Mary & Gabriel

The girls wanted to reenact the birth of Jesus for us today, so Macy was director, Lily played Mary & Ava was Gabriel and the inn keeper.  Joseph decided to play Legos instead, so it was what you would consider a "loosely based" rendition.  

 Telling Mary the good news is quite humorous.  The director was not amused.

Merry Christmas to all of you...

Henry, 9 months

His smile is contagious.

He goes.  And goes and goes.  He now crawls really fast away from me when he thinks he's got something I'm going to take away, usually laughing as he goes.

He finally decided that food was worth trying (instead of poison as portrayed by his faces of disgust when I tried giving him anything), but his favorite yummy snack is finding dried leaves on the floor.  This would be suspect #1 to cause speed-crawling away from mommy while giggling.  Little dude doesn't learn though, because as tasty as those look they never, ever go down & he ends up gagging on them & I have to extract them.  Which he hates as much as having his nose wiped & his diaper changed.  Little bit of a drama dude on our hands.

Fog on the lens=cool, dreamy filter

Last week, he had the sniffles so I gave him a bath with the eucalyptus baby wash to help clear his breathing.  He was all over the bubbles, trying to eat them.  

He also spent a great deal of time kissing the cute baby.

Poor little rosy cheeks...but he's better now!

The Christmas Play

Our annual Christmas play

All grades K-4th are the choir.  Jack is setting beside his bestie, being boys.  While I admittedly didn't watch him too much, by the end of the play these two were being increasingly dramatic with their singing.  Looooots of hand gestures & trying to get away with what they could while not attracting the attention of Sr. Stephanie, their teacher, who was sitting in front of them.

The play is put on by the 5th graders.  Macy was truly in her element...

You can see how excited she is.  She was nervous, but not scared.  She told me that 2 minutes after it started, she totally lost her butterflies & loved performing-she was sad that it was over.  She played 2 characters & sang a little solo.  She even got some chuckles out of the crowd for her portrayal of an old lady.  She didn't forget her lines & spoke so well...we were very, very proud of her!!

All of the kids did great, it was such a cute little performance & so fun to see the kids shine.  

Shhh...baby sleeping

He's such a light sleeper.  Some people think you can make a heavy sleeper-"vacuum while the baby sleeps, make noise so they are used to it" is advice new parents are often told.  I'm here to tell all those people they are wrong.  If you have a heavy sleeper, it's because God decided to gift you.  We have 4 very active, very LOUD children, a dog that feels it her personal responsibility to announce every potential intruder (aka-mailman, neighbor dogs, people walking by) & a piano that becomes so enticing at nap time no one can resist banging out some notes in this house, if that's not noise then I don't know what is.  And still, he wakes at the slightest sneeze.
He is the master of power naps.  Ten minutes and he's good.  He seems to need very little sleep & may just be a morning person as well.  *shocker*  Seems that's how we make them around here.  Which is funny because neither parent is a true morning person.

“Let Him Sleep...For When He Wakes, He Will Move Mountains.”

― Napoleon Bonaparte

Fun in any given bathroom

When he's not busy entertaining himself in the dog's water bowl, Henry likes to sneak off to the bathroom.  Any will do, he knows the way & can get there very rapidly.  He also has down the stealth mode of transportation-the "if I quietly sneak off I can buy more time" approach that Ava adopted early in life.

Having a somewhat on the bigger side family means there is about a 90% chance that someone (no names, eh-hm kids?) has left the lid open thus creating a beautiful opportunity to drop whatever he has carried in his little chubby hand into the water with another pretty good chance that aforementioned "someone" did not flush.  All I'm saying is that I'm very glad my husband invested in the new toilet that can flush 20 golf balls because there are things that are just not worth saving, ya know?  Buh-bye.  Splashing does commence after dropping & we all know how fun splashing is when you are of this size.

 Barbie's knee-high boot...best chew toy ever

Next on the list if either the toilet is closed or he has been sidelined by the excitement of the shower curtain is to ascertain what exactly is in the tub.

Annnnnnd then try to reach it.

He is a chubby baby, but that durn melon he carries around for a head still outweighs him & makes him top-heavy.  I know it's only a matter of time before he nose-dives into the tub and it's going to hurt.

(All joking aside, we do realize the dangers of drowning in both places & watch him carefully)

This week he started saying "Daadaa" and has about 100 different intonations & facial expressions to go along with it, making him even more adorable than before.

Holding hands

Macy went to Nana & Bop's last weekend all by herself.  She had so much fun, but missed her pooch.

From the looks of it, Brooke missed her as well.  Brooke hates for you to touch her feet & the fact that she let Macy fall asleep holding her foot says a lot.

October

Pieces and parts from our October...

Ava is adjusting to Lily being in school, but she loves having her at home on Mondays & in the afternoons.

Every day after school Jack cannot wait to get in his room & build with Legos.  He's getting really good at creating things...things with moving parts, or that really look like what he says they are.  You can tell he thinks about Legos at school & then starts building as quickly as he can.  I think he also enjoys the downtime.

Oh, my Henry.  What a little mess.  Bop calls him "Tank"...it's appropriate.  He moves like one & feels like one and is somewhat unstoppable.  Bathing him is truly like wrestling an alligator-a SLICK one!

Ava usually gets to take a bath with him.  She has to cover up the drain so he doesn't try to eat it.  I can only run about a 1/2 inch of water because he moves the whole time & sticks his face in the water.  She starts asking about 5 min into the bath "Can Henry get out yet?"

He popped the bottom two teeth quite awhile ago, but they are fully in & sharp.  He likes to practice using them, not on food-no, that's still poison-but on skin other than his own.  Ouch.

Often he's had enough of his siblings...they just love him so much and so close.  Ha!  Personal space?  Not around here.

This was in our park the other night.  There were supposed to be 30 balloons, but wind was an issue.  It (wind) pretty much messed up the whole weekend's plans for these people.

 It was sooooo cold!  The fires felt good when they would sporadically light up the night.

Enjoying some hot chocolate and loud flames!  Noah (background) was not a fan.  Henry was bundled so tight I don't think he could turn his head to look.

By the end of October, Henry has learned how to crawl fast, pull up, & even let go.  Oh, he's trying as hard as he can to be a big boy...and I'm trying to keep him little!  He's winning.

Halloween is nostalgic in our neighborhood...we gather a group of friends & hit up the neighbors & laugh & talk & pet dogs & stop cars to cross the street & find ways to exploit candy from our kids.  There's lots of kids out and it is fun.  Then we come home & let them binge until bedtime.

So, this morning my kids didn't have school because it's a Holy Day (All Saints Day) & while they waited for breakfast they started bartering with their candy.  "What will you trade me for a Starburst? Ohhh, what can I give you for your Butterfinger?"  With four of them, you have a lot of options!  They have been really sweet about sharing this year...it has surprised me.  Maybe they are listening to our endless lectures once in a while!  Haaaha!