Sammie's 4 months!

I just can't believe she's 4 months already, and yet - just like I've said with the other two - it feels like she's always been here! She is such a sweet, sweet little girl. She has big beautiful eyes that are always looking around and taking everything in. She'll stare at Kevin for however long it takes for him to look at her and then she'll just smile and smile. At her 4 month appt she was 13 pounds 2 ounces and just as happy as could be. My doctor kept saying how she was an 'unusually happy baby' and how she didn't remember Gracie being that happy all the time :) She LOVES her brother and sister, she watches them so closely and will just laugh and laugh at them when they play, run, jump, dance or do anything in front of her. I still have to tell both of them to back off a little because they are right in her face every chance they get. She has rolled from front to back a couple of times but mostly likes to roll MOST of the way and then changes her mind and goes back to the back. Tummy time is not her favorite but she tolerates it for a while and she's definitely a strong little girl. I am trying to get her to sleep without swaddling her sometimes now, but it still wakes her up more than when she is swaddled. She has found her feet and loves to grab them and play with them, but they have not made it to her mouth just yet :) She LOVES to suck on and chew on her hands though! She has always been a drooly baby and she is even more so now, I feel like she is in the beginning stages of teething. I think she really likes the sound of her own voice. She will scream more than cry really and she sticks her little tongue out when she screams. (If I can get the video to upload, you'll see - it's really cute). She loves laying on her back and batting at toys above her. I swear she just has this 6th sense and can feel when I am not in the house with her. We have softball games every thursday night and no matter how long I have her asleep before we leave and no matter who's watching her - she will wake up within 5 minutes of me leaving... every time. Lately she's been waking up really early and I try and try to get her to go back to sleep, which seldom works.

Fun with Friends!

My how my kids love company! It's such a treat for them when they have friends come over and play. Bradley goes a mile a minute and is such a good host, finding the best toys of his to share. The other morning I watched the Gilmartin kids for a few hours while JK had to run an errand. This was the first time I had all 5 kids on my own and when I was talking to Mom we realized that I was watching a 4, 3, 2, 1, and 0 :) year old. So, I had to line them all up on the couch by age and take a few pictures :) The kids were great, well behaved and had a blast together!

Then the next week we had MORE company! We had our not-quite-monthly-but-as-much-as-possible get together with the high school gang :) Once again, we lined the kids up by age - I even tried to get Lanissa to stick her belly in there on the end so the soon-to-be-born newest Larsen baby wouldn't feel left out :) (For some unknown reason when we were taking pictures of the kids my flash on my camera broke, so now without using the flash my pictures are blurry a lot of the time and it's driving me crazy! So bare with me and my blurry picture quality until I can get that fixed!) I am thankful for my friends. Even if we sometimes go a while without speaking much or hanging out as much as we'd like I feel just as close to them - actually more so - than I did 15 years ago. I love that our kids can play and call each other friends.

Pigtails

Even though there's only about 4 hairs in each - we make it work!!!

I have been itching to be able to do stuff with my little girls hair! I have been patiently, patiently waiting :) I LOVE pigtails, and since most of her hair is right on top :) I figured we could make it work as long as they are right on top of her head :)

She's getting better at leaving them in, it depends on the day, sometimes she asks for them, then other times she takes them out 2 seconds after I put them in, over and over...

She's just so cute, she doesn't need hair - but it sure is fun to play with now that it's here :)

Sammie's 3 month update

Trying to catch up again, I am about a month behind and now that Sammie is 4 months I guess I should go back and post about her 3 month update :) She is one smiley, happy baby! She laughs a lot, and at the funniest things. I'll just be talking to her and out of no where she'll laugh. She likes to be scared (most of the time), and drools like CRAZY! We have those outfits that come with bibs that I had never used before with the other 2 kids, but I need to get them out of storage because now I see how handy those bibs would be. Sometimes I have to change her outfit multiple times a day so she's not in soaked clothing. And she LOVES to suck on her hands now, they are almost always in her mouth! She's still a great eater and a pretty good sleeper. She'll usually take one long nap a day and then the other one is pretty broken up and sometimes it takes me getting her back to bed 4 times before she actually stays asleep. She's starting to loose her hair, which makes me sad, but she still has way more than her siblings did :) She sure concentrates on stuff, she will just sit there and stare at us for so long just watching and she has the biggest, prettiest eyes. She's starting to reach up and grab at the toys that are hanging around her and she is getting stronger and stronger! I'm hoping she doesn't need to be swaddled that much longer because she gets out of it multiple times a night no matter how tight I make it. She is sure one sweet, sweet baby!

Full Time Mommy!!!

As of April 19th I am officially a stay-at-home-mommy! It's really weird because I had been working at my job ever since I graduated high school - 13 years ago! I really did enjoy my job for the most part, and had always said if I needed to have a job it was definitely the job to have. BUT I've always talked about how I'd stay home with the kids in a heartbeat if we could swing it. With the beautiful, wonderful addition to the family, Samantha, we decided to finally take the leap we've been talking about for years. And I'm SO happy! I LOVE being able to be home with them all day long. I LOVE them calling for me when the wake up, and having breakfast with them, and having all day to do whatever we want to do together.
Also, I'm the first to admit that I am not a neat freak, and have not always been the most helpful around the house. Now all the sudden, I look at it differently. One thing I liked about my job was how most of my projects were on a strict monthly schedule, and I liked how structured that was. It made me feel organized and productive. Now I feel like I need to do that with housework - since that's part of my new job. I've been trying to figure out what I want my little weekly schedule to be - when I want to do laundry, what time of day is best to do dishes - little things like that which I realize with 3 small children will never be as 'structured' and planned out as I would like, but as long as I have a tentative plan in place and know that things might get mixed around sometimes I think I will feel more in control, organized, and productive. That doesn't mean that my house is spotless now - not even close, but I'm working on getting in a groove with everything. Also, I'm working REALLY hard on getting the kids to help me pick up their toys which they seem to do once in a blue moon. The definition of insanity keeps running through my head every time I'm picking up their toys for the 5th time in one day, and it makes me think - why am I even doing this? But, I know they're little and they're learning, and we'll get it - hopefully sooner rather than later.

Here's a picture from one of our morning walks to the park - one of the many perks that we get to do together now that I'm home in the mornings :)
I don't know if I've mentioned this ever - but I LOVE MY KIDS!!! They bring me so much joy and I thank God every day that I am so blessed, and now I thank God every day for allowing me to be home with them and spend all day, every day with them. They are growing WAY too fast and I am cherishing every day!

Easter in the Mountains

After our morning hunt at home we headed up the mountains to Dad's house for the big event! Dad and Jan have about 6 acres of land. With blue ribbon on landmarks Dad marked off a section for the hunt.

There were rocks, trees, hills, and meadow to look through. The kids had brightly colored eggs to look for, and the adults had much MUCH harder eggs to find!

This is us after HOURS of searching. The hunt had turned into a search with a guided map. After everyone had found what they could find we turned to the drawn out map of where each numbered egg was. Even with the map as a guide, I think we STILL left about 6 or 7 out there at the end of the day, which KILLED me because I was determined, but we just ran out of time!

Kevin found an egg with a special note in it with instructions on how to get the all important GOLDEN EGG! He had to memorize and rehearse a phrase to the Chief Rabbit (Bill) to get the golden egg which was generously filled with $20!

Here's my loot. There was a CURSE on some of the eggs which we were warned about in the beginning. I went to grab an egg out of a bush and felt something on it, looked down and there's a big spider on it! Sure made me jump! Then not too much longer I pulled one out of the grass and a snake seemed to come out after me. I was NOT a fan of these special eggs until we opened them inside - they were worth a lot more money than the normal eggs :) And I seemed to find 3 of them - the big black spider would have really scared me if I didn't see it before I grabbed the egg because it was in a tree and it really would have fallen right on me.

Katie got a war wound in the process of hunting, Mom was very sympathetic.

Sammie was such a sweetheart - she got to spend all afternoon with Mammy while we searched for eggs. She barely got any sleep at all the whole day and she barely complained. Sweet sweet baby!

Jan made a wonderful Easter meal that just hit the spot after a long afternoon of searching every nook and cranny of over an acre of mountainside. It was a great day. I appreciate all the effort that went into it, my Dad sure knows how to host an egg hunt, that's for sure!!! I'm so blessed to have my family. I thank God everyday for them and I'm so happy I was able to spend Easter with all of them.

Easter Sunday Morning

The kids were very excited to wake up to their baskets Easter Morning.

My 3 little bunnies :)

We had a hunt in our backyard which was a lot of fun. Mom brought over some eggs and I filled some eggs and we ended up with 90 for them to find. Gracie was SO into it! She was on a mission!!!

Bradley was so funny, his basket was full so he gave Gracie some of his. Then he started helping Gracie find some. He would pick one up, shake it and if it sounded like money he'd keep it and find her a different one that was just candy - pretty smart :) At least he was sharing and helping her out :)