Fun with hair dryers, Valentines day, and 6 months old

Last weekend the boys got a little silly after their bath. Sometimes when they're good I let them use my hair dryer after bath time and on this night I let them go crazy and make some spikey hair dos. We had a lot of fun and even got a great video - unfortunately Brenden pulled his pants down at the end so I'm not going to post it. Here are a few pictures from all of the fun:

Valentine's day was a couple of days later. We're pretty low key around here, with three kids its nice to take it easy on some of these "holidays". The boys took Transformer valentines to their classes that their Uncle Chris had bought them. They came home from school with lots of valentines from their friends and of course some candy. Chris and I gave the boys a card and a box of chocolates to share. Rylan got a card and some new valentines pajamas. Chris and I exchanged cards and gifts as well and Chris made me a wonderful dinner complete with wine:-) We had a lovely evening and I think Rylan is going to be a wine lover like her mom ;)

And lastly, Rylan is now 6 months old! I can't believe how fast the time has gone. She's doing great, we'll have her 6 month check up and shots on the 28th to she how she's doing in the stat department, I still think she's on the long and skinny side. She's still doing really well with eating "solids". She seems to LOVE broccoli, she chows it every time I give it to her. She's also done with nursing, but we have around 30 6oz frozen pouches of breastmilk so I can continue to give her a bottle a day for about a month more. I am very happy that I was able to nurse all three of my kids, but I am SO happy to be done. I don't know how some women go a full year or even more, my sanity can only take the 6 months :-)

6 months old!

Crawling and More Baby Food

Sometimes when I look at the title of my posts I realize just how boring my life must seem to anyone reading this ;-) Oh well, we enjoy our craziness and all the small milestones.

Anyway, so my mom was in town for about a week and was a huge help watching the kids so I could have a break and get a little extra coaching in while Chris was out of town. While she was watching Rylan there was a lot of practice with crawling. Chris has also been doing this when I coach in the evenings. And lately you can tell that Rylan really wants to figure this out and be on the move like her brothers. She has been able to get up on all fours by herself, but then she's just sort of stuck. She rocks back and forth and then eventually face plants in an attempt to move forward. Its kind of funny to watch until she starts crying, but even then its a little funny;) I know you all must think I'm a terrible mom for saying such a thing, but really its part of the learning process - you fall, pick yourself up, and then try to find the bright side and you can hopefully laugh about it one day. So back to the crawling part, on Sunday she was really trying to figure it out and Chris was down on the living room floor trying to help her out. And what ya know? She did figure it out. She crawled! Hands and legs moving together for a few shuffles. I was of course in the kitchen, but when I came over to see she did it again! She was only able to go a foot or two until she eventually face planted. And she then proceeded to use her head to move - see, the laughing helped - she realized she wasn't hurt and could use her head with her legs to move around as well. Jake also used the head and leg method for quite awhile before mastering the legs and arms together. Rylan spent about an hour Monday morning trying it some more. It'll still probably be another few weeks at least before she's quickly moving about, but she's definitely figured it out and is ready to practice so she can scramble around like a mad woman with her brothers.

In my last post I had mentioned that I tried some cereal with Rylan. Well, this week we've been trying a few more things. So far she has tried apples, pears, oatmeal, rice cereal, sweet potatoes, avocado, carrots, and cauliflower. She's doing pretty good, I'm trying to feed her twice a day, at lunch and dinner. It's been interesting to see what she likes and doesn't like, so far she has liked everything except the avocado. And the things she likes best she's actually trying to grab the spoon and feed herself.

I'm trying this time around to make some of my own baby food. My sister-in-law was kind enough to lend me her Beaba. The machine makes it so easy to do, it steams and purees the food. I always felt like with the boys there wasn't a lot of variety in the ready made foods so being able to make some of my own food I will hopefully be able to have more variety. And I'm hoping Rylan won't be as picky when she gets a bit older - fingers crossed! On Monday I made apples, pears, carrot/cauliflower mix, broccoli/potato mix, and carrots. I was able to freeze about half of it and the rest we've been trying out this week. She seems to like it just as much, if not more, than the ready made jars. Its definitely nice to be trying some new things and I really enjoyed making it.

Snow Storm 2011 and oatmeal

So for the past week we've been hearing about the massive snow storm that would hit. The storm is 2100 miles long and would bring 12-18 inches of snow from Tuesday night until Wednesday. School was canceled the night before, I can't ever remember this happening when I was a kid. Brenden's preschool sent out a message that it was the first time in 10 years that it would be closing for the day. And there was talk of possibly being snowed in for a day or two.

Well the storm came and went. We did get a lot of snow, but closer to 6-8 inches and the "blizzard" conditions only lasted through the night, they thought they would go all day today as well. It has been snowing all day, but nothing too crazy, maybe an additional 2-3 inches.

Pictures from the backyard during the night:



The vanishing dump truck:
Dump truck at 10pm

11pm

9am

12pm

Jake was gone from 11:30 - 4:30 today playing at friends houses and sledding in the neighborhood. Brenden spent the day hanging out at the house and playing with his birthday presents. I took a nap thanks to Chris. And Chris spent the morning helping get all of the toys put together. We were fortunate that one of our neighbors plowed our drive way so we didn't have to shovel - big thanks!

I also decided today to have Rylan try cereal for the first time. She's almost 6 months old so pretty soon we'll be giving her cereal, veggies, and fruit everyday. Today after I fed her at 1:30p she still seemed a little hungry so I made her some baby oatmeal to try. She did great! I mixed about 2 tbsp with 1 ounce of breastmilk and she ate about half. She didn't make any weird faces or try to spit it out. She did get upset toward the end, but I think it was because she was full and that was her way of telling me. Hopefully she'll be this easy with all of her meals, probably not realistic, but one can hope:-)

Oatmeal face

Silly Brenden

My littlest man is 4!

I can't believe its been 4 years since my littlest man was born! Brenden is 4! Although sometimes it seems as though he's getting younger since we treat him like he's Jake's age and he thinks he's the same age as Jake. It can be pretty funny trying to explain to him that he is not as old as Jake and it will be a couple of years before he's old enough for whatever it is he thinks he should be able to do. More than one argument have been started because of this...

Anyway, Brenden had a very nice birthday. Brenden has had a hard time waiting for his birthday because Jake's birthday is just 9 days before. He gets very frustrated that he has to wait and in the past we've even given him an early present, but this year we wanted to break that habit. So everyday from Jake's birthday until his birthday, Brenden would wake up and ask if it was his birthday and when I would tell him no then he would ask how many more days. 9 days of this...at least it helped with counting backwards!

Brenden did luck out and get some early presents. My mom came into town on Friday night to see the boys for their birthdays and to help me because Chris would be leaving town for a few days. So on Saturday when she came over she wanted to give Jake a belated birthday present and also gave Brenden an early one. Also, my Aunt dropped off my mom and she had presents for both the boys birthdays. And then on Sunday my dad came over and took Brenden and Jake over to his house for lunch and presents like he did for Jake's birthday. So you can see that Brenden made out pretty good from my parents before it was even his birthday!

Also, on Sunday Brenden and I made chocolate chip and M & M cookies for him to take into school on Monday since he doesn't go to school on Tuesdays. The cookies turned out great and Brenden was a big help, he added almost all of the ingredients and was very eager to test the dough throughout the process:-) His class ate all of the cookies and sang Happy Birthday to him, he said it was a lot of fun.

For Brenden's actual birthday on Tuesday we had a very nice day. We started the day with chocolate chip pancakes and presents right after. He quickly ripped through all of his presents and was happy with all of them. For lunch, he went with my mom to get her nails done and they both went to McDonald's afterwards. He told me he got to have a chocolate milk shake - yummy! We did cake before dinner because I needed to pick up Chris from the airport at dinner time and didn't want him to have cake after we got back - there's no way he would have gone to sleep if he ate cake after 7pm ;) The cake was a hit and while I was picking up Chris, Uncle Chris came over with MORE presents.

Presents!!!!

The Cake

Chris and I were able to make it back from the airport before it was time for bed. I left two presents for the the boys for Chris to give them. So when we got home Chris gave Brenden a set of Legos and both boys Mario Cart and steering wheels for the wii, they were both thrilled! It was a really nice day and I'm especially happy that Chris was able to beat the storm and see Brenden on his birthday. And today when I asked Brenden what his favorite part of his birthday he told me it was all of his family - sweetest thing I've ever heard!

All in all, it was a great birthday! Happy Birthday B!

Too young

I received some awful news last night. While putting Rylan to bed last my phone rang and someone left a message. Once I was finished putting Rylan down I looked at my phone to see that one of my former divers had called me and I quickly checked my messages wondering why she would be calling me on a Saturday night. She had left me a message to let me know that another one of my former divers, Jake Rachford, died in a house fire early that morning. I quickly called her back and got on the computer to find an article on Ann Arbor.com that had some information. He was only 20 years old and the second diver I had coached to pass away in the past 6 months.

I know my divers aren't my children, but spending so much time with them, watching them grow, and trying to keep them on their path, I really grow quite a bond with some of them. And Jake was no exception. To hear of his passing hit me hard and is continuing to even more today. And for as awful and sad as I feel I can't even begin to imagine how his parents are feeling and what they are going through right now.

I feel so fortunate to have known and coached Jake. Even though he came to me as an awkward freshman with no diving experience, he was always sure of himself. He didn't care that he had never dived, didn't know anyone on the team, he wanted to try diving as something new to tackle. He spent four years getting better and eventually becoming a state meet qualifier his senior year. And although there were lots of changes in him on the outside, he was still the same self-assured, confident kid on the inside. Jake always knew who he was, and I truly admired that in him. Most of us take years to figure out who we really are and he already knew by the time he was 14. I told his parents at our banquet his senior year that I hoped my boys would be as sure of themselves as he was.

I will miss Jake and likely never forget him. My heart is with his family.
Rest in Peace Jake Rachford...

Rylan's first tooth

So for about 2 months now we've been dealing with teething and all the joys that come with teething. Rylan has drooled, chewed, cried, bit, and done just about anything to try to get relief. We've gone through 2 bottles of tylenol and used orajel. There was one night she let out screams every 45 minutes for about 4 hours straight. And then, on Sunday morning when I put my finger in her mouth to check for any signs of a new tooth I was so incredibly pleased to find one! Her first tooth on her lower gums popped through! Unfortunately though it was only one. She is very pleased to have her first tooth cut, but you can tell the one next to it is trying to push through as well. Hopefully it will only take a few days instead of 2 months :-)

In other Rylan news, she also seems to be going through an attachment phase. She wants to be held almost all of the time. And if you do put her down on her mat or exerciser she wants you right there along side. She cries if you leave the room or if some else tries to hold her and she can't see me or Chris. Its starting to get a little annoying, but I know its a phase lots of kids go through. Chris has noticed she's better with him letting her do her own thing. I've tried using my baby sling a few times and she seems to like it, but she's really grabby these days and wants to get her hands on everything in sight, including the raw chicken and knife I was cooking with the other day! So I'll keep trying to leave her to play by herself and I'm sure she'll continue to cry until I come back and hopefully she'll start to work through this phase soon enough. Oh the joys of motherhood :-)

Rylan and me cooking dinner

Jake turns 6!

I can't believe my baby, my first born, is 6! The saying the days go by slow and the years go by fast seems to really be true.

Jake ended up with a birthday weekend. On Friday we made chocolate chip and M & M cookies for him to take into school. It turns out there is another boy in his class that has the same birthday, so Jake got to bring in a treat on Friday and the other boy will bring in a treat today. I was told the cookies were a hit and I know we all enjoyed them here. It was also a treat for me to spend some time with Jake making the cookies, I know these moments are few and far between.

On Saturday, Chris took Jake and Brenden to Jungle Java for a small get together with some of Jake's friends. We asked him if he wanted to invite some friends and go do something or have them over for his birthday. He chose Jungle Java and 4 friends from school, we were only able to get a hold of 3 of his friends, but they were all eager to join Jake. They met at Jungle Java at 2pm and played nonstop until around 4pm. Jake got some presents from his friends as well and it sounds like they all had a great time.

Later in the evening we got visits from Uncle Chris and Uncle Jim. Jim came into to town for a short visit and was so nice to bring Jake and Brenden birthday presents - Brenden's birthday is next week. Uncle Chris was the big hit though, he came in with two giant balloons and lots of presents! Jake loved the gifts and Brenden was a little bummed (to put it mildly) that it wasn't his birthday yet and he'd have to wait to get balloons and presents. It was also nice to all hang out for a bit and watch Jake with his new toys.

For his actual birthday on Sunday it was a pretty low key day - he told me it was actually boring and Saturday had felt more like his birthday :-) We all got up and made a nice breakfast and Jake had about 2 bites before he started pestering us about opening presents - the kid really loves presents, but then again what kid doesn't? He had presents waiting for him from me, Chris, Aunt Meredith, and Uncle Todd. He ripped through them all very fast and loved them all. When I asked him later what his favorite was he said all of the Transformers - he got them from just about everyone. Brenden also got to open a couple of gifts as well, there were two presents that were for both of them and we let Brenden open them so he wouldn't feel so left out.

Birthday breakfast - Chocolate waffle with whipped cream!

Presents!!

Brenden gets a turn

At lunch time my dad came over and took both of the boys to his house for lunch and presents. They both had a nice time. My dad was also going to take them to my brother's basketball game, but when I got home from practice they were already back and had changed their minds about wanting to go to the game. Jake said he just really wanted to be home and play with his new toys.

For dinner Jake requested we make chicken picatta and pasta and of course we would have my homemade chocolate cake for dessert. Dinner was excellent and the cake was my best yet. The night was finished off with a long bath for the boys, some stories before bed, and a card for Jake from Grandma and Grandman. It was a great birthday for Jake!

The Cake!!

Happy Birthday!