A Very Merry Christmas

This year's Christmas was a little different with my parents being gone on their mission. It was the first time I haven't spent Christmas (even if it was a fake Christmas a day before) with them. Luckily Kate and Jonathan were able to come out and so we were able to spend Christmas Eve and Christmas Day with the majority of Adam's family. The main activities were presents and eating. Christmas Eve was primarily spent making and eating gyoza, a delicious Japanese food.  The kids also got to open their traditional pj's on Christmas Eve. Samantha was especially excited that she and Lily matched. Christmas morning we opened our stockings,  presents from Santa, and our presents from Stacy with the Lee's. Then we had to hustle and get ready for church where we were able to focus a little more on the real meaning of Christmas (only a little because the rest of the focus was on not killing our sweet kids who were all hopped up on Christmas candy). After church we headed down to the Hopkins' to finish opening presents. After lunch we headed back up to our house for naps and dinner. The day was also apparently filled with not the best pictures. Either my kids weren't looking or they wouldn't smile normally. Also, the camera was on the wrong setting for our pictures before church so they are blurry. Oh well!

PJ's with a freaky looking Lily

Samantha looking goofy with her favorite present

Paul sporting his new safety goggles that came with his tool set.

The best of the bunch

A Homemade Christmas

Last year I decided that I was tired of buying presents for my kids that would break or get lost within days. So, the past two years I have handmade all my gifts for my kids as well as for everyone else on my list. Although it took A LOT of time and the week before Christmas I swore this was the last year I am happy with the way everything turned out.  I think I will still do it next year, but aim to have everything made before Thanksgiving. That way I can enjoy the holidays without so many projects on my list. I failed to take pictures of many of the things that I made, but here are a few...

This was actually pre Christmas, but I made it so I'm counting it :)

A more delicious version (a caramel, chocolate, toffee version) of an apple for the teacher. 

These were a big hit.

A calendar/menu planner that I copied from "A Girl and a Glue Gun." I actually made four, but this is the only picture I have. By the way, I want be Kim from that blog, she is amazing.

The chocolates (this is only the bottom layer of the box)

A desk for the car. Paul's is blue. To be fair, only the idea of this (and not even this final version) was mine. The majority of the credit goes to my amazing father-in-law who built these for the kids. It is already a huge hit with Samantha.

There were also a variety of small toys that were quick and simple, other smaller gifts that I cannot remember at the moment, calendars (with the help of snapfish.com and mixbook.com), and a book for my mom and dad with letters and pictures from each of their kids and grand kids. All the work paid off and I felt like the presents were a success and definitely more meaningful.

The 25 Days of Christmas

Two years ago we decided to add activities to our advent calendar. I know a lot of people do this, but I had never heard of it before so I was pretty excited. It turned out to be one of our favorite parts of Christmas that year so we have continued to do it. Many of the activities were things that we would do anyway, but somehow having it in the calendar made it more fun for them. I was really bad at remembering to take pictures but I thought I'd still jot down a few of the ones that were a little different and that the kids especially enjoyed...

• Getting a new REALLY soft blanket to watch movies in and then watching a Christmas movie as a family.  I got a really good deal on the blankets during my black Friday shopping. It was fun to give that gift early since it spread things out a bit. The kids were excited to open something and I know having the blankets that early made them more special since they weren't competing with Barbies and Legos. 
• Getting a new board game to play as a family. Paul is really getting into board games so it was a great activity and one we have done many times since.
• Making graham cracker houses. Although not too original, my kids had a great time. The last few years I have bought kits right after Christmas to use the following year. That has meant that my kids had to share. They both preferred the graham crackers since they each got to do their own. (The pictures are not great)

On a side note, notice the shirt? It was Adam's when he was little and is now Paul's favorite. Also, Paul insists on having ALL his buttons buttoned on every shirt. Nice huh?

• One thing we didn't actually get around to doing but I thought sounded like a lot of fun was writing a Christmas story as a family. Each person would say a sentence or two and then "pass" it to someone else. I was planning on writing it down, having the kids illustrate it and then adding it to our Christmas book collection. Oh well, there's always next year.
• Making candy. My great Aunt Shirley taught me how to make DELICIOUS chocolates. They are a lot of work and each time I do them I swear that I am not doing it again, but they turn out so great that I seem to keep doing it the next year. The kids had fun helping with the centers, but I wouldn't let them help dip.

There were a lot of other activities (like hot chocolate bar, making cookies for Santa, etc.) but these were our favorites of 2011.

All Smiles

I am not quite sure how we survived before Lily. There is just something so sweet and wonderful about having a baby at home, especially this baby. The kids absolutely love her and want to spend as much time as they can with her. That is especially nice since it feels like they can't go 15 min without fighting with each other.  It doesn't hurt that Lily almost never cries unless she's hungry or tired and that she smiles ALL the time. All she has to do is hear one of us talking and she'll start grinning. It' s sweet when I go in for the middle of the night feeding (which she's starting to phase out), as soon as I come in the room and turn on the light she'll start grinning at me. In fact, sometimes it's difficult to feed her because she won't stop smiling. If I knew that I could have more babies exactly like this, and that they would never grow into teenagers, I'd have 20 more kids.  I remember Paul being very similar. He was a sweet, sweet baby and then at around 7 months when he started teething he turned into a devil child. I guess the 7 months of sweetness was to make sure I really loved him before he became so difficult. Hopefully Lily doesn't follow the same pattern. Lily has also started cooing and likes to respond when you talk to her. I haven't taken too many pictures of her smiling, but I thought I'd share a few...

The First Real Snow of the Year

Last Wednesday we got about a foot of snow. The kids had a great time playing outside. Unfortunately we weren't quick enough on the snow blowing and the driveway ended up a sheet of ice. It was a royal pain getting out. Luckily it melted pretty quickly and we are now ready for the next storm.

A Witch, Spider-man, and a Cow

I love Halloween. I didn't used to like it at all...the creepy decorations, the spiders and skeletons, basically the whole idea of Halloween just wasn't my thing. Now that I have kids though, I love it. I still don't like the creepy aspect of the holiday, but I love seeing my kids in cute costumes having a great time with all the festivities. It also signifies the beginning of the holiday season. I know once we are getting close to Halloween that Thanksgiving and Christmas aren't too far behind.

This year Paul and Samantha both wanted to be spider-man. Then Samantha wanted to be a black cat, then a purple cat, then spider-man again, then...you get the idea. I found a witch costume at a garage sale so that's what she ended up being. I pushed her a little into it because otherwise I knew that on Halloween she would change her mind again and we'd be left without a costume. Luckily she was happy with it in the end. Paul never wavered from wanting to be spider-man and has already decided to be the same thing next year. We'll see. Lily  fit into the same cow costume that both Samantha and Paul used. She was darling and looked a lot like Samantha. Here are all three kids in the same costume...

Lily

Samantha 

 Paul

We also carved pumpkins on Sunday and went trick or treating around Kevin and Holly's neighborhood with the kids' cousins. 

The "boy team" 

Samantha drawing her face. I helped, but since I am taking the picture, I'm not in it.

When I asked Paul, "what does spider-man do?" This was what he showed me

This was after it was explained that he shoots webs from his wrists

Interviews

I've decided to "interview" the kids every so often so I can remember what they sound like at certain ages. I wish I had started sooner, it's fun to see how cute they are.

Great Granddad

We went down to have dinner with my grandfather earlier this week. He was excited to see Lily and it was fun to watch him with her. 

Granddad and Lily

The kids in a cool old barber's chair. I remember playing in this when I was little.

He's so OLD!

I am officially married to an old man, Adam turned 30! Okay, it's not old at all but I remember being in college and thinking that 30 sounded forever away and that when Adam and I got there we'd have life all figured out. HA! Little did I know Adam would still be in school we'd be living in my parents' house with my sister, and we would still be living on student loans. The only thing that's changed is we have 3 kids. Man, on paper our life doesn't look so hot. Adam's birthday was pretty low key, but it was nice. I think the kids were more excited than he was about celebrating. They wanted to make him a chocolate cake (he bought a key lime pie for himself) that they decorated. After we sang and had a piece of cake we put the kids to bed and had a couple good friends over for dinner. We are actually celebrating this weekend...Adam and I are leaving the kids while we go to an Avs game and stay up in Denver for the night. It will be great to get away, we haven't had a date without Lily since she came home from the hospital.

Just Life and Lily's Stats

I have had many requests to post some updated pictures of our little Lily bean. Samantha and I have taken to calling her bean more often than Lily, we'll see how long that lasts. These are just some fun pictures we've taken over the last few weeks. I also thought I'd post Lily's stats from her last two doctors appointments. 

1 month stats:

20 1/2 in (38th percentile)

8 lb 4 oz (23rd percentile)

2 month stats:

22 1/8 in (51st percentile)

10 lbs 3 oz (34th percentile)

We have the greatest kids. I am amazed at how easy the transition (so far) to three kids has been. Lily is wonderful and the other two are really helpful and wonderful with her. It isn't to say there hasn't been problems...I still get stressed when Lily wakes up in the middle of the night more than once and wonder if that is going to become a regular occurrence. It still bothers me that she takes her main nap in her swing every day (I wonder if she'll be able to transition to her crib okay) but I'm willing to let her because it means she'll sleep for a solid 2-3 hours at the same time as Paul. It was a rough decision to bottle feed because at two weeks she was only 6 lbs 10oz and wasn't getting enough to eat. It's also been a challenge finding a routine with both Samantha and Paul in school and Lily, but I think we've got it figured out. For the most part, these things have been minor and I've just been so happy to have Lily in our home. As you can tell from the pictures, Paul and Samantha are equally happy to have her here.

Paul showing Lily all the features of her baby gym

Paul was more excited than Lily to be so close

Just one Sunday after church

Samantha wants to hold/kiss/love Lily ALL the time. All the time. Luckily she does a pretty good job and is able to pick Lily up from the ground and put her back down safely. She's not allowed to stand up with her though.

Grammie with Lily

Newborn Pictures

My friend Kelly took these AMAZING pictures of Lily and the kids. I am so, so glad that we had them done.

Lily at Six Weeks

Since Lily is changing so fast I figure I'd better document what she's like now before I forget.

• She typically goes to bed at 8:00, wakes up at 3:30 to eat, and then is up for the day around 7:00. She isn't as consistent as either of my other kids were by 6 weeks, but is still doing well.
• Takes one or two naps in the morning (short ones), a long nap from about 1:00-4:00, and one more short nap in the evening.
• I can put her in her bed awake and she'll usually get herself to sleep. Sometimes she cries as she's falling asleep, but usually she's quiet.
• She's a happy baby and doesn't cry too often but when she does it goes from zero to sixty instantly. She doesn't ever fuss, she is either screaming or quiet.
• She started smiling one day before she turned 1 month.
• At her one month check up she weighed 8 lbs 4 oz and was 20 1/2 in long.
• She smiles more at me and Samantha, probably because of our high voices. The only times she smiles at Adam is when he talks in an unusually high pitched voice.
• She is getting much better at controlling her head and can hold it up for few seconds when she's on her tummy.
• She is happy and very loved by everyone in our family!

Butterflies

One day this summer Paul came inside with a caterpillar on his shirt. Since then the kids were obsessed with caterpillars and trying to find more. Of course we couldn't find any...I have no idea where that first one came from. So, we decided to buy a butterfly habitat that included a certificate to order caterpillars. They were not nearly as cute as the green one that we found on our own, but the kids had a great time watching them turn into butterflies. Last week we were finally ready to release them. They are already asking to start the whole process over, but I think we'll wait until next summer to do it again. Paul wasn't really interested in the release, but he did love watching them the rest of the time.