Thankful on Tuesday

I think these pictures are from a few weeks ago.  But, I figure I'm still thankful for these things... so I'm still going to post!

A few weeks back Ben took a day off work and we went to the Children's Museum.  I'm so thankful for Ben and the fact that he loves being with our family as much as I do.  We had a great time playing together!
A fun Halloween week!  More pictures to come on this, but we had lots of fun dressing up, doing Halloween crafts, eating Halloween food and trick or treating!

Pig tails. Enough said.

Our church's hunger challenge.  My friend Heather just posted about this and does a great job explaining all the details, but the challenge that most moved me was to eat rice and beans for a week.  I think something like 28% of the world's population eat rice and beans as their only meal, one time per day.  We were challenged to not only eat similarly for a week (although we were "allowed" to eat it three times per day) but also to donate any money we saved from our grocery budget for that week.  This was tough.  I mean really tough.  I was constantly hungry, constantly tired, and so sick of rice and beans after the first day - but so eye opening.  I'm not sure what it looks like for me to begin to change the way things are in this world, but I do know that no one should have to go hungry in a world where most people, especially most americans have way more than they need.  I also realized two other major things: 1. I complain (whether outloud or in my head) about a lot of stupid, pointless stuff.  When you are hungry, you don't care about anything besides when your next meal is coming.  I challenged Ben (and myself) to just say "rice and beans" to me whenever I start to complain or whine about something.  I hope I never forget how trivial most of my problems are given that three billion people are starving.  2. I need to be more thankful for EVERYTHING.  Even the ability, energy, capacity to work out.  Something I would normally complain about doing, I realized is actually a major gift.  I have enough food/provisions in my life to go leisurely burn off calories/energy.  Three billion people barely have enough calories to survive.  Wow.

Walking!

We officially have two walking babies in our house!  Hank has been taking 3-5 steps at a time since the beginning of the month so I decided that I would say he is officially walking once he walked long enough for me to video tape it.  Well, that proved to be challenging. 

Last week I was watching him walk and counting his steps and I got up to 11, so I decided even if I couldn't grab it on video that was still a decent enough amount to say that he is walking.  He has walked further than that by now, but his average is typically more like 5 steps in a row and then fall.  And he still crawls a lot.  I'm guessing it will be a few more weeks before he is a pro, but last week is what I'm calling the official start.

Here are a few videos.  As you can see, I didn't grab any long stretches.  Ben and I have probably taken 50 videos of him taking 2-3 steps at a time, hoping to grab one of the longer stretches.  Apparently Hank just doesn't want to show off.

Pumpkin Patch

We went to Spencer Farms two weekends ago with Jadyn, Jordyn and my Mom.  The kids had a great time and we got pumpkins and cider to bring home too!

We attempted to have Jadyn carry Hank in the Baby Bjorn.... that didn't last long, but it was pretty cute to see.

Believe it or not these are the best group shots we could get of the kids... nobody was up for posing at this point.

This made for our third year in a row visiting Spencer Farms.  Hopefully we can continue to make this a fall tradition for many years to come!

Hank 10 Months

I'm a little late getting this post up, and I'm scrambling to do it today because Hank keeps doing new things and I don't want to get my months mixed up!

New this month - Hank started standing on his own really well, going from sitting to standing with no support, and took 2-3 steps at a time (all ending in a crash landing unless there was something for him to grab on to).  I wouldn't officially say that he is walking (although yesterday he took 5 steps in a row) but he is almost there!
I couldn't get a good shot of him standing with no hands, but I chose this one because it also highlights his sweet, old man hair line.  

Hank also mastered the art of fake crying this month and showed off some lovely tantrums.  All of which usually make me smile still!  
I wish I had the video on here.  You would see that he was laying on his belly, kicking his legs and screaming.  All because I took the dog food away.   And how, you may ask, do I know when he's fake crying or real crying?  The fake crying he can turn off and on with the snap of a finger.  One second he is screaming as hard as he can with the saddest look on his face.  The next second he is smiling at me and batting his eyelashes.  What a ham. 

He is ALL boy.  He loves banging stuff, throwing stuff, and climbing on stuff.  He loves balls and cars.  He loves music and likes to dance by either rocking back and forth, waving his hands, or banging his head against something (what a weirdo).

He love the stairs, this is his favorite place to be during the day.  And so far he's only fallen down them once... yikes.

He loves being outside.  For a long time I tried to avoid this as much as possible because of the mess and the dangers outside, but I finally just let him be and he was so happy.  The days when he gets to go outside are his happiest days.
On this particular day it was rainy and 60 degrees outside, but Hank kept crying to go out, so I finally let him and he played in the cold rain for a good 45 minutes.  Don't know what he loved about it so much, but a happy baby makes for a happy momma.


On this day I let him out not realizing there was water left in one of our blow up pools.  Of course he went right for it and soaked himself immediately.  He loves water - the tub, Ruthie's water dish, or leftover rain water stored up in our pools on the deck. 

 

That brown stuff by his mouth- oh, just a little dirt he was munching on before heading over for his second course of sand.  Seriously... all boy.


 He still loves his thumb and loves to snuggle.  Half the time he is so busy body and wants to be into everything, but the other half of the time he wants me to hold him, lay his head on my chest and suck his thumb.  Still so precious.  

Words are a little hard to make out, but I sometimes think he says mama, dada, woof, dog and all done (which he'll sometimes do with the sign language in his high chair).  These are all pretty spotty, but there are times when he seems he's making the sounds in the right context.

SLEEP: Half of this month Hank slept great, giving me two 1.5-2 hour naps and 12 hours at night.  The other half of the month (which is the state we are currently in) he has been giving me two 1hr-1hr 15min naps and has been waking early in the mornings (before 7am).  I wouldn't mind this schedule so much except for the fact that he will often go down screaming (not like him at all) and wake up screaming.  And when I say screaming, I mean crying as hard as possible.  So I know he's not well rested.  And when he's awake he's been pretty fussy too.  He'll cry in the car seat and not play as well by himself.  Not sure why this is happening... guessing it's just a phase, so hoping it passes soon!  Naps are usually at 9:30am and 1:30/2pm and Bedtime is still 7pm.

I think this lack of sleep has made him pretty cranky, but he still continues to be a pretty happy baby overall.  People still always comment on how happy he is and think it's weird when he fusses.  I think part of it is that he's starting to get a little bored/manipulative with me, so he's putting on his best behavior for other people.  And he loves playing in new places, so he doesn't think as much about fussing when we are away from home.

EAT:  Hank is still nursing 4 times per day and still seems in to it.  He also will take a bottle fine, and we actually made it a whole weekend apart with me pumping and Ben giving him a bottle while I was gone.  This was pretty exciting for me because I was never able to do this while Lucy was still nursing, but I had pumped enough in advance with Hank to have that freedom.  He eats pretty well.  Again he seems to have good eating weeks and weeks where it seems he is only eating crackers and bread.  I try not to stress too much about it but I find myself caught between not creating a picky eater, but also making sure he's getting enough calories. 

Seriously can not believe how much I love this little guy and am loving staying home with the two of them. We have our bad moments, but that is all it is.  Moments.  My days are full of joy, laughter, purpose, and meaning.  I am so thankful I get to be home with Hank and Lucy.

Thankful on Tuesdays

So much to be thankful for lately, but I am definitely needing to remind myself of that.  Lately it's been easy for me to look at a lot of areas in our life that our lacking (for whatever reason), these posts are such a good way for me to remember all that we have been blessed with.  And at church this past weekend, I was reminded of the importance of Lucy and Hank watching Ben and I exhibit thankfulness in everything we do.

A semi-succesful garden! Our spinach, broccoli and tomatoes produced pretty well.  Green beans all got eaten by bugs (despite organic spray), carrots just never seemed to fully develop (Lucy is eating the 1 carrot, out of like 10 that I've tried that was actually tasty), and our peppers never grew over a foot... not sure what happened there.  Looking forward to trying some new veggies next year!

A fun night out with this "model" couple.  We went to Bonge's for Katy's birthday (a summer bucket list item!)... thankful for good friends, a good babysitter, and good food!

Amazing friends who are like family that spoil Lucy and Hank rotten!  Thanks to Aunt Bethy, Weezy and Gimpy for all the fun new stuff!

Two things from this picture: New running shoes! There is nothing like a sweet new pair of shoes to help motivate me to go to the gym. And new floors!

Our absolutely amazing, wonderful, generous, awesome friends, Heather and Christian who helped Ben lay part of the floor while I was out of town one weekend and then came back two weekends later to finish.  That's right, you read that correctly... I was off laying around with a bunch of girlfriends, while Ben and Christian worked on the floors and Heather watched Lucy, Hank and Henry (their son), all to surprise me when I got home.  I mean, I can't think of anything sweeter.  So thankful for Ben and so thankful for Christian and Heather.

Potty Success! I still wouldn't call Lucy fully potty trained, but she has made some great strides in the past couple months.  I still give a lot of reminders, but Lucy has gone on her own more and has gotten into a routine poop schedule.  I may give more details on this in another post, but for now I am seriously just so thankful that we are moving forward in this area.  (We were riding the train at the mall here to celebrate Lucy going poop at the  mall!)

And of course, I am always thankful for these babies. Seriously... daily I give thanks.  I am one lucky mom. (They were both cracking up in this video... it was adorable.)

Kruithof Visit

A few weeks ago (maybe I should actually be using the term months, I think this visit was back in August!) our good friends the Kruithofs came to visit. It was their first visit since they moved back from Grand Cayman and I am so looking forward to lots more, frequent visits now that they are in the states.... Grand Cayman was just a bit far to make monthly visits to.

Katie, who is one of the best photographers I know (despite her attempts to deny this) took lots of fun pictures from the weekend.  We did however forget to take pictures while we were jumping on the trampoline... Lucy loved jumping with Kiki and Brenty.  So sorry, that is not pictured here!

Saturday night we headed to Symphony on the Prarie for a Tribute to the Beatles.  We had a great time, although the park was packed, so I felt like we spent a lot of our time getting in and out.  Maybe we'll try a less popular group next time we go!

Love these two!


 On Sunday, we had a slow start to our day with a pancake breakfast, but then took Katie and Brent to downtown Carmel to walk around the neighborhoods and grab lunch (this is one of our favorite things to do and was on our summer bucket list, so we were glad to take them there).  We got lunch at a little custard shop, and despite dropping a chili dog all over myself and the inside of the store, we had a good time.

Preschool!

A few months ago I approached a couple friends with the idea of starting a cooperative preschool.  I had wanted to start getting Lucy involved in a more play groups and I also wanted to have a bit of a break during the day, so this seemed like a great way to get both of those things for free!  I don't know a ton of moms whose oldest is the same age as Lucy, but fortunately each of the other moms that I asked were excited to join and we were able to form a group.  We have 5 kids in our group
From left to right - Lucy, Ben (whose parents are in our small group), Ellie, Hallie and Addie (at least I think that's the order they are in, they are identical twins, so it's a little tricky telling them apart!)

The day went surprisingly well.  We decided that we would have "learning objectives" and a theme each week to try to give a little structure to our days.  My theme was "On the Farm" and I was in charge of teaching the letter A, number 1, the color red and the shape circle.  A lot to fit in, but we all agreed that our main focus would be having fun with the kids and getting lots of play time in.

So to fit all that in, here's what my day looked like:

• Welcome/Free play time
• Read two farm books, one of which was about an apple farm (apples worked out well - they are red, shaped like a circle, and start with A... boom)
• Looked for red paper apples throughout the house and then glued them to a tree
• Snack time (apples and cheese sticks and goldfish)

 

• Sang Old McDonald and Baa Baa Black Sheep
• Glued cotton balls onto 1 sheep
• Free play time in the back yard, the kids LOVED Ruthie and chasing after her.  We also got to look for red tomatoes in the garden, just like you would do on a farm (which worked out really well!)

We had a lot of fun, and Lucy has already been to two of the other houses and had a great time too.  It's definitely a lot of work when you have all of the kids at your house, but getting a bit of a break on my off weeks has totally made it worth it!

It has also been great practice for me to start getting used to the idea of Lucy being away from the house as we get closer and closer to the school years.  I'm so used to being able to influence every decision she makes and how she interacts with others, so it has been weird for me to lose control of that. I didn't realize how difficult it would be for me to leave her, but I'm learning to let go as each week passes!  I'm not going to lie though, I really do miss her when she is away.