Thursday, August 30, 2012

End of Summer Randomness!

We have been super busy these last few weeks of summer.  Trying to enjoy every second of the sun that we can.  Although, I cannot wait for fall to arrive!  We have a lot of very fun things coming up in September!  But here's a recap of what our last few weeks have looked like:

Cuteness at our adoption agency picnic:


Our little sweetie pie loves to suck on her fingers.  Better than a pacifier in my opinion, and I think it is pretty darn cute!


                                  Helping mama "wash the dishes"!  He enjoyed this game for almost an hour!


                                                              Playing with colored rice!


                                                                      "helping" outside!


                                                          Super big little boy messes!

                                                   
                                                          Eli LOVES being the baby!



                                                                Ice on the forehead!



                              Big ole bump on the head from running into the corner of the wall!


                          And a first haircut for Eli.  He still has the curls, but they are tamed down a bit!


Monday, August 27, 2012

Very Pinteresting

I have always loved trying out Pinterest recipes, and also pinning lots of house decor ideas.  Over the past few weeks, we've actually been able to utilize a few projects around the house!  

Peter and I tackled a few in door projects that I just love!  a height chart for the kids and an awesome photo decor!  


 Of course Disneyland height requirements Must be on our chart!  Malachi might be getting close!


                                                   I love love love how these turned out!


Now, as I have mentioned in the past, we bought a home that was foreclosed on and was in horrible condition when we purchased it.  We have put a lot of time and money on the inside of the house, but have had to move very slowly on the work outside.  We had really high aspirations for projects this summer (a few, courtesy of Pinterest).  As the summer has worn on and we are looking at a very busy September, we decided that a lot of projects would probably need to wait until next year.

Well, enter the in-laws to the rescue and the yard has now way exceeded my expectations!  It is safe and lots of fun for the kids.  Peter, and his parents, and even his grandma have worked really hard the last two weekends to make our yard a really fun and nice place for the kids.  They love it and I love it!

So I couldn't really find any pictures of before and I'm a little disappointed that we didn't get any good ones, but this one is from a few years ago:


Since then, we have replaced the old cruddy fence (last year's yard project) and this weekend we added a really fun chalkboard to it!


I admit, that people have always complimented our house on the amazing covered deck.  But I have always undervalued it I guess and have never really appreciated.  More times than not, I have wished we just had a patio out there because I always felt like the deck needed more work than we could ever afford to put into it.

But after replacing the rotted boards, cleaning it and getting rid of all the bugs, two-tone staining it, and laying down some outdoor carpet - it is an awesome (caged in!)  play area for the kids!


Once again, my children are not wearing pants, but they were having an awesome time, so who cares :)


                   Look at that deck sparkle.  All it needed was a bit of TLC and now it feels perfect!




Saturday, August 18, 2012

4 Months!

Our sweet little Bina Baby is now 4 months old.  I don't know why, but for some reason knowing she is 4 months old makes me really sad. 4 Months is my most favorite age, so maybe I'm a little bit sad that I know she is going to be blazing right on through it now.  She is growing so fast and getting interactive with everything around her! This month she got to try out the exersaucer, which she loves.  Next will be the jumperoo! 


Sabrina still hates tummy time, but we are trying to get her to spend more time on it.  She has (once) rolled over from tummy to back now and is very close to rolling from back to tummy.  The boys just eat her up whenever she is around.  Here Eli is trying to comfort her while she did tummy time:


Sabrina is still doing amazing in the sleep department!  She goes down right at 7 PM and wakes up for the day between 7-9 AM.  I feel so sooo lucky to have had all of my kids be amazing sleepers (at least while they were babies!).  She is now taking 2 regular naps a day, which I love having everyone on a schedule!  She takes her morning nap around 11 and her second nap around 4 in the afternoon.  Unfortunately her naps are the complete opposite of when the boys nap, which pretty much means I never have a free moment.  But that's okay.  These days will go too fast as it is.


Sabrina now weighs 13 lbs 2 ounces.  That is barely a 2 ounce gain for this month and puts her in the 10-25% now.  I am not overly worried because Eli had a month like this just about at this very same time, but I will bring it up with the pediatrician just in case.  She is wearing all 3-6 month size clothes now and is still in size 2 diapers.


After her 12-14 hour sleepytime, she eats about every 2-3 hours during the day.  She is also getting breakfast and a babyfood snack before bed.  I am really enjoying making my own babyfood.  It is super easy and also very economical!  So far Sabrina has tried Banana, Peaches (her favorite!), avocado, green beans and carrots.  Tonight she will get to try out peas and then I will also be making some applesauce for her.  She is doing awesome with food!



Sweetie Pie, we love you so much!  You are my little princess in every way!  You are just the sweetest little thing!  I love that you have your daddy's dimples and so far seem to be keeping those gorgeous blue eyes (fingers crossed!).  You are pure joy little girl!  Here's to another amazing month!

Wednesday, August 15, 2012

Patience is a Virtue

Soooo, you remember how awhile back I said I wasn't a very patient person and we were in a time of waiting on many different things?

Yep?  Well, we're still waiting........... and I'm not getting anymore patient.

The two big things, we are still waiting on so I can't share about those.  However, one of the big things a door closed on.  But that opened a new door of opportunity that I will hopefully be able to share about soon once all the details are worked out!

The other big thing is still a waiting game.  We are definitely getting somewhere, but I can't really share anymore than that right now.


The little things.  Well, not much is happening. We're still waiting on the board of accountancy to make up their mind.  We're still waiting for the insurance company to review the medical claims (and this was supposed to be done at the beginning of June at the LATEST!) and we're still waiting to hear back from the officer with Peter's car stuff.  I'm very very grateful to have the car back, but it has been 3 weeks since we've heard anything from anybody as far as even getting an idea of what they found and when we can get the stolen items back.

So, life has been one big waiting game this summer.  Hoping that this game of waiting is over SOON!

Friday, August 10, 2012

2 Years!

It has been 2 years since we picked up our precious little man in Ethiopia!  


I can't believe how the last 2 years have flown by!  He is such a joy in our lives and I cannot imagine our life without him in it!  It is unbelievable to me, how God perfectly ordained for this little man to be our son!  We are the luckiest parents alive to be blessed with this joy filled little man!  We have been looking forward to celebrating this special milestone with him for awhile!

While we were in Ethiopia, we picked up a gift to give him every year on his "Gotcha Day"!  This year we gave him a little wooden giraffe toy and an Ethiopian story book!


We have also decided to make Gotcha Day a fun family celebration day!  So Peter took the day off work and we took the boys to play at an awesome jungle gym!  They had a blast running all over the place!  Definitely a place we will need to take them again!



And then we took off to Ethiopian food.  I'm not sure if this part of the tradition will continue because our little Ethiopian doesn't seem to like Ethiopian food, but we'll keep trying :)



He was much happier with good old peanut butter and jelly :)  




Malachi, we love you so much! I am so thankful that we have gotten to spend the last 2 years with you in our arms!  You are an incredible blessing that I thank God for every day!  You are so smart, so funny, and so joyful!  You have taught me so much just by being who you are!  You filled my heart in a way that only you could!  You are the precious gift that I dreamed so long for!  Love you, love you, love you, sweet boy!  

Sunday, August 5, 2012

18 Months

My precious little Elias is now 18 months old.  WHERE has the time gone?!?  Seriously, I can't even believe that he is 18 months already! I just want to scoop him up and enjoy every single second of this sweet little boy before he grows up!  He is seriously, so sooo precious! I just don't know how else to describe him.  He's kissable, huggable, lovable!  He's sweet as sugar!  He's heart melting! He's the warm and fuzzy's!  I adore this little guy!  


Elias has had some huge milestones over these past 3 months.  He learned how to climb on the furniture which means he has a whole new range of things to get into.  But too bad for him, we already had to baby proof everything thanks to big brother! He has also moved into a big boy bed!  This was a huge (and probably a bit hasty) move for Eli.  He kept getting his legs stuck in the crib, so we decided to try the toddler bed.  He is doing pretty good, but the combination of the two boys sharing a room now (another milestone!) creates a lot more drama at night and at naps.  They can truly be double trouble!  Now Malachi is also getting out of bed in the night and he turns on the lights and they have a little 4AM party time!  They go down around 8 at night, and are up between 6-8 in the morning.  They also nap 2-3 hours during the day.

This creates a little bit crankier babies as they aren't sleeping enough.  Poor, silly little man is falling asleep all over the place these days, and even in his high chair :)


Elias is now 24 lbs 12 ounces (25-50%) and 31" (10-25%).  He's still our little guy which is somewhat surprising because this little guy loves to eat!  There still really isn't much that he doesn't like to eat.  He eats anything we put in front of him, which is really nice!  His most favorite foods are waffles, banana's and milk.  He also loves to explore his food and makes quite the mess at meal times as he must play with it and mush it around while he eats!  

His most favorite toys are still balls.  He has a great arm and a great jump shot :)  He also loves to play with cars.  He is really starting to enjoy books.  He knows almost all of his colors and a few of the shapes and a few of his letters.  We call him the little mimicker or the little copy-cat because he tries to do everything that Malachi does!  It is pretty cute to watch!   Also, he loves to sneak into the pantry to play anytime I give him the opportunity!






He is also learning new words left and right.  I haven't really been able to keep track of them, because he has  been saying so much!  So his official count ends at 43!  New words in the last 3 months are:  Minnie, Cracker, Go, Gate, I love you, toast, mickey, eat, help, hot, teeth, car, elmo, down, blue, bowl, apple, more nana (banana), mamma bye bye, hi mama, night night, purple, no, more!  

He is also finally getting some teeth!  He has gotten his upper side incisors and 2 molars on the top - bringing the total to 8 teeth!  He is working on the bottom molars and we are still really wondering where those bottom side incisors are! 

We love you so much Elias!  You continue to amaze us everyday with these new skills you are learning.  You have become such a big boy! Your mind is always working and you always seem busy in thought! I love so many things about you.  Your beautiful curly hair.  Your dark brown eyes and long eye lashes.  Your adorable little smirk that if we're lucky turns into a full on smile with your precious lil dimple!  Your little Russian accent when you speak!  You have a heart of gold that already shines through and we are so blessed to have you in our lives!  We love you little Elias!