Sibling Wars: The Brother Strikes Back

So it finally happened, Jonah fought back. For 15 months Leah has been poking, prodding, pulling, pestering, and just plain bossing her baby brother around. Well Tuesday night he had enough. He was NOT cool with sharing the piano bench with her and reached over and bit her. I know this is not behavior I should encourage but I had to try hard not to laugh and be proud of Jonah for sticking up for himself.

Of course Leah screamed over the bite and was horrified that he left his teeth marks on her arm. That and "he doesn't like me anymore!!!!" After everyone was calmed down and in their own corner they did hug and make up.

I'm sure this is just the beginning of the Sibling Wars saga.

Holiday Dancing

So these kids LOVE to dance. Love it!! Leah begs to have the music louder (her father's child)! We have been rocking out to quite the range of holiday tunes thanks to Pandora. Poor Jonah get's dizzy with all the turning about. Have to make sure he doesn't crack his head on the fireplace!

Stylish Hairdo

Leah requested a "stylish hairdo" this morning and demanded that it include my huge scarf. This was the result. Hope her friends & teachers like it! Oh and now she's off putting makeup on. This could be bad. If she's like this at three what will she be like at 13???



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Other Items of Interest

- Leah's Native American name is "Blooming Flower". Many thanks to her preschool teachers for that one. She no longer wishes to be called Leah. Just Blooming Flower and don't you forget it!!

- Jonah points. At everything. He has very few words but has pointing and grunting and whining down. Baby boy knows what he wants!

-Who ever said the twos were terrible did not have a verbal three year old. Holy Sassy Pants!! Seriously, I thought the attitude was supposed to wait until she was a teenager. I have startted calling it her "Rude 'Tude!"

- Jonah seems to be prone to bloody noses just like his daddy. A few weeks ago his crib looked like a scene from Texas Chainsaw Massacre!! Scarey stuff. He's had 3 bloody nose bumps since then. One frightened the neighbors and had the lady next door scrubbing the concrete with Clorox and another made the childwatch people at the YMCA have to file an incident report!

-I think I am going to spend all of December redecorating my Christmas tree thanks to a small boy who insists on taking all the ornaments off the bottom third of the tree. Many thanks to the inventor of shatterproof ornaments!

-This morning LEah said "Let's have a naked dance party!" Classy, huh?? But we did. I was clothed but the kids were in panties & a diaper and we rocked the Christmas Music. Yeah for Pandora!

=We also keep it real by doing silly things like wearing goggles in the bathtub!

What We've Been Up TO

MOre Blog neglect. I wish I was better at keeping up but it's tough. I really enjoy reading other people's blogs and get annoyed when they never update so I should be better at it here!!

So the big news for this past week is that the kids were sick. Nothing major just temperatures & snotty noses and then an ear infection for Jonah. Made life rough for thier momma since Leah had to miss two days of school and we couldn't go to the YMCA either. We entertained ourselves by getting out all of the Christmas stuff, starting on our Christmas baking & doing some Christmas projects. Fun stuff!

Hmm before that we had two busy weekends of company. First a visit from Grandma Sally & Grandpa Gene on a GORGEOUS weekend. Seriously, almost 80 in November!! We spent some nice time outdoors and had a fire including smores!! The next weekend Grandma Helen & Grandpa Lee came down and spent ANOTHER gorgeous weekend with us. November has had better weather than OCtober!! Paul and my dad hit Cabelas and Bass Pro Shop and mom and I took the kids to the Wildlife Preserve for hike. Lots of walking in the sun!

This weekend we had visitors again. Aunt Laura, Uncle Jim, cousin Brian, & our friend Dave came down to attend the IA State vs Mizzou football game. The kids and I did NOT go along. We tackeled some Christmas shopping!

So yeah, that's what we've been doing.

Good Friends

Fall Fun

So who doesn't love a good leaf pile?? There is something about the smell and the crunch and crisp air! Leah has been begging to make a leaf pile since the first leaf fell from the tree! Little man was in heaven and I was lost in memories of leaf piles from my youth.

Halloween!

I sadly way behind on blogging as usual. The week of Halloween was pretty crazy since Paul came down with the dreaded swine flu on Tuesday of that week. We quarantined him to the bedroom and spent hours keep the kids away from him. We were pretty cute wearing our masks all week too!

Due to the germs our Halloween plans got stirred up a bit since Grandma Sally & Grandpa Gene decided to postpone thier visit. Our friends Troy and Jen still came over to share the festivities with us though!

Jonah was the cutest little fire man in the neighborhood. I had to trick him into wearing the fireman hat by putting a winter hat on underneath it so he couldn't feel the fire hat!

"Uncle" Troy was in charge of handing out candy. Between his scarey set up and the creepy music Paul blasted out the upstairs window we had the creepiest house in the cul de sac!

Leah said "let's take a laughing picture mom!"

Dr. Mom and her swine flu patient!

Bat Girl

 

So about two months ago we started talking about what the kids would dress up as for Halloween. I picked out a cute fireman costume for Jonah at a rummage sale over the summer and Leah was perfectly happy dressing up in her princess gear. That last quite awhile until I recieved a magazine with a boy with a bat hat on the cover. Leah thought it was cool and switched her tune. SHe over and over requested a bat costume instead! Well, I tapped the internet for some ideas and came up with a pretty easy one. We cut an umbrella in half and sewed it to a sweatshirt! I picked up the ears at Walgreens. The combination made for one VERY happy little girl.

Oh and she was the only kid at her school in a homemade costume and the only girl who was not dressed as a princess!

Grand Parents

The first weekend in October Paul had to be out of town for business meeting. Usually when that happens I pack the kids up and head to my parents to hangout. This time though, I found out that my mom was headed up to north west IOwa for teacher meetings. Since my Grandma & aunt, uncle & cousins live there we decided to go along for the ride. . . . . . and it was a LONG ride. (Kitty corner across IA! Keokuk to almost Sioux Falls, SD in one day!) The kids were troopers and I was VERY thankful for the DVD player in the car. Makes me wonder how my parents traveled long distances with four kids in the car.

Anyway, we were hoping to get a taste of the farm while in IOwa but the weather did give us much opportunity for that. Leah did get to see her cousin's bottle calves, market steers & bunnies and we made a fun trip to the Washington Pavillion in Sioux Falls, SD. It was great to see family and I think our visit really made Great-Grandma's day.

We broke up the trip home by spending a night in Pella. Grandma Helen & Grandpa Lee squeezed in a trip to the park and a walk in the prairie even though it was chilly!

More from YEsterday

 

 

 

 

CORN!!

I am dreadfully behind on getting photos up here and blogging about what we have been up too. YOu'd think with the down right dreary cold weather we've been having I'd have lots of time on the computer. NOPE! Too busy hauling JOnah off the counter tops and table tops.

Yesterday we made our first pumpkin farm visit of the season. It felt more like winter but we had fun anyway. The corn box was the kids favorite. We got a quite a few laughs when Leah's classmates & parents saw me sticking my hands in her pants to pull out corn! Her boots were full of corn too. I'm trying a new program for the photos so we'll see how this goes!

 

 

 

 

Conversations with Leah

We took a trip to NW Iowa last week to see my grandma. We had this conversation in the car.

"Mom, we are going to see great grandma right?"

"Yes Leah, we are going to see her at the nursing home"

"Where is grandpa? Does he live at the baby nursing home too?"

"No, he's in heaven"

"With God? How did he get there"

"WEll his body isn't there Leah but his soul is. It's hard to explain. When you die just part of you goes to heaven"

"I think that you hold an umbrella and fly up to the sky. Up above clouds to heaven to be with God. I think that would be really fun mom."

"Me too Leah"

"I was just thinking about that mom"

Cousins

Back on Labor Day, which now seems like ages ago, we ventured up to Iowa for a visit with Paul's parents and extended family that were in town for a memorial service for Paul's uncle. For almost a year now Leah has been talking about seeing her cousin Nickolas. He is really her second cousin but it's all the same to her. Even though he is a five year old boy, he is sweet and dear to Leah and she loves him for it. The two of them were pretty much side by side all weekend and Leah sobbed when he had to leave on Sunday afternoon. It's a good think Thanksgiving isn't too far away! I'm not sure I can take the "when do we get to see Nickolas??" questions much longer!!

Give me a Break

So Paul and I were super tired a few weeks ago and were trying to come up with some way to keep our kids under control with minimal work. This is what we came up with.



Yup, that's carseats in the living room. Yes, they are bucked in. NO, they aren't going anywhere. Yes, they sat like this for a good 15 minutes. Yes, I am considering purchasing another set of carseats to leave in the living room permanently!

So we don't really pin our kids down like this! Leah got a new car seat and JOnah's was in the house for cleaning. They are much more fun in the house than in the car!

Back to School

So it wasn't Leah's first day of school ever ,but it was her first day of school this fall. We went back and forth about sending her to two day a week preschool but when I found out that almost all of her playgroup friends were going somewhere and that there was lots of room left in the program at the YMCA, I signed her up!

It was quite a change from dropping her off last spring where she clung to us and cried when we left. This year she helps pack up her pricess lunch box & elmo backpack & gives me hugs and kisses at the door and says see you later! Sweet! Looks like she is goign to have a fun year full of crafts, games, songs, swimming, field trips, parties, etc!

Oh and it gives me a break!

Conversations with Leah

Paul: Leah, no cartoons tonight. We are going to watch the President on TV
Leah: What?
Paul: We are going to watch grown up TV, the Presidential Address.
Leah: I have dresses daddy. Some of them don't fit anymore. But the flowered one still fits and the pink one still fits!

Sting Razors

The new attraction at the STL Zoo this year is the stingrays. They have a big shallow pool filled with them. You can stick your hand in and pet them and even feed them! It's right at the height for kids Leah's size.

I found out last week that the sting rays will be leaving for the winter and realized that we hadn't been to see them yet, so I packed the kids up on Saturday and off we went. My friend Jen and I totally built up the experience for Leah and somehow in her little mind, stingrays became "sting razors!" Sounds like a scary shaving experience doesn't it!! Leah did stick her hand in the water but never did actually "pet" a sting razor. She got freaked out when the very first one splashed us.

The rest of our day at the zoo was great. Jonah finally is at the age where he was interested in the animals! Fun times.

mmm ice cream cake

Have I mentioned how much I LOVE ice cream cake??? It's one of the perks of having a summer birthday! (Although I've been know to purchase it in the winter too!) Being out of town prior to Jonah's birthday and having no time to bake was the perfect excuse to get one last weekend for his celebration! I think he loves it almost as much as his momma!

ONE!

Jonah is one! A year ago last Friday I spent the day twiddling my thumbs waiting for the pitocin to kick in. I spent 3 hours feeling the pain and about 3 minutes pushing him out! I then spent 30 minutes waiting to hold my cold, congested baby boy. What a year it's been. The sleepless nights are sort of coming to a close. We survived the first few months of projectile puking, the burn, and other aches and pains. Our mellow mushroom has blossomed into our crazy monkey full of personality and attitude. Love you baby boy!