So Far in February

I wish I'd had a better camera when my other kids were little. It's a lot easier to capture moments and expressions now. Jansen and Natalie have been reading through the few blog books I have printed, and it has made me realize once again the importance and treasure of recording the things they do and say. 

Leah is babbling more and says "Da da da da" a lot. She loves to spit with her tongue sticking out. We all love to say "Ah!" to her because she will do it back. 

This little container of markers will keep her busy as long as anything will. I hope I have at least a couple more months till she learns to rip the lids off. 

I can't tell you the number of times I walk in the girls' room and want to cry because it's such a mess. It happens so fast! They have a million little toys, but they use them, so it's hard for me to get rid of them. I think I need to though. Less things means less to organize and less to clean up. 

 We went on a walk on some trails near our house last week. It's so nice to have a little bit of wild and nature within a short distance of our house since so much of this area is construction and growth. Nate brought his scope and helped us see some birds on the pond.

Natalie is my mini me. The good and the bad. It's an interesting feeling to recognize so much of yourself in your child. 

Jansen got through one or two Harry Potters and then quit a couple months ago. I convinced him to try them again (even though I haven't even read them all), and he says he is so glad he did. On my to do list this week is to get our library cards.

Emmy had been asking me all morning to paint her nails. I had a lot on my mind and a lot on my to do list, so I didn't do it right away. When we finally painted them she told me it was "the best day ever because you are painting my nails!" 

Preparing some paper for an origami creation:

This is Leah's favorite thing to do lately. She loves to stand like this with some support from something nearby. She keeps herself busy so much longer now. 

We went to the rodeo/fair/carnival after school on Friday with Nielsens. We didn't end up getting to see any "rodeo" or really very many animals, but we we did eat hot dogs. :)

We didn't stay for too long, but we had fun walking around and being a part of it all.

I probably gave him a hard time about this incident, but these are also the kinds of things I love about Nate. Natalie begged to play every game and he finally caved at the one with the huge white tiger for the grand prize. Of course he didn't win. This kind of stuff reminds me of my dad though - he was a softy and loved to do things like this with us.

As long as we didn't contract any diseases, I'd say the afternoon was a success.

I love coming across things like this. Some day these kids will understand just how incredibly lucky they are to have Nate for their dad. 

I have the 3 older kids in swimming lessons right now. It's really convenient because most of the time their lessons are at the same time even though they are at different levels. I've never loved swimming, but if we are going to live in San Antonio I'm going to need to learn to like it and I need my kids to be good swimmers so I have less to worry about when I take 4 of them to the pool. 

Emmy created a little "unicorn puppet" from an old styrofoam cup. Haha, it's so creepy, but I love it. She is really into making things out of trash lately. 

Just playing at the park...the sunshine is so wonderful, but it also makes me feel sick sometimes. I just can't handle a lot of it, so it worries me that I'm already feeling hot, or tired, or sapped of energy after being outside for a bit and it's only February. 

Jansen still does origami for hours every day. He makes hats, dragons, swiss army knives, rings, clogged arteries (yes, there is a tutorial for that), and always abides by his rules of "no cuts, no glue, no tape."

This picture makes me laugh. It was a cold, rainy Saturday, but we made the kids work outside with Nate for a little while. I know that my kids have plenty of struggles and worries. And being a kid really is hard. But Nate and I are also always trying to figure out how to make them appreciate the wonderful life they have. Sometimes I wonder if we do too many fun things. And sometimes I feel like they don't have enough opportunities to really struggle through something. They think the world has ended when we run out of Nutella. We are trying to find the right balance of work and play. 

Sweet Emmy always volunteers to help Jansen with his jobs after school. I don't know when it started or why she does it, but she always says, "I'll help you Jansen!" BUT. When it comes to other work and her own jobs she is asked to do, she is pretty pathetic. I know part of it is her age, but she is so easily distracted and realllly drags her feet when asked to help with simple tasks. She is known for getting sudden tummy aches and leg pains when she needs to do something she doesn't want to do. She also hates to disappoint us or get in trouble. Today she yelled "HEY!" very rudely at Jansen and when I asked her to please not do that and told her it was not an okay voice to use she told me, "Mom, I was just starting a song." Riiiiight. 

Emmy loves baths. She asked me to take a picture of her after one "with her eyes closed."

Leah is so fun right now. A lot of work, but we all adore her. The kids still, every single day, ooooh and aaaaah and love on her when she wakes up in the morning. The other day she made her way in her walker over to some plants I have and pulled one down. It was quite the unpleasant surprise. I think her absolute favorite thing to do right now is have us hold her hands and help her "walk" around the house. She is not even 9 months old but wears 18 month clothes and pajamas.Her favorite food is probably clementines. 

We love to play outside, and we especially love if it's a Saturday and Dad can play too.

This is a Sunday evening pretzel making party using Nate's grandma's recipe.

I love having little helpers like Natalie. She loves to feed Leah her bottle. Natalie is Leah's biggest cheerleader and loves to see her reach milestones or do something she's never done before.

We were so lucky to have Grandma Kim send us some Seahawks gear. Sad ending for our Hawks, but we sure love cheering them on. 

This girl loves bath time too. Yes, that's my foot in the picture. I sit on a plastic Ikea stool that I put IN the tub while Leah bathes. 

January and February have brought us some beautiful days and some cold ones. Obviously not that cold - we didn't even put on coats this day to head to the bus stop, although I wish we had. I just wrapped a big blanket around Leah.