When you have Hamberger's you make Happy Meals!

This year we decided to do Alex and Kalea’s birthday parties together. With their birthday’s being only 2 weeks apart, trying to do 2 parties, is a little too much stress on mommy. We will likely do seperate once they are old enough to do friend parties, but in the meantime together it is! This year the theme was Veggie Tales. There aren’t a lot of things out there on veggie tales for birthday’s so I kinda pieced stuff together. Here are some of the pics:

Alex AKA Bob the Tomato

Kalea AKA Larry the Cucumber

I made these shirts for the kids, it has their Birthday age on the back as well. Super easy and fun to make. Ill do a blog post on it, but each shirt cost under $5 =)

We set up some shade on our patio and ate outside on this gorgeous day!

Veggie faces for center pieces

cantelope turtle table decor

Bob drawn on the kids table cloth

Larry on the kids table

I had a lot of fun decorating this cake, but I totally used a box mix and had the fondant too thick. It looked cool, but the flavor was lacking. Guess next time Ill have to focus on that instead of just the fun stuff =)

Singing Happy Birthday to them, Kalea loved it!

Blowing the candles out

Chowing down!

At a mother daughter banquet this past weekend, a friend shared that you just have to choose to laugh rather than cry at some of the things our kids do. I constantly remind myself of the need to laugh.  Somehow, the phrase “there is no sense in crying over spilled milk” gets put into constant practice literally at our house. (Unless its breastmilk, then I really do cry.) Our house is always full of noise  excitement   tears  laughter   life.

Here are a few of the things that we have laughed at lately

Alex emptied the ENTIRE newly organized  toy/book shelf (Including actually pulling the shelves off). When I asked him what happened he said “the big giant tomatoes did it!”.  Hmmmm maybe I should reconsider veggie tales.

I set the kids up to do some water colors. I even had them take their shirts off, and still Kalea turned them into finger paints and made me wish I had taken her shorts off too.

Not to be outdone, Alex did the same

Alex (trying to save me from extra work) poured himself an extra bowl of Cheerios… all over the floor.

This was pretty classic of Kalea’s look and mood most of the week 😛

This little guy became mobile:

Which led to this guy getting upset

Because “MOM! Michael is playing with my STUFF!”

When I would ask Michael about it, he merely looked at me, grinned and showed me his new trick: Clapping =)

Welcome to life at the HamHouse! =) I <3 my life!

Kids have a way of really humbling you. Not gonna lie, my kids are great, but they are 2, 1 and baby. So, we have our moments. Well I don’t know what got into them this week but they were pretty well rotten  whiny normal kids. And they were stepping on my last nerve. A. Lot.  I was that mom this week that everyone looks at and says “I won’t be like that”. I lost my temper, put off reading books, snapped, and mumbled under my breath. Which in turn caused them to act even more like 2,1 and baby.  I think you get the picture that it was just a bad week.

But despite my shortfalls as the mommy I should be, I was so blessed by this little girl 

When I went to go get her up in the morning, I could hear little cries coming from her crib. I would walk in with my pleasant “good morning Beautiful!” and then ask what was wrong. “oh *little sigh*, I just tryin.” “why are you crying?” “Tuz, I just missin you”.

Gulp. I wouldn’t be missin me, I would be hanging out in my bedroom to avoid me as much as possible. But my sweet Kalea, had a way of showing me just how I should be loving her. Even when I’m in a bad mood, even when she is in a bad mood. She still loves me unconditionally. She still wanted to spend time with grouchy mom.  After that I kinda shaped up, and tried not to get so aggravated when Kalea shreaked because Alex took the toy sweeper out of her hand, or Alex whined about not having honey on his cheerios, or Michael simply could not be put down and the dog wanted to go out at the most inconvenient time.

So often we look at the parenting relationship as a mirror of us and God, with the children being similar to us. This week, I realized that my kids can give me a pretty good look at the character of God. He loves us unconditionally. We can throw a fit, scream and yell because God isn’t doing things our way, in our time (seriously, do you know how slow a 1 year old can move?) And doesn’t God know that I have dishes to wash and laundry to fold? I just don’t have time to sit and read with Him. We can grumble under our breath about how it just isn’t going as smoothly as it should be. And yet after my fits, He still wants to come up and give me a big hug like my Alex and out of the blue say “I love you so much!”  He still cries just because he is “missing me”.

Now, Jason and I are still working on our three displaying all of the character of God, but they pretty much have the displaying unconditional love thing down.

Today in church we heard a great message about how rules without relationship will lead to rebellion. Right now I can get away with just rules. They pretty much have to listen to me, they are all under 3. But now is the time to really foster the relationship, so when they are teenagers we have a good foundation. Thankfully, as I muddle through this whole mommy thing, they are in a very forgiving stage of their life. And we can kinda learn this together.  I have to keep reminding myself, I only have one shot with these kids, I can either keep beating myself up whenever I have a failure moment, or I can learn from it and learn from them and move on, apologize to my kiddos and do it better the next time.

Now, here is praying I remember this post when the inevitable whining and shrieking start in the morning.

When we moved in to our home (16 mo ago) we repainted all the rooms upstairs (they were pretty… interesting) (I don’t have these pics saved on the computer =( )

Last year about this time we ripped up all the carpet/flooring downstairs and installed beautiful hardwood flooring.

This year, the next step in our remodeling was a new coat of paint in the Kitchen and Family room. (The toy room is on the to do list, but we will have to dry-wall and so so we think we will just leave the paneling up until the kids are a little less likely to destroy them =P )

First up was the family room. It was a really boring/blah cream color. Not HORRIBLE, but not really warm/inviting/ nice either.

Before

Before (different angle)

Wainscoting (sp?) came down, it was glued on and nailed... looked like a mess.

Mudding over all the messed up parts on the bottom half the wall.

Down came the trim...

After a bit of debate, we decided to take down the plate rail too. (I am so glad we did, the room looks much bigger now)

All ready for primer/paint!

The other room that needed done, was the kitchen, it was a icky almost sea green. We had a really hard time figuring out what color to paint it, we both wanted like a terra cotta color, but that looked BAD with the cupboards, reds didn’t look great, oranges GROSS, yellows, browns eh didn’t really do anything for me. The color green actually wasn’t too bad (just not the shade it was), but we wanted something different. I think we found it =)

Kitchen before

Kitchen before (different angle)

First coat (Burlap) in the family room.

Our faithful helper (my Mom-in-law)

Trimming the kitchen in "Marooned"

hmmmm I think it might take more than one coat (they did 3)

Family room after =)

After - another view

Kitchen after.

Kitchen after another view.

I really struggled with which colors to pick (for like months) But I am so so so happy! I LOVE them, the house feels cozier now, it really makes my cupboards look good. We just need to get the trim stained and up (Jason is going to be busy 😉

Thanks so much to Jason who has worked so hard on re-doing these rooms while I have been basically useless (well running after 3 kids) and to my MIL Gwen who helped a TON!

I bribe my kids. Occasionally. And only when I’m desperate. Like last week.

I went to pick the kids up at mom’s and found out that some how Alex had managed to get his very first splinter =( It was a pretty big/long one too.

I felt SOOOOOOO bad for him, he kept asking me to just “kiss it out”. Mom held him down while I used a combination of tweezers and a pin to try and dig/scrape/pry the stubborn little booger out of his poor finger. He kept not holding still very well, so I told him if he cooperated he could have ice cream. You could see him gather his composure and weigh in his tiny little head if ice cream really was worth going through this deep agony over. He relented, and after about 45 minutes of working on it, we got the whole thing out.

So I spent a whopping $1 and got him some ice cream (which we split 3 ways, because it was hard on mommy too, and Kalea couldn’t be left out!) and bribed my 2 year old. He did however tell me that “that sure was nice of you to get my ouchy out for me mama”.

With all the spoiling, I may end up with a brat, but at least he will be a polite one! 😉

And you know what, if he gets another splinter, he’ll probably get another bribe. Just don’t tell him that!

(Oh and I sincerely thought about trying to get pictures of this first splinter episode, but then I also thought it was more important to take advantage of the time and get it out. So you just get the story =) )

I can’t believe he is a month old. One month ago we welcomed Michael Zachary into our little world. He is such a treat to have in our family!!!!

Lets see what is he “up to”

Well not much he is only a month old! But growth wise – he is about 11 lb (based on the oh so scientific mommy weighing him while holding on the bathroom scale) He is definitely in 3-6 mo clothes. Once I finish up the size one diapers I have I will probably be upping to size 2! He has outgrown most of his NewBorn cloth diapers and is now into the same One Size diapers that his big sister is! (it took my other two till 2-3 mos to be able to wear the one size!) I need to move the straps on his car seat too!

He has about 2-3 looooong naps with good awake times during the day. And sleeps from 1030/11 till 4 and then wakes up about 7 or 8 at night. He does so well. Honestly sometimes (most nights) his big brother wakes up as much as he does!

He has started to smile. I know that before like 3 mos or something its supposed to be gas, but I don’t care its stinking CUTE!

On exactly his 4 week mark he started to really coo. I love hearing his little voice!

His hair has gotten a little lighter, but he is still definitely our brunette! His eyes right now are pretty blue. They are darker than Alex’s were, so I can’t tell if they will stay but I kinda hope they do!

His brother and sister absolutely adore him! Alex likes to remind me to burp him and asks to play with him. (his definition of playing and mommy’s definition aren’t necessarily the same, but we are working on it!) His carseat is right next Michael’s. Tonight Michael was fussing and I could hear Alex singing “its alright Baby Michael, you can be happy”.  To Alex his first name is Baby second name is Michael. And he always says both!

Kalea is such a mom to him. She likes to make sure he has all the blankets he needs. LOTS of blankets. She asks to hold him. and helps me know where his diapers are or get his binky. She calls him “My-My” she likes to walk up to him and say “Hi!”

I can see these three having a lot of fun and keeping mama veeeerrrry busy in the next few years!

And now for what you really want to see : the pictures of sir chubs!

Love the chubby cheeks!

Kalea playing with Michael

Alex helping Michael to swing

Meeting great-grandma Hostetler

2 weeks old

At one month!

• http://t.co/7P0TNQX5 is giving away a Thirsties Duo Wrap! http://t.co/CAxXRxub #

Powered by Twitter Tools

• Now I can access all of my personal #backup straight from my smart phone. Thanks, @CrashPlan! Now enter me to #win an iPad! #CPwin #

Powered by Twitter Tools

• Enter to #win a Onesize #clothdiapers Cover & Prefolds on the I Love Cloth Diapers Blog—>http://ow.ly/56wPN #
• Kissaluvs Newborn AIO Cloth Diaper Review and Giveaway http://t.co/gRQkx14 via @momof3boys3702 #

Powered by Twitter Tools

• #Win 3 bumGenius 4.0 diapers from Euphoria Baby & @mamabmy #clothdiapers http://mamabblog.com/?p=1227 #giveaway #

Powered by Twitter Tools