I know I am a mom when.......

1) I go to bed and roll over only to be stabbed by the arrow that goes to Porter's bow and arrow set.

2) I throw the arrow out of my bed, trying to relax again, stretch out, and feel something at the bottom of my toes. I pull my legs up quickly thinking I have a huge bug in my bed, only to find the hamster to Carlee's littlest pet shop.

3) Just when I think there could be no more interruptions, I am reminded by Tessa why we call her rootin', tootin', Tessa.

In case you were wondering, I finally fell asleep at about 1:00 a.m. and I still love Porter, Carlee, and Tessa more than ever.

Playgroups are the best

This morning we went to the Lake Erie Nature and Science Center for a playgroup. They have a planetarium with classes for toddlers and babies. Today we went to Stellar Stars and the kids had a blast. The planet of the week is Jupiter, which I had no idea how huge it is. Just one little spot on the planet can fit two planet earth's, amazing. Anyway, afterwards we walked around to look at all of the animals, and then headed outside to the picnic tables to eat lunch. The kids loved running around with their friends and climbing on top of the huge pile of wood chips. Porter and Cambria looking at the fox.
Carlee doing something she probably shouldn't.
Porter looking for tadpoles.Cambria looking so cute on the woodchip pile.

We love Wal-Mart Clearance

So on Monday we went to Walmart and they had a ton of toys on Clearance. The best purchase of the day was a jar of 450 water balloons for $3.00, and they even came with two hose attachments. Great buy and it meant lots of wet fun outside.

Recycling, Painting, Laughing

Our week started off with a fun family home evening night with some good discussion about recycling. Thanks to some friendly influnece and the new trend of going green, we thought we would give it a try. The kids enjoyed talking about the earth and different things we could recycle. Porter even figured out what litering was when he talked about people throwing their "smoke" on the ground.
After making a fun recycling box out of a diaper box that was going to go in the trash, we headed to Malley's for some ice cream with Devin, Andrea, Cam, and Andin. Carlee loves Andrea, she is always wanting to sit by her or with her. In this picture Carlee is on her lap, but neither of them wanted their picture taken.

Here are Porter and Carlee putting their recycling knowledge into motion. One morning when I was getting ready, Porter came running by me into the kitchen. A few moments later he returned and was so proud when he told me that he had recycled his diaper from the night. I felt so bad when I told him that we did not out diapers in the recycle box, but we could recycle it by using it again because it was dry!So, I am offically an adult and home owner. I went to Home Depot and picked out paint to paint Tessa's room all by myself. I almost broke down and called Kay Lee to ask about finish and what kind of roller to get, but I did it! That does not mean that I didn't stare at all of the rollers and different sizes of brushes for about 20 minutes, there are too many options if you ask me.Here is a picture of Carlee with her "you won't let me paint" face, so I gave in.

Look at these super cute letters!!! Thanks to Anne and Andrea I learned how to make these. I was just going to do a "T" for Tessa's room, but then I decided to do her whole name. I also made one for my sister-in-law Danielle who is having a little boy in a few weeks!! It was so cute, but I forgot to take a picture of it beofre I mailed it off.

I feel like the luckiest mom in the world. Porter, Carlee, and Tessa are so cute and entertaining. Tessa is really starting to smile so we are always trying to get the best smile picture. It is incredible how seeing her smile makes my heart melt.

This is the kids this morning as we were walking out the door to church. Porter loves Tessa May so much, his favorite thing is to hold her and Carlee aslways has to be touching her head. Holy Cow!!! They bring us such joy.

Carlee's Baby Boogie

I was looking on our backup drive today for pictures to put on the wall and came across this video. This is when we lived in Watertown, New York last year. I cannot believe how much Carlee has changed since then.

Good Times

We had another fun and crazy week. Here are some pictures of the kids playing in the back yard. One of the best things about our house is the awesome swing set in the back yard. We love to just sit out there and play, it's great. Porter amazes me with how well he can swing. There have been a few times where I look over at the swings and he is flying high. He is getting so big.

This is how Porter helps Carlee get up the slide, it is often not so succesful because they are both laughing so hard.

Something else that we did this week was work on Carlee not touching Tessa's face. She is always "checking" on her. It is a little scary when I walk in the room to check on Tessa and she has a baby doll and a blanket with her and I didn't even know that happened. Good ol' Car Car did not want her to be alone.

We had a really fun Primary fair at our church this weekend. The kids had a great time. There were so many games for them to play, almost overwhelming. The Primary President was even dressed up as a clown, it was so cute. The kids got a ticket at each booth and at the end we traded in our tickets for M&M's, popcorn, juice boxes, and the kids won two goldfish that we took home!! I was not too pleased about the goldfish, but they will die eventually right. Sorry if that sounds harsh, but we already have Ben 10 and Tinkerbell.

Sunday was a crazy day, I spoke in church and Andy was not able to make it because he was working, well, he had just gotten off of work, so it was just the kids and I. We did it though, we made it there on time and we were all dressed and had our scriptures. Luckily we have made some awesome friends here the Schvaneveldt's who also have two kids, a boy and a girl almost exactly Porter and Carlee's age, so they love them and get along great. Porter, Carlee, and Tessa were able to sit with them while I gave my talk. Big ol' shout out THANKS to Devin, Andrea, Andin, and Cambria, you guys are the best. Anyway, we came home after church and were all pretty much zombies. But I eventually got my act together and made dinner. We ate outside which the kids love doing, we do that as much as we can.

JUST LET HIM EXPERIMENT.............is what Andy said to me when Porter went and got his helmet and the baby walker to go down the slide, I about died. But Porter did it and Andy stood at the bottom and caught him. We have decided as a family, mainly I have decided, that we are not ever allowed to do that again, EVER!!!!!

Oh, and this is one of the bunnies that lives in our backyard, we really have our own nature center sometimes. Lovin' the Ohio life right now!

Feeling Viva la Vida Good

So yesterday was the cleaning day at our house. It felt so weird but good to be on my hands and knees mopping the floor without a huge belly. I told Andy that it felt like I was doing yoga when I would stretch and reach to get in a corner or under the kitchen table. One of my favorite things about cleaning is having music on REALLY loud, and the kids love it too. Yesterady what kept me going was Coldplay, love them and their new album, everyone should have it. It is so good as a pick me up. I cannot wait until I can exercise to it and get my bootie back into shape!