August...BUSY!

August is always a busy month for us and this year is no different. 

The last day of July, the girls were in their 1st fashion show, Cousin Morgan made them some very cute dresses for 4H and they had to model them at the fashion review.  Too funny, they were so nervous.  I think Morgan was too, but she did a very nice job especially for her first year of sewing.  We will see if she does it again next year, wasn't her favorite thing in 4H!  I did a trial run for fixing the girls hair for the upcoming wedding in October.  Not that you could tell at the fashion review b/c it stormed and it was beyond hot and humid.  Curls don't stay in my kids hair no matter what kind of hairspray I use under those circumstances.

Brett and I celebrated our 9th anniversary on August 4th.   Really where has the time gone, I can't believe we have been together for a third of our lives and married 9 of those 12 years!  He had to play ball that night and it was hotter than blazes out so we didn't get to see each other much on our anniversary, but that is a normal day for us anyway! 

The following pictures and video are what the kids were doing while I was packing for the trip back to NE.

Singing Praise songs...too cute!  Yep, they got my lack of ability to carry a tune, but oh well it is still music to my ears to catch them singing praise songs!

Then my mother, kids and I made a road trip back to NE for my nephew's 5th birthday and my cousin's wedding shower.  We left on Friday the 6th, and tried our best to see as much of family as we could.  We visited Grandpa Doug's farm first on that Friday and stayed until time to get the kids to bed. The kids got to ride 4-wheelers with Grandpa and Uncle Gavin.  All three of the kids got to ride and they loved it.  The girls also got to jump in with the cattle that Gavin took to 4H this year and pet them.  They are a lot bigger than the babies they got to feed in April. 

We headed to McCook (about 20 min) from the farm to spend the night with Grandma Harsh.  Grandma had the girls presents all ready for them and the girls were so excited that Grandma let them open them that night.  Needless to say, we didn't get to bed early and getting to sleep ended up being a nightmare, but we all got there eventually!  Austin isn't consistent about sleeping through the night at home and he definitely didn't sleep great while we were back.  The next morning we were able to hang with Grandma and Great-grandma Betty came over to see the kids.  I neglected to get pictures, so Grandma Harsh if you have any...send them my way please!

After lunch we loaded up the truck and headed North about 1 1/2 hours to my nephew's birthday party.  He had a Marine/Army party and all the kids had tons of fun.  Family joined us towards the end of the kids party and we all picnic in the park to support the local fire department and then headed back to Josh and Misty's for a while longer until bedtime.  The kids and I headed back to my dad's to spend the night.  Getting three kids bathed and in bed is a chore and they were exhausted.  Grandpa Bode kind of decided last minute (like the Wednesday or Thursday before we came back) that we should do something fun to celebrate the girls birthday since all the family was around.  He made lunch and Great-Grandma Patsy got a cake for the girls and we celebrated with dinner, cake and presents.   The girls were tickled pink and we are so blessed to have so much family that love us.

We left North Platte early that afternoon to head to Kearney for my cousin's wedding shower.   Matt and Michelle are getting married in October and the girls are going to be the flower girls.  They are supper excited about it and love the cute dress that we found.  When we tried them on, Kaylee said, "I feel like a real princess in this dress!"  Michelle and I share a birthday, she was born on my 10th birthday.  Her bridesmaids did a wonderful job and the shower was fun.  Austin didn't really think so and made himself heard, but not much a 9 month old can do in a small room with a ton of ladies and can't really get down on the floor to crawl around....ahhh!  He did nap for part of it, but he really needed to nap for all of it!  We stayed with my Aunt in Kearney that night.  We hung out the next morning and then headed back home shortly after lunch.  It was a long and crazy trip, but glad we were able to do it and see lots of family.  I was beyond exhausted when I got home from that trip.  The kids were troopers and Grandma Becky only had to ride in the back with Austin for the last 2 hour leg of the trip home.

We came home to Brett being sick for 2 days.  I made him disinfect the bathrooms and kitchen before we got home and then I came in and touched up a few more surfaces before I would let the kids come in the house.  The last thing we all needed was to get the stomach bug.   All our efforts didn't matter much as Kaylee still managed to throw up all over her bed in the middle of the night.  Of course she sleeps with a dozen stuffed animals and books.  Not all of them made it through this mess, some of them had to be tossed.  So all day Tuesday I ended up cleaning her room and the bathroom again and doing tons of laundry.  Fortunately, I think she must have just overdid it the day before as she was fine all day Tuesday and only threw up that one time in the middle of the night.  No one else came down with anything....phew! 

Wednesday was pretty uneventful, I finished laundry and began trying to get my house ready for their party on Saturday.

Thursday, the girls officially turned 6.  I have been getting the girls up at the time they will have to get up to get ready for school which also happens to be the time we wake them up on Sunday's for church.  Well, that is much earlier than Jaylin would like to be woke up.  The first thing she says to me, "mom, you mean to tell me that I don't get to sleep in on my birthday!"  Nope honey, you start school in 5 days and you have a dentist appointment today.  Too funny.  She has my teeth and had to get yet another cavity taken care of.  I brush and floss their teeth every night and Jaylin is WAY more cooperative than Kaylee, but who has 6 baby teeth filled...Jaylin.  Kaylee has no cavities.  I do both of them the same way each and every night before they go to bed.  They do the morning brushing.  So we all head to the dentist, including Grandma who had taken the day off.  Jaylin does great just like she always has and we are in and out in an hour.  She told the dental assistant after they numbed her up, "I forgot how funky this feels."  She was just full of strange comments.  We had to run to the store and get some groceries as the fridge was looking rather sad.  After unloading the cold stuff, we meet dad at Wendy's for lunch.  That is the girl's favorite place to eat.  Austin and I can't eat there, but I just grabbed a few things for us before we left.

Friday was a crazy busy day.  Austin had his 9 month appointment in the morning Jaylin and Kaylee had their 6 year appointment in the afternoon.  When I scheduled them, the nurse told me she couldn't schedule them all at once.  Well, the nurse and the doctor that day both asked me why I didn't schedule them all at once.  Trust me, it would have been way easier!  Anyway, Austin is 28 inches long (47%) and 18lbs 3 oz (18%) for his age.  He has slowed way down, only putting on just over one pound in three months.  They are not worried about it as he eats solids very well, the only food he won't eat so far is peas.  We have not done any dairy products or products with soy.  He won't until a year.   I will add one back into my diet in about a month to see how he does.  He is also very active....very active.  He never stops moving and if he does, he isn't happy about it so it doesn't last for long.  He wears me out!   He figured out how to crawl and he does it very well now, but he really prefers to walk holding onto some one's (usually mine) hands.  I am not a tall person, but I am about 3 inches too tall to spend all day walking Austin around the house.  My back is not loving it!  He free stands for brief periods of time and it getting better about cruising the furniture, bathtub and basically anything that he can pull himself up to and move along.  We still can't leave him unattended as he doesn't always get back down on the floor gracefully.  He latest "trick" is making kissing noises.  He doesn't actually give them or blowing them so I guess you just call them kissing noises.  He sucks his lips in like a fish...too cute!  He has also started using some sign language that I have been using with him since about 6 months of age.  However he uses the wrong one for what he means.  He will sign all done (or bye bye) and mean more food.  The girls picked up on sign quicker than Austin, but he is more gross motor developed than they were at 9 months. 

Jaylin is 45 inches tall and weighs 43lbs 5oz.  Kaylee is 44 inches tall and weighs 44lbs 8 oz.  This is the first time that Kaylee has ever weighed more than Jaylin.  Jaylin has always been about an inch taller and 1-2 pounds heavier...not anymore!  Kaylee can eat a ton and has been hungry all the time this past summer, so it doesn't really surprise me that she passed Jaylin in the weight department.  Her pants fit a little tighter than Jaylin's.  Both of them were in the middle for percentiles on weight and Jaylin was middle for height and Kaylee was in the 30's for height.  I don't remember the exact numbers as they didn't write them down for me!  They also did hearing and vision tests on them this year.   Both of them see about 20/25.  Not perfect, but glasses won't be recommended yet.  I started wearing glasses in second grade and have horrible eyes.  Brett eyes were great until his last couple years of college and 3 years ago he decided to get lasik b/c he couldn't wear/put contacts in and refused to wear glasses.  Kaylee passed with flying colors on the hearing test.  Jaylin showed some difficulties in her left ear.   Nothing that they are overly concerned about and will just retest it again next year.  They had to consistently bump it up to 30 vs the 20 that they did with her right ear and Kaylee's ears.  I haven't noticed anything that concerns me, so I am not going to push for further testing unless she has difficulty in school.

That night we had "Sneak Peek" at their school.  A chance to meet the teacher and drop off all the school supplies.  Which is a lot by the way!  They are getting very excited about school and nervous all at the same time.  Jaylin has already started picking at her nails again, so I know she is a little nervous. To be honest, I am a little nervous too!  My babies are going to kindergarten and will be gone all day...it will be very quiet around here.  Not completely though as Austin makes a lot of noise.  I imagine he will be confused for awhile, but isn't able to ask, "where are the girls mommy?"

 

Saturday we celebrated the girls birthday with a few of their friends.  They wanted a pool/beach party here at the house and I told them they could invite 3 friends each.  They say the number of kids per year, but that would make 12 kids and I said 6 total would be enough.  All but one was able to join them and they had a blast.  They did a little sand art project that took a whole 10 minutes.  Played outside in the pools (2 we borrowed from the neighbors) and then we did cake, ice cream, flip flop cookies (that my neighbors found the idea and ended up putting them together for me...thanks Dominic and Shilo) and opened gifts.  Other than it was hotter than blazes, it was a fun party.  As the kids were leaving, Uncle Nathan and Holly stopped by and stayed the rest of the evening.  It was a crazy fun filled day!

Here I sit the night before my girls start Kindergarten thinking where has the time went....6 years ago we started this chapter of parenthood and it has been a crazy, exciting, overwhelming at times, but mostly a rewarding and growing experience.   We are blessed to have two beautiful girls and one little man who brighten our days and keep us on our toes.  They have taught us more about ourselves than we learned in the previous 25 years of our lives.  Teaching us about our father's love that is greater than our own love for our children.  We thank God for all our blessings as that is what children are.  There are days/moments that they drive us crazy and we wonder what we got ourselves into, but truth be told, I am going to miss having them at home all day.   I have been home with them all day for 6 years and now I will only get to see them for a few hours in the morning and 4 hours in the evening before they have to go to bed.  I will cry because I am excited for them, sad for them, and a little nervous for them.  I know they will do fine and I am not the first nor last mother to send their babies to school.

Up next...duh, pictures from the first day of Kindergarten...