5

Kason turned 5!!

He was pretty excited. After feeding Emry I went in to check on the boys at 5 am. Kason woke up and wanted to get up then because he said he was so excited.

Isaac had to get to school, but they started Kason's day off with an early, quick trip to Albertson's for Kason to pick out whatever kind of cereal he wanted for breakfast. He picked out Captain Crunch mixed berries - quite the treat.

One of the boys favorite songs is "I'll Make a Man Out of You" from Mulan. They've never seen the movie though, we just watched the song on Youtube. So, we rented Mulan from the library and they were so excited to watch it.

This picture makes me laugh. Kason is sitting very crossed legged, Asher can't even sit that way. Asher has one sock on, one off...a normal thing. And we are trying potty training again with Asher, so far it's going great.

This year we had a friend party. Kason wrote some of the invitations and was very serious about handing them out. When his friends answered the door he would hand the invitation to them and say seriously, "You are invited to my birthday party". The theme was fighter jets. We played yarn spider webs (not so fighter jet-ish) and pin the fighter jet on the refueler plane. Then we had cake and ice cream. I felt like the cake was...struggling, but Kason loved it.

Then all 14 kids just ran around and got some energy out.

Asher and his buddy Myer.

A typical Asher face

It was a busy (everything takes 10 times longer to do when you have an infant) but fun day.

Some things about Kason:

-Words I would use to describe him: mature, sensitive, sweet, sometimes shy, emotional, competitive, detail oriented, and responsible.

-He really likes to draw

-He makes noises all. day. long. Like gun/fighting/plane/spitting/loud noises while he is holding an alligator, or tiger, or gun or whatever. Sometimes I feel like the noise is just reverberating around in my head and I have to really get his attention to snap him out of whatever intense game is going on in his head.

-He is such a good helper and such a good big brother. One time I was putting Asher down for nap (which really isn't nap anymore, just pile lots of toys on his bed time) and Emry was crying. I usually tell Asher a story and sing him a song before nap/bed. Kason patted my back and said, "I got this mom, you go take care of Whippy". (Yes, he still calls her that). It was very sweet.

-This birthday Isaac had quite the joke going with Kason that all his presents were going to be cleaning things. He even went as far as to wrap a roll of paper towels up and give it to him as his first present. Kason was pretty good natured about it. The other day, though, Kason got his paper towels out and started cleaning all the doorknobs! That's my boy!

-We love our Kason!

Stats and Snow

All dressed up for church - I think purple is her color

Emry had a 2 month check up, though she was 11 weeks at the time.

Her stats:

Height: 24 " (80%)

Weight: 13 lbs 4 oz (80%)

Head: 15.25" (40%)

She is doing well and is usually a pretty happy and content baby. She spits up waaaay less than the boys and that difference is wonderful! She doesn't like to be cradled, she likes to either be held looking over my shoulder or looking out. She smiles and I've gotten a little laugh out of her once.

I love these next two pictures!

We have had snow a couple times this year!! It lasts on the ground all of 10 minutes at most, but it is so much better to see snow coming down out the window than rain. I think I was more excited than the boys when we saw the snow on this morning.

Here, There, and Everywhere

Some more pictures from the blessing weekend:

I love this picture

With Grandma Swensen

The boys really love their aunts, I think it goes both ways. And I don't know why, but Kason is really into doing this pose for pictures...

With Grandma Higgins

Isaac had a birthday. It was a big one, entering a new decade and all. :) We opened presents and had oreo cheesecake. The next day we left the kids with some good friends and went for a quick shopping trip.

This was Emry's Valentine's Day outfit. I had different plans, but Asher picked this out by himself and there was no compromising on his part.

One Sunday

My boys have loved, loved, loved vacuums, since they were babies - not a bad thing to love. They do think it will vacuum up their toys, though, so when I turn it on they usually rush to clean up their toys so the vacuum doesn't "eat it". I'm not about to tell them otherwise.

I won this prize at a game night. It's a sweeper and I think it might be the best prize ever. The boys vacuum with it all day long. They fight over who gets to vacuum with it. It's a good thing because every single crumb shows up on this awful "carpet".

Life of Late

I have been busy just doing the day to day things, which means trying to keep everyone fed, trying to get everyone dressed, trying to keep Kason and Asher from injuring each other too badly, trying to do laundry (getting it folded and put away is a whole different matter), the list goes on...

This morning is actually pretty good. I exercised, showered, everyone is dressed (ok, not Emry) and it is just 12:00! Alot of that has to do with the fact that (dare I say it) Emry practically slept through the night last night!

We blessed Emry on February 5th. It was a fun weekend.

My mom gave her a beautiful dress.

I think this is actually our first family picture of all 5 of us

We also did some slacklining over the weekend. It was Isaac's Christmas gift and it is super fun, super hard, and a good workout. Obviously we have a long way to go before we can call ourselves "slackliners".

Some more random pictures:

Emry fell fast asleep on a little ottoman we have and we thought it was cute.

Guess I'm not always succeeding at keeping Kason and Asher from injuring each other...This is Asher and it looked way worse than the picture shows...something about wrestling, the ottoman and tackling were involved.

Emry's first day of church (before the blessing). We went to listen to Kason give an awesome primary talk about agency all by himself.

We love smiles

(I seem to not be able to take clear pictures lately)

We have had some unseasonable sunny weather lately and I put Emry down for some sun and tummy time.

Then she started to hate it and her anger gave her strength and she was doing some pretty good planks for an 8 week old.

A few things I have learned or re-learned the last little bit"

-Having 3 kids is busy

-Transferring a stockpot of noodles to the strainer in the sink one handed with a crying baby in the other is nearly impossible.

-Asher really likes to put Emry's "piece of fire" in her mouth (pacifier)