Life is starting to normalize, whatever that means. We are getting into a good routine (and you all know how much I LOVE routine!). I’m starting to feel normal-ish.
/Caisen went from only going 4-5 hours between bottles to suddenly sleeping 8-9 hours between bottles. That’s the best gift! He’s been doing it for a few weeks now, and we love it! He gets a bottle around 10 (a dreamfeed), and we feed him again sometime between 7 and 8 am. We tried thickening his formula with oatmeal instead of rice (it helps his reflux) to see if that helped with his tummy troubles. It didn’t. Turns out the poor kid is allergic to oatmeal and broke out in excema head to toe. Literally, it’s all over his head. We switched back to rice, but it will take a few weeks to clear his body. Caisen has been smiling more and more. His happy place is the changing table. I’m not sure why, but that’s where I get the most smiles out of him. Tonight while I was changing him for bed I was tickling him and he giggled! It was so cute! He has been cooing, but this was the first real giggle I’ve heard.
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/All four grandparents cam the weekend of July fourth for Caisen’s baby blessing. Eric and Tristi and family were going to come, but with Kimball’s nose still running, I didn’t want to pass on any germs. Church starts at 8:30 (which is only horrible when you don’t have kids and get to sleep in on weekends. We’re up anyway, so it doesn’t matter). We dressed him in his white outfit at the last possible moment to avoid any spit ups. Literally 3 minutes before Adam was getting up to do the baby blessing, Caisen had the loudest, stinkiest, biggest poop ever. He was as serene as he could be as he squirted and squirted. Adam and I were cracking up (so irreverent!). As soon as he was done (and Adam got up with him), he started screaming because his bum was on fire thanks to the toxic goo in his pants. He screamed through the whole thing. As soon as it was over, Adam took our angel for a diaper change. That’s when we saw the leakage. It could have been worse. It has been worse. But yuck! Glad I wasn’t holding him (love you Caisen).
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/The weekend of the blessing we went to the botanical gardens and Stone Mountain with grandma and grandpa. Poor Kimball had been sick all week with a high fever over 103 and runny nose. He was feeling better but still pretty pooped and not feeling 100%. We climbed all over the top of the mountain with the kids’ new backpack leashes. They just love being up there! We rode the train again and explored some of the plantation. There is a barnyard/petting zoo with pigs, sheep and goats. The kids didn’t want to touch the animals (which is fine by me!), but Kimball did follow the sheep around saying, “Ma! Ma! Ma!” Those are some patient animals.
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/Brinlee found every rock and pebble in the park and promptly put it in her mouth. Absolutely everything goes in her mouth these days. She likes to come show me what is in her mouth, and I get to dig it out. I’m lucky to have all my fingers because she takes the opportunity to bite down as hard as she can. No blood. Yet.
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/The kids have discovered……SAUCE! The first was ketchup. They saw us put it on our burgers and wanted some. We couldn’t convince them to put it on their food or dip, but they did wipe it up with their hands and suck it off and smear it everywhere. At Stone Mountain they wanted some of our sauce, so we got those little paper cups of ketchup and they dipped their fries. After lunch I took Brinlee out of the stroller and noticed something in the seat. There was a paper ketchup cup stuck to the back of her pants and ketchup all over her backside. I have no idea how that happened, but she was a mess. A cute mess, but a mess. From ketchup we moved on to alfredo sauce and sweet and sour sauce (which is when we picked up dipping our food).
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/The other big mealtime mastery is forks and spoons!! Forks have been easiest. We give them the shrimp cocktail forks that came with our silverware set. They were made for kids, it seems! The points are sharp enough to spear food, and small enough to fit in their mouths. Spoons are a little harder, but they’re practicing. I was worried about dangerous behavior with forks, but if they start waving them around, we say, “If you wave your fork around, I’ll take it away. That could hurt you.” They usually stop, and if they don’t, they lose it. They rarely do that.
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/All three of them have officially matered shapes, colors, numbers, 25 sight words, and most of their letters. They have a hard time with W, X and Q. Their favorite shape is octagon, probably because it’s fun to say, and they way they say it is too cute. Kimball’s version is about 6 syllables long. Sawyer calls it octy. Brinlee’s version is almost right. They love picking sight words, numbers, colors, shapes and letters out in the books we read. Sawyer even got “play” from “playing” in one of their books.
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/The baby balding tradition continues. Caisen was born with a head full of hair, and most of the top is gone. The sides and back are quickly following. It was dark auburn, but I’m guessing it will come in (surprise surprise) blond. Kimball’s hair comes nearly to the middle of his back if you pull it straight. The curls come to his shoulders. It’s getting pretty wild, so we might actually have to trim it. The grandfathers were murmuring about taking him on a drive to the barber. I murmured back some very serious threats if they pulled a stunt like that. People ask why I cut Sawyer’s hair and not Kimball’s. I don’t. Sawyer’s hair hasn’t been cut (minus the rat tail). That is all it’s grown. My hair grows really fast, and I guess so does Kimball’s. I’m not playing favorites, folks. Brinlee has been wearing pigtails everyday. She looksdownright adorable with her hair up like that.
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/Our lessons in manners are paying off. The kids are signing please and signing and saying thank you. It sounds more like “geku”, but we get what they mean. They like to bring me things and tell me thank you. Or maybe they’re telling me to say thank you.
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/Our garden is doing ok. We planted some things too early (three days before Caisen was born), so the green beans never sprouted (though I replanted some this week), only two zucchini and cucumber plants came up. We have gads of pumpkin vines, but only two big pumpkins (about the size of basketballs) and a few small ones. Something has been chewing on the base. We have lots of green tomatoes, but have only had a few ripe ones. We have some sweet red peppers growing, but those won’t be ready until August or September. The butternut squash have gone wild, so wild they’re smothering the carrots. We learn more with each year of gardening.
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/I’m actually going to try canning this year. I can honestly say I never dreamed I’d do that. I want to can some tomato products, but I need a bunch to ripen at once. I’ve got all my gear and recipes, I just need some large quantities of tomatoes! I’m planning on tomato soup, spaghetti with meat sauce, chili, green bean and maybe some chicken and beef. I’m also going to experiment with dehydrating foods. I received a free dehydrator and I’m going to see how we like it. My first try will be zucchini chips and maybe some blueberries that someone gave us. If you had told me even a few months ago that I would try this, I would have told you no way!
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/Church nursery is going well. Last week during snacktime Brinlee left the table with her brothers and went to sit at an all girl table. The boys didn’t seem offended. We have stayed in there with them each Sunday as they adjust. Sawyer needs the most reassurance, especially right now when we’ve had so much change. Today we went in with them, I grabbed Caisen’s bottle and blanket, told them I was going to feed the baby and I’d see them later. Brinlee and Kimball barely looked up at me. Sawyer looked a little distressed. I listened outside the door, but didn’t hear a peep out of him (and I would have heard him, believe me!). When we came back 2 hours later they said everyone did great! Sawyer occasionally looked at the door like he might cry, but they quickly distracted him with a toy. He never fussed. It’s really good for them to get to play with other kids and socialize. It’s good for mommy and daddy to go to Sunday School and listen. I confess it’s hard for me to leave them there. I feel guilty.
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/Things have gone pretty well during Sacrament Meeting at church the last two Sundays. We bought some special books that they only see during that hour. They have moving parts and have numbers, shapes, letters, colors and words they recognize. Between that and the Cheerios, they do pretty well. We still don’t hear hardly anything, but we’re there, right?
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/The two favorite songs right now are head shoulders knees and toes (HSKT) and itsy bitsy spider. Brinlee likes to stand on top of one of my grain buckets and do HSKT. That scares me. She hasn’t fallen yet, but I suppose when she does she’ll either work on her balancing skills or not do it anymore. They love to sit in my lap so I can help them do the motions to itsy bitsy spider. We have some CDs with kid songs that we turn on and dance to. All three of them love to dance. It’s actually stomping and marching in place, but they chant, “dancing, dancing, dancing!” while they do it.
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/I still can’t upload pictures since we updated our blog software, but we’re working on fixing it. Hopefully I’ll have some soon.