Gavin: six months

This happy guy loves people and attention! Just about anyone can get a smile and a laugh from him.

His favorite game is peek-a-boo.

He's got the sweetest laugh, and is very ticklish! I love to tickle his cheeks and his big round belly :)

He babbles "dadada" all day long, and very occasionally a "mama" will slip out when he's upset. I'll take what I can get!

Gavin is scooting like a pro, and he'll rock on his hands and knees. Oh boy, crawling is not far away! It's actually really great, because now that he can move around and get to what he wants, we don't have to hold him all day long (though I still get plenty of snuggle time!)

So far he has tasted oatmeal, green beans, squash, sweet potatoes, apples, and banana. And he doesn't like any of it! Paul even gave him a lick of candy cane, for cryin out loud, and he hated that too!

His sleep habits are more or less the same (three naps a day, and wakes up 4 times a night), except now he refuses his binky and he rolls all over; kicking, pushing, and scratching us all night. We're tired. Just so tired.

This little boy is giving me dark circles under my eyes, is literally breaking my back in my efforts to bounce him to sleep, and is somehow making me love him more and more every day!

Thanksgiving

We have so so so much to be thankful for this year! I won't list everything here, but it definitely includes family, and the opportunity we had to visit for Thanksgiving.

We began with an 11 hour trip to meet my family at my Aunt and Uncle's place in Georgia (it's only supposed to be 7.5 hours, but there was a lot of holiday traffic accidents). It may be because we expected the worst, but we were pleasantly surprised by how well the kids did in the car! Actually, it's probably because of our awesome new van! We put Jenna and Liam in the back, and I sat in the middle to keep Gavin happy and distribute snacks. We only stopped twice, Gavin and Liam slept a bunch, and Jenna didn't ask for the iPad the entire trip!

We had lunch at Cracker Barrel (of course), Jenna read books and worked on her new Fashion Designer book, and Paul and I listened to Jim Gaffigan's new book. An overall enjoyable ride.

I'm not usually a very good photographer on vacation (too relaxed!) and this trip was no different. But I did manage to get a picture of the reason we made the trip - my Momo!

She wanted to get all her great-grankids together, and it was wonderful!
Jenna and Liam had so much fun with their cousins. They barely even noticed when Paul and I snuck out with my cousins to see Mockingjay.
And the FOOD! Yum! I would almost make the trip every week for that good southern cookin'. Almost.

We got to break up the trip back by stopping at Paul's sister's house in South Carolina for a couple nights. They even postponed their Thanksgiving dinner until Saturday for us, so we got two Thanksgivings this year!
We spent our time eating, chatting, shopping, waiting for Hilary's baby girl to come (she was born Dec. 5), and we took a walk to feed their neighborhood ducks.

And that was our Thanksgiving!

In other news, Jenna lost her 7th and 8th teeth in just a week! That tooth fairy has been working some serious overtime! I think she deserves a nap ;)

Gavin: five months

Gavin has had a big month: he had his first taste of food, moved out of his cradle, and is starting to scoot and sit up on his own!

It's kind of been a rough month for sleeping though. He is waking up at least 4 times every night. We've tried everything we can think of, and the only way to get him to stay asleep longer than an hour is to let him sleep with us.

When he is really tired, he "sings" himself to sleep. Pretty dang cute!

He doesn't demand to be held ALL the time now, but he does prefer to spend most of his day in my arms.

Gavin is my little mama's boy! And I love it! Paul jokes that Gavin doesn't like him, but let's be honest - nobody can get these kids to laugh like he does! I'm soaking up all my baby's attention now before he realizes who the fun parent is :)

I haven't let my hair down this month, because he is grabbing at everything he can get his mitts on!

He loves when we talk to him, watching Jenna and Liam run around, and "jumping".

Our little Gavin may be high-maintenance, but he makes up for it in adorable smiles and giggles!

Liam: 2 years

Oh Liam, Liam, Liam! How do I even begin to describe this little firecracker!?

-He doesn't walk. He runs. Everywhere he goes!

-He's got a big 'ole head, and he uses it like a battering ram when he wrestles daddy.

-Liam is just the sweetest little boy! He is always giving us hugs and kisses and cuddles. He says "sorry" by giving a kiss on the cheek.

-He's got the you've-hurt-my-feelings pouty lip thing down! It's so cute!

-He still isn't much of a talker. And he's not a copy-cat; he won't say anything unless he wants to. Does it frustrate me that he says "Hulk" and "Ralph" perfectly but won't say "I love you"? Yes, it does.
-His first phrase was "there it is". -He refers to all animals by the sound they make. -He doesn't say any colors or numbers, but he does know a lot of them. -If he's really excited about something, he whispers it: "pizza!" "daddy!" "choo-choo!" "dee deem!" (ice cream)

-Things he finds hilarious: destroying things, being chased but not caught, animal noises, spinning in circles, and when Anna turns into ice at the end of Frozen. That one disturbs me a bit.

-He loves ducks, lions, trains, planes, balls, hats, and being outside. And puzzles - we have puzzles in every room of our house, and he does them every day.

-He hates getting his diaper changed. And getting dressed. He runs away every time. Fun times for all!

-He dumps out all the toys as soon as I put them away. Our playroom is just always a mess now.

-Liam likes to run away from me whenever we are out of the house. And he doesn't listen to me. Ever! I have to be very strategic in our outings, like making sure I have access to enclosed places, strollers, and somewhere to put Gavin when I inevitably have to chase Liam down.
I'm totally getting my come-upance from judging other moms when Jenna was my only kid.

-He LOVES Gavin!  He always comes running if Gavin cries. He is constantly giving him kisses, laying on him, and trying to pick him up. He calls him "Dee" so much that I've even started calling him Baby Dee. And he gets very concerned when strangers hold his brother.
I can't even handle the cuteness from these two:

Jenna: 6 years

Jenna. I cannot imagine my life without her! And I don't know how I would handle having these boys so close together without my big helper.

This sweet girl:

-Loves to make up jokes! They don't usually make sense, but she will be offended if we don't laugh.

-Still says she wants to be an art teacher when she grows up. But every once in a while she say she also wants to be a scientist, ballerina, fashion designer and mom.

-Is a huge cuddler. It is a rare sight to see her sitting by herself. And I love that she wants to hold our hands, and give hugs and kisses in public. I'll be sad when that someday stops.

-LOVES animals! And learning all about them! Every time we go to the library she comes home with a book about a different animal. Last month it was horses and butterflies. Now she has books about flamingos and poodles.

-Is very protective and proud of her brothers. She loves to run and wrestle with Liam, and entertain little Gavin. But, heaven help the little boy who dares to enter her room! That is her sacred space, and gets very upset when I let Liam in there.

-Makes gifts for people all the time! Her teachers (school, piano, art, church), friends, cousins, grandmas, brothers, and Paul and I have been the recipients of tons of pictures, bracelets, crowns, and necklaces.

-Is super sensitive, which can be good and bad. She is very kind to everyone, but can also get her feelings hurt pretty easily. Many days have been declared "the worst ever" if we don't play or read to her on cue. Drama.

-Loves to sing, especially in the bathroom. The whole house is treated to songs from primary, Frozen, and little ditties she makes up while she showers or brushes her teeth.

-Still is very concerned about doing the right thing. She is constantly asking about what is "allowed", or she'll make a statement and then ask "Is that correct?"

-Is becoming quite sassy! I'd like to blame it on the other kids at school, but the truth is she reminds me a lot of myself as a kid.

-Is a little fashionista! She draws all the time in her "Style book" and just got a "Learn to be a Fashion Designer" book for our upcoming Thanksgiving trip. We have to pick out her school outfits the night before because it takes forever, then in the morning she selects her jewelry and models in front of the mirror.

-Hates to get her hair brushed, because she inherited my super sensitive scalp. But she still loves to get all dolled up: curl her hair, paint her nails, pretend to put on make-up. She talks about sending the boys all camping so she and I can do a spa day. Sounds good to me!

I love my Jenna-fish so much! She is my best little buddy, and the most awesome little girl I've ever met!

Hilarious first food try!

We said good-bye to the warm weather this week with one last picnic in our backyard.

Now bring on the winter coats, mittens, and SNOW!!

Also this week:

Gavin finally graduated out of his cradle. But he's still in our room, just now in the pack 'n play. We won't move him to the crib in his and Liam's room until he is sleeping through the night, or at least only getting up once in the night (it's taking longer than we had hoped).
He also got his first taste of real food this week, on the day he turned 5 months.
I absolutely love the pictures we got, very reminiscent of Liam's first taste of rice cereal.

"This. is. disgusting."

"Please! No more!"

"Ugh. I think I'm going to be sick."

"I'm gonna get you for this..."

Hahaha! And then we furthered the torture by letting Liam in on the fun!

Liam started taking naps again, thank goodness! He had stopped when Jenna went back to school and we weren't doing a lot, because Gavin was so little. I guess I felt bad making him lay down if we hadn't been very active in the morning. But I've realized we both need that time, so even if he doesn't sleep he has quiet time in his room every day.

Jenna gave our FHE lesson on Monday. She read us a story about Jesus, and then for the first time unprompted, bore her testimony. It was pure faith, and I'm so grateful for her example to us!

She got her first 1st grade report card this week, and I was not at all surprised by 2 things her teacher said: "Jenna has developed into a social butterfly and is a friend to everyone in the room." and "She has an astonishing curiosity for science topics." That's my girl!
Her class is currently learning about geography, and each family was asked which states or countries they had family/friends who the child could write to and receive a post card from. We said we could do Brazil (Paul asked one of his mission companions), so of course that was the country Jenna was assigned. I hadn't thought about the fact that they don't speak English, so Paul obviously had to help Jenna write the letter:

She can't wait to get a reply!

Paul and his boys at work decided to not shave their mustaches in November in support of men's health. But, he reluctantly shaved it this week when he learned the local news station was going to interview him about UVA's concessions again. I was not at all sad to see it go!
I forgot to take a picture, but he's excited to do it again next year. So we have that to look forward to!

Kali is just enjoying life! I'm trying to slow the the inevitable march of time and be more grateful that I get to stay home and be a mommy to these 3 beautiful children! And a game night with the girls Saturday night certainly didn't hurt ;)

Lipizzans

Jenna had Monday and Tuesday off of school this week! The school probably wanted to make sure the Halloween sugar-high wore off before they let the kids come back :)
On Monday we tackled some art projects, cleaned our rooms, and took a long walk around the neighborhood. Then we spent Tuesday at Bounce 'n Play! In order to get out of the house these days (since I am carrying Gavin 90% of the time) I need somewhere Liam can run around, but won't get lost or hit by a car. And this place fits the bill! I also love going out with Jenna and Liam because no matter how much they might fight at home, they are always best buds in public!

Liam is always so excited when Jenna comes home from school! Part of it may be because he LOVES to see the "bus! bus!". But he sure does love his sister:

...and his brother:

On Friday Paul and Jenna went on a daddy-daughter date to see The Gala of the Royal Horses!

Jenna was so excited, and it didn't hurt that she had just picked up a book about Lipizzans (a breed of Spanish royal horse) from the library! They both had a lot of fun together:

Saturday, Jenna was invited to a friend's spa-themed birthday party. They did manicures, facials, decorated their own cupcakes, glittered their hair, and even had a pinata. A little girl's dream!!
While Jenna was getting pampered, I checked out the Library sale. It was completely packed, and not nearly as cheap as the one in Maryland, but $2 for a new hardback certainly isn't bad! I came home with some goodies of my own :)

Sunday was our ward's Primary Program. Jenna had been looking forward to it for weeks, and we made sure to get a seat right in front of her. She was singing and smiling and waving to us for the first half of the program. But, right before her part, she got an itchy throat and started coughing a lot. It wasn't distracting, but she thought that it was and got super embarrassed. So much so that they had to skip her part :(
She was heart-broken! Then in nursery another little boy hit Liam hard in the face with a toy truck, and he refused to go back in after he calmed down.
A rough day, but nothing a few hugs and kisses couldn't fix!

Mario Bros. Halloween

We had our Ward Halloween party on Thursday, and of course Trick-or-Treating on Friday. I'm loving the fact that the boys are still young enough to not care about their costumes. So when Jenna chose Princess Peach, it was an easy decision to dress up Liam as Mario and Gavin as Toadstool. If I was really feeling motivated, Paul and I would have dressed up as Bowser and Daisy. But I wasn't, so we carried Wii controllers and went as the players.
I'm pretty proud of the fact that we spent a grand total of $8 on all our costumes! We bought jewels and tulle for Jenna's costume, and everything else was made from stuff we found around the house.

I just can't get enough of these cuties!!

I walked around with Liam while Paul and Gavin handed out candy at the ward trunk-or-treat, and then Friday night Gavin and I manned the door while Paul took the big kids trick-or-treating around the neighborhood.
Liam doesn't say "trick or treat", but he held up his bucket for candy and said "thank you!"
And as usual, Jenna was a great big sister. 

They were only out for a bit, and then Jenna had a blast handing out the candy. She said that's what she's most excited about for next year!

In other news, Paul only has one more football game for the year! Yay, we're so excited to see more of him! Kali got a second calling this week: Relief Society pianist. I haven't had this calling before, and I'm excited to finally nail down all those hymns!
Jenna had her Fall project for school this week. She had to come up with a "wondering question" about fall and present it any way she wants. She chose: How and Why do leaves change color and fall? We went to the library and got as many books as we could find on trees and leaves, and she got to work on her research:

Then she made a poster with her findings and glued on colorful leaves she had collected. I forgot to take a picture of it before she turned it in. I'll try when we get it back.

Liam is doing his best to motivate me to start working out

And Jenna is loving the fact that we will let her carry around Gavin now (always supervised of course).

check-ups, puzzles, and feet

Every Tuesday we pick up Jenna from school and go straight to her piano lesson at Miss Eliza's home. She recommends parents stay for the lesson, so we know what they are working on and can help them practice. This means I have to try to entertain Liam for 30 minutes in a house without a playroom. I have found it works best to get him worn out in the early afternoon, and then this is his little set-up:

It works well until the last couple minutes when he wants to explore, and I try to keep him from interrupting. I don't even want to think about how we're going to do it next year...

The boys had their 2 year and 4 month check-ups this week. They're both right on track, healthy, got two shots each, cried for about ten seconds, and were super brave.

I think the worst part for Liam was getting weighed. I don't know why but he hates that scale, and didn't like us putting Gavin on it either.
After the appointment Liam entertained the staff by making me chase him through the entire office. Oh what fun.

Jenna has been saying all year long that she wants to be a vampire for Halloween (ever since last Halloween when someone gave her those plastic vampire teeth). Then last week she announced that she was going to be a witch. The next day she was writing a letter to one of her friends from Maryland and I suggested she tell him what she is going to be for Halloween. I thought she'd say either vampire or witch, but she asked to see her costume idea list (that she made sometime last summer). She was studying it, happened to glance up and saw her backpack with Princess Peach on it, and the decision was made. Princess Peach!
I was 100% more excited about this than a vampire :)
We made her crown, bought some tulle, and the rest we already had in the dress-up clothes. She looked so great for her school's trunk-or-treat:

Liam discovered the wooden puzzles and has been obsessed with them all week! He doesn't distinguish edge pieces yet, but he's doing really well matching the pictures up, and can finish them on his own as long as we give him a starting point.

Notice the big scab on his nose? It looks a lot worse in person. He took a nose dive while running on the sidewalk :(
We joked about making him some antlers and sending his as Rudolf for Halloween, but it's mostly healed now.

Gavin has had several long conversations with his feet lately. I don't know what they're talking about, but it sure is funny to watch!

He has also been super patient as Liam uses him as a human pillow.

He just adores his big brother!

Gavin: four months

16 lbs. 8 oz.

26 inches

Gavin has lost what little amount of dark hair he was born with, and is now sporting the bald look. He pulls it off nicely, though!

Paul calls him our "freaker-outer". While he is most often a happy little guy, he goes from perfectly content to total freak out in less than 2 seconds!

When he gets sleepy, I can just lay him down and he will put himself to sleep.  But that's as far as my luck goes; he hasn't slept longer than 3 hours in well over a month (and most of the time it's only 2 hours)! Which means neither have I...
Thank goodness he's so stinkin cute!

Our Gavin's a big boy. He's already wearing size 6 months clothes, rolling, scooting, and just generally growing up way too fast!

mid-October

Paul had to work 7 days this week. 3 of those days he didn't get to see the kids at all.
We just have to keep reminding ourselves that it's his first year at a new job, it's the busy season, and it's only going to get better from here.
The kids miss him like crazy, but Paul is awesome about giving them all his attention when he's home.
I'm lucky to have a husband who works hard, loves what he does, and is really great at it. And he's lucky to have a wife who is understanding and supportive of his crazy schedule (that's what I hear).

With our without him home, life carries on:

Gavin was acting fussy even while I was holding him, so into the saucer he went! And he has been loving it all week! I guess he just wanted some toys to play with. Growing up too fast...

Their first brother bath! Gavin loved watching Liam splash and play, and Liam enjoyed helping pour the water on Gavin.
Jenna is officially a shower-taker now. Again, growing up too fast...

I haven't turned the heat on yet, so we've had lots of snuggle parties!

We don't usually go very big on Halloween decorations, so Jenna tried covering the house in paper bats, ghosts, and pumpkins. And we love our Halloween signs:

Time to make some costumes!

Share goodness

-We are loving this fall weather, and spent as much of the afternoons as we could this week in our backyard. The kids enjoyed collecting acorns, throwing rocks, and exploring the little 20 ft. "woods" behind our house. They can't wait until the leaves start to fall!

-It got so cold at night I felt the need to cover up Gavin's bald little head. Unnecessary? maybe. Cute? definitely.

-Liam is finally really getting into books! His favorite this week was Fuzzy Yellow Ducklings. We read it over and over for an hour one night!

-Jenna decided to take Liam's education into her own hands. She got out her Joy School rug and made him sit on it while she attempted to teach abc's and such. She got frustrated when he only listened for about a minute :)

-I was playing with a photo editing app that my friend developed. It's called Studio and is really fun to "remix" other people's designs.

-The best part of the week for me came rather unexpectedly on Saturday afternoon. We were just hanging around the house, enjoying Paul's first Saturday off in two months when I got a call from the Sister Missionaries. They asked if I would come with them on an appointment. This may not sound like a big deal to some people, but I haven't served a mission or been out with the missionaries before so I was kind of terrified!
We were able to teach a sweet family from Pakistan, and I'm happy to report that it wasn't at all scary! And I was surprised how easy it was. I forget that the simple truths that I grew up knowing are not common knowledge. I had the opportunity to share my testimony of Jesus Christ and eternal families.
I'm happy I got over my fear, and I'm really excited to do it again!

General Conference!

This week was typical and pretty uneventful. I didn't even take any pictures.
We had trips to the grocery store, mall, park, and library and we filled our days with trains, dinosaurs, rattles, piano practice, homework, books, cooking, and watching probably too much Netflix.

The best part of our week was General Conference! I love these weekends so much, and I love that Jenna gets excited for them as well. If you ask her about it, she'll say something about the prophet and chocolate-covered raisins. Whatever works, right?!

There are tons of ideas and activity packets online to help kids pay attention (or at least sit still). This time I printed one out for Jenna, and we tried the treat bag activity. I put each of the apostles' and first presidency's pictures on bags and filled half of them with treats and the other half with stuff to do, like coloring books, stickers, and halloween decorations.

Jenna and Liam really enjoyed it, and it was so funny watching Jenna trying to match the speaker to their picture (except for the first presidency - she knows them). I understand though; some of the pictures aren't updated and to a 6 year-old they all look alike!

Paul had to work on Saturday, but the kids were so excited for the morning session and the boys slept during the afternoon session, so I actually was able to pay better attention Saturday than Sunday. The kids were a little more restless for the Sunday sessions, so I'm glad Paul was home to help entertain them. He and Liam even made us girls breakfast :)

It'll be fun to re-listen to and read these talks, to get the parts I missed and review the messages that I needed and loved!

And for fun, here's my handsome boys dressed up for conference:

Rolling

The beginning of this week was strictly damage control from last week (Paul being gone and Liam's birthday). Then Paul had to work a bunch and the rest of us hung out mostly at home.

Gavin - Is rolling over, from back to front, pretty much every time I put him down now. He supposedly rolled to his back twice, but I didn't personally witness it so am in denial.

I put him in one of Liam's old outfits and wanted to see if they looked the same. I was really surprised at how different they look (but still obviously brothers), and how chubby Liam was!

Liam - Is in denial about growing up:

And he has a new game to further postpone bedtime. We call it "Where's Liam?"

Jenna - has been working for a couple weeks now on her "Style Notebook". She has filled it with "fashions" she sees on her dolls and in books, and designed some herself. These are my favorites:

She hasn't been assigned any actual homework yet (I'm not complaining) but she had her first project this week: to dress up as one of America's symbols and give a presentation about it to the class. She chose the Statue of Liberty!

Paul and Kali - are super tired. September and October are Paul's busiest months, and we're both feeling it. But we're trying not to complain, and get as much rest as we can. Good Night!