August Cell Phone Pictures

I am posting August cell phone pictures finally, I must be getting closer to all caught up right?! One can hope. We had so much fun this summer with walks, bike rides, time with friends and trips to the park. Summer always stresses me out a little since it is go go go but looking back now makes me wish it was August again! Anyways, here was the last of our summer hooray!

 Ice Cream at Kellie's such a special treat!

 With the construction of the play house going on, Benjamin felt the need to do some building of his own. Someone should tell him the tree needs to come down before you can build something with it!

 Zucchini the size of Benjamin? Why not. 

 Olaf sure does like making surprise visits at the dinner table. 

 haircuts!

 The 4 year olds on the block

 Grandma and Annie out for a bike ride. Annie loves riding her bike and being active. 

 Nicholas learned how to crawl from the living room to the kitchen, this prompted some baby proofing!

 Last trip to the pool for the summer, it was a warm 90+ degree day and it was amazing.

 Police officer Annie at your service

 Lots of walks with Uncle Jordan and Finn

Free Family Fun

Before I get onto one of our last summer fun happings, here is my last back to school picture. My handsome hubby all dressed and ready to go start his second year of teaching!

Ok, so I am not usually one for community events. They are crowded, and give me anxiety attacks like no other, The big kids always want to go in one direction and the littles in another plus throw in a baby who may poop or need to eat and you have a gong show in the making. Somehow, Brandon convinced me to go to....I actually don't even know what this event was called, either way, Brandon convinced us to go. As soon as we pulled up I knew it was going to be a great evening! It was the town's open house for most elementary schools so that drastically dropped the number of people at the event. There was ample parking and well laid out attractions. We visited the bomb squad then hit up the bounce houses FOR EVER. After I finally pulled the kids away from all the out door fun, we headed inside for some freebies and games. It was a wonderful event and I am so glad we went! It was nice that Kellie and like a bijillion cops we knew were there, made for a very stress free time!

What was supposed to be a quick 30 minutes, turned into 2+ hours! Such a fun( and warm) time!

Back to School

Ah, the first day of school. So much excitement, so much willingness to learn, so much fun! Thankfully my kids enjoy the back to school season just as much as I do and even though we started a week before the Neighborhood kids, we were up and at 'em our first morning. It has been so long I don't really remember the special things we did on the first day. I am sure it involved a coffee for me and maybe daddy brought home doughnuts? I just know we woke up, got dressed, filled out our AWESOME beginning of the year document and took the obligatory first day of school pictures! 

Sammy isn't really doing "Preschool" but we wanted to make him feel like a big kid. he wants to be a Mcdonalds worker when he grows up.

Benjamin is 4, doing Preschool and wants to be a car wash attendant. 

Annie is 6, starting 2nd grade and wants to be a gymnastics coach and mommy.

Elias is 8, starting 3rd grade and wants to be a Lego Engineer/Pokemon designer. 

 When we finished breakfast, we got right to work. At this point, I still didn't know if Benjamin was going to be going to a preschool or not, so we proceeded as if he was not and began working with him. He LOVES school! Even though he now goes to Preschool two mornings a week he still really enjoys learning to read and write at home. No complaints here!

 The kids did absolutely fantastic all morning, have I mentioned that yet? The little boys played, the big kids were eager to see each new book and subject, the baby slept and played happily. It was wonderful, and we got A LOT done.

 Annie and Elias' favorite subject so far is World Geography. They are learning a little bit about 36 countries all over the world. We do activities, watch videos, cook, very hands on and they are soaking it all up.

Can you tell they were SO over pictures?
The start to School Year 2016-2017 is in the books!

Back to School Shopping

Any one else love back to school shopping? Me too, it was my favorite non-holiday day! I loved wondering through the isles of whatever superstore we went to and picking out just the right pencils, folders markers etc. My love for school supplies and back to school shopping has not wavered since my youth. My first semester after college, Brandon was still in school. I went to the store bought all of his supplies labeled and color coded everything. While technically Brandon is still in school, it is now WAY more fun to relive my love of all thing school supply related, through my kids!

As we were gearing up to start school for the year, I decided to take each kid on a special mommy-kid school shopping trip! Each kid would get a trip to Wal-Mart/Target and to a clothing store for a couple of new cool weather outfits. 

Brandon had decided to take the older kids to a movie that wasn't good for Samuel so I convinced Samuel that back to school shopping was way more fun and he agreed! Samuel insisted on going to Wal Mart! When we pulled up he began crying and said "Not the BLUE wal-mart, the RED wal-mart"...aka Target After explaining that they were indeed two different stores, he convinced me to go to both. Samuel's back to school needs consisted of a few outfits( thanks for the friendly prices Wally World) a Despicable Me cup and some clearance Disney Infinity characters. Even though he isn't doing any school stuff this year, he sure enjoyed his trip!

Up next was Benjamin. Benjamin didn't care where we went, he just wanted to pick out a toy because Samuel picked out one. I don't really consider a $1 Despicable Me cup a toy, but whatever. Benjamin didn't care about what clothes he picked out, just said yes to everything but did spend 15 minutes picking out some oh so important $5 darts for their NERF guns. That was the highlight of his trip! He needed a few school supplies like a backpack and other preschool essentials which he enjoyed picking out. He also was very adamant on getting his "fancy shoes", $5 walmart loafers that he LOVES! Benjamin and Samuel are in the same size clothes for the most part so we need double of everything. I have a lot of saved from Elias but not two messy kids worth! It is amazing  how dirty a 3 and 4 year old can get their clothes. I guess that is how you know they are having fun! Grass stains on the knees and dirt on the sleeves. Ah, boys. Anyways I have a feeling next year I will have to take the terror twins together since they will be sharing all their clothes! 

Annie Kat was up next. She didn't need any schools supplies since I bought SO many last year and the few items I did need, I was going to pick up on Elias' trip. Since this was a clothes only trip, I headed to Old Navy with Annie and Kellie. We spent a while picking out clothes and trying them on. Annie gave us quite a fashion show and loved the floor length mirrors a little too much. She kept pretending to be a "teenager" and was acting pretty silly! We picked out some really cute stuff and headed home...only to realize that most of what we bought her was 20% cheaper online! Obviously Kellie and I then spend an hour price checking, and ordering the cheaper stuff. It is so silly that the prices are that different in store and online! After a quick return the next day, Annie's school shopping trip was complete!

Last up was Elias. We headed to the store to pick up some random school supplies and then straight to the mall. We hit up a few stores including  JC Pennys and Childrens Place. Elias was a pretty good shopper and was very sure in what he didn't like. He picked out a few things on his own that I think really reflect him( Pokemon tee shirt anyone?). It was fun to go shopping with him, and even more fun to go overboard on pretzel bits after! I didn't get any pictures of him, but that is just how he rolls.

I can't wait to continue this tradition from year to year!

Carrie and her crew

I am chugging right along and attempting to get caught up before the end of October! It is really hard doing summer blogging in the fall. While I love the fall, all these warm park pictures are really making me miss our carefree summer days. Anyways, the beginning of August brought a much anticipated visit from Carrie and her THREE kids. Carrie and Ian moved back from the states after a several year stint in Hong Kong. Carrie is one of the few people I keep in touch with from my early cheering days at UND. Although our visits are always way too short they are always very eventful. This time we had 8 kids and two moms who were attempting to get in some conversation, ya it didn't really happen. He kids are so well behaved and adorable that I enjoyed the visit none the less. Maybe next time they make a trip to Grand Forks( or dare I say me down to the cities)we will actually get to chat more:)

 Nicholas and Eoin( did I spell that right?) They are only a couple months apart in age. James is photo bombing in the back ground with a cute couch crawl.

 I attempted to get a picture of all 8, it didn't go terrible but it didn't go great. And yes, that is Samuel wearing a puppy costume

Note to self, attempt to take giant kid picture BEFORE they all play dress up. ah, never a dull moment with this many kids!

Nicholas 10 Months

Nicholas is 10 months old !

 Weight: Thankfully Nicholas has been pretty healthy and so we haven't been to the doctor in awhile. He feels much smaller than my other babies at this point so I am guessing 18 to 19 lbs.

Hair color- His hair was really starting to look red until the big hair cut. Now, it is pretty much the same color as Samuel's a light blonde to go with those baby blue eyes.

Eye Color- Baby Blue and as pretty as his big brother.

Sleep- We are slowly but surly getting better. The chiropractor, ear drops and probiotic may have helped or may not, who knows. We are down to only waking once or twice and usually if its after 4am I just bring him into bed with me since Brandon is still at work. I am really hoping to see some improvements in this area for his 10th month!

Eating- Nicholas is eating pretty much whatever we do. He only has two teeth but boy they can sure chew lots of foods! He loves loves veggies and doesn't seem to be a big fan of meat. He gets several bottles a day now but is starting to want more and more real people food. 

Daily routine- Wake up around 8ish( if in my room) for the day after waking  a couple times during the night.Have a bottle then fruit or applesauce for breakfast. Lots and lots of play with brothers and sister before first morning nap round 10. Lunch with the big kids when you wake up followed by more play, usually some fun outside time with daddy ( if he is off) and around 3 a bottle and an afternoon  nap. Dinner bath play and bed with a nice hot bottle sends you off to at least 5 solid hours of sleep. You have seemed much happier this month so that is very refreshing.

Firsts: Haircut( it didn't go so hot), first bite of cupcake, you loved it, first time letting go on your own standing without help, first step. 

What we are looking forward to:  Seeing you start walking. You have taken a step a few different times but that seems to be all you are comfortable with. You take a step, put your arms out to balance your self and slowly squat down to a seated position then go back to crawling like crazy. It is actually pretty funny to see. You are exploring your words a lot more and officially say Mama, dada, and many words that all sound similar like bath,baby and baba( bottle). We can't wait until you start saying Annie, ok she can't wait. 

Message to Nicholas:You LOVE the bath so much its not even funny. Anytime you hear water running you dash towards it like a crazy person. You will stay in there all night if I let you . You are such a daddy's boy and will frequently crawl around the house chanting his name trying to find him. If you are successful and he picks you up, you smile, kick your legs in delight and sequel while give me the haha I love him more than you look. You know who else you love? Your sissy mommy, Annie! You love to crawl over to her desk,pull yourself up to standing on her chair and hit her lap until she picks you up and sticks you on her lap or desk. She has gotten really good at doing school work with you around. I try to take you away but both you and her prefer this way! You wave bye bye like a boss and do so with a smile. You have such an adorable little personality and I can't wait to see it continue to develop.