Ryan

These pictures are not from today, but they sure are cute. It is almost like he is in baby jail!

Layla

Today has been a very fun, but busy day. We have some friends staying with us for a few weeks. Regina, and her two boys, Nathaniel 5, and Chase 18months. Then today we had two friends and play while their mommy was doing some errands. There were six kids running around the house and one mommy. Needless to say, the house is a disaster and we are all exhausted. I wish that I could just lay down on the ground and nap too!

And yes, in case you were wondering, she is dressed up as a unicorn. If you have to ask why, you don't know Layla that well!

Laundry Room

Here are my updated pictures for the laundry room my amazing man built me! I absolutely LOVE it! The color is a light purple (not blue/gray like the pics show) and it just makes me happy to be in there. Seriously...I have been doing laundry everyday and not letting it pile up because I love to be in that room. Maybe I need to repaint the bathrooms so they will be cleaned more often!














This picture is in our bedroom, it is showing where the closet door used to be...soon we will paint our room and you will never know there was a door there.

First haircut!

Sunday morning Jason was combing Ryan's hair. We realized that it is WAY too long in the back. So we quickly trimmed off about 2inches of hair off the back of his head. We are not considering this his "first haircut" but rather a trim!

Dutch Wonderland

The week before school started we went to Dutch Wonderland to celebrate Joseph Mattson's birthday (one of Austin's friends). It was lots of fun. The rides are made for littler riders, Austin could ride on all of the rides, Layla and Ryan could ride on most of them. Ryan usually didn't want to ride though. We did finally get him to ride on the airplane ride. At first he seemed to like it and was almost smiling, but the more it went around, the sadder he got. I don't think that it helped that he had to see us every time he went around. It was so sad!
We had a great day. It was a little over cast and started to rain in the afternoon. We went to the big roller coaster and the boys got to ride it ten times in a row! Everyone else was staying inside trying to keep dry. We left a couple hours early because it began pouring. We got rain day passes, so we will get to go back later this year!

Gymnastics

Layla just finished her second session of gymnastics, or maybe it is her third session. Who knows? Anyway, at the last class we have observation day when we get to watch them in action. It is very fun to see them roll and jump and spin. She was in the class with one of her little friends, Mya. Mya's little sister GG is giving Layla a hug after class. I actually think she was trying to steal Layla's ribbon...

Jason's party

For whatever reason, these are the only pictures that I took at Jason's birthday party. Maybe because there were a ton of people there...mostly dads and kids, so I was distracted from the photography job!

Obi-wan and Anikan

Austin is obsessed with Star Wars and light sabers. Apparently he is passing that obsession on to his little Jedi brother.

Austin's Drawings

My friend recently put a post with her daughter's drawings. They were impressive. I realized that Austin also has some pretty incredible drawings and I wanted to share them with you all!

The top picture is me at work. There is a street that drives in front of the hospital, a person in a wheelchair, and that is me upstairs walking around. The doors withs the arrows are the elevators.

The next picture is Jason at work. Outside is Austin's go-kart. Jason is under a car. The other thing outside of the shop is Jason's new airconditioning fixit machine.

Ryan

Yesterday Ryan turned 18months old!! So today was his first day in nursery. I know he didn't spend the entire two hours in there, but he was not with us. Ryan has a very good friend at church...Brother Oh...we gave him to Brother Oh and He took Ryan to nursery. When Ryan got fussy, Brother Oh brought him out and walked with him in the hallway. It was great. Sister Oh is one of Ryan's nursery leaders.
On a side note, last Thursday when we went to visit Michelle in Ft Meade, I forgot to take any diapers with me. When it was time to leave I borrowed one of her baby's diapers that are too big, they are size 1, 8-14pounds. The pictures are when Ryan is wearing that diaper. I had to use of nursing tape to tape the diaper together. You can see it is a low rise diaper! Thank fully he only peed once in it, I don't think it would have held much more than that!

Growing up

Today Austin tied his shoes! All by himself! It is so exciting. He is really growing up!

The demolition continues....

Jason has been spending every spare second in the closet lately, and hopefully he will not be coming out anytime soon. He has the washer and dryer are upstairs!!! YEAH!!! I have done laundry that I didn't have to cart up or down stairs! It is wonderful. There is still a lot of work to be done yet. Like put walls in...but hey, at least I am no longer carrying baskets up and down.

Slowly but surely

I have been trying to get back to the weight that I was when Jason and I got married...having three children did not help with that! I am very close now and decided the other day to see if I could get into my wedding dress. Well, here it is! I did it. It is pretty tight still, but it is zipped up.
When I had it on the kids were very excited and wanted to know why I was wearing a princess dress.

I never thought...

Today in the mail I received two subpoenas, yes I wrote subpoenas, and yes, TWO!!!

A couples weeks ago in the middle of the night Jason and I heard some kids outside. We got up, it was 2:20am, and looked out the window. There was a group of kids walking down the middle of the street, talking loudly, and carrying something. Jason said they must be delivering papers...then he said maybe they were collecting the papers (can you tell that he wasn't fully awake?). Anyway, we closed our windows and went to sleep.

The next morning at 6:30am the doorbell rang twice. Jason, who was just getting ready to leave for work, went down and answered the door. It was the police. They had caught one of the kids and were trying to find out everything that had happened during the night. Apparently they went around pulling out mailboxes (ours was thrown in the neighbors yard two doors down) and destroying random things.

Later that morning I was on the treadmill when Austin ran upstairs telling me that there was someone at the door. I jumped off the treadmill, dripping in sweat, and opened the door to another policeman. This time they were trying to get an estimate of how much damage was done by the delinquents. They took my name, my SSN, my DOB, and phone number.

When Jason came home he told me that the kids they caught was 20 years old. YES, 20!!! Most of us were married by that time, not walking through neighborhoods destroying things!

Anyway, so I am being subpoenaed to testify against two of the vandals...the sad part is we will still have to buy our own new mailbox!

Destruction to make life easier

A week or so ago Jason decided that he would like to move my laundry room upstairs. After many ideas were reviewed and discarded, we decided to tear out the wall that separates our master bedroom closet and our linen closet. This makes a nice big open room that Jason will run pipes, etc, into and then more the washer and dryer up. I am VERY excited about this. Right now he is cutting into the plumbing drain...I am a little nervous about this. He said he needed a towel that I wouldn't want back and also a cookie sheet....be nervous if I volunteer to bring you cookies anytime soon!
We will keep you updated and let you know how the demolition and remodeling is going!

Spun Glass Hair

We took Ryan to the Pediatric Dermatologist yesterday. After an hour on the road to get there, and an hour waiting, we finally got to see the doctor. Dr Cohen was a very nice man who flew into the room gave Ryan a high-5, pulled on his hair, looked at his teeth, and then flew out of the room again to get scissors and a camera. When he came back he brought two residents with him so they could check out Ryan's hair. He then took a bunch of pictures and clipped off a chunck of Ryan's hair off the top of his head, yes, the TOP OF HIS HEAD. Not that you can really tell, but still, what was he thinking. Dr Cohen said that he would be looking at the hairs under a microscope to determine if Ryan really has spun glass hair also know as uncombable hair syndrome. The doctor said that Ryan should outgrow it by the time he is 12 years old. If not, I guess he will always have a buzz cut!!

Elise and Layla

Layla has a little friend, Elise, in her nusery class.
Elise's birthday is nine days after Layla's birthday.
On Sundays Layla will refuse to go to nursery until
Elise gets there. Today, Jason was even in the
nursery as one of the teachers and Layla would not
go in, until Elise got there.



After church Elise and her family came to our house for dinner and a little birthday celebration. The girls played dress up with Layla's new dress-up clothes. They had presents and then cake.




Everything went pretty well until Elise (and her big brother Joseph) blew out Layla's three candles. Layla started crying. So Jason relit her candles. Then Elise was sad because Layla got to blow twice. All in all we had a fun third birthday celebration.

Grandma and Crapah

For Layla's Birthday Grandma and Grandpa (and Aunt Emily and Uncle David) picked Layla up and took her to the Rain Forest Cafe for lunch and then took her to Build a Bear. There she made a Doggy, Lovey. The Doggy is a mommy with a baby, also named Lovey.
Layla had a great time. When she got home she had a little party with her other grandparents as well. When asked if she had fun with grandma she said "yes, and I had fun with that girl too." pointing to her grandma...
Another amusing thing is that she can pronounce Grandma without any difficulty. But she pronounces Grandpa as Crap-ah. She will even correct herself if she starts to say in correctly...Silly girl!

Twins

For my birthday my mother-in-law paid my sister-in-law, Katie, to make Layla and me matching skirts. They are a pale blue with embroidered flowers with a white under layer. They are both wrap skirts, and they are both absolutely gorgeous. We got all kinds of compliments.
Thanks Patti-mom and Katie! WE LOVE THEM!

Our Yard Phase 2

These are the pictures after we put sod down on the bottom and have the first retaining wall finished. Jason is laying the final pieces of sod.

Our Yard, phase One

We have been doing a lot of work in the back yard...digging, and flattening, and building. Here are the phase one pictures! I am standing on the top deck taking these pictures.