I've been a blogging slacker. I'd blame double ear infections (Owen) and a potentially broken bone (Isaac), except that all just happened in the last couple days. I don't know why I wasn't blogging the weeks before that. So, here's some pictures of our lives from the last couple weeks . . .
Poor Isaac was going down the slide with Daddy, when his foot got twisted between Dad's leg and the slide on a turn. It was x-rayed, the doctor said it seemed like a break, but they couldn't see one, so they put on a molded splint and wrapped it, and we go back in on Friday for more x-rays.
He was REALLY miserable the first day. Being immobile and angry about it. He thrashed his hardened leg around the place in anger, injuring innocent bystanders (i.e., me). The next morning (after a blow out diaper that he SMEARED ALL OVER MY BED AND HIMSELF) we took off the splint only to discover one nasty looking pressure sore on his heel. No wonder he was so miserable (and kept us up much of the night). The next day we got it rewrapped, and he's been crawling around and climbing one legged every since.
We've noticed he's keeping his whole hand (sometimes both) inside his mouth when upset or hurt.
Curled up to watch a movie. We've watched lots and lots of movies.
Some random cute pictures of my boys sleeping . . .
Comparison of sleeping Isaac and his Dad sleeping as a toddler too.
My poor Grandma was recently moved to an Assisted Living Center after a nasty fall at home. Since then she's been in and out of the hospital repeatedly. We've tried to get over to visit regularly, bringing the kids when she's not at the hospital . . .
Owen wore the same tux Isaac did for his blessing. It cracks me up to see his serious little faces when I was trying to get pictures of him in it . . . and I couldn't help but think of one part of a song that I'd just heard on a commercial, over and over again in my head while I looked at the pictures later . . .
And I somehow managed to get 250 pictures down to this . . .
Man, I love good excuses to get together as family.
The first time Greg tickled Isaac he laughed, then said, "That funny!" We tried to get him to say it again for the camera ('cause it's adorable), but no luck.
Isaac showing off his dance moves. Which includes (and is pretty limited to) stomping.
Then no night is complete without singing and dancing from the girls.
(They all picked out their Christmas pajamas to wear, thus the Christmas carols.)
We had heart shaped pink pancakes and pink milk for breakfast this morning. I felt a bit guilty about the amount of red food coloring being ingested. :-) The girls were so excited, and Annie kept trying to coach Ellie, "1 - 2 - 3 . . . Best Valentine's Day EVER!!!" Ellie usually caught on in time to triumphantly yell, "EVER!" a split second after Annie did. They were so giggly and excited -- and hungry! I've never seen those two girls finish off a plate of pancakes so quickly. Apparently I should start dyeing everything pink!
The girls got their next Valentine's surprise, matching dresses. Complete with matching doll dresses. (I got them both on clearance super cheap last year at Kohl's and have been waiting ever since to give 'em to them!) They were even more excited than they were about the pink pancakes. We did a little photo shoot in their new dresses.
Isaac made out with Elmo. (Everyone needs a Valentine.)
While Ellie was off at school, Annie finished writing all the kids names on our Valentine's posters we'd made for all the grandparents the night before for Family Home Evening. (It involved hands and feet and red paint. It was messy and stressed me out, but turned out to be worth it.) Once Ellie came home, we went on a walk around the block to drop off Valentine's for some friends. I had the baby in the sling, pushing the double stroller with Isaac and Ellie loaded in, and Annie walked along side us. Oh, what I wouldn't give for Annie to be big enough to push the stroller :-) Then we grabbed the Valentine's we made for Aunt Star, and drove to her work where she got to show off her adorable nieces and nephews to her team and the class she's currently training. They were so cute and friendly, and Star assured me everyone gushed about them once we left. Then we came home, had sugar cookies, Grandma Karine stopped by with stuffed animals for all the kids and Dad got home. Ellie came up while I was holding Owen and he started to cry, she leaned in and in a high, sweet voice cooed, "It's OK baby, I won't eat you." Um, OK. :-) After dinner the girls got their final surprise -- Cinderella pens, filled with candy. That turned out to have a stamp in the top part AND it lights up! Annie kept shrieking things like, "This day just keeps getting BETTER AND BETTER!" and, my personal favorite, "This is COOL! This is freaking darn cool!" (It's the first time I've heard her use the words freaking and darn -- I've so raised a Mormon.) :-) Then Annie brought up a tiny piece of paper, slid it under my mouse pad while I typed this blog post and said, "Mom, I left a surprise for you!" I pulled it out and read, "I Love You Mom. Happy Valentine's Day!"
Annie's right, this day just keeps getting better and better. :-)
Here's some videos we made today too:
Isaac's favorite book is called "Rainbow Rob". Except Isaac calls him "Penguin Bob"
Isaac turning off his guitar, then declaring it broken.
The girls making up impromptu Valentine's songs. Ellie kinda drowns Annie out.
Them making Valentine's videos for their out-of-state cousins.
My sister Talina and I took our kids to the Festival of Trees the other day.
It was fun. We ate scones (and chocolate covered bananas, and mint brownies and cookies . . . not exactly the healthiest of outings). Although, I don't know if I could be talked into doing it again anytime soon -- Isaac wanted to pull on and swing the white chains around the trees . . . which gets you glared out by the hostesses. When I held him or when he was put in the stroller, he tended to scream uncontrollably. It was a lot of Isaac-management. I was tired when we were done. :-)
My kids favorite part had to be the kids enjoying the Christmas music performances. Plus, it meant Isaac wasn't screaming at me, and he stayed in one general area. And did make any old ladies glare at us. In fact, old ladies were smiling at him. Much better.
The girls love to dance (well, actually, all three kids love it.) In their room is a keyboard, and they often turn on the music on it and dance in their rooms until they nearly collapse from exhaustion (but they don't fall asleep or anything, that'd be crazy.) Last night, after baths, they had an impromptu dance party. That lasted over a half hour, and was dissolving into giggles and lots of falling down. (Isaac was already in bed). You would've thought they'd fallen happily into bed and go right to sleep. You'd be wrong. It was still a good 30-45 minutes before we got these kids to bed after this.
Here are five of the videos (there are a total of 15 on youtube)
I want to be quite clear, I don't expect anyone to watch even 5 whole videos of my kids just spastically dancing, unless they are blood related to the girls. And even then, only like one or two of their blood relatives will make it through all five. If you want to be totally diehard though, you can go to youtube and put it on autoplay and watch all 15. 'Cause that's what you'd be doing if you were hanging out on a Sunday morning with my girls :-) We're on our second time through them . . .
Annie had her first ever Piano Recital this weekend.
Unfortunately, her Mom is a video camera idiot, so not only is this first video blurry, but I somehow (without my knowledge) didn't even RECORD the second song she played (a more difficult, "In the Jungle.")
Isaac, Ellie and Annie enjoying the refreshments afterwards.
Then pictures from yesterday, before Trick or Treating.
The weather could not have been more perfect, and the girls enjoyed over TWO HOURS of trick or treating last night! (One hour in our neighborhood, then up to my parent's neighborhood for a spook alley and some more trick or treating.) Poor Isaac though, never even got into his costume last night. He's been so very, very sick (almost necessitating a hospital visit on Sunday, but fortunately, he finally stopped throwing up and we've been able to keep him hydrated since), and was down for a nap the first half of trick or treating, and was up screaming during the second half. The kid is guzzling down the pedialyte (to the tune of about 50-80 ounces a day), and starting to eat a bit more, so amazingly he hasn't lost any weight. (I was SHOCKED when we had him weighed at the doctor's today, that he hadn't lost anything since last Thursday when we had been there last . . . apparently pedialyte, crackers and bananas are somehow enough to keep him from wasting away.) Him staying the same weight is really saying something, when you realize that just from blow out diapers, we went through every last crib sheet we own between 5AM-8AM this morning; we're changing diapers 3-4 times an hour during his waking hours, and we've had two nights we've run out of clean pajamas . . . and that's with us doing about 3 large loads of laundry a day since Sunday. It's been really heartbreaking to see him this sick, and I'm hoping the latest tests they are running at the hospital will get us some answers, but this may just be a case of a particularly nasty stomach bug we have to wait out. It's been kinda funny to see him with a bottle -- the kid has never taken a bottle before, other than the one I cut the tip off of that I serve him his morning spinach smoothies in. But suddenly, he's attached to one 24-7, and is drinking from a pedialyte filled bottle pretty much around the clock. Watch, he'll end up attached to one at 16 months old and I'll have to wean him from it :-)
Isaac, Ellie and their two week old cousin Bailey were all supposed to be matching pumpkins for Halloween, but unfortunately Isaac never got dressed up and there's no way we're bringing a two week old anywhere near anyone at our house, so unfortunately we have no pictures this Halloween of the tiny trio. Maybe we'll do a makeup photo session next week?
Isaac loves baths. He asks for them constantly. I once told him it wasn't bathtime, and he grabbed a handful of yogurt, rubbed it in his hair, and sweetly asked again, "Bath?"
Today in the tub he was happily playing with cups and other things to dump water with, and I realized I don't have any video of him playing in his favorite place on Earth. So, here's a bunch of videos of him happily splashing away . . .
Greg was working late last week, so I threw a towel down on our bed and let the kids have a 'picnic' for dinner while we watched a movie. Then they got to all take a bath together. They had so much fun!
My little helper! He's LOVING to wash walls and vacuum anything!
Mmmmm, cupcakes! The kids were pretty psyched about the brownies and cupcakes at our Labor Day celebration at Grandma's house!
Isaac's becoming more of a bookworm by the day -- here he is reading on Labor Day with Aunt Talina and Uncle David.
Isaac and Ellie got a hold of one of Uncle Cody's old helmets. Ellie is a tiny bit crazy. :-)
Do NOT get between Ellie and her basketball -- she will take you DOWN!
The girls LOVE going out in the garden with Grandma!
Unrelated to our Labor Day festivities, this weekend has given me one of my great 'beaming with pride' motherhood moments. Annie gave a talk in Primary this last Sunday. We'd read through it a few times, she read it on her own, and we practiced it aloud. I was a bit nervous though about it taking too long, since she was reading it a bit slow and about the kids not being able to hear her 'cause she was speaking so softly. Primary came though, and with only one small stumble, my little girl read her talk from start to finish perfectly. She spoke right into the microphone, at a perfect tempo and volume. She's a born public speaker! She'll also be singing a small solo in Sacrament Meeting in a couple weeks. The confidence I saw in her as she got up and gave her talk was one of those things that made this Mom so happy I felt like I was gonna burst. :-)
And if you want to check out Annie reading the talk she gave in Primary last week, it's posted on youtube now . . . at over 3 1/2 minutes long though, I'm guessing Aunts and Grandmas are the only ones who'll make it through . . . :-) (While making the video she tried to do more from memory, which made her stumble a bit more, but it was so cute!)
