Prayer Request

I have a prayer request for our poor little boy, Noah. I should've known his life was never going to be easy since the day he was born 9 weeks early and weighed only 3 lbs. He spent six weeks in the NICU then and had MRI's, CAT scans, and a spinal tap all done to him while he was there because they kept thinking something else was wrong with him besides the problem with his leg. When he finally came home from the hospital he went right back for hernia surgery. At 18 months he had to have a second circumcision. He's had countless surgeries on his leg. I think we are up to 10 now, but I've lost count. Then a little over a year ago now he had to have an emergency hernia surgery. He's been through so much in his little life. It's no wonder he's terrified of doctors if they are doing anything more than listening to his heart beat or looking in his ears. Now he has something else going on, and we are not sure what. The other day he started complaining of some stomach pain and having like a rust color to his urine. Daddy took him to the doctor yesterday where they took a urine sample and some blood and started running some tests. So far all the tests they did at the doctor's office came back fine, but they had to send it off to a lab too for further testing. It could be a few days before they get the results, so please pray for our boy that this will be nothing and will be all cleared up very soon. The waiting for answers though is the hardest part.

Daddy's Girls

The girls love playing with Daddy and often fight over him when he gets home. They have so much fun playing their little games with him every night and climbing all over him.

Mommy's Little Helpers

Gracie has recently started wanting to help out with chores around the house. Anna was around this age as well when she started helping also. Both girls love to help me dust. They actually get mad if I don't give them each their own dust cloth and let them help. I hope they continue to enjoy dusting. Once they get old enough to do a good job on their own, the job is all theirs. I hate dusting.

Gracie and Anna dusting.


Gracie also enjoys helping me unload the silverware from the dishwasher. She gets them out one by one and walks over to the drawer and since she can't quite reach yet, she just throws them in any old place. They land where they land. She also likes to help turn the dishwasher on as well, but it's usually not when I want it on...silly girl.

Getting out a fork.

Tossing it in.

Closing up the dishwasher.


I thought I'd post some memories too. The next two pictures are of Anna at about 20 months when she started being my little helper. It must be a girl thing. I don't remember Noah ever wanting to help out that much, even now, except for vacuuming, that seems to be his thing. He likes to help vacuum. Unfortunately the vacuum we use throughout most of the house is still too big and heavy for him to push around, but I do have a small one that I use for the tile and hard wood floors that he can handle.

Little Anna helping dust.

Little Anna helping with the laundry.

Grace is 18 months

Today Gracie turned 18 months old. She also went to the doctor for her 18 month check up. She weighed 21 lbs 12 oz and was 30 inches tall. I believe that put her in the 10th percentile for both. She continues to be our tiny little munchkin. She was so good at her appointment. She waited patiently and quietly both in the waiting area and in the room. She played with a little telephone and cuddled in my lap while we were in the waiting area. Then after we went back into a room Anna kept bringing her lots of books to look at. She enjoyed each and every one and pointed at all the pretty pictures in them. She didn't even cry or put up a fuss this time when the doctor came in to do her check up. She got 3 shots at this visit and only cried a little for the last two. She may be tiny, but she's a tough little girl.

Getting ready to go for her check up.

Ready to head out the door.

Making some important calls.

Reading while she waits.

Ready to head home for a nice nap.

Arron's Birthday

We just celebrated Arron's birthday, the last birthday of the year for our family. Arron loves Carrabba's so that's where we went for dinner to celebrate. It was so good. They gave the kids some dough to play with while we waited for our dinner, so that entertained them pretty well and everybody was happy. After dinner they brought Arron a free dessert for his birthday. It was called Chocolate Dream, and that it was. It was soooo yummy, and it was a big piece too. We all were able to share it. When we went home Arron opened all his presents (with help of course). Then we had more dessert because I had made him a birthday cake and bought some ice cream as well. Needless to say we were all very full by the time the night was over.

Anna playing with her pizza dough.

Gracie just kept trying to eat her dough.

Noah playing with his pizza dough.

Anna just can't keep her hands off of presents that need to be unwrapped.

Gracie's getting in on the action too.

Yes, I had to post this picture. I don't know why my husband insists on cutting cake with a giant butcher knife, and then he looked as if he was about to kill our baby with it while we sang happy birthday to him.

The kids blew out all of Daddy's candles for him.

Gracie loves birthday cake.

Faces full of cake.



I took some cute pictures of the kids today too. Here are some of the good ones.

Sweet baby Gracie

Handsome Noah

Pretty little Anna

The big kids

All of our babies

Proud of our Princess

(Warning, potty post ahead.)

Before she turned 2 I started trying to potty train Anna. She did okay, but not great. She probably peed in the potty just as much as she did in her pants, so I took a little break until I thought she was more ready. Then when she was right around 2 years old she went and got her potty chair herself and sat down and peed in it. She decided on her own that she was ready and has been peeing in the potty ever since. She still had some accidents, but they kept becoming less and less often as time went by. She did great, and it was so much easier than potty training Noah. He had no desire to use the potty at all ever. Several months ago she started letting me know whenever we were out somewhere that she needed to go potty even if she was wearing a pullup, something she never used to do. She also started several months ago staying dry all through the night too. The one thing she hasn't done consistently though was poop in the potty....until now. I've told people all along that she potty trained herself. She decided in her own time when she was going to start peeing in the potty and just started doing it, and I guess she needed to do the same thing with pooping in the potty. She did it in her own time when she was ready. Nothing I ever did got her to do it when I wanted her to do it. I'm glad she finally decided it was time. I was getting tired of cleaning out her underwear or throwing them away. She started doing it when we were on vacation last month. I was relieved to not have to clean any of her underwear while we were out of town. When we got back home she went back to her old ways though for a few days, but by the following week she was pooping in the potty again, and she's been doing it ever since. It's such a relief to finally be able to say she is COMPLETELY 100% potty trained, and goes all on her own and never needs to be reminded. Now I hope things go smoothly when the time comes to start potty training Grace. Maybe she'll be even easier. Wouldn't that be nice?

Being silly for the camera.

Dancing.

Crazy face.

Our pretty little princess.

Playdate at the Children's Museum

I recently joined a Christian mom's playgroup. A girl that I went to school with started it last year and told me about it. I joined at the beginning of the summer, but because of the busyness of the summer and some summer colds too we have not been able to go to very many get togethers. Now that Noah's back in school and our routine is getting back to normal I've been able to start going to some things. This week I met some of the other mothers at the Children's Museum on Tuesday and then a park on Friday. The other moms are all so very nice and friendly. I'm really enjoying meeting all of them and getting to know them while our kids play. I'm looking forward to getting together with all of them again this week.

Gracie doing her little craft after story time.

Anna working on her little craft.

Playing in the bubbles.

Gracie behind the wheel.

Gracie climbed in the raft all by herself.

She didn't know she was looking in the wrong end.

Anna wearing her lifejacket in the raft.

Anna making a giant bubble around herself and trying to blow it.

I think this was their favorite part, playing in the sand.

Anna driving the bus.

Playing with the giant lite brite.