It must be fall

I absolutely love this time of year. I love the crisp, clean air, I love the changing leaves, I love the cloudy skies, I love the smell of bon fires, roasted marshmallows, and baked cinnamon apples... So I sent Brad and Kathryn over to our good friend's house to pick some fresh apples. Nothing says fall like Grandma Ople's Apple Pie...

The bears are in hibernation

I knew those old Beanie Babies would be worth something one day...


When I asked Kathryn what she was doing, she said, "Mom, I'm putting them in bed!" Like, what else would they be doing in shoes?!? Is that not obvious?

Somebody turned 2

Mom says now that I'm 2, I'm grumpier than I used to be.

Gramma and Grandpa sent me this really cool package. Mom made me wait until my birthday to open it. She thought Gramma would want it that way. Actually, I was easier to convince than Dad. She got me these really great pots and pans. They are my favorite. Kate and I fought over them all morning, until Mom and Dad finally said, "Okay, let's go get donuts!"

On Saturday, even though it wasn't really my birthday anymore, Taylor, Ella, and Jack, Aunt Heidi and Uncle Josh, and Nana and PawPaw came to celebrate. I got to wear my new dress from Gramma and Grandpa, go to the store with Mommy all by myself, and help her make my special cupcakes with Smarties on top. Those are my favorites.
Nana and PawPaw got me a farm with all kinds of animals in it. I got to pick it out all by myself. It was so hard to chose between the Mr. Potato Head and the Little People farm, but I finally decided on the farm. I really would have liked to play with it, but I really didn't get a chance until everyone else left and Kate went to bed.
Turning 2 was really great. Maybe I'll do it again tomorrow.

I put on my mascara before my eyeshadow today. I've felt "backward" ever since.

I had decided I would start some "fun" pre-school days with Kathryn this year, just to get her used to the idea of "school". I had this brilliant idea that we would have "themed weeks" where we would focus on something new every week, like one week would be butterflies. We would wear things with butterflies, make butterflies, observe butterflies, get library books about butterflies, you get the idea. I was so proud of myself for thinking so creatively and just knew this would be a wonderful learning experience for both of us. My bubble was completely burst when I read on her blog, that this was a completely unoriginal idea. In fact, not only is it not just my idea, there has apparently been a book already published with a whole curriculum like this. So much for originality.

Its been raining all morning. I love rainy days, especially when I can just sit curled up on the couch and read a good book. I can't do that today. I have to clean my house, then I have to go over and clean my mom's house. So much for a rainy day.

I had this great plan to get all my laundry caught up first thing this morning (I think I even promised Brad last night that I would :-O), but when I went to put a load in, I realized I was out of laundry detergant. So much for doing the laundry.

I wish I could start this day over.

Kathryn never stops talking

Ever! Sometimes if she actually falls asleep during nap time it will be quiet in her corner of the house, but otherwise, her mouth goes all day. Most of the time, Brad gets home in the evening and I say, "Oh, Kate said something really funny today..." and I can't remember for the life of me what it was. So today I decided to write them down as she said them. Here's a taste of our day:

Kate: "Did God make this cheese?"
Me: "Yes, God has made and given us everything that we have."
Kate: (looking thoughtful) "Did God make this at the grocery store or where did He make it?"

(Me putting up the coffee maker in the kitchen)
Kate: "Oh, Mom! That was what Gramma used while she was here!!"
Me: "Yes, but since she is gone, I think I'll put it up now."
Kate: "How will we ever get her back??? I miss her so much this day."

In the adult Bible class at church, we're memorizing Psalm 27. I got a little behind, so I've been desperately trying to catch up before Wednesday night. I've been repeating it every waking moment. When Kate woke up from her nap, guess what I was doing =)
Kate: "Are you done saying that yet?"
Me: "Are you tired of hearing me say it?"
Kate: (let out a huge breath) "Do you hear how tired I am?"

Gramma's been here

We had such a fun week last week when Gramma came to visit, and now today is the typical "blah" Monday where we're trying to get back in the swing of things, and I'm trying to get used to having to actually take care of the children by myself. I'm always so spoiled when she's here. I only took a couple pictures of our time together, but this was one of my favorites - Kathryn playing like a dog, and Gramma taking her for a walk:


Then this one: Kathryn and Gramma (and Pheobe) playing Guess Who, only they are playing it as a matching game. Gramma also taught her to play Memory, and to say she loves it would be an understatement. She would really be happy if I would play it with her every waking moment.

Our "big outing" for the week was meeting Brad for lunch then heading over to Zionsville to shop in the fancy shops and just enjoy the beautiful day. We were over at Mom's at different times during the week helping out and fixing meals. She is doing so well since her surgery, and seems to be on the right track to recovery. She has a dr's appointment tomorrow and they are hoping to take her cast off. She still won't be able to put any weight on it for about a month, but she has learned how to get around fairly well.

Here's my sweet little baby girl sucking on her finger...

...and chillin' out while she waits her turn in the bathtub

"I touch the stove. It was HOT!"

Never leave an almost 2 year old to stir the green beans... I turned my back for two seconds, with very clear instructions not to touch the stove. Well, you can guess what happened next, and it just happened to be one of the fingers that she sucks - ALL the time. So after a quick phone call to Brad we decided now was as good a time as any to take them away from her for good. I bandaged the blistered finger and 2 hours later (when she finally stopped screaming) I thought she was asleep. Never assume quietness=sleep.

This was day 1, operation no finger sucking:


And this was day 2:

Maggie turned 4 months old on Saturday. When we found out we were expecting her, we wondered how in the world we would manage with three babies. The Lord gave us strength, and now we wonder how in the world we could survive without her. She has brought nothing but sheer joy to our family. We love that little girl more than words could ever say.

Last Thursday Mom missed the last step down into the basement and fell, planting hard on her right foot, breaking her ankle in two different spots. Her surgery (which is tentatively scheduled for Wednesday) will require plates and pins, and about 6 weeks of bed rest/lying around. Please keep her in your prayers. As "minor" as this may seem in the grand scheme of things, it has certainly shaken our lives up a little bit. You can specifically pray that the swelling would go down enough that the doctor can actually perform the surgery on Wednesday (if it hasn't, he'll have to wait until Monday). Until the surgery is done, and the healing process has begun, her pain will not lessen at all.

Also last Thursday, my favorite husband turned 29. It wasn't the best day ever, considering the circumstances, but we did manage to eat some cake =). That's the most important part of a birthday, right?

He's a pretty special guy. I guess we'll keep him around for another year ;)

Some things never change

But other things do. Who would have guessed in just two short months that Maggie would go from this:


to this:

I guess she learned it was easier just to give in than to fight it. It is now her favorite thing to do. When all else fails, I ask Kathryn to push her in her stroller. It's a win/win situation: Kathryn is preoccupied, and Maggie is happy!

A visit from friends

So, maybe this is a little late =), but I have to confess: I haven't been in much of a blogging mood lately. I've been too busy sewing, and cleaning, and living to take the time. But I couldn't move on without posting about our wonderful weekend when the Shumake's came to visit. Our first day we headed off to the Children's Museum. It was a huge success - the kiddos were absolutely worn out by the time we made it home (yes, that's how I determine success these days). The dinosaur exhibit was incredible (that was a new one for me). The kids favorite part was probably the water and sand. But the other cool thing that they had was one of the eight Batmobile's used in the filming of the new Batman movie: The Dark Night. Pretty cool...

Then Saturday we relaxed before heading downtown to the Indian's baseball game. The weather was perfect, and the kids were more than cooperative. We sat in the yard in the outfield so the girls were able to run around, then stand up by the fence and get a "close up" view. It was just the perfect weekend. Just wish we could get them to move up our way so we could do it more often =(. Now for the pictures so you can see for yourself...

Make a Smilebox scrapbook

I overheard the girls yelling and I had just put Maggie down for her nap.
Me: (yelling) "Girls, stop yelling!"
Kate: (yelling) "What?"
Me: (yelling lounder) "Stop yelling!!"
Kate: (yelling) "Stop yelling?"
Me: (yelling) "Yes! Maggie is trying to take her nap!"
Kate: (yelling) "Maggie's asleep?"
Me: (yelling) "She's trying, so keep it down!"
Kate: (yelling) "Otay!"

Unfortunately I feel like a lot of our conversations throughout the day are this non-sensicle.

Chillin' with Dad on Saturday


This is the girls new car. They get in it and go to Kroger and Avon and worship ALL DAY LONG



Only really skinny people can do this sort of thing...

A little piece of quiet

This is my one moment of silence for the day and I'm sharing it with the Blogging world. It all started on Saturday, when I woke Livie up from her nap to go to what I thought would be a great time at the park, attending the Florida College Indiana Booster Club silent auction. Wrongo. About 15 minutes after we got there, Olivia crawled up on the bench of the picnic table to sit next to me, tumbled backwards, head first. She started crying, so I ran her out of the pavilion just in time - she started throwing up. Thankfully, we were right around the corner to the hospital, so we rushed her to ER. They did a CT scan, and everything looked fine, but they said she could still have symptoms from the fall, so we should keep her activity down for 2-3 days, and especially guard against another head injury. Saturday night she slept in the room with us so we could keep a close eye on her. Around midnight, she started running fever of around 103, so I called the on-call doctor. She said she should be fine, and that was not a sign of a concussion. I gave her some ibuprofen around 5:30 am, and the two of us finally started drifting off to sleep...

We stayed in on Sunday morning, but by that afternoon, she was acting better, so we all went to worship Sunday night. She was very reserved and just wanted to be held and rest her head. Monday morning she woke up whining and crawled up on the couch to lay down. She ended up throwing up again, so I called my doctor to fill him in on the weekend happenings. He also reviewed the CT scan and confirmed that she was in the clear, and that she may still have symptoms like throwing up, headache, etc. Other than being a little clingy and reserved, she has pretty much been back to normal. Brad and I were both so scared when it happened, and so thankful and relieved to get a clean bill of health.

My sister came up from Louisville on Monday because she needed me to make a dress for her daughter for a wedding she is going to be in. She dropped off the material, and picked up Kathryn so she could play with Hannah's kiddos and give me a little more time to sew. I sewed the better part of Monday, and finished up on Tuesday just in time for them to bring Kathryn back over to me saying she had a stomach ache. Great. Turned out she didn't have a stomach flu, but she has been running fever and whining like CRAZY the past two days. Livie started up today just crying over every little thing. I told her she could only have water to drink, she started crying. I asked her if she wanted macaroni, she started crying. I offered her a bite of macaroni, she started crying. I took the bite away, she started crying. I think you get the picture. And really, that's not an exaggeration. So when I said I was sharing my moment of silence with you, you really should have felt honored =). It might be the only one I have today! But, after a scare like we went through with Livie this weekend, you realize how insignificant the "bad days" really are.

It has been over a week now since we "took" Kathryn's fingers away from her. We've had our slip ups, but over all, she has done fabulous. When she first started getting sick, she kept whining and saying, "But Mom, I'm sick, so I need to suck my fingers", but we've stayed strong. Hopefully it won't take too much longer to form this "new" habit.

Maggie is her usual content and happy self. She is still sleeping 11-12 hours at night, for which I could not be more thankful =). She is 3 months today! That is so hard to believe, but she definitely has the thighs to prove it =). She's turning into quite a little chunk! She is such an angel, just smiling and cooing all day. Of course, we look back now and wonder what in the world we would ever do without her. The Lord has truly blessed us.

We're hoping to have an un-eventful last-half of the week ;-). Happy hump day!

(This is how Maggie likes to sleep - all snuggled up into her bunny that Jen gave her. She'll scoot up until she can get her face pressed into something warm and soft. =)

4 days, 3 nights down; the rest of her life to go

We've officially started the process of weaning Kathyrn from her finger sucking habit. This week has been devoted to trying different things until we found something that worked. I'm still not totally convinced that we're "there" - i.e. where we need to be - but we're definitely much, much closer than we ever have been. During the day she wears Band-Aids as "reminders". During the night, though, she would suck over the Band-Aids just out of habit, so she's been wearing mittens during naps and at bedtime. She wasn't too sure about it until I told her the story of The Three Little Kittens. Ever since then, she wants to wear them all day, and eat pie =).


My two crazy toddlers


Kathryn just got her first pair of real "fip fops" on clearance at Target for $1.76. She picked them out all by herself and is so totally in love with them. She is sleeping in them right now =)

Sweet Baby Girl

When my machine was working =(...

Total Randomness

Last night at supper, Livie was less than enthused about what I offered her to eat. I heard her wining, but was in the middle of a conversation with Brad that I decided to finish before I corrected her. In the meantime, Kathryn spoke up: "Livie, this is what we're having tonight, so no complaining. You need to be thankful and eat that." Hmmm... If Livie knew her Bible very well, she would have said, "Get the log out of your own eye first, sister!"

I made bread from freshly ground whole wheat. I felt like a pioneer woman. Actually, my Mom ground the wheat, so I guess that makes me half of a pioneer woman. Since she ground the wheat with an electric grinder, I guess that makes her a fourth of a pioneer woman... Okay, never mind.... We had homemade whole wheat bread for supper and it was really good.

Next weekend my parents are bidding on a cabin in Gatlinburg hoping that our whole family will be able to find a time we can all go (whole family being Mom and Dad, all my siblings and spouses, and all of our children). I am so hoping this works out. I can't remember the last time my *whole* family was together in one place - mostly because we can't all fit anywhere, but also because of how all of our schedules mesh (or don't mesh). It was at least 8 years ago. Eight years ago there were only 18 of us. Now there are 32.

My sewing machine hasn't been working properly since we were living at Mom and Dad's. In fact, I had just written it off as "broken" and had not sewed on it since we moved. A lady at church asked me to help her out with some embroidery this past weekend, so I scurried to fix my machine, got it working, and finished her project. I was so inspired that I set to work on all sorts of embroidery projects that have been so neglected during the past couple of months. Just about everything Maggie owns now has her name on it. Then I started working on an order that I have had since the week Maggie was born, and my machine broke again =(. I can't figure out what is wrong with it for the life of me. I broke 7 needles in the span of about 20 stitches. Sewing is a lot like golf. As long as you're doing well at it, you don't ever want to stop. The minute you start not doing so well, you're ready to throw your equipment in the lake.

Today I asked Kathryn what she wanted for breakfast. She said, "Peanut and butter and jelly on a sandwich." I told her that was more of a lunch entree and asked her again what she would like for breakfast. She said, "Ummm... CANDY!!!"

Here's our little bear after being tortured by her big sisters. She really puts up with a lot from those girls. They are always thinking of something to play with Maggie, and they are always so sure that she will love whatever they decide to do to her. Most of the time she actually doesn't seem to mind. That probably won't last much longer, so I'm enjoying it while I can =).

Back to the grind

Olivia was so wiped out from our trip, she slept for over 3 hours on Sunday afternoon. When I finally went in to wake her up for church, this is how I found her. She was not happy to be woken up.
The girls have lived in these chairs that Gramma and Aunt Norma found for them. (We finally figured out how to lock them, by the way =).

Kathryn decided to bring her chair in to read Maggie a story. Guess who was right behind her. Kate put her sunglasses on to read, then she pushed them up on top of her head and said, "Now I'm just going to wear them like Aunt Rosie does." You can't get much past this little girl!
Nana has Kate at the Children's Museum for her birthday treat today. Livie is beside herself with loneliness. About every 5 minutes she says, "Tate went with Nana?" Poor thing! We're going to have some special Livie/Mommy time today! Happy hump day everyone!