Merry Christmas!

C at 3 months old

Charlotte is three months old! She is getting sturdier and less jerky all the time. She likes to be held so that she can sit up or stand with help and better see everything around her.

She is SUCH a sweet baby. When she is upset because she is hungry/wet/tired, nine times out of ten, she looks at us and makes a very quiet discontented sound to let us know she needs something so we can take care of her before she feels compelled to holler.

She still loves her pacifier, monkey, and holding her own hands if no one else’s are available.

She is sleeping up to seven hours a night at a stretch, which is great for Mommy and Daddy.

She loves to be where she can see us, but she doesn’t demand to be held all the time. She is easy going and easily entertained by her brothers, although Landon in particular has to be reminded not to give her too much love and squishes.

There just aren’t words for how lucky we are to have her in our family and look forward to our first Christmas with three little munchkins!

November News

Highlights from November include…

*selling our CR-V. It is still weird to me that we don’t have it anymore. After 12.5 years of it being my primary ride, I’m having a hard time adjusting to our other vehicles. It was in pretty good shape and had very low mileage, so we got a good chunk of change for it, and we hope it makes another family very happy.

I got older. We got Baskin Robbins since Isaac says one of his earliest memories is having Baskin Robbins with his mom on her 31st birthday… 31 flavors.

We have a smiley little girl on our hands. She is SO sweet. She doesn’t cry a lot, she handles her boisterous brothers and dog like a champ, and she loves to snuggle, so she pretty much has everyone wrapped around her tiny fingers already.

I went back to work, which is good and bad I guess. I miss that face, but I’m grateful for my job too. I wasn’t about to complain about having a whole week off for Thanksgiving after two weeks back at it though, ha.

I’ve been working on decorating the nursery. Landon has been bunking with Aiden since he turned two, which is going amazingly smoothly so far. I was worried bedtime would become a nightmare, but it hasn’t been bad at all. Charlotte is still in her bassinet in our room, but the plan is to transition her over soon, so I painted her room, changed the crib sheet, rehung pictures and shelves and applied a tree decal with my mom’s help. Then we couldn’t see it at all, so my mom came over to sponge paint around it, and we cleaned everything up, so now you can actually see a tree. It’s been a fun project.

We had a quiet Thanksgiving with lots of delicious food and fun with family.

Aiden and Landon helped me decorate the house for Christmas this weekend, and we are already reading our Christmas books. It’s our favorite time of the year, and we’re excited for all the fun to come!

C at 2 months

She has started cooing sometimes, and it's pretty awesome to hear something from her besides burping or crying.

She has been doing stretches of up to six hours (on a good night) in her bassinet, which is amazing.

She smiles sometimes when she sees us.

The hair that fell out on the front of her head is being replaced by lighter hair. She may end up with dirty blond hair.

One of the math teachers at work gave her this cute shirt. I’m letting Landon wear it right now…

She LOVES to hold things. She snuggles this little monkey blanket regularly and holds onto our fingers and clothes. Landon fell asleep in the car on the way home from shopping recently, holding her hand.

Landon is TWO

He's two! He definitely ACTS two. He loves to talk (and especially mimic what people are saying, ha) and is pretty good at it. He uses short sentences and is experimenting with longer ones, sometimes saying something two or three times as he pieces the sentence together until he's happy with it. We like it when Landon says the prayer along with us; occasionally we suggest too many words… so he summarizes.

He loves to eat. He is not very picky and will try anything. He was super duper pleased with his birthday dinner of grilled chicken, pasta in a garlic cream, strawberries, raspberries, grapes, and lemonade. He kept asking for more of whatever he saw and ended up pretty full.

He follows Aiden around all the time and wants to do and say everything Aiden does and says (Aiden is not always overly fond of this). He is also the pushiest with Aiden and loves to literally push him around or poke him or chase him when Aiden wants to be alone. I guess that's a sibling thing.

He loves to play with balls and can usually correctly identify soccer balls, basketballs, and footballs (and "bouncy balls").

He seems to have adjusted to having a little sister and doesn't seem as jealous as he did initially. He does sometimes say to me "Baby down!" when he wants help with something and I am holding Charlotte. He is quick to shout out that "Baby's crying!" when he feels we need the information... even if usually he's just adding more noise...

He pays attention to everything. If he spots my phone or book lying around the house, he brings it to me (even when I really don't need it). He repeats words we say even when I haven't realized he was listening. The other day, he came into my room wearing his Iron Man mask and said, “Mom, I’m 3PO!” He doesn’t know anything about Star Wars, but one of Aiden’s friends loves it and must have used some of the character names while they played, and Landon remembered.

He pays attention to how people feel. Making his birthday cupcakes, I poured a few before I realized I forgot the cupcake liners. I said "Oh no! ahhhhhhhhhhh" as I scraped out the pan. He said, "Mom, you sad?" I said yes. He said "Why sad?" I told him I didn't want to mess up his cupcakes. He repeated it back to me, and as I finished scraping the pan and put it down, he said "Mom, you sad? I give you hug now!"

He is super independent. He wants to do everything from carrying a bag out of the store to getting in the stroller to feeding himself to walking rather than be carried... even when those things are challenging. What he insists on varies with his mood, but every day he insists on doing something his way.

He was super excited to get his own mail. Thanks to his G&G Snow!
He loves to be active and run around, climb, and jump (he is a bit of a daredevil). He was dribbling a soccer ball through the backyard last week better than I could, ha (although that's not really saying much).
He has strong emotions. He can be the most super happy, giggly little boy about food or toys or a game or something someone said... and he can be the saddest little toddler over being scolded in a second. He is SO stubborn and will say the same thing over and over and OVER until he gets a response.

He loves his family and keeps tabs on everyone. I can't count the number of times a day he asks where someone is, tells me where someone is ("Daddy at work") or asks if it's time to get Aiden from school yet.
He totally keeps us on our toes, but I can't imagine life without him in it.

Happy Halloween!

This one’s for the boys

In the past week, my boys cut down most of the rest of the olive tree. It was just too messy to stay. We have lots of olive wood if anyone local wants some before we get rid of it!

They painted pumpkins. Aiden was particularly excited to design and paint a pirate pumpkin.

Landon is inconsistently interested in using the potty and consistently keeping us very busy.

Aiden did a good job with his second Primary Program. He remembered his part all by himself and made a good effort on the songs, ha, so we were proud of him.

He also participated in the school Walk-a-Thon and did 22 laps (over two miles). He never complained, jogged a lot, and had a blast.

Both boys love to help out with their little sister.