February

February began, and ended, with me feeling like this winter is never going to end. I totally love winter, snow, rain, the whole bit, so it's unusual for me to say this, but I am ready to have all of it gone. In the street in front of our house is snow that has been there since the week of Thanksgiving, and every few days it gets covered up a bit by new snow, that melts - mostly - before it snows again. So I started getting creative inside with activities to entertain the kids, and myself.

I started the month by making laundry soap. I'm all about trying new things to cut some $$ from the grocery budget, and I have heard good things about this particular recipe, so I gave it a try...a few weeks in and I can say that I won't be going back! I use liquid still on anything I wash in cold, but if my simple math in my head is correct, our soap for the month of February cost us about 1.50, which is about 15% of what we normally use. I consider that a major win!

I also cashed in some credit card points to get myself a late Christmas present...a treadmill! There isn't any gyms in Pullman with daycare, which is a major problem for me and my weight loss goals. I'm not great at following DIY workout plans, but I can commit time to a treadmill, so this is where we start. Unfortunately, most days I am interrupted by Hunter, who seems to have a radar in his sleep for whenever I am working out. The first day I got a whole 6 minutes in before he woke up from his lengthy, 30 minute nap :).

Carter got to celebrate his 1/2 birthday at preschool! He was super excited about it, and his Montessori preschool had a really cool celebration. He got to walk around the sun 4 1/2 times to symbolize his 4.5 years, and the teacher read a story that I wrote about his life while the kids passed around pictures from all his different ages. Here is the story she read, focusing on all the ways that Carter has become independent at different ages.

Carter was born on August 11, 2012 in Keizer, Oregon, United States, North America, on the planet Earth. He was held most of the time and needed help to sit, eat, and do everything except sleep. At 8 months old, he started crawling, and Carter hasn't stopped moving since. 

When Carter was one he moved to Boise, Idaho. He learned to walk and kick a ball, and he had his first swimming lessons. 

When Carter was two he drew his first picture of a person by himself and started doing chores like unloading the silverware to help at home.

When Carter was three he moved to Concord, California. Carter learned to ride his scooter and bike, and loved going to music class.  He learned to put his clothes away and make his bed to show that he is responsible for his own space.

Now Carter is four, and he recently moved here to Pullman, Washington. He started going to Montessori School and is learning a lot about the world around us. Most recently he enjoyed learning about the stars and planets, so he is asking a lot of questions about the sun. His favorite activity is to play Dino-ball with his sisters. His favorite color is black and he loves to eat carrots.

Ms. Jane (Carter's teacher) and his classmates were duly impressed at how many times Carter has moved in his life. It is quite impressive to have lived in as many houses - more if you count or rental in Colton - as you are old, but I hope Pullman proves to be the ticket that ends this for all of our children (each has lived in as many or more houses than they are old at this point)

That night we had our first kid-free date since Hunter was born! Having 4 kids so close together means that I feel strange any time I don't have any kids with me, even if it's just going to Walmart at 9PM after bedtimes are done, but date nights after babies are old enough to leave behind are especially fun. The kids absolutely LOVE staying with their fun babysitters, and are really good about going to bed on time, and it's just great to have some couple time occasionally.

This date was especially fun because we saw Star Wars Rogue One in a completely empty movie theater. This meant that Alex could karaoke the local advertisements before the show and I could text the wifi password to the babysitter without feeling bad. I asked Alex my questions about which bad guy was which and didn't even have to whisper! It was just pretty fun, and we had a great dinner at The Foundry before heading home refreshed before 10:00. Life with kids I suppose :).

I just love this sweet, fiercely independent girl who picks her clothes every day, which sometimes includes huge gloves, a frilly tutu, and Lightning McQueen boots. She gets each of those things on herself, but occasionally asks for help when her legs get stuck in the same pant leg (she says 'Mom, me having trouble, me a mermaid' in the cutest voice ever) of her pants, and usually needs help with her shirt and coat. It's crazy to me how grown up she looks these days, I definitely have 3 big kids.

Cheapest baby gate ever!

I wish I had a better picture, but we don't think that far ahead anymore :). Alex built great shelves in the closet after we sold all of our dressers, and he even took them down to spray paint the brackets white when it bothered me :). We are happy to have the piles of clothes in our room under control again.

I love this picture so much. I was busy chopping in the kitchen and I looked up to find Olivia getting Makenzie out the sand so she could get back to her piano theory. Olivia shocks me all the time with these moments of thoughtfulness and just awareness of what can make the situation better. I asked her about it later, and she said that Kenz was 'bothering her' so she wanted to get her out something fun. It's just so much nicer than the whining and pushing that could have come from the exact same situation.

I should have changed the order of these pictures, but they are consecutive, so this is what you get. Alex's other construction project for the month was building food storage shelves in the back room of the garage. I was so happy to get all the cans and containers organized and my spreadsheet back up to date so I always know what we have on hand again!

Just a fun picture of Hunter climbing the stairs. As soon as he discovered the stairs, we were all replaced. He will jet off from whatever room we are in to climb the stairs, even if there is no one at the top. I am really glad that our flight of stairs is split in half so he can't roll down more than 5 or 6 at a time :)

The same snow day that prompted me to put that cutie snow suit on Hunter made some trouble for me outside. I usually park in the garage, but we hadn't finished loading the back room so I had to clear off the car. This is what happens when you open the door, start the car, and the windshield wipers immediately turn on, pushing 6 inches of snow onto you and your door and seat. It was a wet car ride :).

I was watching a random episode of 'Outdaughtered' - a show about a family with quintuplet girls - one morning and turned around to see Makenzie trying it out for the morning. She carried around her 4-5 babies for a while, put them on top of each other in the stroller for a walk, then put them all to sleep. I was happy to comply when she instructed me to be quiet when the babies were sleeping, If she managed to get them all to sleep at once I wasn't about to wake one up!

Olivia made this card at school for Grandma Mary. It says 'Dear Grandma, I love when you play together because it is nice. Love, Olivia'. She made sure to point out that I could tell which person was Grandma because she has the 'mommy lips'. It's funny to see the differentiation between all of her drawings these days. Often people have the correct hair and eye color, and are wearing things they would like - she always draws dad in basketball shorts and mom in sweats...maybe we should get dressed more!

This guy is always making strides when we aren't looking, like pulling himself up on everything and climbing up steps. He has just started walking along furniture, so our days with a baby are coming to a close more quickly than I would like.