JJ's and old fogey baby

Can you believe JJ is 6 months old? Yeah, me either. I think he's considered and "older" baby now. :(  
He has 5 teeth now! He's starting to grab his toes...who knew he could even reach them (or see them)?!
I don't think he's anywhere close to crawling...at all. His sleeping has been a little rough lately and I think it's from all the teething and he had a little tiny cold for about a week...he still sounds like a hog when he's nursing. But I can't complain too much, with all the extra nursing I've lost 2lbs! Woot, woot!

This is right before the crying started.

Is that not the cutest thing you've ever seen? Don't you just want to hold him and kiss his fat little cheeks?

Here's the best close up of all his new teeth. You can see his front right gum is broken through, I took this two nights ago and the tooth is already popped down more.

After this I picked him up (I swear) and cuddled him and gave him kisses!
He has his 6 month appt next week (on my birthday...oh how the mighty have fallen) and we'll see what his stats are. Our guess at home is a whopping 24lbs...any other guesses out there?

Project Runway

P.R. is one of my favorite shows- ever. In every season they do this "look into the past" and they show the designers as kids. It's always so cute and you can tell from an early age that they had an eye for style.

That's why I've been trying to take more pictures of Elle and her outfits. I can totally see her on P.R. someday. I'm going to try and put up some pictures of her once a week in her choices of clothes.
Her newest "piece" is a pair of Eva's tights that are waaaaay too long for her legs but she's obsessed with them. This is how she's been wearing them:
p.s. these are all her own poses

Elle is her own girl, she always has been. I LOVE that she loves shopping and I've really enjoyed watching her style develop over the years. From her hair down to her shoes she picks everything and is always extremely specific on how she wants me to do her hair...so if you see her with one random tiny ponytail in the back of her head...it's is purposeful and planned.

Helping Hands

The girls always want to help with JJ. It's been hard for me to let them. Mostly because I don't want to be one of those moms that asks their kids to do tons of things...so much so that they aren't doing kid things anymore. I'm realizing that there are certain things that they really want to do at this age and honestly there are things they should be doing (like chores).
It's been hard for me to get organized enough to have a regular schedule of things. I'm still getting use to the fact that I have a school age child and next year I'll have 2 kids in school! Yikes.

I'm also learning that when they ask to do something I need to just say "yes" and then they will have the opportunity to serve, to learn from mistakes and it makes it easier on me (best part)!

The other night Eva asked to feed JJ, a regular occurrence and I said, "Yes!"

I tired to snap some pictures of her feeding him, she did such a great job, but of course once I got the camera out JJ was mesmerized by it and wasn't really paying attention to Eva anymore...plus I think he was getting full!
Here are some pictures of our youngest and our oldest bonding!

Cute, right?
She did a really great job and she's learning from any "mistakes" like last week when she got too close and JJ kicked the bowl out of her hand...it got all over her pants and all over the carpet...you better believe she holds onto the bowl better and doesn't get as close to him now. Lesson learned.
Look at me, I'm growing up by letting my kids grow up...it's hard!

Stuff

Elle calls a forehead a "head board." We will be dilating Elle's eye again for the next three months to try and correct the vision in her left eye. The eye Dr. suggested putting the drops in at night after she falls asleep, I tried it last night...it totally worked and was equally hilarious and a little sad. But mostly I was trying not to laugh at her reaction. Luckily with one dilated eye she wants to wear her glasses...which is exactly the desired effect to correct her vision.
Elle also started preschool and doesn't like that it's only an hour and a half and that she can't bring her lunch yet. She currently likes to wear all of her tops backwards and usually has either leggings, shorts or jeans that are too short under some type of tulle or petti skirt.

Eva likes to wear shorts at all times. She does not like plain t-shirts. She currently wears this ugly spider velcro bracelet all the time...except to church, her choice. She started a drawing class after school this week and she loves it. Second grade is currently "totally awesome and I never want to leave!" We've been giving Eva more responsibilities and she's done them all very well. Jeremy and I can't believe how old she's getting, I'm excited...Jeremy's currently googling "best guns to scare boys away from my daughter" we all handle it in our own way.

Said spider bracelet is in the picture below:

JJ is now 5.5 months old. He sleeps through the night. He likes to be warm when he sleeps, I've experimented on him and he seems to sleep longer when he wears his fleece jammies, which is good because those are the only ones that he fits into. He's going through that stage where he wants to hold things and explore them but then drops them 5 seconds later and then cries till you hand it back to him...luckily I have TWO older girls who looooove to keep handing crap back to him. He still has two teeth. He likes eating solids...whenever I get around to it. He's very quiet...until he's not quiet. He never really opens his throat when he cries...think about how deaf people talk...that's how JJ cries or whines. He's most ticklish in his moobie region. I can't hold him on one arm for too long because my muscles start to shake and when I nurse him sometimes my hand goes numb. Jeremy and I decided that he's just like Eva as a baby but with Elle's face. I love him.

These pictures of the girls are from the other night when they were in charge of dinner, they made pancakes and cooked for us. It was so awesome eating first...it was warm! They did a great job, Elle did get a little burn but really, I think we all kind of assumed someone was going to end up getting burned, luckily that didn't deter her at all and she just learned not to touch a hot pan (funny, I could have swore I said that about a thousand times before they got started but we all know mom only talks to hear herself talk, right?)

JJ's 1st real laughs!

JJ was on the floor and starting to whine so I clapped really loud to get his attention (yes, I am the mom the startles my children to get their attention) and he just stared at me, so naturally, I did it again. Then he started to smirk a little, like he liked it, so I kept on clapping and then he started to laugh, like a real-life "I'm a person" laugh. It was so cute, so we quickly grabbed my cell phone and recorded it.
He's just the sweetest little guy ever!

1st day of 2nd grade

Eva was so nervous about 2nd grade. She had heard all sorts of things about the 2nd grade teacher (ie: she gives a lot of homework, she's really strict etc.) and I told her not to believe everything she hears. Then she was nervous about seeing her friends and just being in 2nd grade. On the way to school yesterday I told her I was always nervous and excited too, but after a little bit it all went back to normal and was lots of fun. She said, "I'm in 2nd grade now, it's not going to be normal." I said, "it's you're new normal." and then Eva paused and said, "A new normal, ok, I like that."

When I picked her up from school yesterday she said, "I LOVE 2nd grade, I NEVER want to LEAVE!!!"
"I LOVE my new teacher, she is SO funny, she tells us about ALL her different personalities, like when she's Mrs. Picky or Mrs. Grumpy, it's SO funny!" "And she didn't feel like doing math today SO WE DIDN'T! It was SO awesome!!"

Pretty sure 2nd grade will be an awesome year for her.
Here are a bunch of pictures of the same thing:

The "2" is for 2nd grade...not a peace sign.

New teacher, Mrs. Free.

Elle starts preschool in a couple weeks...I'm sure she'll have her fill of pics for her last year of preschool.

Labor Day Weekend 2011

There was shopping (fun for mom).
And there was playing at the beach (fun for everyone else).
There was also really great food at Eleanor's Undertow, our favorite place in Lincoln City.
(All photos are by Jeremy, he's getting good!)

Making a sand rock.

Sisterly love...possibly a forced hug.

I love this picture:



Caution, extreme thighness:

He screamed in horror after he touched the water...it was absolutely freezing, my toes went numb after a few seconds, I have no idea how the girls could stand being in it.

We all had a really great time, it was a long day but, a great way to end summer.