That's My Girl!

Ponytail on top of her head and ponytail in the back to keep her hair out of her breakfast. Mouth full of Cheerios. Cereal coming out of the sides of the bowl so that she can drink the milk first out of the bottom. Showing a very strong preference for her left hand. Wearing next year's rain boots that I got on clearance this year...I didn't hide them soon enough, and she found them and had to wear them to eat her meal.

Cousins

Here are Benjamin and his twin cousins, Darcy and Mary Ann. They are 10 mos. old and he is 5 mos. old in these pictures. I can't believe the girls' birthday is coming up so soon!

Baby Talk

Playing with Mommy's Bear

Grace is doing an excellent job of being a very busy two-year-old and keeping me on my toes all day, every day. She does have some very sweet moments, though, and the things she says are hilarious. Here she is, playing with the bear my mom made for me when I was little.

PS-About Benjamin.

More thoughts about Benjamin's height:  I find it crazy that Benjamin has grown 7 1/2 inches in 5 months.  Even thought he was 2 1/2 inches shorter at birth than Jonathan was, he has already caught up to where Jonathan was at this age.  I am trying not to compare them in other ways, but I can't help it in the area of height.  Our little guy has just zoomed through his cute little clothes in his first few months.  It's amazing.

All in a Day's Work

Disclaimer: This post gets gross in the end and involves poop. Also, it involves lots of talk about Benjamin's stats these days, so if you're not a huge Benjamin fan, you may want to wait for my next post that might be cute. :)

Grace and I took B to the pediatrician for his 5-month checkup today. He is not as big as I feared...only 28", just like Jonathan was at this age, and he weighs 18 lbs, 14 oz. The doc said he's as big as a small one-year-old. 90th percentile for weight and off the charts for height. The funny thing was that they called him "long and lean." Ha! Our boy is not exactly lean, but he's just perfect as fas as I'm concerned. We are thankful for our happy boy, and so thankful he got the hang of gaining weight so quickly and so well. He and his big sister are keeping me hopping these days. I'm ready for school to be out so we're not running around quite so much!

Now, a transition to the grossness. One thing I've noticed about being a stay-at-home mom is that my job (which I am so thankful for, by the way) is that it involves lots of invisible things. I do lots of things that no one notices unless they don't get done, and I do lots of things that no one sees, and things that get undone almost immediately. So, when Jeff sees some of the invisible things I do, I'm glad. And hopefully he doesn't wonder what I do all day.

Cleaning up blowouts is one of those invisible tasks. I do it all the time, and the only effect of my cleanup that someone might notice is that the house is still a mess. So, this morning, when I was trying to get everyone out the door to get Jonathan to school and the rest of us to Benjamin's doctor appointment, my dear, happy, content baby, was happily playing...

like this.

Mothering is very glamorous. But I am so thankful for my dear family. Even with the poop, and lots of it.

Five Months Old

Yep, our sweet boy is five months old already! Can you believe it? He is sweet, happy, cuddly, and sleeping through the night...sometimes. We're working on it. I am anxious for school to be out so that I don't have to drag him around so much during the day and hope that makes a difference for him at night. But, here are the pictures...

If you are wondering what Jonathan was like at this age, you can see here that J. had filled out and gotten some cheeks by this point. At his five-month checkup, Jonathan was 17 lbs., 2 oz., and 28" long. Benjamin's stats will come tomorrow!

Edit:  I have to add this link.  Here is one of my all-time favorite pictures of Jeff and Jonathan, taken when Jonathan was close to Benjamin's age.

The Big Sister

Giving him the pacifier, isn't that cute? Actually, she loves to poke it in and pull it out. She thinks it's hilarious. And she hopes to sneak a nibble for herself when I'm not looking, even though she never did get hooked on a pacifier when she was little. Grace makes my days anything but boring!

Ready for a Hard Day at the Office

I never know...

what I'll see coming down the stairs.

Guy Things

Looking at the features of the new Legoland that's opening soon in Florida. Their target customer is an 8-year-old boy and his family. The age difference didn't bother our 6-year-old. It all looked great to Jonathan!

Unplanned

When you are a baby away from home, and you have a diaper event that your mom failed to plan for, this is what you get to wear in the car.

(This was taken the day my dad died, after getting home from Dad's house. A very hard day, but a baby puts smiles in the midst of tears, as Benjamin certainly did in this situation.)

Benjamin and His Great Grandma

Grandma is leaned way back, entertaining B, and look how much he's enjoying it!

Get Your Fill

Here's another load of pictures of the kids together. Each picture has one or two of the kids looking at me and smiling, but never all three, so you can just pick your favorite of the bunch.










I couldn't resist putting a couple in of Benjamin by himself. He is as cuddly in real life as he looks in these pictures. He has his five-month checkup in a few days, and I'm anxious to find out how big he really is. He seems to have grown by leaps and bounds, but we'll see if he's grown as much as I imagine.

Sweetie

I'm behind, as I mentioned, so this is from April 22, but here's my youngest sweetie with me (with wet hair, as always.)

Mission Accomplished

One of my minor missions in life is accomplished. My child is a fan of Beverly Cleary.

Remember This

Dear Benjamin,

This is how you looked when I came in to get you after you slept all the way through the night for the very first time. See how happy it made you? I was even happier. Wouldn't it be great to be this happy every day?

Love,

Mommy

Attempt at Family Photos

I'm very behind on posting photos that I had set aside as blog-worthy! Most of my computer time (and spare time) lately has been spent gathering pictures for the slideshow at my dad's celebration of life. Big thanks to everyone who contributed and who was patient with me as all my other responsibilities got pushed to the side at times. (I ended up with close to 400 photos to share with our guests.) I may share thoughts about Dad's memorial gatherings soon, we'll see. I'm still processing all of it and may be for awhile. Now that we're finished planning those gatherings, I'm trying to catch up on a few things, including blog pictures. Anyway, here are some attempts at family photos that we took ourselves on Palm Sunday (the week before Easter.) As you can see, it's a good thing we didn't pay an actual professional to take our pictures. The quality would have been better, but not everyone in our family is very cooperative right now.

Happy Mother's Day to My Mom

Motherhood

Squinting into the sun with Benjamin. The third child gets dragged around a lot, but he is a very good sport.

That's the Sound...

of bubbles in the big bathtub.

Grace has been saying this at random times for days, and we think it's pretty funny!

What to Wear...Again

I mentioned here that Jonathan and Benjamin had worn the same cozy outfit, but I forgot to include Grace in the post. Here she is, all snuggled up with her daddy.

My Little Monkey

My Boys

They still love each other. I can't believe Benjamin is old enough for the exersaucer, by the way, but he loves it.

What to Wear to Yosemite

It worked for Jonathan, too!