Grandma Lue

Grandma Lue came to visit this weekend!  Brooks LOVES his grandparents so it was a special treat to spend a few days with Chris' mom.  Friday we ventured out to the Kingswood rummage sale, but it was pretty cold and windy so we didn't last long.  Saturday we played around the house and enjoyed some delicious Pickle Barrel for lunch.  Sunday was church and then we headed to the zoo in the afternoon.  I wish the weather had been nicer, but we still enjoyed getting out when we could.

As always, I forget about taking pictures when company comes, but here's a few from the weekend.

Carter's green beans :)

my super duper handsome boy!

Reading books with Grandma Lue

I realized I didn't have a good picture of Brooks and Grandma until this morning.  (shame on me)  Poor kiddo just woke up and and clearly, was still tired.

Fluff Butt

A few weeks ago Carter did a mini cloth diaper photo shoot with MPrints Photography.  It was kind of a whim and something I normally wouldn't do, but since she was doing the photos for free I thought, heck, why not.  Plus they doubled at his 6 month photos.  The pictures turned out awesome!!!

Is he not the most adorable baby you've ever seen?  I mean, seriously.  Cute!  And you can even see his two little teeth!

 Oh, the rolls.  It's different having such a chunky baby but I love it.  He's so squishy and huggable.  And I fully understand why old ladies pinch babies cheeks.  They're so hard to resist!!

This picture cracks me up and it's totally my favorite.  I know it's not the "picture perfect" smile, but this totally captures Carter's personality.  When he's really happy or excited, this is the smile we see.  I don't think he could open his mouth any wider.  I love it!!

 Carter hammed it up during the whole session.  Check out that pose!

Today I will Rejoice

Early yesterday morning a student of mine (and a new friend) gave birth to her twin boys, Isaac Ryan and Caleb Mark.  She was 31 weeks pregnant.  And as you can imagine, the boys are very premature, but stable in the NICU.  And my heart is sad.  And happy.  And ... I don't know.  When a baby is born, the event is usually surrounded by celebration and rejoicing.  And although we rejoice at the birth of these precious babies, I'm sad knowing the great struggle that lies ahead.  Not only are they premature, but during the many ultrasounds they had, it was discovered that the boys have some kind of genetic birth defects.  Definitely physical, possibly mental.

And then this is when I ask what I'm sure everyone is asking.  Why?  Why God?  But I've found myself not asking "why are these babies sick?" but rather "why are my babies healthy?"  Why was I able to carry my babies to term?  Why are they healthy?  And growing strong?  What did I do to deserve that?

Ryan and Barbara, Isaac & Caleb's parents, are incredible people with a faith that humbles me.  I know they've cried and asked the "why's" but they somehow continue to look to God for strength through all of this.  And although we may never have answers to the "why" in this situation, I guess this is where we trust that God does.  He knows.  He didn't make a mistake.  These boys were born in this way to these parents for a reason.  But I'm still a little sad.  And I continue to pray.  Oh, have I prayed.

And so today I've hugged my children a little tighter.  Thanked God for them a little more.  And today I rejoice.  I rejoice that my boys are strong and healthy.  I rejoice that God has an intentional plan for everyone on this earth and that I get to be a part of that plan.

If you will, friends, please pray for Ryan & Barbara and their boys, Isaac and Caleb.  I can't tell you how to pray or what to pray for because I still don't know myself.  But please pray.  God knows.  You can follow their story and updates on their blog.

Easter with the Boys

Chris, Tim, JD
I can see where my boys get their good looks from.

We had a wonderful time celebrating Resurrection Sunday with family.  Both of Chris' brothers came to visit for the weekend, JD from Minneapolis, MN and Tim from Billings, MT.  Let me just say up front that Chris and I were both honored that they would travel so far to spend time with us.  And JD's wife Pamela had a prior appointment this weekend so she couldn't come (which was a bummer - we missed you Pamela!), but JD still came.  So that's how it was.  Me and the boys.  More boys.  But I loved it!  And Brooks loved having his uncles to play with.  We don't see them nearly enough, but you would think that Brooks plays with them every day the way he hugged them, and played with them and didn't want them to leave.

Brooks playing hide 'n seek with Uncle JD

I found you!

Saturday we just hung around the house.  I actually left for a few hours to get my hair cut and do some shopping.  I figured there were three adults to two kids.  They would be fine.  That night I made a big ham dinner with mashed potatoes, squash and strawberry shortcake for dessert.  Tim, who normally eats cafeteria food at college, was very appreciative!  And after supper the boys cleaned up all the dishes!!  Their mother taught them well! 

When the little boys were all tucked in for the night, Chris and his brothers went to the arcade for a few hours.  They may be all grown up, but that doesn't mean they still don't enjoy a good skeet ball competition :)

Sunday morning Carter and I left early to help in the nursery during early service at church.  Then the rest of the boys met us there for second service.  So because I was gone in the morning, we decided to do Easter baskets and the egg hunt in the afternoon, after Brooks' nap.  That actually worked out really well because it gave us a few hours to stuff and hide the eggs.

JD hiding Easter eggs.  Even Phil got in on the action.

After his nap, Brooks found his Easter basket on the table.  The funny thing was that as soon as he saw the chips in his basket he was good.  We tried to show him the Rice Krispy bar, matchbox cars and sand toys he received, but he kept asking "Can I eat these chips now?"  We totally could have skipped everything else and Brooks would have had a perfect Easter!

 We did eventually convince him to do the Easter egg hunt.

 

But again, he found one egg, discovered that there was a treat inside of it and he was ready to call it a day.  "No buddy there's more eggs.  With more treats."  I've never had to work so hard to talk someone into finding treats.  All the eggs were filled with mini graham crackers that Chris and I made on Friday night.  He loved them!  He didn't find all the eggs, but that's ok.  It just made this morning more fun when he kept finding treat filled eggs as I was making breakfast.  "Look Mom!  Another egg!!"

Brooks ended with a whole basket full of eggs.  And when Carter spotted them, he decided he wanted in on this action.  He bee-lined it for the basket and helped himself.

 

As you can imagine, Brooks wasn't very happy about it.  "No Carter! Those are my eggs.  You can't have them.  Mom, Carter can't have them.  These eggs are only for big boys."  And we just sat back and smiled.  Because we knew this is just one of many arguments (albeit one sided now) that will happen over toys.  We tried explaining that Carter just wants to see them and that he won't hurt them, but it didn't matter.  Brooks promptly took away all the eggs from Carter.  Oh well.

Brooks took away my egg!

Carter had his own present to open.  Which of course Brooks wanted to open instead, but we stopped that action.

This paper is for eating, right?

Wow, look at that posed picture!

We bought Carter a new blanket.  He already has a soft blanket that he loves with silky edges, but it's super thick and way too hot for summer.  So we found a lighter blanket, still with the silky edge.  He taste tested it right away and soon after took his first nap with it.  I think he approved :)  This boy sure loves his blankets.

Our neighbors also had a little egg hunt and asked Brooks to be a part of it.  So we went outside and hunted for a few more eggs.

 

 

Nice toss, Daddy!

 

The rest of the weekend was rounded out with drinking coffee, playing video games and sharing childhood stories.  It was a great weekend and I'm looking forward to seeing these guys again.

 

Watch Me Grow: 7 Months

This month really seemed to be a turning point for Carter - a lot of changes occured.  He seems so much more grown up all of a sudden.  And gosh is he handsome!!

Stats:

• Carter now weighs just under 20 pounds.  Whew he's a big boy!
• He's pretty much outgrown his 6 month clothing.  He's wearing all 9 month and even some 12 month clothes.
• We bumped Carter up to the medium size FuzziBunz cloth diapers.  Which, ironically, is the same size diaper Brooks wears (at nightime).  How different they are!

Eating:

• Last month we started giving Carter solid foods.  And so far he's tried avocado, carrots, bananas, and pears.  And so far he's liked none of it.  The avocado he tolerated, but other than that when I offer the spoon he shuts his mouth and turns his head.  (Well, my Dad let him suck on a piece of pineapple when I wasn't around and he didn't seem to mind that)  We've tried just putting the mashed up food on his tray, and although he loves to play with it, he's still not fond of eating it.  I guess it just doesn't compete with mama's milk!
• Carter is nursing pretty consistently every 3-4 hours.  It's nice that he's going a little longer between eating, but I'm so programmed to feeding him every 2 hours, it's been a bit of an adjustment for me.

Sleeping

• I finally have good news!!  Some magical switch must have flipped and Carter is now taking naps.  I actually hesitated writing this for fear that as soon as I said it out loud that it would no longer be true.  But for the last three weeks Carter has gone down for naps without screaming and crying and sleeps for longer than 20 minutes!  Can I get an "Amen"!!
• I nurse Carter to sleep for all his naps and bedtime.  I suppose at some point I'll need to wean him of that, but for now I'm just thrilled that he's sleeping.  He'll take a morning nap around 10am and an afternoon nap around 2pm.  Of course our days are so varied that he doesn't always nap at the same time, but he's learned to be flexible.  I really appreciate that about him.
• We've established an earlier bedtime for Carter.  We realized some of the screaming was due to him being very very over-tired.  So he's usually in bed between 7:30p and 8:00p.  His morning wake-up time is now 7am, earlier than the 8:00 when he was waking up, but I don't mind.  He'll wake up to eat once or twice in the night, but then goes right back to sleep.
• One little hurdle we're trying to overcome (and I say "little" because compared to other issues we've had with his sleeping, this seems really, very minor) is after I nurse Carter to sleep for the night, he'll consistently wake up after 1/2 hour and cry.  Every night.  And one of us will go up there, rub his back or rock him and he'll go right back to sleep.  But I'm still not sure why he wakes up in the first place.  He doesn't do that at nap time.  Like I said, it's really not a big deal and he's pretty good at going right back to sleep, but it would be nice not having to put him back to sleep again and again in the same night.

New Discoveries:

• Tags.  Carter loves to suck on the tags of his plush toys.  I totally get why those "tag" blankets are so appealing.
• His blanket.  He's always slept with a blanket, but lately he seems very attached to one in particular.  It's a soft fleece blanket with a satin edge.  At bedtime, he'll grab it and press it close to his face.  Then he'll suck on the satin edge and fall asleep.  I think we have "blankie" guy!
• Grass.  It's been soooo warm here the last month (like in the 70's and 80's warm!), that we've spent a lot of time outside playing.  We put a blanket down for Carter to play on, but he'll always scoot himself to the edge and play with the grass.

• Along with playing in the grass, Carter took his first ride on the swings!!  He's always loved moving (being held, riding in the car, etc), so naturally he loved the swings.

New Abilities:

• Carter is crawling!  Well, he's army crawling, but he sure is getting around!  He's loving this new-found freedom and is so much happier now that he can move.  Brooks, however, is not.  He's now discovering that Carter likes to play with his toys too and Brooks isn't always that fond of sharing.  Carter still gets up on all fours and rocks back and forth.  He just hasn't made it to actually crawling yet.
• Sitting up.  Carter is now sitting up pretty much unassisted.  But even though Carter can sit up, doesn't mean that he wants to.  He likes to move move move and sitting in one spot just isn't that appealing to him.
• Babbling.  Carter's been more of a cryer/screamer in the past, so now that he's sleeping better and consequently much happier, we're starting to hear his voice in a much more pleasant manner.  He loves to coo and babble.  Some current sounds we're hearing:  vuh vuh vuh, bah bah bah (my little sheep) and mmmmmeh, mmmmmeh.  I like to think that last one is his attempt at saying "mama" :)

Big Events:

• Grandma Marty and Papa Dave came to visit this month.  They spent a whole week at our house.  Both Brooks and Carter loved having them around.
• On Sunday, March 11 Carter was dedicated at our church.  It was a special time to stand before our church family and dedicate our son to the Lord.

Pastor Quentin and Carter

For the Love of Chips

Brooks loves chips.  No, Brooks LOVES chips.  We usually don't even have them in the house, but since Chris' birthday party last weekend we have mounds of Pringles stacked on top of our fridge.  And Brooks has been using his lawyer-like negotiating skills to obtain them whenever and however possible.  For instance ....

Recently, Brooks fell on our sidewalk outside and as I was holding & comforting him, trying to subside the crying he says to me "I think I need some chips."

The other day Chris was carrying Brooks on top of his shoulders.  When he asked how he liked being up so high, Brooks replied, "This is great!  Now I can reach the chips!"

Or today as he's sitting and eating lunch he starts complaining that his tummy hurts.  When I offered a few suggestions to make it feel better he states, "I think chips would make my tummy feel better."  Nice try, buddy.  Nice try.

The Stash Bash!

To celebrate Chris' 30th birthday, we decided to throw a Mustache party.  And to prepare, Chris grew out his beard for almost a month.

I like Chris with facial hair, but this was even a bit too wooly for me.  The morning of his party, it was time to shave in the stash!

Apparently it takes a lot of concentration to shave a beard.  The end result???

One wicked awesome mustache with a pair of giant sideburns to boot!

Sorry, ladies.  He's all mine!

Around 4pm we packed up the kids and all the party supplies (which was A LOT by the way.  We ended up taking two vehicles just to fit it all!) and headed for the party.  And during the whole ride, Brooks kept interrogating me as to whether or not we had the cupcakes.  He'd been wanting one all day and we told him to had to wait until the party.  So all I heard was "Do we have the cupcakes?  Are you sure you brought the cupcakes?  I think we forgot the cupcakes.  We need to got back and get the cupcakes!"  I reassured him several times that we did, indeed have the cupcakes and he could have one after dinner.

The party was held at the Grand Prairie Clubhouse.  I put together some balloon topiaries for the tables and pretty much just left it at that.  I had planned on putting up streamers and balloons, but since the room is so classy anyway, I felt like it didn't need anything else.  Then we put Pringles cans on each table at the base of topiaries, 'cause ya know, the Pringles guy has a mustache :)

When guests arrived we had pizza, pop, and a gigantic fruit salad.  I didn't feel right serving only junk food.  I just couldn't do it.  Then there was the cake.

It think it turned out awesome!  It was German Choclate, Chris' favorite, with coconut pecan frosting.  Then because I didn't think it would be enough to feed everyone, I made another two dozen cupcakes.  And Chris came home with about two dozen cupcakes.  My worst fear when hosting a party is running out of food.  So we always have waaaaaay more food than our guests could possibly consume.  You'd think by now I would learn to prepare less food, but that seriously gives me anxiety thinking that I won't have enough to feed everyone.  So, we've been eating a lot of cupcakes, pizza and Pringles the last few days.  No one seems to be complaining.

We told all of the guests to wear their best real or fake mustache to the party.  And I was really impressed by how much effort and creativity people put into it! 

And I was truly humbled by how much love our friends showed my husband that night. People wore mustaches, brought gifts and even helped clean up Brooks' .... um ... mess.   And Joel drove over three hours from North Dakota just to come to the party. We are very blessed with some GREAT people in our lives!!

Richard, that is the creepiest mustache I've ever seen!  Well done!!

These were the winners of the "Best Mustache" competition.  We awarded them with chocolate mustache lollipops!

And what's a party without games??  We had "Name that Stash" where folks had to guess the celebrity mustache.  And "Pin the Mustache on Burt Reynolds".  That was my personal favorite.

Cole rocked "Pin the Mustache"!!

My biggest regret from the evening (other than having to leave early, that is) is not getting more pictures.  Before I did leave, I handed my camera to a friend and said "Here, please take some pictures for me."  I thought there weren't any pictures of me, but then I found one.

Look, there I am in the back.  Getting ready to leave.  That's the only picture I'm in.  I'm kicking myself for not getting at least one good picture with my husband and with my really awesome mustache.  But oh well.  I guess this picture is fitting and rather indicitive of the evening.

The party obviously continued after I left, but Chris said it just wasn't the same.  It seemed all our guests wished I could have been there too.  But despite the fact that things didn't turn out at all the way we had planned, Chris still said he felt loved and appreciated all the work I put into the party.  I guess the lesson learned from this is the next time we throw a big party ... have a back-up plan for puking kids.