Maeve and the Oatmeal

We can't take it any longer. We finally caved in and gave her oatmeal.

She has been watching us eat for months, and within the last few weeks, its almost unbearable to see. Her eyes follow the utensil to our mouths. She opens her mouth with ours, a little bit of drool comes out, and then she mimics the motion of chewing. This kid is wanting to eat!


She did amazing, and was so happy to join us last night at dinner. Such a big girl already!

Happy Birthday to Me!

Nov 1 is a great day! It's my birthday. I turned..(pause and deep breath)...31...this year. I can't believe that now I have to officially say that I am in 30's. Married, 3 kids, in my thirties...wow.

Any who, it was a great birthday. They all are. I love my birthday. It's the day that I set aside to do whatever I want, and don't feel guilty about it. I don't go to work (when I was employed), I don't go to school (when I was in school), and I don't change diapers.

We convinced some of the family to go with us to the Exploratorium and play all day. There is so much to see, and we didn't even have enough energy to do it all in one day. I really want to go back again! www.exploratorium.edu


We had a great time, and being the science nerd that I am, I am happy to say that we all learned something too. The kids had fun running around touching, using and playing with all the displays.

Spinning the sand table to create patterns.

Placing different shaped objects on the fountain to change the flow of water.


Cannon spaced out and watched fish in a tank for about 30 minutes.


I spent some time by myself in the "Mind" section, testing my abilities to reason, discern and learn. One of my favorite exhibits is the toilet drinking fountain, but there were so many that I had fun working with.

www.exploratorium.edu/mind

After everyone was Exploratoriumed out, we ate a yummy meal at California Pizza Kitchen and came home to put the kids to bed and relax for the rest of the evening. Fun, fun, fun! Can't wait till next year. Only 364 days to go!


This is actually the second go at the candles. The first time, Cannon didn't get to help, and he burst into tears, so we had a do-over that included him. Notice the high heels my son is wearing...

My beautiful Princess Cake. It's my new favorite kind!

Oh, yeah. That is layer upon layer of deliciousness. White cake layer, whip cream layer, white cake layer, raspberry layer, whip cream layer, white cake layer, and then another whip cream layer. All topped off with a almond fondant layer, and marzipan decorations. Its amazing, delicious, and wonderful all in the same decadent mouthful!

Halloween

As I just raided the kids Halloween candy supply, I remembered that I hadn't blogged yet about our night!

We had the chance to dress up two times for Halloween. The first was for our home team costume party, and the second for trick-or-treating.

Cannon was a spartan from 300 (I think you will see the resemblance) on Wednesday night, and then a frog on Friday night.


Brynn was a princess on Wednesday night and a (gasp of surprise) princess on Friday night.


Maeve was a leopard/cat (?) both nights.


Had the dog not been the laziest creature on the face of the earth, he would have been superman as usual.

I stayed home to hand out candy to the 19 kids that came by. Its a good thing that I didn't buy any candy to hand out. Its pretty sad that I handed out random Easter candy, and some leftover candy from Christmas, valentines day, and such to the neighborhood kids huh. Oh well, blame it on the recession...

The kids came home with buckets of candy, so we let them pick out a few pieces and bought the rest off of them. My hips and my dentist will thank me later I am sure...

Nuggie, Monkey and the Zoo

Meet Nuggie...
He is just your average snugly lovey that Cannon has had since birth. Actually, to be quite honest, this is Nuggie #2. Nuggie #1 lasted less than 2 years of intense cuddling. Nuggie has silk pads on his "feet" that Cannon rubs as he falls asleep. He can't sleep without him, and loves him dearly.
We were walking home from bible study a week ago, and Rich brought up some wild animals that we would see if we went to the zoo. (Good one Rich. First of all, its dark, and we are walking home with a few children who have super active imaginations. Second of all, now we have to go to the zoo....) He talked about lions, tigers, and bears (oh my), hippos (huh?), elephants, etc. He talked about how if you saw those animals at the zoo, it was safe to walk around and look at them since they were behind cages. Then, being safety dad that he is, he also discussed that if you saw those animals out wandering on the streets (again - good one dad) that you should stay away cause they are not nice and can be dangerous.
There was a bit of silence, as my children pondered being mauled by wild animals, then I hear my precious little boy's voice pipe up....
"But daddy, nuggies are nice..."


Meet Monkey
Monkey is a gift that Maeve gave to Cannon when she was born. Monkey is the newest member of the "animals that sleep on the bed every night" family.
Rich was on you tube looking up videos of all the animals that we would see if we went to the zoo. (OK seriously...now its like we are horrible parents if we don't take these kids to the zoo sometime soon!) We looked up videos of lions, sharks, hippos and monkeys. The kids were amazed. Cannon took particular interest to the monkey clips. He watched them, and then went racing off to the room to find something. He came back dragging monkey out of his bed shouting....
"Look daddy! I have one! I have one too!!!"

OK, fine - we will go to the zoo!

Mix-up

This morning at the breakfast table, we were talking before Rich had to go to work. Brynn decided to share with us her version of one of the verses that I have been repeating to them over and over these last couple days.

The original text goes something like this: Do to others as you would have done to you.
Her version is a bit different - (and I quote) : Do what you want others to do, and if not, that's your problem.

Huh?

I think she might have gotten two of my lectures mixed up. The "Do you want Cannon to do that you? Then why did you do it to him?" lecture and the "I don't know what you did with that toy...it's not my problem that you can't find it." one....

Hey, this parenting stuff is all new to me!

On an separate note. I found a funny new blog that I have been reading everyday. Its all about crock pot meals! The fall weather hits, and all I want to do is have food simmering in a crock pot on my counter all day. This girl has been cooking in her crock pot for the entire year. She makes cool meals, rates them, and shares the recipes. Everything from stew to play dough! Pretty cool so I thought I would share! Enjoy!

http://crockpot365.blogspot.com

The same, but different....

Here is my monthly photo comparison of the kids.

Brynn 5 months

Cannon 5 months

Maeve 5 months

Look What I Made!

Yummy!!!

The pumpkin is the casserole in this case! Cook stuff, mix stuff, put in in a pumpkin, cook some more, and voile' --- serve dinner! The kids thought it was pretty fun to eat out of a pumpkin. Perfect fall dinner.

Pumpkin Patch

We took our annual trip to the pumpkin patch on our Tuesday night "family date". We went to Olufs Pumpkin Patch in Windsor, and had a great time. There were pumpkins, animals, a small hay maze for the kids, a jumpy house, and plenty of warm fall evening sunshine to warm our bodies. The kids had a great time with all of the activities, and Rich and I enjoyed a long talk with one of the local farmers in the area who helps out with the pumpkin patch each year. This man was a male version of my grandma, and it was fun to talk to him and hear his stories.
Cannon's mission to find a pumpkin ended quickly. (Typical seek and destroy shopping attitude of a male.) He walked to the patch, picked the first white pumpkin up, and claimed it as his own.

Brynn (typical female shopping attitude) had to look over every single pumpkin in the patch before she settled on the "perfect" one.


Our rule for purchase - you have to be able to carry it if you want to buy it. Keeps the cost, and the size of pumpkin down.
The kids fed some sheep, petted an brawn (?) cow, and shared time in the cage with a beautiful bunny rabbit.

They went through the hay maze about 20 times, and enjoyed it every single time. We saved the jumpy house for last.. Cannon isn't a fan of jumpy things so he just picked grass by the handfuls and threw it in the air (to bad we paid $5 for him to do that), but Brynn loved it and she jumped enough for the both of them.


Rich and I got to sit in the sunlight and enjoy the fall evening. We paid for the pumpkins, took the kids to Mickey D's for dinner and came home. I hope they enjoyed it as much as we did....

Wonderfall !

Yep, I spelled that exactly the way I wanted to!
Last week I was sitting on my parents front porch watching the kids play on the swing set, and I had the great idea of inviting a few friends out for a day in the fall sunshine. I sent out an evite to all my mommy friends for a day of play out in the orchard picking apples, playing on the playground and picnicking. We had a blast! The weather was perfect ( 87 degrees...even a bit hot) and tons of little friends showed up for some fresh-air play. We pulled all of the toys out of my parents garage and Farmer John (my dad) surprised us with hay rides. Kids had fun in the dirt, picking organic apples (watch the worm holes) and playing with "new" toys that they don't usually see. Thank you to all my friends who came out!

Lily is enjoying the dirt.

The oldest ones

The youngest one

Hay Rides for all !

Cannon with his bag "O" apples

Old Toys, New Fun

We recently pulled out some of the large toys for Maeve. Brynn was the first to enjoy this excersaucer. She actually spent A LOT of time in it. She loved the activities, and all of the fun toys to play with. Cannon needed more activity, and was not satisfied with the saucer. He required another huge piece of equipment - The Jumperoo. So now, our living room looks like a daycare! We have a full sized swing, an exersaucer and a jumperoo all crowding the already small room.
The good news is that Maeve seems to be enjoying them. The bad news is that she might have to fight off the other two to get her turn...

Daddy's Little Angels

Something is wrong with this picture....

Starts off nicely,




But ends badly...




Daddy wasn't so happy with this whole arrangement!

Updated Andre Look-alike Meter 1

MyHeritage: Family tree - Genealogy - Celebrity - Collage - Morph

Updated Andre Look-alike Meter 2

MyHeritage: Look-alike Meter - Geneology - Free family history

Updated Andre Look-alike Meter 3

Had to see if it had changed since last year...

MyHeritage: Family trees - Genealogy - Celebs - Collage - Morph

Sabine

Sara and Marlin had their baby! It was a long awaited little one, and I am so happy for them! Sabine Ruth was born Sunday, and we were the first to go and see them in the hospital. She is precious, and I am looking forward to lots of playtime between Maeve and Sabine!

Cutie Pies!

I took this idea from my sister in law. The poor kids are cursed with my ginormous feet!

Naked girl has found her toes and is loving to play with them!

We did it!

Here is a treat! They can now make the bed for me. I just have to lower my standards a bit. It isn't Martha Stewart Living, but it is one less job for me to do!

Treks!

So I took my mangy pound puppy to the vet for his annual shots and checkup. I mentioned to the vet that he had a funny bump under his arm (leg/paw - whatever), and asked her to look at it. She did a quick look, took out a syringe and pulled a sample to check out under the microscope. She came back in, scheduled him for surgery and told me that he had an aggressive malignant tumor that would kill him if we didn't get it taken care of soon. Huh?
In about 3 minutes I went from happy dog owner, to stressed out dog owner. How much will this cost, is he going to die, do I have to take care of another sick thing in my home, etc....THEN she proceeded to tell me that unfortunately this kind of tumor doesn't respond well to chemotherapy. HUH??
I felt myself growing a bit faint. My mind was racing, and I started to wonder where to sign over my rights.
Long story short, he had the surgery a few days later, and is on the road to recovery. I had to keep the kids off of him, and him off the bed for a few days, but all is well. His biopsy came back well, and the vet is confident that she removed enough of the tissue to stop it from spreading in that particular area. She did mention that he has a 30% chance of getting it somewhere else on his body in his lifetime. Great....

Treks is sporting his post surgery t-shirt. He was pretty drugged up and uncomfortable for a while. (The t-shirt keeps him from scratching at the incision.)

Four Months Old

Today marks Maeves' 4 month birthday. It also marked her 4 month Dr appointment. We got all her latest stats, as well as another round of shots. Soooo much fun. I hate being the one in the room with my kids when they get that "why in the world is that lady slamming needles into my leg" look. I usually tear up a bit, and just try to whisper in their ears that I love them, and I only do this because that is what will hopefully keep them healthy.
The good thing is that at this age, they don't remember any of it, and its over as quick as it starts. Maeve did let out a pretty angry cry though.

4 month stats:
Height: 26 inches (96%)
Weight: 15 lbs (81%)
Head Circ: 16.5 inches (77%)

She has a slight amount of torticollis (huh?) meaning that her head tilts slightly to the left due to some muscle tightening. It's common, and she will outgrow it, and her case is very mild. I always just thought her ears were crooked....

Evening at the Park

We took a walk to the park last night. The kids crack me up. Between the constant chatter, the silly noises, silly faces and goofy actions I am constantly entertained. I am so blessed to be part of this family!