Tuesday, April 23, 2013

Spring Break

We had a pretty fun Spring break.   Most of it was pretty laid back.  The girls spent a good portion of the week doing this:
Those are Harry Potter books.  Elizabeth finally decided she was brave enough to try them out and she was quickly hooked.  Of course Natalie wasn't far behind.  Elizabeth was seriously a reading fiend and read the whole series in like 2 1/2 weeks.  Natalie has started the fourth one but is taking a break right now, I think.

It was fun being in Harry Potter mode again.  I remember reading the first 6 myself soon after Natalie was born and then excitedly waiting for the last one to come out.  We watched the first two movies together, too. 

We also took a trip to the beach, of course.  I will take any chance I can get to go.  I was debating about going until the morning we left since the weather wasn't supposed to be very good but I'm glad I went.  We had perfect weather.  In fact it was a little too warm.  I wasn't as prepared as I should have been with sunscreen and the girls and I got some sun.

My happy place:
I wasn't prepared with stuff either.  I think we threw out all of our junky sand toys when we moved the last time so we didn't have a single thing.  I was worried the kids would be mad we didn't have any buckets but I guess I don't give them enough credit.  They don't need any cheap plastic toys to have fun! :)  They were completely entertained.

The girls played in the ocean:

Elizabeth was going out farther than ever and making me nervous but she had a blast:

 Looking for shells:

I love this belly button and the way he always has to wear his hat like this:
Nate and I had fun with his wiffle ball and bat.  I was pitching him balls and he was hitting them really well.  I think he is going to be a good little baseball player.

Even Eli had fun on his towel in the shade:

Obnoxious self-portrait:
 Hey--it's the only way I'm in pictures these days!

All tired out:

Friday, April 19, 2013

Recently

We're starting to get back into the swings of things around here. In the past it has always been around 4-5 months when I get that coming out of the fog feeling and sure enough, Eli is 4 months and I'm feeling it again. One thing that helps a ton is that he is such a good sleeper.  He is already making it 12 hours between feedings at night!  It's heaven.  He's not the best napper during the day, but I'll take sleeping that long at night over naps any day.  He is a thumb-sucker like his siblings before him and it is so adorable...


My two thumb-suckers:
In fact when Eli started, Nate said, "Now he can suck his thumb like a big boy!" 
That's right, Nate.  That's right. :)

The poor boys spend a lot of time in the car driving all over creation to all the activities we're doing after school.  I decided to pack them all in to two days and I think I like it best that way.  We have a couple busy days but the rest are open so we can take it easy at home if we want. 

Natalie and I recently had this conversation:
Natalie: Yay!  It's Thursday!  I like Thursdays because we don't have to go anywhere.
Me: Maybe we should just quit all the activities so every day can be like that!
Natalie: OK...except piano.  How about just piano, gymnastics... oh and swim lessons! I want to do swim lessons.  (this is basically the same as what we're doing right now...)

It's such a balance.  We're still trying to figure it out.  We probably should cut back some more.

Here we are hanging out in the car during Elizabeth's horseback riding lesson:







Here's some shots of Natalie playing indoor soccer:
She seems to really like soccer but unfortunately they are on a young team and haven't won a game yet and they are old enough to know it and be disappointed about it. 

We got out as a family to go bowling and had a lot of fun.  The kids love Wii bowling so we thought we'd try out the real thing.  It was a bit of rude awakening for them but I think they still had fun.




Eli didn't seem to mind missing out on the fun much.

He's such a happy guy.  
He's been known to improve quite a few bad moods just by his smiles and giggles.


He's awfully fun to snuggle with, too:

Especially when he's naked and smiling:





Here's a final picture of the blossoms we had on our plum tree:
I was so happy to see those back in February (you gotta love California for that--early Spring).  Of course now most of the blossoms are gone and the leaves are back.  Hopefully we've got a few more weeks before the heat makes an appearance!

Thursday, April 18, 2013

Paint Pictures

 Occasionally when one of the girls is having computer time they'll make a picture in Paint.  They pretty much always save them and I finally made a folder to keep them in.  My favorite part is the titles they give their pictures.  So, some of these are a few years old and I'm not quite sure who made all of them but here they are....

Paint Art
by Elizabeth & Natalie

Colors of the Rainbow by Natalie

Rainbow splat

Blue is Everywhere! by Natalie

Splat N Smile by Natalie

 Spray Symphony by Natalie

The Earth is Alive by Natalie

Budy (as in beauty) by Elizabeth

 Color Swirl

For Dad by Natalie

Lizzy by Elizabeth

My Silly Daddy by Elizabeth
 My Mommy by Elizabeth

Prey Against Prey by Natalie

Pritty

The Liberty Bell by Elizabeth

Varry Varry Pritty