I am Mommy

Our son turned 2 a couple of weeks ago and since then both da-da and ma-ma have gone through a name change. Our two older kids were coaching him on how to say Daddy and Mommy and right away he made the switch to Daddy. It was funny hearing him say it but the ma-ma still stuck around. Now for the past several days I have been Mommy... no coaching. I actually miss the ma-ma but now I am Mommy to all 3 :)

Pirates

Our son is into pirates right now. He loves reading about them and pretending he is one. We even saw a pirate suit at the store (meant for Halloween) but since we don't celebrate Halloween - just dress up at home - I told him to write it on his Christmas list. (That being the first Christmas gift I have bought :) So we went to the store yesterday to pick up some groceries and all of the sudden he just stopped and started getting really excited. Pulling on my shirt he says "Mommy LOOK!!!! A real pirate!!!!" I turned around to see what he was talking about and I just about died laughing!! It was 2 people dressed up in motorcycle gear (all black leather) and bandana's around their heads. It was quite funny. I tried to explain the situation to him, but he is very convinced he saw a pirate yesterday :)

Answering machine

I got a good laugh from hearing this answering machine message at a high school in Australia.
Thought you might enjoy a good laugh too :)

Gastroenternologist

Our daughter went for her appointment today for her stomach pains. It's been 3 months now. I have to say September has been much better than the past 2 months. He looked over all her tests, bloodwork, etc and he really doesn't think there is anything bad going on right at the moment. He felt around her abdomen and he could feel gas and fluid. I'm sure glad we have met our medical deductible because that would have been frustrating to pay out a couple hundred dollars to hear she has gas!!! *smile* The doctor said we can try any of the gas aids out there and stuff to see if that helps. He did want us to try taking her off dairy for week or so. Because she has been having bowel issues as well for a couple months, this could be the beginning of a lactose problem. So I guess we just wait and see if things improve with these few changes. If not, he said to come back and we'll look more into it.
While we were out, I also picked up my first Christmas gift :) I've spotted it for weeks now and knew it wasn't going to be around for long. Hard to believe it is less than 3 months away!!!

Colds, colds go away!

All 3 kids are now sick with a cold. I'm staying home with them today so no singing in the children's choir tonight :( They don't seem to mind it during the day but at night, when they lay down, I think the congestion really sets in and all 3 were crying or whining at some point throughout the night. Hopefully it's one of those childhood colds that hubby and I have already had so we won't get it :)
I've also been really tired lately!! It seems like I just run out of energy way too quickly. After my shower in the morning I have to lay down for awhile because I feel so exhausted. I set out schoolwork for our daughter (all her seatwork done on her own) and do some school with our son, then go and lay in the recliner for awhile.....etc, etc... I'm so thankful hubby is working alot from home cause I sure rely on him alot throughout the day!! I'm finding it really hard now to go out and even grocery shop for awhile...I just get so worn out! I think these last 2 months will find me laying around the house alot conserving energy :)

Cloth diapers

There is a giveaway at Life in a Shoe's blog for some cloth diaper accessories! All cloth-diapering mommies will want to go check it out. I'm hoping to win *smile*.

Just updates

The van is in the shop till about Monday and we are enjoying a tiny rental car with 3 car seats crammed in the back :) The compressor went out for the air conditioning, so it's going to be a big job. We've been having air conditioning issues over the summer. It just wasnt' cooling like it should but since they found no leaks or anything, it wasn't covered under our warranty. Now that the compressor is kaput, warranty kicks in!! Yay :) We have already gone above what we paid for our warranty so it was well worth getting it this time around.

Our daughter has been hit with a nasty cold. Today I hear the barking cough. I don't know if she will make it to church on Sunday or not. The kids are all suppose to sing in the Children's choir. I may also have to cancel her appointment on Monday with the pediatric gastroentronologist (sp?) - for her stomach pains. She doesn't complain nearly as much as she used to which was daily, but she does still complain about it while she eats sometimes. I'd like to find out if it is some kind of wheat allergy or something. Hopefully she won't have to wait another couple months before getting in.

We are also thankful for the work that came in this month for hubby. The first couple weeks in Sept. were really slow, and it was going to be a struggle to get what we needed for our end of the month bills, BUT as always...God has provided and we even paid off 3 more medical bills :) Our God is good!!!

Today's news

Today hubby is taking the van into the repair shop....again. Our air conditioner completely died yesterday. No cool air at all. I sure hope they fix it right this time!! What a fiasco the last time we took the van in for repairs.
Our daughter is also having a rough day today. I don't know if it is her allergies or she is getting a cold. She was sitting on the deck yesterday for some sunshine, but our back yard is full of trees (some of which she is allergic to) so I'll keep an eye on her today to see what it develops into. Last week I don't know what got up her nose, but her day was full of sneezing. Same thing today....all in her nose....poor girl.
I'm still waiting on the results of my gestational diabetes test I had on Monday. They said no news is good news, so I'm hoping NOT to get a phone call!! Our baby counter is almost in the 70's!!!! Woohoo.
Hubby opened the door this morning to go clean out the van and we had another friendly visitor on our doorstep. He slithered off into the grass....I'm looking forward to the fall and winter!! Speaking of visitors, we have had several dogs dropped off in our neighborhood lately. I guess people can't afford to feed them anymore or something.....but this is the 5th stray that has wandered our subdivision. It's getting annoying and they scare the kids when they come running up barking at them (gets me annoyed when they are all dirty and want to jump up on the kids clothes!!)
Hopefully the rest of our day will go smoothly.

Tooth #3

Just as we were about to head out the door for a cousin's birthday party, our daughter was really annoyed with her loose tooth. I had been checking it for the past couple weeks and it still hadn't reached the point of being yanked.....but as we were all putting on our shoes, she was complaining about the discomfort. I grabbed a kleenex, took hold of the tooth...and presto!!! After a few ooowww's and ouches, out popped #3. When she went for her dentist appointment last week, the hygenist said her top 2 teeth were wiggly and will probably be out by Christmas. She was so excited to show off her new space :)

Brothers

I've been trying to catch up with the photo albums again. I'm still over a year behind....takes a lot of work to sort through and choose the ones for printing!!! I had just printed off some pics of our older son in a cute Sunday outfit and realized this past Sunday our youngest was dressed in the same outfit.....so I had to take pictures to compare. Here they both are....at 2 1/2 yrs and 2 yrs.




And here's one of all 3. Do you think someone is getting tired of having their picture taken??!!

Great Grandma and Granddad

A few pictures from our trip to see Great Grandma and Granddad.

In the golf cart with Grandpa

Watching the chickens

Watching the ducks

Sitting with Great Granddad

Great Grandma reading a book

This week in review

So this week I've been printing off more pictures trying to catch up on all the kids photo albums. I am still over a year behind!! I think I've reached the end of May '08 so I have a long way to go!
School has been going well. Our Monday - Saturday routine has held up nicely with little to normal complaining :) Our daughter is loving her new math curriculum. We were doing Singapore math which she did average with (her difficulties lied with all the word problems!) Switching to Horizons she is now is Grade 3 math and doing really well. What I plan to do (since she is so far ahead) is work through Horizons 3 and then follow up with Singapore 3. Our son is doing really well! He gets very upset if I cut his school days short and begs for more. Oh to have children so eager to learn!!!! We should definitely be done all the kindergarten curriculum before his 5th birthday. It is going to be interested adjusting and managing my time when baby arrives. With our 3rd child, I was only schooling one at the time and it wasn't too bad. With schooling 2 now, and a toddler running arounding, with a new baby.....will be quite the adventure!!!
I did want to wish my grandparents a Happy Anniversary today. Hubby and I were actually going to get married on the same day, but with our pastor already booked for that day we had to move our date ahead a few weeks. We are also heading to see the kids great grandparents today to wish Granddad a Happy Birthday. Hopefully I'll have some nice pictures to post later - if the rain stops!!

6 months and counting

Is it time for the baby yet??? I think they are all anxious to meet their sister! With 3 months to go and an ever-expanding belly, we wait as our countdown gets closer and closer. They each give her a kiss at night before bed and love to rub mommy's tummy. The other day our little one comes out with his shirt hiked up pointing to his belly saying 'baby'. Our daughter lately has been playing 'mommy' alot with her dolls pretending she is pregnant, and our older son just loves to sit beside mommy with his hand on my belly. What love this baby girl is going to be surrounded by!!
Monday I go for my glucola test for gestational diabetes. I have been fine with our past 3 children so I'm hoping for good results with this one!

Dentist

Today was the first dentist appointment for the older kids. I know I was behind the ball on our daughter since she is already 6!! I was hoping mommy wouldn't get in too much trouble for waiting so long :) Their appointments were scheduled for the same time so daddy went with our daughter, who had a great cleaning and xrays, and I went with our son who got through his cleaning but not sure if he liked it or not. They both got a goodie bag with a toothbrush, sticker, toy, sugar-free sucker and a new t-shirt! They wanted to wear their shirts during school today. The doctor said both kids have great teeth and are doing a super job with brushing!!



And a big HAPPY BIRTHDAY to our boy who is now 2!

Party

Our boy had his 2nd birthday party tonight....tomorrow he is officially 2!! So hard to believe how quickly the time has gone by! Right away when he saw his cake he said de-bra so I knew I had done well :) Here are a few pictures from this evening.

Zebra's

Here is a picture of the cake. I'll post birthday pictures tomorrow night after his party. I think he's going to like it....even if he is only 2 :) If I at least get a "de-bra" out of him, I'll know it was a success!
(click on the picture to view a bigger version)

Cake making day

Tomorrow we are going to celebrate a 2nd birthday :) His birthday is not till Tuesday though. Today in between services will be cake making and decorating. Hopefully I will get the majority of it done and leave just the finishing touches for tomorrow. Our boy loves zebras...he actually pronounces it 'de-bra' but he has to point them out in all his animal books and we have one nature video that he loves with them. I hope to have some cute pictures to post tomorrow so stay tuned!!

Bird fight!

This morning I heard laughter coming from the kitchen while daddy was cooking breakfast. Our little one was saying "go, go, go!!" Hubby came in to wake me up and said I had to come see this hummingbird fight. I had been going on for over 5 minutes! These two hummingbirds kept chasing after each other, not letting the other get a drink from the hummingbird feeder. It was quite funny!
We went for a couple months without food for our birds, so we were hoping now that we have some feed out there again they would come back. Sure enough they have and now the kids are experiencing what 'molting' means. Our poor cardinals and blue jays are half naked!! One blue jay was featherless on his head and we could only recognize it by the feathers left on his body. They look pretty pitiful!

hats

We love the Walmart they built 5 mins from our house. They often have some really great specials, even compared to the other Walmarts in the area. Today our $1 specials included a hat for each child and some summer clothes for $1. They wanted to show off their new hats so here they are...they look so cute!!

Reading time

There are not too many kids that don't enjoy reading!! Our kids love books and hubby always laughs at me when I read to the kids because I really get into the story with my many voices and dynamics. So while Mommy was making supper last night, it was daddy's turn. We even got a nice surprise in the mail the other day from the kids great Aunt and Uncle. They each got a new book that they keep in the car with them and a big book full of animal stories that big sister can read to them. I'm really trying to find a good series for our daughter to read on her own (grade 2-3 level) that is Christian based....so any ideas would be great!! I did come across a Rachel Yoder series that looks like it might be nice. I think I just need to get out the the Christian bookstore and search through the kids section!

We're here!

I think this is the longest I've gone without blogging :) We are all doing well....just seem to be busy lately. We are doing great sticking to our new school schedule and I have no doubts we will finish before baby arrives. I'm really liking our line-up for next year's schooling. I'm just waiting to purchase a few more books for our Bible and Science subjects.
I do want to give a praise as well. Hubby has been blessed with a constant flow of work over the past couple months. Sometimes weeks can be slow but then other weeks make up for it. Our Lord has continually provided and supplied work during these months of lay-off. We have been so excited to see how God has worked things out. Although I would love to have the stability of a full-time position, it has been so wonderful having hubby working from home and we've enjoyed the flexibility that comes with it!!
We also have a birthday coming up next week. Hard to believe my baby is turning 2!! He's quite the character and is developing a funny personality as well. Some of my favorite words from him right now are de-lick-a (for delicious), bad boy (when someone does something wrong), and 2 claps of the hand for 'amen'. He will repeat his prayer after me but when I try and get him to say 'amen' he will only clap.....(after his first time praying we all clapped for him and since then that is how he wants to end his prayers) That, he will definitely have to grow out of!!! *smile*
So now off to complete our day of school and enjoy the afternoon with daddy.

The look!!

You'd think by now I'd be used to 'the look'. It is the look I get when I am asked how much longer till baby arrives. Do I really need to go around with a sign around my neck or posted on my belly saying 'YES! I do get BIG!!!' There are several comments I get with EVERY pregnancy. First of all I get the bug-eyed look as always when I'm asked how much longer. I get big!!! I am just over 5 1/2 months and to some I look like I'm due tomorrow. I get BIG!!! Then there is the comment (with every pregnancy) 'are you sure there's only ONE????' Yes, I'm sure it's only one :) Ultrasounds are very good at determining this. I get BIG!!!!
But I had my first rude comment with this pregnancy. We were at a gas station and the cashier found out this was our 4th child. She replied 'do you know what the problem is?????" At least it wasn't the 'don't you know what causes it' comment, but still. How sad when people view children as problems or burdens or even 4 children as TOO many!
I am just so thankful that my God has seen fit to bless our family with another precious gift. I look forward to finally meeting her and continuing our life as a family of 6. The kids keep asking when baby is going to arrive. With every appointment we go to, our older son asks if I'm bringing the baby home :) I think he is anxious to meet to her!! Everyone has now felt baby kick against their hands and it's fun watching their eyes light up, especially our daughter. I look forward to another month or 2 when we can start guessing the body part....my tummy can make some very weird formations!
The anticipation is exciting! My continued prayer is that all goes well with delivery and for the safety of baby and myself. Our countdown is almost below 100!!!!!

Funny and sweet moments

Kids can sure make you laugh at times and we've had some sweet and funny moments over the past couple days. Today as I was going through our sight words flashcards with our 4 yr old boy he was sounding out the word 'w-e-ll' and after he said the complete word he gave a big sneeze and without missing a beat said "my nose is NOT well...it's sick!" ......I had a good chuckle over that one!! And a sweet moment yesterday was after he had his haircut. He doesn't enjoy getting his haircut and complained quite a bit through the process, then was not happy with taking a shower to get all the hair off him, and was quite grumpy and said "this is not a good day!" After about half an hour he came out from playing and gave me a hug and said "thank you mommy for my haircut" and I just about melted!!!! He has such a tender and loving heart....such a sweet boy.

We have really been trying to work on 'attitudes' with the kids lately. It seems they are all at some stage where there are attitude issues whether it be a 23 month old who isn't getting his own way, or a 4 yr old who doesn't want to take a nap, or a 6 yr old who would rather complain than try and figure out a math problem. Attitude is a reflection of the heart, and when our attitude is not pleasing to God, our heart is not right. We are trying to teach them that they are not complaining just against mommy and daddy, but they are bucking God's authority as well. It's an ongoing process but something every child needs to grasp a hold of and understand. Obedience and attitude go hand in hand. Obedience with the wrong attitude is still not pleasing to God. Something I think we as adults still struggle with at times!!

And one more side note....please keep hubby's dad in prayer. His issues are not just gallbladder anymore and I know there is a lot of anxiety within the family. I know they would appreciate others thinking of them!