Reading Brothers

Today I was cleaning the bathroom so I asked Carter to play with his little brother.  After awhile I realized that Carter was "reading" his brother a story.  Of course it was Rudolph but he is Mike's son after all.  It is moments like these where I realized how much I love staying at home with my kids.  What a good big brother!  

Baby Sandwich

It's a Baby Sandwich!

Ava, don't smother your brother!

Carter, don't pull at his ears!

Carter?  Are you ok?

Aww.  Nice sweet smiles.  But sometimes I like the outtakes better!

Little Girl Pigtails

I love little girl pigtails.

And of course, I love this little girl.

Incohesive Drivel

• I asked Ava what animals she wanted to see at the zoo tomorrow.  Her response?  Angels and Cinderella
• Is everyone familiar with our spooky fur real kitty?  It's a stuffed animal cat that can purr, lick its fur, blink and roll to its side.  Well, Dawson is smitten with it.  Everytime he sees it he goes crazy flapping his arms, smiling, and generally trying to eat it.  Pretty funny to watch. 
• Carter is becoming too smart for his own good.  Today I told him that he had lost television and his after dinner treat for being disrespectful.  Fast forward to dinner time, he asked me "What's for dinner?"  I responded with "chicken."  He started to whine about how he dosen't want chicken every day.  Mike told him not to worry, because we had pork chops the previous night and spaghetti the night before that.  In fact, chicken is a special treat!  Carter looked at me and said "But Mommy I'm not allowed to have treats tonight."  Not even four and already turning my words against me.
• Ava is becoming quite the little conversationalist.  At dinner she looked at us and said "Nice day today, not raining."  It was so funny to hear her strike up a conversation with us about the weather.
• It has been wonderful to see Ava becoming such a little Mommy's girl.  Carter has always preferred his Daddy, and for awhile Ava did too.  But for whatever reason that has drastically changed, and now she asks for me when she is upset or sad.
• Luckily we are all on the upswing, Carter's spots are gone and nobody else has broken out. 
• Ava is doing really good with potty training.  While we were on vacation in Gettysburg she woke up one morning, asked to go to the restroom and refused to put a diaper back on.  I hadn't packed any underpants for her, so I put her in a pair of Carter's for the day.  She didn't have a single accident that day, so I bought some pull ups and just went with it.  Since we got back she has not been in a diaper a single day!  While she has had some accidents, they are getting fewer and further in between.  I can't believe it was this easy with her!

So those are some of the little moments in our life lately. 

Chicken Pox

Yup, we got them. 

Chicken Pox.

Not the end of the world, but certainly a big inconvenience.

Even though we have had the vaccine and typically it's a late winter/early spring virus, we still managed to contract it.  My kids are overachievers like that.

So far only Carter has it and all his spots have scabbed over today so we should be able to leave our quarantine tomorrow.  I just really hope Dawson dosen't get it.

Very easily the hardest hour of my life:  trying to entertain three kids in the doctor's office for an hour while we waited.  There was nothing in the exam room for the kids to play with. I had very little in my diaper bag because I really didn't think it would take that long.  Plus I had to wake Carter and Ava up out of bed to get there so they were cranky and hungry.

On clearance bib at target:  Star of Mommy's blog!

Although we all know who the real star is.

Last week before he broke out, Carter went to his very first dental appointment.  He did wonderfully.  Of course, it helped that our dentist's office has cable TV for everyone to watch while they get their teeth cleaned.  He zoned out watching Word World.  They also have massaging dental chairs!  I must say, I'm looking forward to getting my teeth cleaned in January, it almost felt like a little relaxing vacation!

Baby Food

I know it goes without saying, but I am smitten with this little guy.

FEED ME.

What a sweet boy.

Notice the cheerio stuck in the middle of his chest?

But speaking of baby food, we had a close call today at the grocery store.  I ran in for a few quick items and left him in the baby car seat in the middle of the shopping cart.  Naturally there is food piled up on either side of him.  My attention is being pulled in ten different directions when I suddenly look down and see Dawson with a bag of grapes in his lap.  He also has two fistfuls of grapes and obviously a mouth full of something.  I had to pry his jaws open to fish out a gigantic grape that was clearly a huge choking hazard.  He had the audacity to yell at me for taking away his yummy new snack.  I also had to pry grapes out of his hand.  He was not a happy baby.

Sudsy Situation

Meme, the kids loved the bath time soap finger paints.  We decided to do them in the baby pool.  I have had the bath crayons stain the grout in our bathroom, so outside we went.

Although next time we won't let them use all three paint cans in one day!

Garden

Hooray, my garden grew something!

Apparently zucchini is pretty easy to grow because we are overrun with zucchini!  We've picked four already and there are at least 4 more out there.

Hopefully, we will soon have tomatoes and sunflowers.



Gettysburg Wedding

We finished off our vacation with a trip to Gettysburg, Pennsylvania.  One of my cousins, Katie was getting married.  This was quite an excursion for our little ones, they faced a five hour car ride on thursday, two nights in a hotel and an eight and a half hour car ride home on Saturday.  Despite numerous stops, disrupted sleep in the hotel and very late bedtimes we enjoyed ourselves!  I can be a schedule/bed time/nap time nazi, so it was really outside my comfort level to put the kids to bed so late to go to the wedding.  But we all survived, and even had a great time! 

Funny story #1

On the way to Gettysburg the kids were sick and tired of being in the car.  We were all getting a little crazy and Carter started yelling about boogers growing in his nose.  Mike started laughing and said "We're not growing boogers!"  Ava then started yelling "Booger Farm!  Booger Farm!"  

Funny Story #2

On the way home from the wedding everyone was a little delirious.  Carter declared that he was born here, at this hotel.  He was born in Gettysburg.  Ava looked at Mike and very earnestly said "I born at Burger King."  

Now onto some pictures:

Our Family in front of the beautiful golf course

Yes, Carter is shooting a spider man web.

My sister with her lovely family:  Marcus, Margie, Julean, Brendan and Riley

Uncle Patrick and Ava

Hmm, was this before or after you used Ava to steal chicken fingers from the little kids buffet?

Aunt Margie and Carter dancing

Ava was our little dancing queen.  She had a ball!

The next day there was a picnic at a local park in Gettysburg.  Here are some of my younger cousins and my cousins kids. 

I also got to talk to one of my cousins, Becca.  She has a hilarious, heartfelt blog with six intelligent, beautiful little girls.  It was so nice to talk to her in person!  Plus, she has been where we are right now, with three little kids spaced closed together. 

Here is my Mom with most of her brothers and sisters (10 out of the 11)

Carol, Kevin, Mary Beth, Rachel, Bill, Jeanne, Michael, Margaret, Patty, Jimmy

We had such a great time seeing all these family members that we never get to see.

After the picnic on Saturday we made the best decisions EVER!  We were facing an 8.5 hour drive, the kids had been up late the night before, it was nap time so let's go sightseeing, right?

 

 

We did make it to the visitor's center for a short excursion.  But it was quickly cut short with cries of "My legs are tired.   I'm thirsty, I'm thirsty, I'm THIRSTY!" from Carter.  From Ava it was one big cry of "MOMMY, AHHHH!  THIRSTY!  AHHHH!"

We finally made it on the road and had to stop 5 TIMES in about a two hour period.  Finally everyone fell asleep and we made it home around 12:30 at night.  It was a long day, but we made it through.

We definetely want to return to Gettysburg when the kids are older.  Mike and I were actually giddy with excitement pulling up to the visitor's center, but the kids quickly squelched those feelings.  Oh well, we will be back.  

Pioneer Water Park

We also took the kids to Pioneer Water Park.  It was one of our favorite experiences on vacation.  There were water slides for the big and small, a gigantic pool, playground, miniature golf, driving range and a lazy river.  Best of all, Grandma and Bo came with us!  

Ava loved climbing a little pelican slide that landed in about a foot of water.  She did this over and over (and over!)

Carter liked the water blasters and playing miniature golf (although there really wasn't much playing going on.)  

Dawson liked the lazy river.  The rafts were delicious and he got lots of cuddling time with Grandma.

 Thank you Grandma and Bo for spending a couple of vacation days with us.  It made the whole experience a lot less stressful and much more enjoyable.

Cars 2

Another fun thing we did on vacation was take the older two kids to their very first movie in a movie theatre!  We (mainly Mike and I) have been eagerly anticipating this experience.  We had a lot of fun, we had popcorn and candy.  They even had a couple of sips of pop. Well, maybe Carter had more than a couple sips because he had to go to the bathroom 4 times during the movie!  Carter also really enjoyed those hard things (whoppers.)  About 3/4 of the way into the movie Ava just passed out on my lap and slept for the rest of the time.

The Verdict:  The kids loved the whole movie experience.  In fact Carter told us tonight before bed "there's always another day to go to the movie."  Mike and I weren't too impressed with the movie, but the company was the best.

 

Sparklers

What fourth of July would be complete without sparklers?

The 4th of July

We spent the fourth of July on the Beach!  Granted it was on Lake Erie, but that still counts, right? 

Ava was not conviced that this was going to be fun.  She didn't like the sharp rocks/shells on her feet.

Carter loved it! 

Dawson loved playing in the shade with his Grandma and Bo.

It's a submarine/dump truck!

Relaxing at the shore!

Carter loving it/ Ava crying

Finally, a picture with Ava smiling!  She did like burying her brother in the sand.

Apparently getting buried was pretty fun too!

This has me so excited to take the kids to a real beach in Florida.  Hopefully one day.

Crazy Kids

So I know that I had promised pictures and stories from our vacation, but the past 48 hours have been crazy and now I have a different story to tell!  Yesterday I had the sheer pleasure (sarcasm) of taking Carter to Children's Hospital for an X-ray.  Oh no!  Why would that be? you say.  But he deserves no sympathy.  The kid decided to eat a plastic fish that came with Ava's pee pee kitties (a reward for potty training.)  I wasn't 100% percent sure that he did eat it, but he kept saying that the fish in my belly is making me hurt.  After a call to our doctor it was determined that we needed to get an x-ray to confirm.  Sure enough, a little plastic toy is floating around in there and I get to add number two inspector to my daily to do list.  I'm just so suprised that he ate the plastic fish.  He's almost four years old!  I never expected him to do this.  But this was a big wake up call.  I'm going to really need to scour the playroom once Dawson is mobile to make sure all the small toys are out of reach. 

It just never ends.  Plus Ava is feeling under the weather and woke up last night with a temperature and again today after nap.  But thank you, Ava for waiting to get sick until we get home from our trip.  There is nothing worse than a sick kid in a hotel room.  Ava is just so clingy and whiny whenever she gets sick.  She has been plastered to me every waking moment. 

One of these days I'll tell you all about our vacation............

Vacation

Last saturday we left on a seven day vacation.  I have so many funny stories to tell, pictures to  edit and upload, and memories to write.  Everyone is exhausted, we didn't roll into our house last night until around 12:30.  We have a napping house, everyone is asleep except Carter and I.  As you can imagine, our house looks like a tornado tore through it and I have loads of laundry and dishes to do.  So I'm going to keep it short and sweet, but there will be more to come.


The first day we spent with Grandma, Bo, Uncle Jason and Aunt Tiffany.  There is always so much for the kids to do and we had a great day relaxing at their house.

With campfires to enjoy, koi fish to feed, cats to pet, turtles to feed, s'mores to eat, walkie talkies to play with, it was little kid heaven! 

Mike and I were also in heaven once 8:30 hit and all the kids were in bed.  Time to enjoy a drink and the hot tub!  This was Mike's first vacation since 2008 that hasn't been spent at Mercy Fairfield's Labor and Delivery unit.

Oh, and just in case you were wondering it is not advisable to leave dirty diapers and cauliflower to bake in your trash can while you go away for a week.  It leaves quite a memorable stench in the house.  Not that I did that or anything...... 

vacation at Grandma and Bo's

7 Months Old

Dawson, today you are seven months old.

This past month I have seen so many changes in you:  you started rolling from your back to your front.  You are babbling (ba ba ba ba). 

I can't believe how quickly you started eating baby food.  Very quickly we went from one meal of solids a day, now to three.  I know I wrote just a couple of weeks ago how you were less than thrilled with fruits and veggies.  That has totally changed!  The only taste that you don't like seems to be green beans.

You are rolling everywhere.  I look away for a second and you will roll and wedge your little body under the coffee table or TV stand.  You are working your little legs up underneath your bottom.  I'm sure any day now I will catch you on all fours.

Your hair is growing so fast, and becoming so blonde!  We love you baby boy!

Just another morning

Scene:  A quiet morning in our home, 7:00 am.  The boys are down at the kitchen table.  Dawson is eating his breakfast of yogurt and pears.  Carter is coloring a picture at the table.  Ava is still snoozing.  I am singing songs to Dawson, he seems to like If you are happy and you know it and The wheels on the bus. 


Carter:  Mom, I don't need any entertainment right now.  Can you be quiet?

Me:  Chin to my knees.  Where did you learn the word entertainment?


For the record, I did stop singing.  But seriously, where did he learn the word entertainment?