January 30, 2013

Just me and my littlest buddy.  He's starting to push himself up more and pivot around on the floor so he can watch Levi better.  Poor baby so BADLY wants to be a big boy.

I was supposed to go to Bible study today but the van's battery was dead. :(  After nearly bursting into tears because I SO look forward to Wednesday mornings, I instead enjoyed a morning hanging out with Nana Sarah and the boys. It was nice to have a partner in crime and someone to talk to.

Levi disappears after dinner these days and shuts himself in our room to lie on the bed.  He loves to talk about how big and "warm and cozy" our bed is (and @Mary Wolters - he was regaling me today about how "cool" Josiah's bed is because "he can just climb in"), and will literally just lie in there in the dark by himself until one of us goes up there to tell him we miss him.  He's also getting to the "Mama!! Mama! Watch!!" stage where he wants me to stop and watch everything he's doing. I think I'll be hearing a LOT of that for the next several years!!

January 29, 2013

Well we have ample evidence that Levi's millions will not be made as an undercover anything.  But modeling....oh yes.  Who knew.

Love the camera...

 

   

 ...yeah bay-bay

Work it!!! 

I was doing something in the kitchen this morning and Levi was down in the basement (okay, stop being jealous of our basement, I know it's awesome) - he just loves to fiddle around down there.  I shouted, "Hey baby, whatcha doin' down there?" and ran down to see him in Matt's lawn-mowing shoes playing with his lawn mower.  Every time I ask him to look at the camera and say cheese he looks everywhere BUT at me and says cheese.  And he starts jabbering a mile a minute and gesturing all over the place (my child), and...well...these are the pictures I end up with.  HAHA!!

Making "beef stew" with decorative squash while I heat up leftovers

And Luke after his highly-demanded warm bath. :)

Bad lighting in this area, it's either freak-attack flash or super-dark.  But he's still cute in this one.

January 28, 2013

Where do sticky hands come from??  Sticky faces and peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, of course.

Matt was at the helm of the ship this weekend while I worked, and the boys gave him a run for his money, poor man.  When Levi was a baby, getting him to take naps was a challenge because he'd want to just jabber to himself and play in his bed, sleep for 20 or 30 min, and then want to get up again.  Luke is a challenge because he wants everything to be *JUST SO* in order to fall asleep.  You have to stand a certain way, hold him a certain way, put his paci in a certain way, sing him a certain song...and THEN - maybe THEN - he will be pleased.  But then once he's pleased he'll sleep for a good hour or two at least a couple times a day.  Unfortunately, Matt had not cracked the code and our little mighty warrior was in hysterics for much of the day yesterday.  Thankfully, today we had everything back in order and Luke was pleased.:)

Levi now covers his ears when we are telling him something he doesn't want to hear.  He rolls out Matt's phrases one after the other and in shockingly appropriate context, which makes it even funnier: "That's what I'M talking about!" and "Prove it!" and "Molly get out of this kitchen and stop pacing" (Oh wait, that's my phrase...but yes, he does tell Molly to get out of this kitchen and stop pacing).  He likes to put his stuffed animals down for 'naps' in Luke's crib...only I don't know it until I'm setting Luke down (ever so gingerly in the dark) and come upon a large stuffed bear, frog, dog, giraffe, or monkey right where Luke belongs.  Honestly, I love living with a two year old - they are so full of raw life. :)

January 25, 2013

I bit the bullet and bundled the three of us up today and went outside.  Bundling up even one kid isn't for the faint of heart; I can only imagine you moms out there with three or four, multiples, or some combination thereof.

Levi wasn't terribly enthused about wearing snow pants, but after overly-enthusiastic reminders of how Mama wears snow pants, Josiah wears snow pants, and Little Critter from his Little Critter books wears snow pants, he conceded.

And then he was thrilled to be outside and didn't want to come back in. :)




Even Molly joined in the fun.

 

One of my favorite times of the day  is getting the boys up from their naps.  Luke just smiles and coos, and Levi loves to sit and chitty chat - me or Matt sitting on the floor by his crib, him just hanging out in his crib.  Sometimes we guess when the light will blink again on the smoke detector and then count down until it does....others, like today, we throw the blinds open and talk about outside.  He loves to wax about the skunk in the back yard (the one that sprayed Molly a couple months ago) and how it's going downtown to Tip Toes to bake brownies in the play kitchen, and then go to Froggy's for a hot dog and fries.  (We've done that like one time - in that order - and he hasn't been able to stop talking about it.)  Sometimes the worm that he saw recently in the garden (before it got super-cold) joins the skunk on these downtown junkets.  Hey man, even skunks and earthworms can appreciate heated sidewalks.

January 24, 2013

Ya know, life in our house is just not terribly riveting, but I love our days.  We do housework, we play trucks, we listen to music, we eat snacks, there's just a nice rhythm.  Poor Levi would love to play outside but I just can't take a baby out when it's in the single digits and teens. 

 
 "Mama play trucks?"  It's so hard to turn him down.

Levi's been declaring that he "loves" things a lot lately.  It's usually related to food (he's his mother's child).  He asks for oatmeal (Sarah, he was so excited to eat his oatmeal leftovers today) - then says, "I LOVE oatmeal."  Then it's "I LOVE banana bread."  "I LOVE avocado." Today also he asked to hold Luke and he said, "I LOVE Luke." :)  He doesn't typically say that he loves people, so that was sweet.




A couple of nursing students are going to be coming every other week or so for the next couple of months to observe us as a family for their Family Nursing class.  They came this afternoon for the initial assessment and Luke screeched for about half the time.  Ear-piercing screeching. Because I was not paying all of my attention to him. He's SO sweet, and SO peaceful and SO charming...until things aren't exactly how he wants it.  Matt jokes that if you want to know what it's like to be married to him, spend some time with Luke.  I'll remain silent on that. ;)


@Mary Wolters - This outfit is Josiah's.  I knew it wasn't one that I had bought but could NOT figure out where it was from, and I absolutely love it.  Today I finally looked at the tag and saw that I had written "JW" on it.  Can you believe your little boy was ever that small???

January 22, 2013

Levi "helping" me clean the kitchen...


 

...and Luke helping me clean the kitchen. :)

January 20, 2013

 

A relatively uneventful weekend here, and we sure don't take that for granted.  Luke is much happier than he was this past week and sleeping much better.  His "jumpa-jumpa" came in the mail (a term that Matt and I coined - from when Levi was in his exersaucer days and we'd say, "Buddy! Jumpa-jumpa-jumpa-jumpa..." while he jumped and banged around in it) and at first he was like what the heck...  Today he was a little more intrigued by it.  Levi's stuffed animals all took their turn in it too.



Levi loves when "Luke Kabook" hangs out in his crib with him after nap time. :)

And by request:  

 

I made homemade hand sanitizer today.  I don't normally use hand sanitizer; in fact, I avoid it if possible for a variety of reasons, for the same reasons that I don't have anything labeled "antibacterial" in the house.  Washing your hands with plain soap and water are best, and germs are good for us and our immune system.  Antibacterial products, and alcohol-based hand sanitizers, not only kill the pathogens on your skin but also the good bacteria that happily dwell there and are your body's first line of defense.  I won't get on a soapbox about it, but if you want to see more, click here and here for good, simple reasons.

But just like anyone else, I find myself in situations where I would like a little squirt of something on my hands, so thought I'd give it a whirl.   Here's the recipe - I found a couple of recipes and combined them to come up with one that worked with what I had:

*Little 2oz bottles like you see on the far left can be found in the section at the grocery store or Target where you get travel sized toiletries

*1/8t tea tree oil (essential oils can be found at crafty stores like Hobby Lobby or Michael's, health food store, or for even cheaper on Vitacost.com)

*24 drops lavender, cinnamon, thyme, or other essential oil that has antibacterial properties (I used lemon)

*A couple squirts of witch hazel (found at the grocery store with first aid stuff, by hydrogen peroxide, etc)

*Fill the bottle up now with 100% aloe vera (couldn't find any plain aloe at Meijer, but got a little 8oz bottle at the health food store).

*This concoction is not imperishable, so if you get some vitamin E capsules and cut a couple open and squirt the liquid in, it not only adds a pleasing emollient for your skin, it's a natural preservative too and will extend the shelf life to a few months.

Shake it up, and throw it in your bag.  Voila.

January 18, 2013

It was a rough week but ended well.  Luke celebrated his four month birthday last Saturday by diving straight into a week-long bona fide sleep regression.  It was classic: you go from feeling like ahhhh...maybe we ARE settling into a good routine to realizing you have a black-belt sleep ninja in the house.  The fussing, the screeching, the sleep-fighting, the night waking, the refusal to nap...BUUUUT - that little brain in overdrive paid off.  We  bucked out of the swaddle, found our hands, started pulling at and picking up toys, and found another neat trick:

 

          Thinking about it.....

 

 Flirting with it....

 

Swing the leg over...

 Push off the shoulder... 

 Over the speed bump...

 Gather your bearings...

 Stabilize....

 TA-DAAAA!!!!  A successful back-to-front roll!

Enjoying being able to play with toys. :)

And the best part is that it appears sleep has returned to the house. *phew* Until the next round of milestones!

Janary 15, 2013

Well today turned out a whole lot better than I expected.  Luke started out having a very hard time pulling it together.  I prayed most of Philippians 4 over my day, took a deep breath and dove in.  Thankfully, I got housework done with him in the Ergo (note to anyone wondering if they should get one and if it's worth the price: if that thing cost a thousand dollars, it would still be worth every. single. penny), and by the time my reinforcement came (praise the Lord for Nana Sarah!), he was down for a nap and remained there for 2.5hrs...and I got my shower and lunch in.  He took another 2.5hr nap in the afternoon.  The poor baby comes unglued when he's tired, and I remember at this age Levi was the same way: it didn't take a whole lot to go from happy and having fun to being overstimulated and completely undone.  Many nights are spent sitting by the crib in the dark, barely daring to breathe, waiting for his breathing to slow into deep sleep.  These days will be gone in a flash and I'm grateful for those times in the dark spent in prayer for my little mighty warrior.

Levi was particularly fun today - just being himself, but the things that come out of his mouth each day make me roll.  Here we are having a popcorn picnic after his nap.



Here's what the kitchen looks like when we are both "cooking" at the same time:



And a family shot before dinner.  Looking at our 2012 photo album that recently came in the mail.

January 14, 2013

Not a fun day here for the under-15lb variety.  Yes, we had the four month checkup, and shockingly enough, he was only 14lbs 12oz!!!  Like 30-something percentile! He is so chubby and feels so long that I just could not believe that. But the numbers don't lie.  With the checkup came the 4mo vaccines, so not a very happy baby for the rest of the day.  Hence the reason that I'm wearing him here, while I pound chicken down with a rolling pin.  But he was really screechy and was a horrid sleep ninja yesterday too, so who knows.  I suspect we're in the midst of a sleep regression as he comes up to bigger milestones.  I have to admit, this is not our favorite stage of having children.  We love babies, but we love a little more predictability.  But it'll be gone in a blink so we will enjoy - and be grateful for - the ups and downs.

In other news, Levi had a fine day. He got to hang out with Matt while I was at the peds office with Luke...they went to Meijer and looked at toys.  I had some time to play with him while Luke briefly flirted with a nap in the late afternoon.



Here's the crackup: Levi's really into playing hide and seek lately...only his version of hiding is to flop down on the floor next to his crib and laugh hysterically while you pretend to look for him.  Tonight he seemed to catch on to the idea of actually hiding...save for one small detail:

Can you find him? (hint - he's not in the barn)

 

Here, let me zoom in for you.



We might not be looking at a bright future in undercover skills.

January 13, 2013

The past couple of nights Matt and I have been honoring our annual after-holiday tradish of watching the Lord of the Rings trilogy (all extended versions, of course), so that trumped blogging.  Before kids we could eat trash and curl up under a blanket and watch the entire thing...now we watch it in 20min increments while Matt flosses his teeth and I pump.  Wow.

Not a terribly exciting couple of days...except...Luke turned 4mos yesterday!!  Holy cats!!  He's very talkative, very zen one minute and demanding and screechy the next (apparently a Gouveia trait?), is starting to grab at the toys on his little jungle, occasionally rolls from his tummy to his back, is starting to roll from his back up to his side, and badly, badly, BADLY wants to walk like his brother.  He is NOT pleased unless he is standing up in your lap.  You can nearly feel the wistful yearning pouring out of him as he watches Levi walk and run.



 

 

Levi earned some video time tonight (five stars on his potty chart...which means he told us he needed a diaper change, we're not exactly in full-throttle potty training here), so he's watching one of his favorite "Mighty Machines" - the one about cranes and air cranes (the intriguing helicopter pictured here).  It IS pretty funny to hear him muttering to himself while he plays with his trucks about attaching the secondary winch to the luffing jib.  Luke joined him this evening for a brief viewing.



 

New Melissa and Doug blocks showed up  in the mail on Friday (I ordered them, they didn't *just* show up).  Levi ran around the living room pulling the little cart saying, "Look Baby Luke!!  New toy!"  Here he is building a "house."

January 10, 2013

What do you get when you combine a really cute little 1940 phone niche, a two year old boy, and a shelf full of books??

 

Well.......

You get this.  Own it, buddy.  Show it off.

January 9, 2013

We got an impromptu visit from Levi's buddy Josiah today while his mom got some things done at the church.  Why is it that kids are so well behaved until someone comes to play with their toys???  It was so good to see both Josiah and Mary nonetheless. :)

The top pic just cracks me up.  A ceramic napkin-holder duck on a tractor pulling a trailer full of crayons.  Levi always gets major points for being able to entertain himself.  He also discovered that the "bum-bum seat" fits HIS bum-bum so now if Luke's not in it, he is.