Beat up by a girl?

Just a little story I wanted to write down before I forgot....

When we were playing at the playground in the mall today, Tyler came running up to me to tattle on another kid. He said "that baby girl just pushed me!" He was all upset! Danielle and Matt were sitting there too, and we were all really amused that Tyler was getting pushed around by a "baby girl." Hopefully he'll be able to hold his own as he gets older and won't get beat up by the girls!

It's Friday already?!

Today, I realized that my poor kids haven't been out of the house since Tuesday. It's Friday. Wow, bad Mommy for not finding things to do! I guess I can blame it on the heat, but not really. I had plans of doing things, really, I did! I was going to send Ty to Grandma's on Wednesday, but some of the kids had been sick, so didn't want to take any chances. Same story on Thursday. Camryn came over for awhile to play yesterday, so at least he saw someone other than me and Ava. Before I knew it, it's Friday and the week is over! Man, where does the week go when you aren't doing anything?! I only have 3 weeks left before work so these weeks better start slowing down! A stay at hom mom needs to be really organized and creative to keep the days from getting monotonous. I'll just get it figured out and it will be time to go back to work. We did get out today, although it wasn't for long. We went to the mall for lunch and to play on the playground. Exciting. Again, blaming it on the heat.

This lack of leaving the house has given me time to do a few other things, at least. I decided it was time to go through some more boxes of hand-me-down clothes in Ava's closet. In case you don't know, there is no shortage of baby clothes in this family. Fortunately for us, we had our kids at the end of the line (grandkids #6 and #9), so most of them have fallen into our closet. Kathy's youngest daughter is almost exactly one year older than Ava, so it works out perfectly. The seasons are even right (same age at the same time of the year). So far, Kathy has give us 9 or 10 boxes of 0-9 month clothing. I went through the 0-6 month before Ava was born and had it all ready to go. I decided this was the best time to get through the rest. Here are some pictures of what my living room looked like on Wednesday. Some of these clothes have been around awhile. Sydney is 5, so many of them started with her. There are 3 girls (Sydney, Hailey and Lacy) who used these clothes, so some of them are stained, shrunk or worn looking. Since I probably have the last baby in the family (the sisters are all done, or at least, that's the plan now), I have gotten rid of some of the clothes I don't plan on using. I figure that even if there is another girl in the family, the clothes I'm keeping plus any I buy or get as gifts are more than enough to pass down. There just isn't any way a child could wear the amount of clothing that came in these boxes! It has been so great to get all these clothes! It's like Christmas every time I opena box! Thanks so much to Kathy (and Jen before her) for passing them down! I don't really know how I'm going to get them all to fit in the closet and dresser though! I've got some organizing to do. Here are the piles I made. The stuff on the couch and on the right side of the floor are the keep piles. The left is the Goodwill pile. Remind you, this is just 6-9 month clothes!

All these super cute outfits and Ava is lying there in a t-shirt and diaper! It gets hot in our house in the afternoon--what can I say? She is in a cute dress today though--one I got from these boxes! Her hair looks really light in this picture. It has seemed to lighten up a bit, but is not as light as it appears here. She is also getting that nice bald spot on the back of her head from rubbing it back and forth too. That's always a good look!

The other thing I did yesterday was make Tyler a new bleach stencil shirt. My friend, Jenifer, taught me how to do this, and has a tutorial on her blog. She is really good at it, and has some great stuff she sells in a store on etsy.com called Canteloupe Corner. Check it out if you ever need any cute baby or kids clothes! I also won one for myself in one of her giveaways. It's really cool! Anyway..

Here is the new train shirt I made for Tyler. The shirt is way too big for him right now, but he'll grown in to it! It turned out pretty well! They're really fun to make, and not too tough. It makes for nice, unique clothing and gifts. The hardest part is deciding what type of design to use and then finding one that will work.

Well, the weekend is almost here, so Daddy will be home with us. Although, he's been getting home pretty early this week. Good for us, not so good if he's not busy at work. Hopefully we'll find something to do outside of the house this weekend! Tyler needs to get out and burn some energy! Maybe someone with a pool will invite us over? Or else, we'll just invite ourselves like we usually do! ☺

Newsflash....

I love these kids.... SO much...

...sometimes I can't believe they are mine.

♥

The coolest toy store!

We went to the coolest toy store yesterday. It's called Brilliant Skies Toys and Books, and it is on I10 & Chandler Blvd in Ahwatukee. It is filled with great high quality learning toys that are so much better than the junk you get at WalMart and other stores. The kids can play with many of the toys too, so it is a fun place to visit. When I was checking out, I told the lady that I wished there was another location in the East Valley (because it's a bit of a drive). She said they are opening a store in the Superstition Springs mall on August 15! I bet we'll be visiting this cool store much more often! I vow never to buy any more children's gifts at WalMart!

Danielle picked us up and we all piled in her van. Here are Kate and Ava, all ready for the trip. Kate is 13 months old, and I'm sure she and Ava will be good friends just like Tyler and Camryn.
Speaking of Ty and Cam, here they are too! I had told Ty the night before that we were going to the toy store in the morning. He came into my room when he woke up and the first thing he said was "I'm ready for breakfast so we can go to the toy store." That kids doesn't forget a thing! Isn't Danielle's van cool? It has built in car seats.

♪♪♫♪La la la laaaaa ♪♪♫♪ Imagine choirs singing, lights flashing, and one happy little boy. Tyler found the Thomas section of the store!

He played at this table most of the time we were at the store. He's a bit bossy when it comes to playing trains, so I had to watch him pretty closely. He gets mad if other little kids try to play trains different from the way he thinks they should play. One little boy kept saying "beep beep," and Ty was getting so mad at him. "Trains don't say 'beep beep,' they say 'woo woo'!" Okeydokey....train nazi...

He did venture away from the Island of Sodor for a bit to check out the rest of the store. There are so many cool things there, fortunately he didn't limit himself to his one obsession.

Afterwards, we went to Rumbi Island Grill for lunch and had a nice meal. Kids eat free! Can't beat that. It was a nice way to spend a hot morning. I'm excited that this cool store is opening up in our neighborhood!

3 months old!

Ava is 3 months old today! I say it every time, but where in the world does the time go? The best news is that I am not back to work yet. My first day back was supposed to be July 22, but fortunately I now have until August 24 to be home with my wonderful kids! I was granted a one month personal leave of absence, and will go back part time for the first month or so. YEAH!

It seems like this last month has gone exceptionally quick. I'm sure part of the reason is because we spent a week of it in ND. It seems like Ava has grown so much in this month. She is over 13 pounds now and is so strong! She can hold her head up really well and loves to sit up and look around. She also enjoys standing. It is amazing how strong her little legs are. She is very happy when she can be watching all that is going on around her. As you could imagine, she really likes watching her busy big brother and all his shenanigans.

It makes me so delighted to say this is one happy baby! One of my favorite things to do is to greet Ava first thing when she wakes up in the morning. She is so excited to see me (or Daddy) and rewards us with the biggest smile. She does this thing where she smiles really big and puts her tongue to the roof of her mouth. I ♥ it! She is getting close to giggling too. I'm sure that will be more pronounced this month. She has made a little noise a few times that seems like the start of a giggle. I can't wait for that!

She is still treating me to countless hours of untinterruped sleep at night. As a matter of fact, last night was probably the best yet! I fed her at 9:15 and she woke up again at 6:15. 9 hours! The average is probably around 7, but that is still great. She continues to be a bit of a sleepy head some days too, but those are less frequent. Hopefully she'll start to get on a more consistent sleep schedule during the day. I guess it's getting there, but she still has her lazy days.

We are so lucky to have such a happy and content little girl. I am amazed that she is 3 months old already, and have loved to see all the changes that have come in such a short period of time. I will savor every moment I have with her this next month....and always!

We ♥ you Ava Claire! Happy 3 month birthday!

Swimming and Rocking

We went to Mike & Marty's house (Dave's cousins) yesterday. They have a nice pool, and Tyler never misses an opportunity to swim! I can't believe how well he is swimming! They have lots of steps and ledges around their pool, so Tyler had fun swimming from one side of the pool to the other. Check out the video to see for yourself!

Cannon ball!
High five for good swimming!

The guys were playing the video game Rock Band, so Tyler had to get in on the action too. He is quite the performer. He can sing and play the drums! Future musician maybe?!

After that party, we headed over to Heather & Craig's house to visit. Heather is 5 months pregnant with a baby girl, but has been put on bed rest temporarily (hopefully only temporarily) until they figure some things out. Keep her and her baby girl in your thoughts. It would be a long 4 months if she has to stay in bed! We brought dinner over and hung out for awhile. Tyler had a good time playing with her cockatiel, Sunny. I'm not so sure Sunny had as much fun....she was probably relieved with that noisy boy left.

No new pictures of Ava today. I'll try to snap a few tomorrow. She's almost 3 months old, so watch for a 3 month update on the 28th. You wouldn't believe how big and strong she's getting!

Lazy summer days

I haven't had much to write about lately. It seems like our days are pretty uneventful. We aren't able to be outside much, and sometimes its just easier to stay home rather than pack up both kids to go anywhere! I'll just share a few pictures from the last 2 days. Ava is growing so fast. She is really starting to fill out and get some little rolls on her legs! She is very alert and happy. Tyler has been playing in the sprinklers and the Slip n Slide in the afternoons, but still keeps himself busiest with his trains. We don't have much planned for the weekend, but hopefully we'll find something to keep us busy!

She's quite the drooler lately and always seems to have little spitty bubbles! I think her eyes are turning more brown too.
Cooling off with the Slip N Slide...

Happy girl!

Ty is such a good big brother! Ava loves watching him, and gives him big smiles when she sees him. He likes to make her smile. She's not smiling here, but she was just a minute before!

Tyler got this shirt for his birthday (thanks Aunty Mary) and he got to wear it today. I sang him the ole WHS fight song, but he told me to stop singing. He said "that song's too long."

We're over at Grandma Claire's right now. She called and asked if Tyler wanted to come play with his cousins. It sounded like a good reason to get out of the house! I think he misses seeing his cousins every day! In 6 short weeks, he'll be back to being at Grandma's every day during the week. I go back to work one month from today (insert tears), and then Grandma Jean will be here to babysit for 2 weeks while Grandma Claire and Grandpa Ed are in Germany. I plan to only work 1/2 days for those first few weeks back too. I'll have to ease myself back into working full time...and being away from my kids. My heart hurts already....this time has gone too fast!

Photoshop tricks

So, these pictures are repeats--sort of. I have been learning some tricks with Photoshop and practiced on the pictures below. There is so much to learn! This is a way to "antique" photographs. Just thought I'd share! An all-time favorite picture of Ty from when he was only 2 weeks old.

Thanks to this blog, I have learned some cool photography and Photoshop tricks.

A boy and his bike

Can you believe it? Two posts in a row about being outside! Could it be that the weather is cooling? Nope--just monsoon season. We had a huge thunderstorm early this morning. The thunder was about as loud as I've ever heard. It was shaking the house! We also got some rain that cooled things off a bit. Unfortunately, it is really humid today as a result.

Almost every morning, Tyler eats his breakfast outside on the patio--no matter how hot it is. He usually says "it's a very nice day to go to the park." I usually have to correct him and say, "sorry, buddy, too hot." Today, however I was able to say, "you're right, it is a very nice day to go to the park!" We packed up his construction vehicles, sand toys, and baby sister and headed to the park for the first time in several weeks. He decided he wanted to ride his bike, so I got some good pictures of him cruising around on the basketball court. Rather than post all the good ones, I made another collage (click picture to enlarge). He is doing so well on his bike. I'm sure he'll be riding without training wheels as soon as the weather cools off enough to practice some more! He especially enjoyed riding through the puddles. It's so fun to have puddles!

Slip-N-Slide fun!

We finally got outside to play for a bit yesterday evening. We pulled out the Slip-n-Slide and Tyler had a blast! Here are a few pictures, but click on the Smilebox show below for more!

Make a Smilebox scrapbook

It's hot here.

Ok, so that's not much of a newsflash. We live in Arizona. It's July. It's hot. 115 and heat advisory for the whole weekend? Yep.

Due to the above points, we didn't do much this weekend. At least, nothing that resulted in thrilling or exciting or even slightly notable blog material. Dave worked late on Friday night. We did get to go on a date on Saturday afternoon. Grandma Claire watched the kids while we went to the new Harry Potter movie. Afterwards, we had dinner at Grandma's and then Dave played in a poker tournament with some friends. Yesterday, we hung around inside the house all day. See, being in AZ in the summer is somewhat like being in ND in the winter. It's fine...as long as you don't have to be outside! We did go to a place called Amazing Jakes last night. It's a giant arcade-like-place with a pizza buffet, some rides, and video games. It's sort of like Chucky Cheese on a much larger scale.

Since we didn't do anything too exciting, the pictures below are not very exciting. They are, however, of our cute kids...so enjoy! And if you live somewhere other than the desert, go outside and do something fun, and think of us spending our day inside!

Collage time

So, I got a new camera this week. It's a Nikon P90, and I'm hoping to learn how to take some nice pictures with it. I have alot to learn, and am planning to take a class eventually. Here are a few collages of pics I have taken with the new camera this week. If it wasn't 112 degrees outside, we'd have a few more outside shots. They always seem to turn out better. If you click on the picture, it should enlarge it....

When big brother helps....

Tyler was in the living room with Ava this morning. She was in her swing, but had started crying. She stopped crying a few seconds later, and when I went out to check on her, I saw that Tyler had been a helpful big brother and gave Ava her binky...... ....and she didn't seem to mind that it was upside-down!

A Tyler flashback

I was looking at a few videos of Tyler from a while back. This one is absolutely adorable. We got a video camera for Dave for his 30th birthday last year, and before we gave it to him, I had Tyler record a couple of messages for his Daddy. This was almost exactly one year ago....how sweet is he?!

My favorite...♥

And many of you will remember this classic....Ty pickin' his nose while singing Orange Blossom Special.

For more classic Tyler videos, click here to see some posted on You Tube.

Ava being Ava

I know she's not doing much in these videos, but she is making the cutest faces, so I had to share. I also want to be able to look back at these some day and remember how little she once was. She is growing so fast! I can't believe she's almost 3 months old already. The good news is that I have another month off before I have to go back to work! August 24 will come way too soon, but it is better than having to go back on Wednesday. Enjoy these clips of our pretty little Ava doing what she does best...♥♥♥

Yeah for healthy kids!

We just got back from the Pediatrician's office. Tyler had his 3 year check-up and Ava had her 2 month visit. They are both doing great! Tyler weighs about 35 lbs and is 37.5 inches tall. He is right around the 50th percentile for kids his age. Ava is 12 lbs 15.5 oz (50th %) for weight and she is 24 inches tall (90th %).

Tyler was lucky enough not to need any shots this time, but Ava had 3. It is always so hard to watch them get shots. She was a trooper though...hardly cried at all. She actually cried harder the other night when I accidentally clipped a little skin off her finger when trying to clip her nails. I felt horrible after I did that! Bad Mommy!

We are very lucky to have two healthy children. In Tyler's 3 years, he has only gone to the doctor twice (other than well child check ups). He has never even had an ear infection! We hope we will continue to be so fortunate!

Boy needs a pool

Dave was watching out the window yesterday and said "that kid needs a pool." I looked out there and he had taken his clothes off and was sitting in this bucket of water. Dave had filled it for him because he wanted to put his cars in the carwash. When it's 113, it doesn't take long to strip down and climb right in the water....even if it's only a bucket. I might have done the same, but that would make for a slightly more inappropriate blog post....and none of you want that!

I guess it wouldn't hurt to get the kid a bit larger pool. After all, we live in AZ and it's mighty hot outside. As I type this it is a balmy 110 degrees. Gotta love Mesa in July. North Dakota is sounding pretty nice right about now! I guess as long as we have buckets of water we will survive. Tyler will anyway. Stay cool everyone!

On a similar note...you should SEE this kid swim in a real pool! Dave took him swimming at his cousins Marty & Mike's house on Saturday and he was swimming across the pool! We'll have to get some video next time to share. Quite the little fish...must be all that practice in the bucket. No?

Just Ava

Ty and Thomas--best buds

And when I refer to Thomas, it is not a real person. It is a train. A train who Tyler cannot seem to get enough of. It seems that when Tyler is "in to" something... there is nothing else of interest to him. He started with Disney Cars, and now that he is 3, he has developed a healthy fascination with all things Thomas the Train. If you are not familiar with Thomas, it is a whole (expensive) line of trains, tracks, buildings, movies, clothes, and pretty much everything else you could imagine. The trains have names like James, Edward, Molly, Emily, Gordon, Henry, Percy...and other more obscure names like Skarlooey and Rheneus. They all live together on the Island of Sodor. This Island doesn't seem to have many people, other than Sir Topham Hat and some other train folk. There are visitors to this Island, but I'm not really sure what they do there. It's more about the trains and their adventures. They talk funny in the shows too. They use words like "cheeky" and expressions like "cinders and ashes!" The whole purpose of these trains is to be "Very Useful Engines." But, like I said, Tyler cannot get enough. He will watch an episode of Thomas and then reinact the entire show with his trains. He does not have all the characters (we'd have to take out a 2nd mortgage to buy them all), but he pretends they are who he wants them to be. So creative!

Those kind friends and family who gave Tyler birthday gifts got the memo about Ty's Thomas fascination. Here are some of the Thomas things he got for his birthday: 2 books, a movie, Emily, Rosie, Harvey, 2 coloring books, a kite, a nice wooden train set and a few trains (given to him in April from Jason & Janae). With some birthday money he chose to purchase Edward and a set of 3 Thomas books to go in the book reader from Aunt Jen. There could be more that I'm forgetting. He also has wooden magnet trains that spell T.Y.L.E.R. (thanks Joyce) and A.V.A (thanks Grandma J)with an engine and caboose. They are interchangable with his Thomas. This saves us from needing more Thomas engines and cars!

We went to Toys R Us today to spend Tyler's birthday money and they have a Thomas track table set up with engines to play with. We could have stayed there all day. Ty wasn't even interested in picking out his own train to take home. They really need to set up chairs around this table so Moms like me could relax while our Thomas obsessed children play with their toys for free.....! Man, I'll miss days like this when I have to go back to work. I'd much rather stand around a train table and listen to my 3 year old say things like "cinders and ashes, Thomas chuffed into Percival Pond!"

Ava's sleeping & The Miracle Blanket

Have you ever heard of "The Miracle Blanket?" If you are a new mom or know any new or soon to be new moms, this is a must have! It is a swaddling blanket that could be better described as a baby straight jacket. Sounds cruel, right? It's great! I started using one with Tyler when he was about 3 months old. We swaddled him before that, but he always managed to wiggle his way out of it. This blanket allows you to wrap baby much tighter and hold their arms down better. When they are infants, they have a startle reflex that tends to wake them up at night. It doesn't happen as much with this blanket.

I have used it with Ava since the day she came home from the hospital. Ava is sleeping so well! She has always been a better sleeper than Ty was. He was up every 3 hours, like clockwork (although it was better after the Miracle Blanket). When we were in ND, Ava started sleeping from 6-8 hours in one stretch--at 2 months old! She would then go back to sleep for another 3-4 hours. It has continued for almost 2 weeks now! When I start to wrap her up in her MB, she knows it is bedtime and seems very comfortable. I ♥ the Miracle Blanket! See below for a video of Ava getting swaddled....

Fingerpaint fun

Have you ever seen such a pretty baby girl? Oh ya, this post was going to be about fingerpainting. I got sidetracked by Ava's cuteness....anyway....

There's not a lot to do around here when it's 107 degrees outside, so we had some fun with fingerpaint today. We started by fingerpainting the patio door, but decided it was more fun to paint Tyler's tummy. The best part, of course, was running through the sprinklers to cool off and clean up.

We need to teach Tyler some more funny faces. This is the only one he knows!

Pretty Ava is 10 weeks old....check out those eyes!