St. Louis for the Day

Yesterday we spent the day in St. Louis. I haven't been down there since last March and I had really been wanting to have the Bells meet the babies. Plus a good college friend, Melissa, was in town from New Jersey. Since we hadn't seen her since the spring of 2009 I thought it was a great time to make a day trip. I got to use one of my Christmas presents (DVD players for the car). I was super excited about that. Jack loved watching movies and I loved the peace and quite. Whoever thinks DVD players in the car are for kids is wrong, they are so for the parents. Once we got to the Bell's house Melissa, Graham and Angela came over for a visit. It really seemed so much like old times having all of us together, except for all the extra people now. It was so fun to get to introduce my youngest boys to my college friends and to catch up at least a little with one another. College really seems so far away now. And Natalie and Schaeffer have grown up so much. It's hard to believe that Schaeffer will be graduating high school this spring and Natalie will be getting her drivers license this summer. The were just little kids when I first met them. Natalie used to ride around on my shoulders. Hopefully, now that we are a little closer to St. Louis we can visit them more often. Jack had a blast playing all day and being quite the funny man. He loved having an audience and he loved chasing the dog and cat around...they however, were not so fond of him. He had way too much energy and crowded their space way too much. I'm sure both animals breathed a huge sigh of relief when Jack left! Here are a few pictures, though Melissa has more I'll have to get from her. And I don't have a picture of Ami trying to feed Logan his cereal. I wish I would have thought to take one because that was quite the sight.

The two Schaeffers. Our Schaeffer got his name from this Schaeffer.

The two Schaeffers and the two Natalies. It wasn't confusing at all :-)

Jack with super cool monster trucks and an awesome train watch.

Fish Stories

What a fun week for Jack. Yesterday he had cousins to play with all day. Today he had daddy and papa to play with. Dad decided he wanted to do some ice fishing today so he, Paul and Jack bundled up this morning and headed out to the lake to see what they could catch. One of the poles dad has wasn't working right so they let Jack use it. Jack was so excited to be going out fishing and to have his own pole. He also got to try out his new carhartt coat that matches his papa's. He and Micah got these super cute coats for Christmas. They didn't catch anything this morning but Jack had a lot of fun going out and walking on the lake and trying out his shovel. And if you ask him he caught a really tall fish. Pretty much as tall as him.

Monday Pictures-Week 23

Somehow I managed to get a few pictures of the boys for their Monday pictures yesterday. They weren't quite as "posed" as usual, but they are super cute. These were taken in the morning while all the kids were in the living room playing with their new toys. This past week was a lot of fun with Christmas and all. We saw lots of family and did some traveling. Schaeffer is getting better at sitting, though I haven't been able to get his picture yet. He's also scooting more. Logan is rolling all over the place. Even Schaeffer is doing some traveling rolling. And they are both getting much more intentional about their rolling. Logan has also started sucking on/chewing on his toes. I think it's so cute when he does it. Before he would just pull his feet up and hold on to them while he looked at them. Then Sunday night his big toe made it into his mouth. They've been enjoying their rice cereal in the evenings though I wouldn't say it's helped Logan sleep any better. Perhaps if they could both kick this cold that's been hanging around for almost two weeks. 

Christmas 2010

Another Christmas has come and gone. It's hard to believe how much has changed in the last year. We had a wonderful time celebrating Christ's birth with our family. We celebrated Christmas Eve, Christmas Day and the day after Christmas. And then we spent Monday playing with family and trying out new toys. One thing that has been very nice this year is that we've had to travel much less. It's one thing Paul was really looking forward to with moving back to Morton. Here are several pictures from the last few days.

Mom and Dad with all the grandkids. This number is double what it was last year. 

The "triplets". Ok, not really. This is George, Schaeffer and Logan in their matching Christmas jammies. George is two months younger than the twins, but you can't really tell it from their sizes. 

Jack drooling over one of his presents. With pretty much every gift that was opened he said "I want to play" or "Open it". He had a really hard time not opening up all the toys right away. 

This was Christmas morning. The box is full of Hot Wheels cars and he was quite excited. It was really nice being able to have our own little family Christmas on Christmas morning.

Here is Schaeffer enjoying one of his new toys, a tool bench. The twins have been loving all the new toys they got.

Here is Logan playing with Jack's new excavator. Jack wasn't around at the time or he probably would have not let this happen.

Christmas Cookies

Last Wednesday we had Christmas cookie night with Jack and Kyle. I had planned for them to help make peanut butter cookies with the Hersey Kiss in the middle and sugar cookies. The boys had such a good time with the cookies. They loved rolling them in sugar and pushing the kisses into the middle of the cookies. They also enjoyed using the cookie cutters and decorating their sugar cookies. But perhaps the most fun was dumping the sprinkles and other toppings. Somehow during the course of the evening Kyle lost his shirt and Jack lost his pants due to messy circumstances. Despite the chaos and the mess the boys made some pretty colorful and yummy cookies and they were quite proud of them. We took the cookies to Christmas at Paul's parents on Saturday and each of the boys proudly delivered their masterpieces to their grandparents. Each one got two cookies, one from each boy, delivered in the back of a toy dump truck.  It was cute.

Funny Jack

Jack says and does some of the funniest things sometimes. I always think I need to write them down or record them in some way so we don't forget. Here are a few things that have really made us laugh lately. I'm not sure they'll come across as funny in writing as they do when he actually says them, but I'll try.
-Paul almost always gets Jack out of bed in the morning before he leaves for work while I'm feeding the babies. Sometimes though Jack has to wait for Daddy to get out of the shower so he sits in bed for a while. If he get's impatient he'll often start "crying". One such morning Paul went in and Jack immediately had a smile on his face and said "Daddy, I say ahh ahh so you come get me." Turns out his morning "crying" is just a ploy to get one of us to come get him out of bed. He said the same thing to me a few days later after nap time.
-For a while Jack had a list he would consult before he made any decision or answered any questions. It was a small piece of rolled up contact paper. He carried it around for days and if he was asked to do something or asked a question or anything he'd say "Let me check my list" and he'd unroll the paper look it it intently and then announce what the list said. Thankfully the list almost always lined up with what Mommy and Daddy wanted.
-Jack has been struggling with some of the difficult aspects of the English language lately. Especially things like when to use me and you or he and she. He's figuring out he and she as the explanation for that is simpler than the one for when to use me and you. The conversations we've had trying to explain me and you to Jack have been quite hysterical, sort of following the "Who's On First" comedy routine. For instance, Jack when you talk about you, you say me. When you talk about me (mommy) you say, you. He often says "help you". When I say "Jack do you need help?" he says "yes, help you". I say "Jack if you need help say, help me". Jack says "Help Mommy?".
-I'll finish with this story for now, though he does and says much more that cracks us up. Jack loves to talk on the phone. I usually let him talk to my mom if we talk during the day. Once I let him do that he decided he needs to talk on the phone every time it rings. So sometimes I let him talk even after the other person has hung up. Somewhere along the line he started ending his conversations by saying "Happy Birthday!". I have no idea where that came from but he's very excited to tell everyone happy birthday.

All the Stockings Were Hung

A while back I was browsing Pottery Barn Kids online. I just love to look at their stuff. I have admired their stockings for several years and always think I should order some after Christmas when perhaps they might be on sale. So as I was contemplating this and deciding which stockings I would really like I discovered a problem. I didn't want five matching stockings, I wanted five coordinating stockings. You can't find that. All the ones I liked at PBK were different sizes or different styles. I couldn't put together five of the same size that were different yet similar. So then I had a brilliant idea. Paul loves it when I have brilliant ideas because they usually cost more money, take more time and cause more stress than I ever think they will. I decided it would be fun to make stockings for my family. My mom has made stockings for all her kids and grandkids and they are so cute, so I figured why couldn't I do that. I'm sure Paul groaned when I told him what I wanted to do. Now after hours of cutting and sewing our stockings are done! My mom was a big help in giving me directions and guidance and reminding me that they didn't need to be perfect. And Mrs. Johnson, a friend of my mom's, did all the names for me and let me borrow her sewing machine to do some fancy stitches. I'm so glad I didn't break her machine even after sewing right through a pin! I think they turned out super cute and I learned something in the process. If you're going to make stockings for your family, you shouldn't give your children long names. What were we thinking using the name Schaeffer? It has 9 letters! That's not easy to fit on a stocking. Regardless, they all turned out cute and coordinating. And now we all have stockings for what I hope are many memory filled Christmases to come.

Did you notice all the extra stocking hangers on the mantel? Those would be for the 12 stockings my parents hang for their kids and grandkids. I'd show you a picture of that sight, but three of the stockings are new this year and have not been "presented" to their owners yet. Well, actually that's not true. Mainly just George's since I helped make Logan and Schaeffer's. So we'll wait and keep George's a surprise until Christmas. It's really cute.

Monday Pictures-Week 22

 I sorta cheated this week and these aren't really Monday pictures. They are Sunday pictures. The boys turned 5 months on Sunday so I took some pictures and since Sunday is so close to Monday and they were dressed a lot cuter yesterday than today...I didn't do any new ones today. They never got out of their jammies today, except to put on clean jammies before bed. Anyway, I'm pretty sure they look about the same. The only thing new this week is that we started rice cereal before bed. They both seem to really enjoy it which is fun. Jack hated it and I would spend so much time trying to get him to open his mouth so I could shove a spoonful in. These guys open right up so that's nice. Now I just have to remember how to do this whole solids things.

Out and About

Today the kids and I went out for the first time in about a month I think. We might have gone out for vaccinations but other than that we've been laying pretty low. Part of that due to sickness and part due to weather, but mostly because very rarely do I feel it's worth the effort these days. This is so not like me! When it was just Jack we went out all the time. Most weeks we got out of the house at least 4 out of 5 weekdays. So I sorta feel like I'm on house arrest or something. Though no one is forcing us to stay in and I'm sure if I would try I could find plenty of places to go and things to do. Perhaps I've just gotten lazy. It's a lot of work to get everyone fed, dressed and out the door in the morning. And then to unload everyone and reload them and deal with the whining and crying, plus try and get home before it's time to eat again. Ahh! The twins are so much more scheduled than Jack ever was and they don't really do the best on outings. When Jack was a baby I took him everywhere and he did great. He slept in his car seat or in his stroller without much problem. Schaeffer and Logan refuse to sleep while we are out. They'll fall asleep in the car but as soon as I stop they wake up. So any time we go somewhere it is for sure a missed nap. Which isn't so bad occasionally and would be totally tolerable if they didn't scream and fuss in lieu of napping. Today I decided we needed to get out and I wanted to try and finish up the last of my Christmas shopping. So I sucked it up and put forth the effort. By the time we finished at Target I was ready to pull my hair out thanks to the never ending crying and whining coming from my brood. Plus when I finally pushed my stroller and cart through the thick slush to my van I was less than thrilled to find a vehicle parked so close to me on one side that I couldn't get my car seats in (and I have sliding doors-come on people!). Despite the disaster I decided we still had time to run to Best Buy, so on the quick drive I chatted with Jack about proper shopping behavior. This time I let him walk and surprisingly it went much better.  I guess that means we had about a 50% success rate on our outing today. Not too bad I guess. Thankfully everyone was quiet on the drive home. Now I have to decide whether or not that was worth all the effort!

Christmas Card Outtakes

Well I am incredibly behind this year in the way of getting out our Christmas card. We finally did our pictures on Tuesday and I finished designing the card Tuesday night. I sent one off to Sam's for a test print and wouldn't you know Sam's is so backed up right now that I can't even send my order in. So hopefully, one day in the near future, I'll send out my Christmas cards. Here are a few pictures that didn't make the cut for the card but cracked me up. Jack was doing a really good job and in the first picture he was actually just being goofy, not crying. I'm pretty sure he kept saying "cheese" really loud and obnoxiously which in turn scared Logan who was already on the brink of falling apart. Once Logan started screaming Jack just stared at the camera, perhaps trying to match Schaeffer's "deer in the headlights" look. Schaeffer of course was not bothered in the least by Jack's loudness. Paul suggested I just post our Christmas card to the blog this year instead of mailing it out. While I much prefer snail mail, it might just come down to that! Can I blame being really behind this year on having three children under 3?

Monday Pictures-Week 21

I'm a little late posting this, but the pictures really are from Monday. Few things to note about this week. Logan is starting to sit for seconds at a time (as you might have read in an earlier post) and Schaeffer, at times, is trying really hard to crawl. He should not be crawling. He should not be trying to crawl or even thinking about trying to crawl. But he is. If you catch him at the right time you'll see him trying his best to get his tummy off the ground and his hands and knees under him. Every once in a while he is successful for a fraction of a second. Also, both boys love to suck their hands or fingers and while Logan used to be the more smiley of the two, Schaeffer might have passed him up lately. Schaeffer laughs and smiles quite a bit, especially when Jack is around. Schaeffer loves it when Jack is wild and loud and crazy. Logan finds it to be a bit terrifying at times. And Logan very rarely laughs. That's how Jack was, it was quite a while before Jack really laughed at things.

Our Evening Out

I'm sure at some point everyone asks themselves, "what happened to my life?". Probably this question gets asked multiple times over the years. Paul and I had one such moment tonight. Here it is Friday night, we're in the prime of our lives and our excitement for the evening was going to Walmart for dinner and a few gallons of milk. The thing that really got us was not that we were going to Walmart, but how excited everyone was. Jack was seriously so excited to go to Walmart and eat at the Subway there. I was excited to be getting out of the house. And I'm sure Paul was excited, but I'm not sure for what exactly. Perhaps just to be spending time with his family? On our drive to the store Paul and I laughed at ourselves and thought about how much our Friday nights have changed over the years.

Logan the Sitter

We have a sitter! I had been sorta hoping that the boys would be sitting by the time Christmas rolled around. But when I asked the doctor for a general timeline of when babies start sitting it seemed like perhaps my expectations were a bit unrealistic. So I readjusted my expectations but I didn't stop having the boys sit with help at least occasionally. I knew Jack sat around this age, so I knew there was still a chance. Yesterday while we were playing Logan did it! He sat all by himself for seconds. I took a few pictures and he fell over in between them. But the last two I took he sat through them both without tipping. I remember exactly when Jack sat by himself for more than a half second. It was so exciting and when Logan did it I was just as excited. He's of course not really close to being able to sit and play by himself or for me to plop him down on his bottom and leave him there. He still needs help finding his balance and getting situated. But he sits! It's so cute. We even got it on video last night when I was having him show off to Paul and my mom. And when we got him on video he sat even longer than he did earlier in the day. What a big boy he is. Schaeffer is close to sitting, he's just a little more stiff than Logan...ok a lot more stiff. The times when he'll actually bend at the waist and assume the sitting position all he really wants to do is push backwards. But on the rare occasions he doesn't do that, he can almost sit by himself for a few seconds. I'll be sure to post when he officially becomes a sitter.

3 Little Angels

We had another crafty day yesterday. We took this idea from my friend Meghan. She just did this project with her kids the other day and I thought it was cute so I promptly copied her! These angels turned out cute and Jack really enjoyed having his hands and feet traced. He also really enjoyed squirting the blue glitter glue and smearing it around with his hands. Without a doubt, his favorite color right now is blue. It takes some encouraging to get him to try other colors out. He also loves to use the glitter paint and glitter glue I have. It was almost a fight getting him to call it quits. Schaeffer and Logan "made" their own angels. They did not really enjoy having their hands and feet traced. And I found it to be quite difficult to trace them. But their angels turned out cute and it will be fun to have at least a general representation of their hands and feet at this age. All the angels are hanging up on the tree now, right alongside some of the ornaments my sisters and I made as kids.

Jack's Angel

Schaeffer's Angel

Logan's Angel

Monday Pictures-Week 20

It's another Monday. Seems like Monday's come around so quickly. Not a whole lot new going on since last week we basically did nothing except fight a stomach bug. I don't think the twins really got sick which is good, but the rest of us sure did. They have been having a lot of fun playing in their cousin's exosaucer which we are borrowing. Both of them try to stand up in it and they're not half bad at it. Jack loves playing with them while they are in it too. He pushes all the buttons and sings and dances with the songs and they think it's pretty great. Logan has also recently found his toes. Though he only knows they are there when his feet are bare. And sometimes even having pants on is enough to fool him into thinking he has no toes to play with. So despite the cold I've been giving him a little bit of time pantsless so he can play with his feet. And as you can see from the pictures Schaeffer could care less about feet since he's always sucking on his fingers.

Snowy Weekend

Last week was quite the week. Jack, Paul and I all got sick with a stomach bug. It wasn't fun, but it did mean that Paul was at home on Thursday and he was feeling well enough to hang out with Jack. We had a light dusting of snow on the deck so Paul took Jack out to play in it that morning. Jack has been waiting so patiently for it to snow and he couldn't wait to get out there even if there was barely enough to leave footprints. The rest of the day Jack was stuck to Paul like glue. While Paul tried to nap, Jack sat in bed next to him and watched Cars. Friday it snowed quite a bit and Paul took Jack out in the snow after he got home from work. Jack had so much fun learning about snow and Paul taught him all things snow related. They tried snow angels, built a snowman, ate snow, threw snowballs, made tracks, and rode on the sled. Oh what fun it was. Saturday morning was more of the same for the boys. Only it was even more fun because Jack got to help plow the driveway with the CAT tractor. I wish I had some pictures of the boys having so much fun but the camera battery was dead and I'd been to lazy to get the charger out of the van all week long. I think I might have a few on the little camera, I'll have to check. Saturday afternoon Paul, Jack and I loaded up in my dad's truck and went to get a Christmas tree. Jack got to ride in the front seat which he thought was super cool. We picked out a cute little tree and have been trying to get it decorated ever since. So far we've put on the lights, a ribbon and 5 ornaments. Paul keeps bringing up boxes of Christmas decorations from the basement, but so far he hasn't brought up the ornament ones. Hopefully by the end of this week it will be finished and hopefully the camera will be charge for Monday pictures tomorrow.

Thanksgiving Day

Here are a few pictures from our very busy Thanksgiving day. We fit three families into one day. It was very busy and tiring, but it was good. Normally we would only do one or two families but I had some family from Colorado that wanted to meet the twins. So we started off our day hanging out with Grandma and Grandpa Friend at their house. Sadly, Kyle couldn't make it since he was recovering from a double ear infection, strep throat and scarlet fever. Yuck! Jack was disappointed, but he still had a good time. After lunch we packed up and drove to Roberts to see my mom's side of the family. Then in the late afternoon we packed up again and drove to Champaign to see my dad's side of the family. My dad rented a wheel chair accessible van so that my grandma could join us this year. It was the first time that all the grandkids and great grandkids were together. So that was a lot of fun and enjoyable for my grandma. We did our best to get a few good pictures, but you know how it is with little ones. After hanging out for a while we packed up again and drove back to Morton. Once we unloaded kids and got them into bed, Megan and I got back in the car and picked up my mother-in-law to go shopping at Babies R Us. That didn't really pan out as expected though. I figured they would be busy, but I had no idea we wouldn't be able to get in! We stood in an incredibly long line, in the very cold outdoors for around 30 minutes before we reassessed the situation and determined it would be another hour before we could get in the store. We didn't that was worth it so we got back in the car, picked up some hot chocolate and headed home. It was sooo cold, and we were not prepared. I borrowed mittens from the lady ahead of us in line. Megan put Paul's rain coat over her dress coat she had on. I wrapped a sheet around my head and upper body. That's all was could find in the car, it was lovely. Megan said she wanted an adventure and I think we had one.

The twins with Papa.

Kaia loves babies. She was so thrilled I let her hold Logan.

All the great grandkids on the Vest side. Kaden, Dawson, Micah, Logan, Hailey, George, Jack and Schaeffer.

All the great grandkids with their great grandma.

Iowa Visit

Last Tuesday we took a day trip to Iowa to visit Megan and George. I had been promising to come up and decorate George's nursery with some cute vinyl pieces I'd made. I used her crib bedding to create a lion, elephant, monkey and letters for the walls. Then I used my Cricut to cut everything out. I had never done multi-color pieces before so I wasn't sure how it would go. But it all turned out super cute and though I did have to redo a few pieces it went better than expected. After I finished putting everything up we headed back home. But Megan had generously offered to keep Jack for the night since they were coming to Morton the next day. So he got to have a fun evening with Dennis, Megan and George. Then on Wednesday Megan took him to the John Deere headquarters where he got to climb in a bunch of tractors. Of course he loved that. He had a great time and Megan said he was really good!

A Crafty Thanksgiving

I'm a little behind on my postings! We've had a busy Thanksgiving season full of crafts and family and shopping. Jack and I have been doing a lot of crafts lately, some to make cute things and others just to practice different skills like cutting and gluing. Jack loves to cut strips of paper into smaller pieces and I finally figured out how to use all those scraps. I let him practicing gluing for the first time and he did a great job gluing his scraps onto a paper plate in an abstract design. We also had a craft night with Kyle and Nicole. The boys helped make a centerpiece for our Thanksgiving table and place cards too. I made the yarn ball turkey with hopes that perhaps it could be used year after year. Then the boys decorated feathers for the turkey and told us what they were thankful for. My favorite when Kyle blurted out that he was thankful for roller coasters. The boys loved using the glitter paint I had found. They also helped make the pilgrim hats that we used for place cards. I put glue on a paper plate and they dipped their cup into the glue then put it on a paper circle. They thought that was a lot of fun too. They did a really good job with the crafts. Now I'll have to figure out something fun to do for Christmas.

Monday Pictures-Week 19

We've had such a busy week I'm trying to remember what's new with the twins in their 19th week. Their night sleeping was so great this past week. Eating at 8 and going right to bed, then not up again until 5. Of course with everything going on over the weekend that has gone out the window and Logan is back to getting up several times a night for some reason. I'll be grateful when a good night's sleep is something I can count on, not just something that might happen. Logan started rolling over from his back to his tummy this week. He actually has done this before just very rarely and never when anyone was watching. But as of Tuesday he rolls over frequently and has pretty much joined Schaeffer in being a tummy sleeper. Schaeffer is actually becoming someone mobile. He started doing this schooching thing this past week. He gets his belly off the ground and puts his head down and pushes himself forward. For his age it's pretty impressive and makes me wonder if crawling is coming sooner than I'd thought. I guess we'll see. For now I don't have a picture of the boys together. The ones I took didn't turn out. So I'll try again tonight and hopefully add to my post.