Random Happenings

Tonight was Jace's first night in bible class.  I think he did okay - he was asleep when we picked him up.  When Haylie was little, we would get pages all the time to come get our screaming child and the nursery nannies wouldn't take her for fear of her temper.  I'm hopeful that won't happen with this little guy!

I think Haylie likes her brother! I caught this adorable picture a few days ago.  I wish it wasn't taken on my phone, but oh well.  I still caught the sweet expression on her face!

 Balancing so good!  He then fell over on his face.  Whoops!

Haylie "washing" dishes.  Or just filling up all of our dirty dishes with water.  I'm not going to tell her that I'm going to have to re-wash everything - it might burst her little bubble.

These kids keep me super busy, but I love (almost) every minute!

Baby Faces

Jace has so many faces...and I think all of them are adorable. I might be a tad bit biased though.

The goofy face

The are you kidding me? face

The sleeping falling over face

The "I'm doing something big" face

The stare down.

He is spending more time awake and I love it! I can't wait to see how his personality develops.

Say Hello!

To my new floor (sample)! We have gotten so many samples over the last week or so.  I've been to Don's Floor Gallery (three times), Lumber Liquidators, Floor Trader, Lowe's, Home Depot and Smith's Carpet & Tile (twice).

Thankfully, Smith's has what we want, for the price we want.

Don't you love it?  It has three varying wood plank sizes that you alternate, is handscraped and has chatter marks so if we drop something on the floor, you'll never know where it hit.

The two pics are the same floor...or are supposed to be.  We've decided to just hardwood everything and get a huge area rug for the living room.  I think that's the best decision and will re-sale better if we do it that way.  Or maybe I am just so sick of my nasty living room carpet that it doesn't matter to me what we do, just as long as it's gone.  You'll never know.

I'm hopeful this project will be done soon...but as with everything we do, it will be longer than I hope for.  That's okay.  We've lived with concrete for this long, what's a couple more months?

Things I've Learned Lately

1. Don't throw away any diapers in the house unless you have unrolled and checked for actual pee or poop.  Haylie diapers all of her dolls/Elmos/Bears, then takes the diapers off because they are "nasty."  So she rolls them up and leaves them on the floor.  Hmm, I wonder where she gets that from?

2. Don't start pumping until you are POSITIVE it's on the lowest setting.  Someone (ahem Haylie) might have set it up on a higher setting while "helping". YIKES!!

3. Don't try to be quiet while moving the vacuum cleaner because you will inevitably hit something with your elbow, causing it to crash and shatter the glass on the floor, waking up your sleeping toddler.

More to come, I'm sure...

Designers Challenge

My friend Chellie does this sometimes on her blog and I'm hoping I get as much feedback as she does!  We are trying to decide on flooring.  Well, the type of flooring is decided - hardwood.  The part we don't know is - should we keep an area of the living room with carpet or hardwood the rest (minus beds and baths)?  

Justin ultimately would love to keep a carpeted area in the living space because of wrestling and playing with kids.  I have no issue with this - my issue is with the layout of our living/dining room.  It's one big space and no good cut off place.

We want to hardwood the office/playroom and dining area, but in between those is the living room.  See pics and ignore the mess.  This is just my life these days.

See?  One continual room.  If you were us, what would you do?  Keep carpet and cut it off?  If so, WHERE??  Or just hardwood the whole place and get a huge carpet for the living space to make it more home-y?

These are some new samples I got today.  I took back the one we really like because we expired on our time-limit.  Should have taken a pic to remember it by...because these aren't looking so hot.  And neither are our cabinets. Yikes...

Ready, set, design. Please!

Newborn Pictures

My friend Peyton came over when Jace was just 10 days old and took these amazing pictures.

Love this one.

I can't believe how many great ones she got!  There are much more. Jace was a really good model for her, unlike his sister Haylie.  When Peyton took Haylie's pictures when she was a newborn, she just cried most of the time.  It's just amazing how different their personalities are.  I'm thankful for a chill baby this time around!

It grew legs and just walked off

See the beautiful ring below? The one that was given to me as a symbol of love and forever just 5 short years ago?

I lost it.

I want to throw up just thinking that it's possibly gone for good.

At the end of my pregnancy, I stopped wearing it since my fingers were a little swollen and it wasn't fitting comfortably any more.  I kept it in the bathroom so when I wanted to wear it again, I would know where to look.  Well, a week ago I tidied up the bathroom and I put it in either a box with my earrings that my hubby had just given me or my jewelry box.  I can't remember which but I know it was one of the two.

Well, the other day I was ready to try to wear it again and I go to get it - and it's not there.

Nothing is more frustrating to me than remembering exactly where I had it last and then it not being in that same place.  The only thing I can think of is one certain 2 year old who loves to get in things and puts them in different places.  I do remember last week when I was in the shower, she came and flushed the toilet.  I am hoping that my ring didn't go down with that flush.  It's a good possibility though.

I've shown her pictures, I've asked her several times, I've even tried to recreate her playing with my jewelry to see what she does.  Never does any jewelry go beyond the bathroom and she just repeats any question I ask her.  I'm not getting any information out of her!

I feel like I've looked over every square inch of my house, but I'm going to keep trying.  Justin says we can just get another one, but I don't want another one.  I want the one I had.  I want to not lose sleep over where it could be.  I want Haylie to tell me if she put it somewhere.  I want it to not hopefully be at the bottom of some sewage plant.

So if anyone has any ideas or wants to come help me look, please do.  I'm going crazy!

I did it!

Last week was my first whole week going solo with two kids.  I was a little anxious, but I mentally planned out the week and hoped we could have a fun time...and we did!  We made it to school on time, to the library, the park, a walk or two, and just enjoyed being together.  There were a few tears and melt-downs, but I just dealt with it the best I could.  Exhausting?  Yes.  But everyone survived!

Last Wednesday was ridiculously nice so I decided to bust out our "new"  (thank you, Craigslist) double stroller and walk with the kids to the park.

Katie B, why does this picture remind me of Coralie?

Airing out those toes!

We were doing good until Jace started to cry.  We started back home hoping the walking motion would soothe him.  It did not. I get him out of the stroller to try to calm him, but when I go to put him back in, Haylie's bear is in the carseat, already buckled in. Throwing Bear out, I change Jace's diaper awkwardly on the side of the road in the stroller.  It helps for a minute, but then he roars again. So I get him out again.  The second Jace is out of the seat, Bear is back in.  Ugh!! Finally realizing J is hungry (even though he JUST ate before we left), I unbuckle Bear one more time and we just head home as fast as I can walk.

I get Jace inside and let Haylie go run around the backyard while I feed the baby. Justin had called Okie One Call to come mark our utilities so he could safely dig out a garden plot and when I go to find Haylie, she had run around and collected all the flags!! (Good thing they paint the lines too.)

So proud of her accomplishment!

I guess she wanted to plant her own garden - so we now have flags for flowers.

But that's okay with me!

One Month Today!

My newest baby turned one month old today.  I really feel like I just had him yesterday (mentally, not physically thankfully).

I have no idea what his "stats" are but I do know he is a lot heavier & longer.  So, there ya go.

He still doesn't do much, he is still quite a sleeper during the day.  He is going for longer stretches at night but in the mornings it is just ridiculous.  No matter what time he is fed last, he always wakes up around 5:30-6 to eat again.  Haylie usually wakes up around this time (ugh) and so thus begins the day.  I do not care for this schedule.

 I chose the wrong time to try to take his picture.  He was starting to get hungry so that's why he is sad.  Otherwise, he wouldn't probably care at all.  He is pretty chill like that.  Unlike his sister who at one month was still quite a screamer.

Haylie @  1 month

(Please do not judge the messiness in the background.  It's inevitable.)

And here is he naked and covered in his infant acne.  I hope this isn't foreshadowing his teenage skin...because if so, he doesn't have a chance.

Going from one to two has certainly had it's challenges.  It takes me about 2 hours to try to get out of the house, I have gone back to living in 3-4 hour stretches, and coming up with the energy to entertain my two year old certainly has proven to be exhausting.  It's a good day if I can actually take a nap and we have fewer than 5 threats of time-outs or spankings (usually which 75% of those actually happen).  But Jace is such a good baby that he only cries if he is hungry, has a dirty diaper or is sleepy.

I can't believe a month has already gone by. I know everything probably goes by quicker with the second one, but I'm hoping to enjoy him as much as I can.

Self Portraits

Can you tell she took these pictures ALL by herself?  I think we have a future photographer on our hands.

Or not.