Jump, jump, jump

Alena tries to do a lot of things that she is simply too small to do because she sees Gabe and Mya doing them. She was cracking us up today trying to jump and here's a video so you can laugh at her too.

Big Boy Room

I had to show off what my wonderful and very patient husband accomplished today. I got up this morning with the intention of "cleaning up" Gabe's room. I really try to limit the amount of toys he has out at one time, but somehow so much "junk" accumulates in there whether it be pieces of string tied on to rubber bands which I found today or broken happy meal toys. Once we started this process, I began to envision more of a big boy room and Nae graciously helped me complete the vision :)

First, Gabe had a Little Tykes tool bench that sat right here. It was an excellent thrift store find that was very well played with. Lately, though he had just been using it as a desk to write on and a place to store things. So, we put that up in the attic and Nae built this little desk instead. I think it's perfect for what he needs right now - shelves to put all his "treasures" on as well as a place to store pencils, paper, etc. Now I have to follow thru with the project and paint the desk. Next up, was the beds. Gabe had two beds in his room that were once mine that my Dad had made. Sometime after I had quit using these beds, my younger sisters had them in their room and the bunk bed was cut apart to make two separate beds. I knew Gabe would really enjoy them being bunked again, though and it would also free up a lot of floor space in his room. So, Nae with the help of Dad via the phone, figured out a way to do this. As you can see, Gabe was very excited about it. By the way, this first picture looks kind of funny, but the fireman hat you can see is actually a small ornament that is hanging from the light fixture.

Thanks, Nae, you're the best!

Play Ball!!!

I picked up this little bat and tee at a yard sale recently, and we decided to try it out this evening. Now granted, it would make more since to play in the backyard which is flat, but it has been so hot, and only the front yard has any shade at this time of day. This meant, of course that every time someone hit, the ball had to be chased down the hill and usually into another driveway. This wasn't necessarily a bad thing as they tired out very quickly and went right to bed tonight.


Gabe loved smacking the ball as hard as he possibly could. Only problem, he had a hard time remembering to make sure everyone was out of the way. The very first ball he hit (it's plastic by the way) got Mya who was standing about 4 feet away, right in the nose. Ouch!!
Mya couldn't quite figure out how to make contact with the ball but she was very good at knocking over the tee. She also was very good at telling Gabe were to stand to catch the ball which is what she's doing in this picture.

Alena Bena has just been cracking me up lately. She is learning new things everyday and of course the tee was just the right hight for her. She didn't hit the ball with the bat but instead would just knock it off with her hand much to the annoyance of her siblings.
Speaking of learning new things, this was the first time she successfully walked all the way down the driveway by herself without falling. Must have been the bat that helped her.

A trip to the lake

We had really meant to get to the lake often this year, but alas here it is the middle of July and this is only the second time we've been all summer. We did have a great time this afternoon, though so here's some pictures.

Nae, of course, did all the cooking. (If it had been up to me we would have had turkey sandwiches.) Mya and Gabe always want to eat their corn on the cob on a bamboo skewer which actually works pretty well. Alena liked her corn as well though not on a bamboo skewer for obvious reasons.

Gabe trying to show me some rocks he collected.

I love this "real" smile from Mya.

Collecting more rocks.

Alena spent a long time knocking over sand castles as fast as Nae could build them.

Playtime

All of our kids have enjoyed this Little People Farm at about this age. (Meaning of course, that it holds their attention for all of about 5 minutes). I took these pictures of Alena playing in the kitchen this afternoon.

Pool and Craft Time

I am happy to report that there has been no more throwing up at our house and boy am I thankful. To celebrate, I filled the little wade pool up for the kids yesterday morning. What I didn't know was that it was supposed to rain yesterday so they didn't get to play very long before the clouds moved in.

I have found that the best outside toys are recycled food containers. They love to play with any type of cleaned-out bottle or container. I love it because once they're broken we can just toss it and get something else. This old syrup bottle Gabe has works great in the pool as a squirt bottle.

Alena saying she is ready to get out and take a nap. Mom's ready too. :)

When the rain brought everyone inside, I let them get out the craft stuff to kill some time. We haven't done much crafting over the summer since I encourage them to be outside as much as possible and we've done a good bit of traveling.

I assisted in the making of these two little people and then left Gabe and Mya to come up with their own ideas which is what they really enjoy doing.

Life this Week

So, this week we've all been feeling like this:That stomach bug Alena had on July 4th has made it's rounds with Gabe and Mya as well. As usual with these type of things, Gabe seemed to get the worse of it although Mya actually got sick on two different days. I hope we've made it to the end of this little stint of illness at least no one has thrown up in the last 24 hours. Now maybe Mommy can lay down on the couch with a cool cloth on her eyes...

A new look

I have been wanting to add a flower bed to the front of our house for a while now since last year when they put in our sidewalk they demolished the two small beds I had at the end of our driveway. When Julie came to visit a few weeks ago she brought me some purple plant (not sure of the name but she said it was very easy to grow) so we finally today got everything planted. I'm not sure why we waited until it was 90 degrees to do this - we were all guzzling water the entire time. Also I use the term "we" very loosely since Nae actually was the only one to stay out all day. I helped when the girls were napping but he did the majority of the work.

Here's Nae just getting started. This is a good "before" picture the whole area was rocky with a little grass to cover it up. This is the only picture I have of Mya because while she was very excited to go out and help, once out there she decided it wasn't really her thing and went back inside to get her purse and baby doll. Once it came time for the mulch, she walked around with her fingers in her nose the entire time saying, "That mooch stinks!

Gabe loves this kind of work and actually worked really hard. He stayed out just about the whole time and thankfully has gotten past his very sensitive nose. Notice both he and Mya have on their winter gloves - this didn't last long before they decided blisters would be better than sweaty hands.

Alena even got in on the action - throwing some dirt in the bucket.

Alena seems to be feeling a lot better, thankfully!

Gabe enjoying an ice cream truck treat for all his hard work.

Here's the finished product (ignore Nae's truck in the picture) and I'm quite pleased with how it turned out. We put one of the "purple plants" in between the monkey grass which you can't really see in the picture, but hopefully we can keep everything alive now. Nae also mulched all the other trees and flowers in our yard so everything looks nice and neat (even if the plants are dead). Thanks, Nae, for doing a great job and helping me get all this done!

Our July 4th - as it turned out

When kids are involved, things hardly ever turn out as you expect but somehow that still takes me by surprise. Take yesterday...our friends the Crooks had invited us over for an afternoon of swimming, a barbecue and fireworks. All was preceding along nicely, the kids were having a great time in the pool when Alena throws up - twice. Needless to say we had to pack up and go home much to Gabe and Mya's disappointment. They did get a couple hours of swim time , though and Alena seems fine this morning. She must have picked up a little bug somewhere. So far everyone else has escaped the illness but we'll see how long that lasts.

Gabe gets a little more brave every time he's in the water. He loved swimming with his buddies.

Mya always cautious, couldn't have on too many floats. Here she is sitting in Alena's swimming ring.

Alena had fun too, up until she got sick.

These pictures are from earlier in the week. Alena loves to be pushed around in the doll stroller and in fact sits in it much better than she does the big stroller. In this picture Mya is holding Alena's head so she's looking at the camera.

A comparison

For more details on our recent trip, scroll down to the previous post. I believe we only took four pictures the entire time, but I had to put this one on here. We've always thought that Nae's sisters little boy Henry favored Gabriel and while we were visiting them this past week he and Gabe really had a great time. Henry followed Gabe around everywhere and they became little buddies. So, here's Henry this weekend; he just turned 2 last week. and here's Gabriel at his 2nd birthday party. There is definitely some family resemblances.

Our trip - by the numbers

We just got back from a road trip to Dallas, TX. We went to go to a friends wedding, but along the way got to see several friends as well as some family. We had a great time especially considering how much time was spent in the car. We didn't take very many pictures, so I'm just going to give you the details in numbers.

Number of miles traveled - 1480
Number of hours spent driving - 26
Amount of time Alena slept in the car - approximately 10 hours
Amount of time Mya slept in the car - approximately 2 hours
Amount of time Gabriel slept in the car - approximately 20 minutes
Number of different places we stayed for the 5 nights - 3 (this included unpacking and repacking every time)
Number of times Mya said, "I'm hungry" or "Can I have something to eat?" - at
least 30
Number of times we had to stop just so someone could go to the potty - 5
Number of times we stopped to gas up the van - 5
Number of times we got lost - 0 (thanks Jack for letting us use the GPS)
Number of times Alena tossed her paci and we had to climb back and find it - 7
Number of movies that were played and re-played in the van - 12
Number of load of laundry I've done since getting home this afternoon - 4
Spending hours locked in a small space with my husband and three children - priceless