April Springtime Fun!

April got a little interesting in our house. The third trimester of this pregnancy has been one to forget. Starting at the very end of March, #4 has been resting on a very important vein, and has prevented my brain from getting proper blood flow. Because of this, depending on his position, some days I am unable to stand for more than a couple minutes without blacking out and then losing consciousness. We started spending a lot more time at home, and my house cleaning/cooking/parenting has been virtually nonexistent. 

That being said, kids are still kids and we have continued to have milestones, cute moments, and fun times. Most of my pictures are taken from a chair or couch, but I try to be around as much as possible, and Alex has been a super hero with the cleaning. He never complains about mac-n-cheese or spaghetti for dinner (again), and does most of bedtimes, nighttime cleaning, and everything he can to help.

We have regular visits from the cutest Spiderman around :)

Makenzie has been growing and learning so much. I couldn't help but take a picture when I turned around after getting dressed and she was happily playing peek-a-boo with herself in the mirror.

Hair chalk has added a whole new dimension to our school hair-dos. O has new ideas almost daily, and I can get away with anything day-old or super messy as long as it's pink or purple!

I had my first mean mom moment with Kenzie this week. She is totally attached to her 'melmo' and 'woof woof'. She carries them around with her, sleeps with them, and always wants them at the table. I am totally good with placing them on the table or counter to watch, but I don't let her put them on the tray...they just get too messy. One morning she was very insistent, and refused to get into her high chair without 'melmo'. After about 15 minutes of helping the other kids get through breakfast, she finally pouted her way over to me and gave me Elmo. I put him on the counter, her in her chair, and she ate breakfast with a scowl the entire time. That day and every day since, I have been really grateful for a new reader who loves to practice her skills. On days when Makenzie sleeps in, Olivia sits with her during breakfast and reads to her. This helps Makenzie be happy with company, and frees me up to do other morning things and not sit at the table for an hour.

The kids have been really into smoothies lately, and are getting a lion's share of their veggies that way. We still cook with veggies every day, but the kids all drink the smoothies with smiles and no bribing...I call that a win! This particular day, I threw all of the leftover veggies into the blender, and made a combination that I had a tough time with. I was the only one, however, who took a little longer drinking mine. The kids were quite happy with their broccoli, tomato, spinach and banana smoothie.

I still try to do learning activities with Carter while O is at school at least once a week. He's learning his letters and sounds, and is much happier with hands on activities than reading or anything that is sitting. During 'G' Day, we went outside, gave our grass a haircut, and used it to make a Green G covered in Grass. He actually made two of these and gave one to his good friend Grayson. I'm really proud of my sweet, happy kid.

After a few days of fighting, we went back to our happy kid with her 'guys' looking on during meal times. This is her 'cheese' face right now...I love it.

Sometimes during the first week in April, it gets into the mid-90s and you give up on life. Bring on the nugget ice and Otter Pops!

Makenzie has really gotten into reading lately, and found a magical place when she found Carter's ABC book. She turns through the entire book pointing out her Dada on every page. She also pointed out Dan the first day that she found it, and it melted my heart. We miss Amber's family every day, it's by far been the hardest thing about our move to California.

Here is a huge Carter milestone. He walked up to his music class by himself, knocked on the door, and went in without a second glance. He is my slow-to-adapt and more sensitive kid, so it's hard for him to leave me. This music class gives me hope for preschool camp this summer and then preschool in the fall. I will probably be the parent kissing my preschooler on the head and shutting the door as fast as possible, but hopefully he will adapt quickly.

Notice anything wrong with this picture? Besides, of course, the total jungle of a back yard and crazy mess on the craft table? This is the result of kids playing in the back yard right before we left for the morning, and Mom being in a rush to get out the door.  I was the last to come inside, and when O came to tell me that there was a bird in the house, I didn't believe her. She has a tendency, lately, to exaggerate stories and totally make stuff up for a reaction, I was determined not to give her the reaction she was looking for, so I totally ignored the statement and reminded her not to dump her shoes/backpack/jacket in the entryway as I was carrying in a bag of groceries and a toddler. I was quite surprised to walk into the living room and actually find that we had a friend in our house!

This is normally the kind of situation that I would just call Alex for and let him deal with. I consider myself a capable person, but I'm totally thrilled to hand over anything involving batteries, bugs, living creatures, or power tools to my wonderful husband. However, since he wasn't home, I had some fast thinking to do. The one thing I didn't want to deal with was bird poop in the house. Luckily our super old windows have unattached screens, so it only took a few minutes and a couple loud kids to coax the bird through the right window and back outside.

That spurred a living/breathing fad for the afternoon, and I had quite a few visits from happy kids holding mostly-alive bugs while they played outside. I'm glad they have curious hearts and are so excited about these things...they don't get it from me :).

When Dad gets home, we try to do something fun as a family or with him and the kids before bed because he leaves before they wake up in the morning. This particular evening, Dad and the kids did some Cosmic Kids Yoga (our favorite!) and made Spray Cheese creations, thanks to Grandpa Gary and the amazing Easter Box!

One of our kids was more tired than usual this night, looking back at the pictures I realize that I probably should have just taken her to bed. It was super cute to see her do all the yoga poses laying down though!

Even Dad gets in on the action! It's amazing how easy the kids make this stuff look, my and my huge belly don't even try this stuff anymore.

Makenzie liked the cheese just fine, but called it quits after 2 crackers. Smart girl.

Carter barely licked his before determining that he didn't like it, and I gave him a pass from the usual '3 bites per new food' rule in our house. Something about forcing fake cheese down his throat didn't seem necessary.

Olivia, on the other hand, loved the whole process. She helped her dad make the shapes and ate at least 15 Ritz with cheese that night. She is definitely the adventurous one!

And we learned that she has one of my most prestigious talents! As a kid I could do crazy things with my eyeballs and loved showing off my 'flutter. O is demonstrating some impressive eye-crossing in this picture while she tries to watch the giant spray cheese sandwich go into her mouth.

One day I volunteered to watch a couple of our favorite friends for the morning, and we did a school drop off so we had to fit everyone in the van. Unfortunately, all of our backup car seats are in Dad's car, and he forgot to get everything situated the night before (he took major flack and was totally apologetic after saying as I went to bed 'consider it done'). I was so glad that we had the new baby's carseat hanging out inside the house so that everyone could be legal when we took the kids to school. Kenzie totally didn't love the baby seat until I picked it up and swung her around, then she was doubly thrilled when she realized that she could talk to all the kids in the back while we drove.

Our evening was made quite a bit more exciting one night when there was an arrest made right in front of our hedge. The kids stared out the window for a full half hour while I tried to convince them to eat their dinner. Apparently the guy getting searched and handcuffed outside was more exciting than chili cheese dogs :). Olivia was so funny about it because she was SURE about everything as she watched it happen. Some of my favorite quotes were 'Mom, they are checking under his hat to make sure he doesn't have a gun there' and 'they have that big bag of garbage from his car because if you leave garbage in the car it can get stinky' She never asked why or what was happening, she just declared totally off-the-wall explanations for everything. Definitely a first, and hopefully a last for us!

I don't want to forget this phase that Kenzie is in. Most of the time when you ask if you can take her picture, she backs up blindly until she hits a wall or some other stumbling block, then stands there and waits until the picture is taken. No smile, no reactions whatsoever until she sees the picture after it's taken and she always laughs at herself.

I was apparently on a marshmallow kick, because this is a picture of Carter helping me make rice Krispies, and it was taken merely hours after we had a great conversation with Olivia. After eating an entire bowl of oatmeal, a bowl of cereal, and an English muffin for breakfast (growth spurt?) she laid down on her chair and said: 'Man. I feel like a walking marshmallow.' I'm pretty sure we would all feel like marshmallows if we ate like that!

There's always at least one thing a day to document and remember. I wish I could bottle up all the memories for when the kids get older, because every day feels like an adventure with this crew. Even from my mostly-stationary vantage point I get to witness the love, laughter, and fighting that usually occur every 20 minutes.

The rest of our month of April was very full because we had visits from both sets of grandparents! I think everyone wanted one last ditch visit before we are slowed down this summer with a newborn.