google Reader a while ago, & this is even better (for me anyway)! If you see this little orange button on your internet toolbar that means the blog (or other site) offers this feature. So I just copy & paste the feed's URL into my Outlook's RSS directory & botta-bing botta bang! No more checking a million blogs only to discover they haven't been updated! Now I can see when somebody's updated & I can read it right from Outlook w/out even opening my browser! I love it!



Here's another cool thing I recently discovered. Squid Soap! It helps kids with handwashing because it inks their hand when they press on the pump to get soap & they have to wash long enough to get the ink off. Callie & Jack both think it's really cool. We got it at Target in case you think it's cool too.

Mr. Mischief

We were grocery shopping around lunch time earlier this week & I figured I'd pick up some lunch on the way home but in the frozen food section the kids saw Kids' Cuisine & wanted them & I figured why not - I'd spend the same on them that I would buying fast food & both are probably equally unhealthy but I'd be cutting out a stop. They thought it was SO cool that they each got to pick out their very own lunch! They went ga-ga over the pudding with sprinkles on it for dessert! :)

That same morning Jack pooped on the toilet for the first time! This is huge for us because we have been trying for MONTHS to get him to do this! He always says he's scared. It's been annoying me that everybody is pushing him to get potty trained because when he's ready he'll do it, but at the same time I'm getting super annoyed having to smell him and then change his poopy pull-ups! His Uncle Kenny had told him that if he pooped on the toilet he'd get him a candy bar, so after he did the landmark poop he right away said, "Do I get a candy bar?" YES! We got him one when we were out & he made a huge mess out of enjoying it! I showed him how to give me thumbs up & he had to try several times. He'd get it & then do something else with his hands & forget how he got his thumb like that! :) Of course he hasn't pooped on the toilet again since then, but that fact that he's done it once is very encouraging!

Here's some more of Jack's silly faces. The thing I think is funniest about them is that they're not just occassion faces - these are regulars around our house - all the time! Even if he's playing by himself he makes these faces!

He's such a mischievious kid! I don't know if it's cause he's a boy or if it's just his personality or a mix of both (& probably his age too), but he is always making mischief! Callie never colored on a wall or anything, but Jack has colored on walls, floors, bodies, dishes, important papers, furniture, you name it! He doesn't give a crap about me telling him not to do something. Not only is he going to do what he wants, lots of times he makes sure I know he's gonna do what he wants! It's hard to stay on top of him when he's constantly doing things he's been taught not to do! It's especially hard when I'm nursing to do anything. It's gotta be something pretty bad for me to get up in the middle of feeding Ellie! I've mentioned his sense of humor. I think he's smart. One day Callie was playing with some little plastic jewels she has & Jack wanted them & she didn't want him to have them so he grabbed them & tossed them & they were scattered. Okay, typical, right? Every kid does that. So Callie gathers them up & has them in this little pile that she's hovering over & he's a couple feet away from her & he says, "there's one!" So Callie looks in the direction he's pointing & jumps up to look for it & the second she left her pile he swooped them up & ran out with them as fast as he could! How many 2 1/2 year-olds are smart enough to trick their older sister?! Like I said, mischievious!

Ellie's 2 months!

I can't believe it's only been 2 months since Ellie was born! Life is hectic right now, as you can imagine from my lack of posting! Yesterday somebody ask me how I spend my day. This was my yesterday: nurse, feed the kids, nurse, visiting teachers, nurse, feed my kids lunch, nurse, some yardwork, nurse, throw together the rest of my mutual stuff, go to YW presidency mtg & mutual, nurse, relax, nurse, go to bed! So that's why I don't have time to update my blog! Because when I'm not nursing & doing normal mom stuff, I have a to-do list that keeps getting things added to it & not much getting crossed off! So anyway, here's our little sweetheart! She is seriously a great baby! She is very happy most of the time & she is totally cool with her big brother & sister fussing over her all the time. Jack utterly adores her! He's always saying to her in this very sweet voice, "Oh my sweetheart." Or "Oh, my precious." :) He's a keeper! They all are! Sad story - we went to Chili's for dinner last weekend & got these jalepeno cheese fries as an appetizer. Ellie was getting fussy so I figured she was ready to eat so I went to feed her & she suddenly starts screaming bloody murder! For at least 5 minutes! I just couldn't calm her down! Once she settled down & fell asleep I went back in to eat & we concluded I must have touched her with my jalepeno fingers or something & either her eye was burning or her mouth? Sad huh? Well then tonight we had pizza for dinner & Jeremiah likes crushed red peppers on his. He finished first & took Ellie in the other room & all of a sudden the same bloody murder cries. I'm assuming it's the same thing. Poor girl! We'll teach her yet to hold her spicy! :)