Marcus's new trick

Sign this boy up for gymnastics! (mostly before he accidentally hurts himself :-) ) He's so proud of himself! Marcus worked really hard to be able to do this.

Liam's 12 month check up

In other news, I took Liam to the doctor today for his 12 month check up. Dr. Mazurek was happy to see him and Cale and Ewan. Liam enjoyed the visit until he got his shots. And, really, it wasn't getting stuck that upset him, it was getting held down so he wouldn't fidget. He stopped crying as soon as I picked him up. Of course, Liam got weighed and measured, and here are the results:

height 32 1/4 inches (97th percentile), weight 24 pounds 9.5 ounces (80th percentile)

Compared to the brothers....

Marcus: H 31 inches W 25 pounds 8 ounces

Cale: H 31 1/2 inches W 25 pounds 5 ounces

Ewan: H 31 3/4 inches W 25 pounds 1 ounce

It's kind of fun to see the differences between the boys. As I was typing this out, I was surprised to see that Liam is actually the "lightest" of all the boys at this age (he definitely doesn't feel like it!). In my mind, they are all the same size :-)

????

My dryer has decided to stop drying my clothes. It doesn't even try to make them hot. We knew it would happen eventually since the dryer is probably over 10 years old and we are its third owners. So, now I'm on the hunt for a new or "new" dryer. My problem is that I am torn between hunting for a good deal on craigslist, or just going to Lowe's to buy a new dryer. Looking through some of the listings, I might be able to score a washer/dryer pair off craigslist for the same price, or less, than a new dryer by itself. But then I think about the time involved in looking for good used ones, and setting up a time to see them, and what if the person who got there before you wants it-then you have to start back over! Lowe's is looking really good right now, since they will deliver for free and take the old one out. And, I could get a dryer way faster than searching craigslist. I'm so torn. I want to save money, but I don't have a lot of space to hang wet clothes to dry....
And, Andy is letting me decide what to do. I guess because I do the laundry and he really doesn't care too much. Although, he did say he would rather have a new one.

??????

Our Wee-man turns 1!

One year ago, we welcomed Liam Christopher into the world. It has been a wonderful, too fast year watching him grow up into our little wee-man (or wee-ums, or peanut, or little man, or cocobean-he has a lot of nicknames).
Fun facts about our new 1 year old:
*the boy likes to eat, he is not a picky eater
*he loves to be near his brothers and be "included" in their play
*he likes to watch Marcus and Cale play Wii Fit Plus, I think he likes to watch the little people run around
*favorite snacks-baby goldfish, yogurt drops, gerber puffs
*favorite toys-cell phones, home phone, balls, loves to push buttons
*when he's tired, he'll grab his blankie and put his thumb in his mouth-so sweet
That's all I can think of for now. We just love him so much!

Here is Liam with his birthday cake. I did a farmyard cake based on one I saw in Family Fun magazine. Thanks to Grammy Pammy's help, it turned out pretty good, I think.

Liam was a very lucky boy that got some toys, balls, diapers and clothes for his birthday. His brothers enjoyed opening the presents more than Liam did, especially after he was distracted by the first ball he opened.

Happy birthday song. Grammy Pammy, Grammy Linda and Grandpa Jerry were all here to help celebrate today.

Happy Birthday Andy!

Happy birthday to Andy! His birthday was on Saturday and he celebrated with a little bit of girls' lacrosse, some grilling of ribeyes and a pie! (store bought-I don't do pies well) Even though the boys wanted to get him a lightsaber and a nerf gun, I managed to slip out to do the gift shopping on my own and got him a computer game and a family game. We also gave him bubble bath and flaxseed, but those gifts benefitted the whole family. It was fun to see Andy try to figure out what the gifts were when we placed them in his lap. I am thankful for Andy. He is an excellent father and husband and works hard for our family. I'm glad we got to celebrate as a family!

Boy Scout fun

Andy got to take Marcus and Cale to a Boy Scout campout event at our church. The boys aren't in Boy Scouts, but the invitation was open to non-scouts, too. They didn't get to stay the night, but they had fun for the time they were there. The boys played games, tied knots, rode on make-shift strechers and had hot chocolate and s'mores. They were tired when they got home and even took naps the next afternoon. They just had fun being boys.

Tug of war


some awesome knot tieing


more knots


inside a tent. A friend has lent us one so that when the weather warms up, Andy can camp outside with the boys. Marcus and Cale were sad they couldn't stay for the overnight. I know they'll have fun when we "camp" here. It was great that they could go and Andy had time to go with them (no sports events except for MS girls lacrosse that got finished early!)

I have my moments

So, the other day I was in the kitchen and I looked over and saw this drawer.

I couldn't remember what was in the drawer. Here is my thought process:

What's in the drawer?

Have I even opened the drawer?

You mean there is an entire drawer that I have not opened in the almost 3 years that we have lived here?!?

(At this point, I'm thinking of the awesome new storage space I found)

Then, I opened the drawer....


Yeah, I use this drawer every day. So much for a new storage space.

True story

facing forward

Andy switched Liam's car seat around before we came back to Indiana last week and now he can see as much as the big boys can! I think Liam really liked being able to look out the windows and watch the little DVD and actually see all the movies that he had previously just heard the audio to. I was a little worried about sleeping in this new position, only because Liam is sitting up more and I wanted him to be able to snooze if he wanted to-no problems there-so easygoing! Another milestone reached. Just look at how happy he is....

ready to go!

the people that you meet in Illinois

Last week was our spring break and we went back to Illinois for a few days. It was great to see everyone and of course, we did the whirlwind tour of all the towns. We got to Decatur in time for dinner on Tuesday. Since I had worked the night before, I got to sleep in the car while Andy drove. The next day, we had an impromtu visit to our friends the Bradd family in Clinton. Thank you to the "Clinton don" for treating us to lunch!

Here are the Shaffer boys, the Bradd boys and Cassie-along for the trip.


Ranae, me and Kim. Ranae is ready to have Bradd baby #4 any day now!


We spent Thursday in Decatur, just hanging out. We got treated to lunch on Thursday, too. Hey, visiting is great! The cousins didn't get much face time, though. Savannah and Marie had school-their spring break was the week before we visited.


On Thursday night, we went to Jim's house in Sherman. Bitsy and the girls drove up to see everybody. We had to take the obligatory grandkid photo. We are missing Maddie, who decided not to have her picture taken. I think some of the other cousins were thinking the same thing.


Some of the Shaffer boys/men.

We had to leave Friday morning because I had to work that night. And, actually, I got called off of work which was fantastic because I am much happier when I work 2 days a week instead of 3 (but that is an entirely different post). The boys were worn out and ready to be home. It took a couple days to get back to our routine, but I think we've got it now. We're ready to meet the rest of the school year!

Liam 10 month photos

I just wanted to scan these photos into the computer. They're Liam's 10 month photos that got taken at the beginning of March. Never fear relatives! I have the photos in envelopes ready to get mailed as soon as we buy some stamps! Until you receive yours, enjoy looking at the "wee-man" :-)

Happy Easter!

Happy Easter!

Love, the Shaffers

we must be crazy!

On a slightly thought out whim, we have gotten the boys some fish! Actually, we got them each a betta fish. This was going to be their Easter gift, but the bunny has something else exciting for them tomorrow. I used to have a lot of fish (a lot of fish), and I remember bettas as being especially hard to kill. We thought these would be a great first fish for the boys. Well, they were all excited, Cale was thrilled and only Ewan's betta has been dropped (it was safe in its little travel cup and looks okay). The cats have discovered them, too, and the fish have been moved from the table to the bookcase for safety (although, the Anna Kitty is still keeping a close eye on them). I think the boys like having something to call their "own" pet.


The three "little men" all in a row.


Cale named his fish "Z" (after a Mii character from the Wii) and Marcus said his was named "Flash"


Not too sure what Ewan's betta's name is. When I asked him, he said "I have to take a bath with it because it's swimming with me." I was a little concerned for the fish's safety. No worries, the fish was in it's container.

death of the re-freezer-ator

Goodbye refreezerator. You have served us well. We appreciated that we got you for free, since we did not have a refridgerator when we moved to this house. We did not mind that we had to strategically place food items on the shelves, not knowing which items would get frozen sitting on the top shelf. No light when we opened the door, no problem.

But, it's time to move on and replace you with a newer model that matches our other appliances and doesn't suck the power out of the electrical socket. It will be hard to decide what to do with the new space, but I'm sure we'll figure it out.

the simple things

Yesterday was great. It really made me appreciate, once again, living where we do. And, maybe I'm feeling a little nostalgic as I sit here and listen to Cale and Ewan argue. Or, maybe I just want to remember the a couple of the nice, easy days. Either way, I'm recording it here.

After breakfast, Marcus got on the bus (right outside our house-I love that we live on the corner). Then, Andy rollerbladed with Ewan in the jogging stroller to the local coffee shop (we get our coffee from here all the time-we can't buy coffee from the grocery store anymore-coffee snobs). It was a beautiful day, a perfect day for yard work, and Andy didn't have to go in to work (doesn't mean that he still didn't get phone calls/texts from parents, atheletes, coaches and a doctor). Cale and I went to the hardware store in town and bought some mulch-20 bags!. The sales lady looked at me like I was crazy when I said it, but 20 bags is what it took to cover the areas that needed it. We also swung by the administration building to drop off my background check for that substitute school nurse position that I applied for (really I think the interview was to check and see if I was a normal person and wouldn't scare the kids). While Andy put down the mulch, the boys played outside with the little girls from next door. Lunch and naptime followed. Andy was foiled in his attempt to go for a bike ride by a flat tire (no worries, he got 2 new innertubes last night and is currently riding the blue "dan henries"-bike path marking from a bike race). Instead of bike riding, Andy edged the lawn, raked the cut grass from yesterday, cleaned off the grill and moved the picnic bench back outside. Marcus came home from school and invited a boy across the street to come over. The boy's two little brothers came over too, so we had a bunch of little boys running around the yard. After dinner, Andy took Marcus, Cale and Ewan to get those innertubes he needed and supplies for milkshakes. Liam and I stayed home and played with toys. The milkshakes were delicious and then it was time to get the boyos to bed! Then, Andy and I were able to watch a movie, thank you Rebox! ("Men who stare at Goats"-it was okay-we kept getting interrupted by Ewan's attempts to stay up all night)

What a great day! I'm not writing this to brag, or rub in how awesome life is, because sometimes it's not and I think we remember the not awesome times more because of the emotions involved. We forget those just nice days, and I know there are tons of those to remember. So, I'm thankful for my blog, my techno diary, where I can record nice days like this.