Lunch Date with Nana and Co

Nana, Aunt Amy, Aunt Val and Ally came over for lunch today. Nana always likes to feed Clara baby food and Clara always likes to eat it. Aunt Val snuggled with Derek and Bryce on the rocking chair and Aunt Amy used her phone to facetime with Danny so Bryce could say hi. Ally did a great job holding and playing with Clara!

 Nana and Clara

 Bryce and Aunt Amy

 Ally!

 smirk

 Family!

 Mmm... carrots! Last time I gave her carrots, she made hilarious, disgusted faces. This time, she seemed to like carrots just fine.

 Happy girl!

 Clara, Aunt Val and Derek

 Aunt Amy, Danny (on facetime), Clara and Nana

Bryce is trying to figure out who that is on the shadowy screen... :)

James

 Derek came blazing into the house yelling that he'd found a GIANT turtle and for me to come see it. Of course, I obliged and Derek proudly pointed to a rather large turtle that had become stuck trying to get under the back fence. I pried it free and Derek asked to take it inside to show Grandma - but he didn't want to hold it. We went to show Grandma and then decided to help the turtle get to his home in the pond behind the house. Derek asked to hold it really quick and, just as he was about to back out, I placed his hands around the shell. He was excited to hold a real turtle, but he's becoming cautious about physical interactions. That's my smart boy! When I asked him what the turtle's name is, he said, "Turtles don't have names, Mom." When I asked what he wanted to call him, he responded with, "Maybe I'll call him James." Ladies and gentleman, James the turtle.

 Derek using James to demonstrate the proper way to hold a turtle "so he can't bite my fingers off." Yep.

James was still rather shy (or maybe a little shell-shocked from the three foot drop).

Pile of Giggles

I put Clara in her carseat for a few minutes and Derek and Bryce decided to build a fort to share with Clara. Bryce didn't really want to be in the fort, but he had a great time piling the pillows on Derek. Sweet Clara just sat in the carseat the whole time watching the building, haha.

 



 See the carseat under all those stuffed animals?

 

 There's a pair of Derek eyes, too

 

Bryce had a blast tickling Derek under that red blanket. Giggles galore!

Isaac and Andrew dropped by for some fun later that day. We built a fort to watch Leapfrog and Bryce decided he'd rather sit on the couch. See him?

This Just Happened

Derek, Bryce and Clara hanging out with Uncle Colton

And Clara just crawled her first inch! :D

Computer Cuties

 Busted!

 

The boys love to pretend to type on the keyboard. Unfortunately, they don't always wait for supervision

Pink Ball of Fluff

We've finally got rubber bands for Clara's hair! She's adorable! I can't believe, at nearly seven months, I can put her hair in such fluffy pigtails. She's getting so big, but she's still so petite. We won't know her percentiles til next month, but she's definitely going to be a leggy lightweight. She loves her brothers and I usually have to break up giggle fests at night between her and Derek. He loves to make her laugh. Clara loves her baby doll and pink singing seahorse. She usually likes stuffed animals, but she isn't obsessed with them like Bryce is. She's a very easy baby to put to sleep - she prefers to be swaddled, but she usually turns as far onto her right side as she can and shoves her face as far into the mattress as possible. If she doesn't feel ready for me to leave the room, I usually give her crystal mobile and spin and she is happy to watch that while I sneak out. :) Clara loves tummy time and usually rolls right onto her tummy if placed on her back. She's trying to figure out how to cover distance by rolling, but most often rolls left to tummy and right back to her back without moving very far. She's started to stand assisted for longer periods and she's gotten pretty good at picking up her binkie and putting it back into her mouth. She usually skips her hands and just lowers her head to the floor while on her tummy to maneuver it back into her mouth, haha! We love our sweet Clara and can't wait to see what she does next!

 She's pushing up and getting ready to crawl!

 Clara loves tummy time

I love her dress. Thanks, Nana and aunties!

Here We Go Again

This time, he tried to drink a bottle of vanilla extract. It went down his chest, soaked his diaper and puddled all over the floor of the pantry. At least he and the pantry smell good now. :)

Happy Birthday, Jenna and Gracie!

Well, their birthdays aren't today but it's a great day for a celebration! Happy birthday, Jenna and Gracie! We had a lot of fun hanging out with cousins and eating cake and playing games after the kids went down. Birthdays are the best!

 

 Happy birthday, Jenna!

 

 Tammy made this awesome cake!

 

 Liz's sister was visiting with her kids so we made quite the grand party!

 

 Gracie really wanted that candle

 

Yay! Make a wish!

Big Brother and Little Sister

Bryce loves to lay down on Clara and talk to her. He loves to ruffle her hair. He is borderline too rough with her but the second she mades the slightest whimper, he says, "Oh!" and pats her head to say sorry. Basically, he adores his little sister. For example, tonight I had to cook dinner while monitoring (and intervening between) Bryce and Clara's playtime. Bryce kept trying to sit on her bouncer while she was still in it. Eventually, I wasn't quick enough to respond and I turned around to see this adorable scene...

 Sweet brother and sister! He finally got to sit next to her, haha!

 Awww... sweet loves!

Bryce trotted off to the backyard to play after Clara had had enough playtime. He finally discovered the cows in the back pasture. He stood at this fence watching them at the watering trough which is mere feet away from the fence. He then proceeded to walk home, as best as I could tell, like a cow. Personally, it looked more like a drunk cow or a cow trying to pretend it was a dinosaur. Nice.

Nuts for Nutella

 Oh this kid.... I couldn't find Bryce, so I walked around calling his name. Derek chimed in and ran upstairs to check the media room. All of a sudden, I hear Derek yelling, "Mom! He's up here! Come quick!" My first thought was that Bryce had somehow figured out how to open the one window in the house that doesn't have a screen door, but I found this on the landing instead. Phew!

Unashamed!

First (and probably last) Trip to the Pool

Now, before you freak out and call my kids deprived, we have a decent sized blow up pool at home. Austin and Liz invited us to their community pool today and we were excited to go. Mitchell was coming with me so I figured we'd have the kids covered between us. 

All three loaded up and ready to go - even Clara's tiny feet in the bottom right corner.

We got to the pool and all four adults were busy shuttling kids and supplies from the van into the gated pool. Isaac, Andrew and Derek were in the six inch deep kiddie pool without floaties but I made eye contact with Derek and told him sternly NOT to get in the big pool til we got his floaties. He responded in the affirmative and I went to make one last trip to get the towels. As I came back into the pool probably 90 seconds later, Liz pointed to Derek splashing in the big pool. No, not splashing - drowning. He was in water that was slightly too deep, so he was bouncing up and down on his toes so he could gasp in little breaths. I jumped in and lifted him spluttering and coughing above the water line, spun him to face me and yelled in his face, "NOT WITHOUT FLOATIES!!!" As we climbed out of the pool, the "security guard" casually walked up to me and remarked that it was a good thing I saw him because a kid in his apartment complex and drowned and died the day before. Really? REALLY?! If ever I wanted to punch someone, that was the time. Apparently, he'd been sitting on a lounge chair 10 feet from Derek playing with his phone. 

So, floaties on, swim diapers on, everybody in the water. I grabbed the wrong size floaties for Bryce, but I had him in my arms, so I felt ok with it. Mitchell had Clara and Derek was fearless with the floaties. All set. I had Emeri and Bryce for a bit trying to get Emeri to laugh (she was so not liking the water, even with her super floaties and chest floatie) so we went into the lazy river part of the pool (yeah, cool pool). Bryce wanted to walk in the foot deep water, but Emeri wasn't having any of it. As I'm trying to adjust Emeri, Bryce trips and is struggling to get back up above the water. I ended up accidentally knocking Emeri on her back while grabbing for Bryce and she promptly decided she was so done with the pool. Bryce was ok, but my nerves were fried. So yes, we're done with big pools for the summer.

Facetiming with Danny

We went to visit Nana, Aunt Bella, Aunt Amy and Aunt Val this weekend in Keller. The aunties were awesome and took the kids in the morning while I slept in this morning, but last night Bryce discovered pictures of Danny on Amy's phone. Anyone who has seen those two together knows how attached they are. Bryce carried Amy's phone around showing Danny's picture to everyone and anyone. Amy eventually got her phone back long enough to Facetime with Danny which resulted in another round of Bryce showing the phone to everyone and trying to say "Danny!" He was kind of mad when he couldn't press buttons on the phone while he was Facetiming with Danny, though, so we quickly put an end to the screaming. It was super cute while it lasted though!

Trying to talk to Danny's picture on the phone

Aunt Amy broke out the Facetime

Real-Life Treasures

We found real-life treasures at Goodwill today! I've been looking for a not-creepy baby doll for Clara for a while. I found the baby Disney princesses, but they were pretty expensive brand new..... but not at Goodwill! Clara was a little skeptical of the doll at first, but she warmed up to it after a quick taste (see photos). I let the boys pick out a board game and Derek chose this Dinosaur board game. The boys love the movie and, sure enough, the board game was an instant hit. It's simple enough that Bryce will be able to play it without help as soon as he can tell his colors apart, but Derek (and Isaac and Andrew) will be able to play with no problem. Bryce is just fascinated with moving his dinosaurs all over the board and Derek insists he wins the game anytime he rolls a red. :)

Just as we were leaving Goodwill, I realized I had dropped Clara's binkie (she was strapped to my chest so I could have my hands and the cart free. As we were walking around the store trying to find it, we passed an older gentleman and his wife. He held a child's guitar in his hands and, when he saw Derek, held it out and told him to be the next Beatle. Derek was thrilled with the guitar and refused to put it down. When I realized it was a real instrument (and only $4!!), I told Derek he could get it. Again, he was thrilled and ran off. I asked him if he had thanked the gentleman who showed him the guitar and he said, "No. Be right back, Mom!" He ran over to the gentleman, threw his arms around his thigh and said, "Thanks for the grit-ar!" The man's face went from surprise at the sudden physical assault, to surprise at the sweet, unfeigned gratitude of a child. He smiled and we moved on. These little kids are my true treasures. I'm so glad I have Derek, Bryce and Clara in my life and I can't wait to watch them grow up. They're doing an outstanding job of it.

 He loves to show me things and always puts them right in front of his face.

 Two happy little clams!

 Putting all the dinosaurs in the starting pit

 Baby Princess Clara meets Baby Princess Belle!

 "Hmmm...tastes ok to me!"

 Two little princesses!

 She loves this doll already!

 Sometimes he just cuddles his "grit-ar" like this. It's cute!

He's figuring out how to strum it.

Happy Birthday, Uncle Colton!

Happy birthday, Uncle Colton! Normally, people GET presents on their birthday, but Colton GAVE presents to the kiddos - Batman cotton candy and Pop-Its. The kids were in heaven when Colton pulled out the cotton candy and started divvying it up between all the grasping hands. Then he topped it all by taking them outside and showing them how to throw the Pop-Its against the ground (or toss them in the air) to make the loud CRACK. The kids really got into that one. Colton is more of a brownie person than a cake person, so we had brownies and ice cream to celebrate his big 2-3. Here's to hoping the next year is just as awesome!

BATMAN CANDYYYYYYYY!!! AHHHHHH!!

 Lift off! Katelyn must go, her people need her!

 Winding up for the pitch... to the concrete. The kids really got into this part.

 Even Bryce threw some of the Pop-Its on the ground. Emeri eventually warmed up to it, but they were pretty loud.

 Now that's creativity. Courtesy of Liz.

 Nathan, Andrew, Katelyn and Derek were excited for brownies and ice cream.

 Happy birthday to you, happy birthday to you, happy BIRTHday, Uncle Colton, happy birthday to YOOOOOOU!!