Kella's 10 months old

I can't believe Kella is 10 months old already.  March is a long month, but it went by too fast.  Here's what our sweet girly is doing now....

She is very good at crawling and pulling herself up on anything she can find.  She especially likes to play with the toys she finds on the chairs.  I'm sure her brothers thought they were out of reach.  She still loves Baby Einstein videos, especially Mozart and VanGogh.  She likes balls, her drum, books and puppets.  She doesnt' mind grass or being put down on the ground outside to crawl around.  She likes trying to feed herself and we are pretty much done with baby food.  In honor of turning 10 months, we have moved her into her own room!  No more pack-n-play sleeping for her.  We repainted the room that Liam was in for her.  She does pretty well sleeping in there.  Daytime naps are hard, because the room isn't as dark as the closet.  Bedtime is usually around 8pm, and she still wakes up once a night.  Usually she is up for the day around 730 and takes 2 naps:  around 1030am and 2pm.  She loves seeing things and haivng people talk to her.  She loves her brothers and loves when they play with her.  Ewan still loves to shower her with affection, sometimes too much.  Such a big girl!

with Mommy

Marcus's music program

I had the pleasure (?) of taking all the kids to Marcus's music program on Thursday night. We almost did't get to go. Here's why.  At dinner, before the program, I told Marcus that he needed to change out of his play clothes in about 10 minutes.  Ok.  Time to change.  The teacher had said that the kids could just wear colorful clothes and pants or slacks.  Marcus has no jeans.  He never wears them, so I didn't buy any new ones when he outgrew his old ones.  And, he DID NOT want to wear his khakis.  "They don't fit me right.", is what he told me.  I told him that this is not a problem that could be fixed at this time and you wear them every Sunday, so I'm not sure how all of a sudden they don't fit right.  Start of major freak out/temper tantrum/melt-down.  Crying.  Yelling.  Stomping.  Slamming.  Pouting.  Threatening.  20 minutes.  Finally, Marcus came downstairs in his khakis (hey, they fit) and a blue tshirt (because the one I recommended he didn 't like.  Let's forget that he's never worn it.).  The tshirt saga was good too:  Marcus is trying to put it on and is yelling how it doesn't fit, it's too tight.  I said that maybe the reason he was having a hard time was because he was having a fit and needed to calm down.  Imagine that-the shirt did fit!

You would think a 20 minute melt-down would tire anyone out.  Not Marcus.  He gets into the car and start panicing about singing in front of everyone.  I asked him how he could play a basketball game in front of a crowd or participate in karate with all the parents right there, watching.  I swear he started to hyperventilate and thought he might make himself pass out.  I talked him down from that ledge with some math problems-trying to figure out how many students are in the 3rd grade.  Ok.

We get to the school 10 minutes before the program starts and 5 mins after he is supposed to be in his class.  I pull up to drop him off and he says, "I can't do this."  His sympathetic mother says, "You need to get out of this car and go inside.  I don't care if you go to your class or just stand in the hallway, but you are not getting back into this vehicle (a shining parenting star for me, I know)."  Marcus went inside.  We parked the car.  As we were walking in, I saw Marcus lining up with his class.  He looked calm and composed.  He proceded to participate in the program.  No tears.  No hysterics.  He actually looked like he was enjoying it.

There's Marcus in the blue.  Look's like everything's okay.

a little bit of choreograhpy for you

one of my videographers.  We tried to record some of the program for Andy.  Should be interesting to watch.

Thanks goodness for my phone and games. It kept the kids, especially Liam, occupied.

I'm so glad that experience is over.

Rank advancement

The Blue and Gold Banquet was Saturday.  This is the Boy Scout awards ceremony where the boys get their animal badge (Tiger, Wolf, Bear).  Cale and Marcus were excited to get these new badges and add them to their shirts.  And, there was a meal afterwards, so they got to eat at the church twice that day!

Cale got his Tiger badge.

Marcus got his Bear badge.

There are 3 more meetings for the year.  Needless to say, as the Tiger Cub leader, I am slightly more than excited that the year is drawing to a close.  I have one more meeting that I have to plan for, and then we have a pack meeting and then at our last meeting, they build kites-a pack tradition.  It was a fun year, but I am ready to eat dinner at home on Wednesday nights instead of in 10 minutes between scouts and Wednesday night church. 

Good work boys! 

Oh, to be an old dog...

Andy set this up for Carina.  I guess if you are almost 91 dog years old, you deserve to be spoiled!

things we do here

we like to stand under the table

we got a new tatoo on our hand

we got a lot of tatoos!

the boys' room painting is done! (next for this room is window repair, curtains, wall art...)

Andy put up a screen door to the garage!  This definitely helps with air flow.  I can't say that our dog is very happy to be able to see in and not come inside.  And our cat isn't pleased that she can't push the door open to escape to the outdoors.  But, we love the air current that comes into the house now!

let's do some car racing!

The pinewood derby has been taking up some of our time recently.  All three of the older boys participated, Marcus and Cale with their Cub Scout dens, and Ewan (who of course wanted to make a car like his big brothers) got to race in the "big kid" race.  Since so many of the grown-ups like to get very involved in helping the kids make the cars, the pack added the "big kid" race to let the "big kids" make their own cars. 

Off to the races!

Thanks to the computer software, it seemed like there were a hundred heats for each den.  Not really.  The top 2 finishers from each den moved on to compete in the fastest car race.  Both Cale and Marcus came in 2nd in their dens!  (this picture shows Cale's car in the yellow lane)

an avid fan

the gold car is Ewan's.  it is lined up with some of the other grown-up cars

a close-up of Cale's car

The end result:  Marcus got 3rd place overall for the pack!  He was very excited and got a little trophy, too.  It was a little harder for Cale:  even though he made it to the fastest car race, his car came in last in almost every heat :-(  Poor kid.  It's hard to be a competitive person and not get to win.  But, it's a good lesson for Cale to learn and he did get 2nd place in his den.

What about Ewan?  Oh, his car was super fast, too!  In fact, he tied for 2nd place in the "big kid" division.  Ewan was so excited to race and had to be super-patient, since his race was not until the very end of the derby.  He had a big grin on his face when it was time to start and he liked seeing his car cross the finish line first in most of his races.

We love car racing!  At least the pinewood derby kind!

Running: an slower, older model

I blame it all on Andy.

In February, Andy went out and got some really nice running shoes.  He's never been a runner, but wanted to start with the end goal, I think, of doing a triathelon. 

I used to run, too.  I used to do road races every year.  I could do a respectable 10 minute mile.  Not the fastest person, by any means.  But, babies and need of sleep and work and time all seemed to distract me from any kind of working out.

But, I really wanted some new shoes, too.

So, goodbye my more-than-4-year-old new balances and hello to my nice, new aesics.  I've broke them in wearing them at work-(which was super-comfy).  And last week, I decided to haul myself out the door to actually use them for their intended purpose-running.  It wasn't pretty, but I survived my first time out running for about 30 mins with a little walking in the middle.  I am not a fast running by any means, but I have a pretty consistent pace once I get started. 

Then, I did it again the next day.

Saturday was too busy a day for me to run, but, no worries, I made it out again Sunday evening. 

And, I am starting to remember what it feels like to love running again.

so nice outside!

I love spring and spring-type weather.   I know that it could get cooler again-I don't care!  Yesterday, I pulled out a bunch of outdoor stuff that had been hibernating in the garage.  I figured, even if it rained, which it did, the stuff would get washed off.  The kids ran around outside all weekend and Marcus and Cale ended up with a bit of a sunburn, even, on their faces.  Oops. 

No fear of the grass here.  She was so happy to be outside and watch her brothers play.

I promise, they did play a lot.  They had to take snack breaks, too.

9 month check-up

Sweet Kella had her 9 month check-up with our favorite doctor on Friday.  She is 28 3/4 inches long (90th%) and 19 pounds 14.5 ounces (75th).  She is developing nicely and reaching all those baby milestones.  I forgot to mention also that we finally switched her to a convertable car seat.  Her little feet had been  hanging over the end of the infant seat for a while now, but I was waiting until icy weather was over before switching her.  ( I just didn't want to carry her when it was slippery out.)  For fun, I looked up all her brothers' stats from this age.  It really isn't fair to compare, you know, boy vs. girl.  But, I will say that she is the lightest/shortest 9 month old we have had :-).  (and the sweetest girl we've had :-) )

Thursday

Thursday was Cale's Dr. Suess pararde. It was the make-up parade from last Friday when some pretty strong storms came through the area. Cale wanted to dress up as the Lorax, and I had a little bit of a challenge coming up with his costume. (Now, here is the difference between Marcus and Cale: Marcus never wanted to dress up as Dr. Seuss character. He does not like that kind of attention. So, last year, I didn't even ask Cale if he wanted to do it. I figured his answer would be the same. Oh no. Cale was mad that he couldn't participate last year and excited to be involved this year. That is Cale, always wanting to be in the mix of things.) For Cale's costume, we finally came up with a fake mostache and eyebrows, spray painted yellow with a stuffed, long-sleeve orange tshirt.  Can you see him in his class picture?  He is in the second row, between 2 girls wearing pink.  There were a lot of Cat in the Hats, a lot of Whos and a fair amount of Thing 1 and Thing 2s, but only about 5-6 Lorax-I'm sure Cale liked that, too.  He had fun, and I brought Ewan to watch the parade-he seemed to enjoy himself.

My new cooking friend.  Thank you Grammy Pammy for my new pressure cooker.  I tried a honey-garlic chicken recipe the other night, and it was pretty good.  I think I will have fun cooking with it.

And, finally, we have found another use for the trampoline....

weekend update

Just some photos from the weekend. Nothing exciting, but sometimes, that's the best part.

The boys' room is in the process of being painted.  I picked a darker blue color called "Ship's Harbor".  Andy is doing a great job with it and is halfway done.  Right now, Ewan's bed in is the middle of the room so Andy could paint around it.  Next step, moving the bunkbeds, dresser and bookcase to paint behind them.  Hopefully, this project can be finished this week.  If not, that's okay, the boys don't seem to mind the mess.

This picture shows a sample of the other color I was looking at.  All the boys, and Andy, swear the colors were exactly the same.  I promise, they were not.  There were some subtle differences between the two.

Kella had her first "up 'do".  Her hair is getting longer and she is starting to try to eat the barettes we put in her hair.  Her hair is long enought that this ponytail had some good height to it.  Ewan thought it was cool.

I had Andy try to get a picture of the kids together.  *hmm*  We may have to try again...

And, Andy found Ewan's DS!  It has been missing for probably a month and I had looked all over the house (so I thought).  I even had Andy's mom check her car and called the school in case Ewan had left it at a basketball practice.  No luck.  Andy was looking something and put his hand down the side of the recliner and there it was!  Of course, it was a little grungy and Ewan promptly took it upon himself to wash it off in the bathroom sink.  That earn the DS a timeout in some rice-no worries, it worked fine.  Ewan was thrilled, of course, and I think his brothers were happy too, since Ewan will no longer be playing their's.

Busy week, this week.  The boys are making a reapperance at karate for the first time since November.  We are still going to gymnastics once a week.  Cub scouts (oh, fun) and Wednesday night church and the preschool chili cook-off are all this week.  And, Grammy Pammy is coming to visit!  (Oh, and I worked Sunday night and have to work tonight and Andy is working, too, of course).  No rest for the wicked, I guess...