Here comes the sun!

The weather is warming up.

It's nice to be outside to throw the ball around.

And go exploring in the yard.

Welcome Spring!

We are so ready for you.

8 years of marriage, 3 months of life

Two days ago, we celebrated our eighth anniversary.  (A sneaky little lady made her way into our photo). Some friends from church came to watch all three kids which allowed us to go out for a nice dinner. We talked, over coffee, about our eight years and all that we've been through together. It's been a great ride and we're looking forward to more of it!

On the same day as our anniversary, this young boy turned three months old!  He giggled at me for the first time today.  I just love being his mommy.  

(Please try to ignore the fact that he just spit up all over himself.)

A lazy afternoon

Warm sun. Gentle breeze.
Flowers springing up.
A freshly mulched yard.

Time on our hands.

A child's imagination. . . A new "cave" (according to Bella) to explore. Music in the air. And joy all around. A beautiful day.

Planting seeds. . .

This Christmas gift has been sitting up against the dining room wall.

Neglected.

For almost three months.

Until today.Laying the foundation. . . . . . for her very own garden.And now the waiting begins.

Here comes the sun. . .

The sun came out to play today.
Two kids (and their Mama) greatly missed him.

(Bella inspects Graydon's mouthful of nature. There was a tree branch in there just moments before).The rain and clouds had overstayed their welcome. But these two visitors left subtle reminders. . . . . . that our long-awaited spring is drawing near.

For the birds. . .

Bella's bird house.
We just need some seeds and we're all set!

Thinking Spring!

As soon as the calendar turned to March, our house went into spring mode! (Having weather in the 50's these past few days has only helped encourage that). Bella kept pretty busy with a few craft projects.

Construction paper rainbow! She did a fantastic job with this one. Then she wanted to make a sun because it would be "beautiful".Painting the sun inspired her to make some flowers. I painted some as well. Sometimes it's so fun and relaxing to make art. After letting all of the paint dry, we cut out the flowers and Bella taped them to the windows. (I think she used about half a roll)! Our spring-ified kitchen! It's kind of hard to capture the whole essence in a photo, but these few things really do make the kitchen look so cheerful. Of course, our pretty kitchen did not come without a price. I left Bella alone with the (child-safe) scissors. She's been handling scissors pretty well and these did not have a pointy tip so I was not fearful of her getting hurt. Anyway, it didn't even dawn on me that Bella would cut anything besides paper that afternoon until she came to me all excited about what she discovered. . . "Look Mom! My scissors work just like yours and Dad's!"

She said this with a chunk of hair in one hand and the scissors in the other.

I thought the damage was minimal at first. But then I followed a trail of hair from the playroom to the dining room and realized that this new discovery was several minutes old. As I got a closer look, I saw that she had cut pieces from her left side that could pass for layers. No biggie. Then I saw the big chunk that she took from the top.

Her bangs that were finally long enough to tuck behind her ears were mostly on the floor. What was left was a big chunk that started at her forehead and made it back to the middle of her head.

The waviness to her hair is kind of a double-edged sword. It really disguises all of the unevenness; but also gives a kink to her new bangs, making them pretty impossible to work with.As a result, she's been wearing lots of flowers in her hair.Good thing I made a bunch of these a few weeks back.

***

Bella and Graydon have been playing together so nicely lately. I think their favorite thing to do is chase each other around the coffee table. Graydon finds this hysterical. On this particular afternoon, both wanted to play the piano. I love the friendship that they already have.This is his "Mommy Hold Me!" face. Works every time.***

This weekend was birthday weekend. Bella had two parties to go to. The first was on Saturday morning at a place called 'Sweet N' Sassy'. It was so adorable! The girls got to pick out princess dresses and get their hair, nails, and make-up done. I was sure that Bella would love it as she loves all of those things.

But. . . she was feeling super shy that morning. Didn't want to put on a dress, didn't want to get her nails done. And then she started crying. I was a bit unsure of how this would all turn out.

Then she saw the other girls getting their nails done - something that she looooooves. After a few minutes, she whispered to me, "I don't want green anymore." (Green was the current color of her nails that I had painted the day before). Nails led to hair and hair led to make-up. Before long, she was all decked out.

Here she is getting the princess treatment. This was just after she agreed to getting her nails done. You can tell by her face that she was still a little uneasy at this point.I think this was her first time wearing eye shadow. She picked pink.Here are all the little princesses! There were tons of dresses to choose from though the Cinderella style was clearly the popular choice. Princess Isabella! I wish I would have thought to take a picture of her hair. It was such a cute up do!
***

Like I mentioned earlier, the weather has been beautiful! We spent more time outside this weekend than we have in months. It was glorious!Today was birthday party number 2. Bella has been talking non-stop about this one since getting the invite two weeks ago. The location has a roller skating rink, bouncy slides, kid maze, and games (Chuck. E. Cheese style). She could not wait.

She had a blast!

I missed seeing her skate as I sat in the car with a napping Graydon; but did get to see her on the giant slides. I think this face says it all. Graydon also gave it a try. That was fun!
Good times!!!

Let's talk about SLEEP. . .

. . . or my lack of it during these past four months.

During those early newborn days, Graydon's days and nights were all confused, as is the case with many newborns. Within a week or two, we got them straightened out; though getting him back down after that 2am feeding continued to be a challenge for the next month. By two months of age, I thought we were making progress. Graydon went down for the night around 8pm and would sleep until 1:00/2:00am, then up again around 4:00/5:00am, and then up for the day around 6:30am. I was tired, but that was manageable. At three months, he started waking more frequently. . . sometimes 10:30 or 11:30pm. Sometimes both - in addition to the other times he was already getting up. He also became increasingly more difficult to get back to sleep {I had to nurse him every time - sometimes for a half hour}. I comforted myself with the thought that he's just going through a growth spurt or it's teething. But things haven't gotten better. Couple that with the fact that he's been fighting naps as well {I'd spend a half hour bouncing/shhhhing/rocking/etc. only to have him wake up as soon as I lay him down - continue this dance a few times until he finally stays down - and then only napping for about 20 min.} and you've got one exhausted Mommy who is very close to losing it.

You do what works while it's working. And when it stops working, you find something else that does. That's where we're at. If Graydon was my only child, I might be able to continue this for a while longer with the hope that things will work themselves out. But I've got Bella who also has needs - ones that require me to have some bit of energy during the day. I decided to do some research on sleep training and ordered this book. It hasn't arrived yet, but I have put into play some of its techniques, as I understand them. I started with naps. I rock with Graydon, read him a book, sing him a song, and then lay him down drowsy. He cries. I let him cry for about 2 minutes and then go back and pat him tummy to remind him that I haven't abandoned him. After a few moments, I leave and come back after 5 min. Repeat. Then 7 min. Etc. I had no expectation of how Graydon would respond to this. Thankfully, the longest he's cried for has been 20 minutes (with me going in during the appropriate intervals). Sometimes, he's only cried for 3 minutes. We're only on Day 3 of this. As far as nights, I won't nurse him if it's before 2am. When he wakes up before that, those are the times that he tends to go the full 20 min. before falling back to sleep. I'm hoping that all of this is teaching him how to fall asleep on his own so that he doesn't depend on nursing back to sleep all of the time. Ideally, the goal is to get him to sleep through the night, but I'll take what I can get at this point.

And before I can go on, I want to add that Andy has been very helpful in all of this. I'm the one that gets up in the night since I see no reason for both of us to be exhausted. But when 6am rolls around and Graydon is ready to be up for the day, Andy will take him and let me sleep until 8:30am. I absolutely need that. One morning I came down to find not only two content kids, but the dishwasher unloaded and reloaded, diapers in the wash machine, and garbage ready to go out the door. I started crying. Apparently sleep deprivation makes me really emotional.

Other than Graydon's sleep issues, here is what we've been up to this week:

Homemade popsicles are quite a treat on those unseasonably hot spring days. We made two batches of pink lemonade ones.My cute family! Bella looking more and more beautiful.Isn't this photo so sweet? Bella didn't like being worn, but Graydon loves it.Such a precious boy. Looks a lot like Daddy here.I took the kids to a farm/play area on Thursday. Bella had a great time! Somebody turned four months old!!! He celebrated by rolling over from his back to his tummy. I've seen it twice - but only when he's not wearing a diaper. Bathtime progression: hanging out on the bathroom floor while Mommy fills the tub.

Getting all cleaned up! Graydon cracks me up in the tub. He's always kicking his legs around; but with not much room on the sides for his arms to do much, they are just kind of there. Makes him look like he's doing a horizontal irish dance!

Drying off: with feet to play with, who needs toys!

My kiddos! Graydon was not quite in the picture-taking mood that Bella was in, but I think it's sweet that they are holding hands.Sometimes my love for these kids just overwhelms me and it makes me cry. Maybe it's the emotion-induced sleep deprivation; but I think that sometimes God lets me in on how blessed I am. That happened this week. Nothing brings me joy faster than to see these two kids interact with each other. Bella can make Graydon laugh like no one else.And he just adores her. My cup overflows!