Redemption

You might remember my last bowling post. It wasn't really pretty on my part. I didn't mention that they have these cool things to place the ball on that Libby could just shove it off and it helped the ball go straight down the lane. I honestly didn't even think about it.

We went bowling with my sister today. I am proud to say that I beat Libby this time. :) She got a 66 (which is still good since she didn't have her "helper" as aforementioned) and I got a 160. We still had the bumpers on, but seriously, without the bumper I probably would have gotten a 150. I got two strikes, then a spare, two strikes and then in my last frame I got a spare and then a strike. Very hapy with that. I will always be looking for a 9 pound ball now. :)

Mud Bath

This is what happens when you get locked out of the house in early spring! A one year old taking a mud bath and a mommy who isn't in a good mood about the whole deal.

Last Friday the kids and I walked down to the mail box to grab the mail and then came back home. Well, without my knowledge, one of the kids (I know who, but I won't mention names...it's not nice) had played with the door lock and locked the door. I know at one point in time we had a key out there, but do you think I could find it to save my life? NADA! Luckily, Chris keeps an entry way open for cases such as this. This is good! That entry way is in the back yard, which means a trek around the house, for an easy slope...in the mud, or a trek down a hill...in the mud. This is bad! So, I left the little squirts in their stroller and took off down the hill. As I got around to the backyard, I heard a screaming Grace...COMING CLOSER! She had managed to play Houdini and get out of her seat...and she was heading my way! This wouldn't be so bad except for the straightest line from her to me is a nasty hill that is straight down and about 6-8 foot down. I was scared half to death that she was going to tumble down and hurt herself...mind you, in the mud. Luckily, she remembered her climbing skills and turned around, on her belly, and scooched down the hill. So, I then had a muddy baby to contend with as I made my way in, but at least not a hurt baby. Did I mention I was NOT happy about this whole incident?

Oh yeah, Janet, it was ONE DAY after you told us we had better put a key in the garage because it would be bad if we got locked out! Granted, I thought we had a key for that door, but still...I thought that was kind of ironic.

Happy Birthday Princess!

For Libby's birthday Grandma and Grandpa Tucker decided that they wanted Libby to feel like a princess. She's been asking for a hair cut for awhile anyway, so that is what they did. They took her out for the afternoon and made her a princess!

Here she is before she got her hair done.

Here she is getting it all chopped off.

And here is our precious princess!

Explosion!

Don't you just love the language explosion? I adore the feeling of my whole body beaming as I hear a new word out of a precious little mouth, one that I have never heard before. This week has been a full week of language explosions for Grace. She was stuck on "mama", "dada", "uh oh" and "meow" for the longest time. Then, we started hearing what could be "thank you" (still not 100% certain). This week, though, woah, hold the train...we started connecting our "bye bye" with our wave and "hi" came out. Then she started saying "more" with her motion for that too. This morning we were talking about the sound that a sheep makes and when I would ask, she would reply "aaaa". Too cute! Immediately after this conversation she put her dirty diaper in the diaper pail, turned around and said, "Good girl" and clapped. Such excitement! I LOVE it!

Sponsor Me at March for Babies!

Bowlerin'

Last night Chris's parents went with us to take Libby bowling. She was SO excited about it that after she finished her supper (at a restaurant) she kept asking if we could leave yet...we hadn't even received the bill. :) Once we got to the bowling alley and had everything set up it was time to start the fun...er, except for one small hitch. Chris had to find a paper towel so he could wipe his ball clean. Why, you ask? Well, Libby picked her nose and wiped a big, old, nasty booger on Chris's ball. Don't ask me why!!! It was really quite funny, but you might have had to been there. I have never seen Tom (my f-i-l) laugh so hard in my life.

It was a good evening, although it was a very sad evening for me: my almost 4 year old daughter beat me...in bumper bowling. I had a 101 (in bumper bowling) and she ended up with a 120. In my defense, she got bored so daddy rolled her last three frames, but I think she would have beat me, or come close, anyway. Oh well, so is life!

Shoulder Ride

Libby loves her lamb so much that she gives her shoulder rides almost everywhere. What a good little mommy!

Art Work

Grace has learned how to draw! Luckily, she only draws on her tiny magnadoodle on one of her toys without mommy around. She has also used crayons, but ONLY with mommy (or daddy)!!!

God is Good!

Yesterday I got sick in the afternoon. It was NO fun! A friend (and our small group leader) called and asked how I was doing. I told her I wasn't feeling well and she said that pretty much answered her question. Two other girls from small group were sick too, so we needed to cancel. She called me back today and told me that she got a call last night that she wouldn't have taken if we were at small group, but since we canceled, she took it. She got the job she had interviewed for a few days before. So, now I'm glad I was sick! :)

Daddy's Little Helper

Libby has always loved being with her daddy and helping him whenever he can let her have the chance. At 14 months old, when he was working on the basement in our Indiana home, she would follow daddy around in her walker and literally unscrew his screws with a screw driver. She hasn't changed a bit, in that department, since then. So, she was ecstatic when daddy offered to let her help him in the basement, here, with some of the finishing work.

In this picture daddy is helping her use the nail gun. He basically would put the gun where he wanted the nail and hold it up while she did the rest of the work.

Yes, Libby really is running the saw in this picture. Once again, daddy would get everything positioned and help guide her hand, but Libby did the rest of the work. She was absolutely thrilled to help her daddy!

Looks Like Fun...Right?

This is one of Grace's favorite games to play! Over and over and over.

My Smudge :)

I went for my first appointment today. It was basically the "information" meeting, BUT...since I have been having pains in my left side (as I did with Libby, but still wanted to be safe) the midwife went ahead and did a quick ultrasound. It is so amazing the difference of only a couple of weeks makes. We had Libby's ultrasound done at 10 weeks and she was a peanut, but not like this 8 week ultrasound. Literally, a smudge on the screen. But, baby is exactly where he/she is supposed to be. :) She zoomed in so that I could see the heart beat, too. What a beautiful sight!

I took Libby and Grace with me and I'm not sure Libby knew quite what to think. She still doesn't quite get the concept. She understands that there is a baby inside of her mommy, but she still thinks that we just go to the hospital and "pick the baby up". She hasn't quite got it figured out how the baby gets from inside of me to the hospital. It's fun to watch her wheels spin as she learns about life and how it begins though.

Busted!

I put Landon and Grace in their chairs and went to make lunch today. As I was turning around to check on them, this is what I found. I had to snap a picture of it before I got them down and let them scamper until lunch was ready!

No, you may NOT hold your little brother/sister!

Ok...so we now know that Grace will not be allowed to hold the baby when it's born. That is, unless her baby holding technique improves a little before then.

Libby Quotes

It's that time of year again...girl scout cookies! Libby just couldn't contain herself, she looked longingly at the box and said, "My tummy is hungry of some of these."

Coming home from Wisconsin the other day, she was full of funnies. First, we were sitting at a red light and we hear from the back of the van: Daddy, you should sneak the red light.

Then, we had been teasing her earlier that day that we were going to go to Pickle Barrell (equivalent to Subway) instead of Pizza Hut for lunch. So when we drove by a Pickle Barrell I asked Libby if we should go. Her reply: Do they have chesse pizza?

Lastly, we were working with one of her workboooks yesterday. This particular workbook is one you use markers with and erase the page when you are finished. She has three markers: red, blue and yellow. As she was making her page a multi-colored page, I saw her hand go to mix two of the colors together. I said, "Don't you dare young lady!" She looked at me innocently and asked what she had done wrong. I said, "Nothing yet, but I see your little brain working. Don't purposefully mix the colors please." Within TWO minutes...she was mixing colors. I said, "Libby! What did I just tell you?" To which she shot back, "But my little brain was working!"

Were You Ready?

Because Grace was CERTAINLY ready for Mardi Gras this year!!!

Smilebox

Make a Smilebox postcard

Just playing around with a new website I found. It's www.smilebox.com . It's quite a neat little site and a fun way to share your photos with loved ones far away. There are three basic ways to use it. You can do it the free way...which is what I have used, where you get advertisements and it plays in a smaller frame. You can pay a small amount of money to get rid of the ads and be able to play your card full frame. OR...you can pay a monthly (or annual) fee and have free access to everything as much as you want. At the moment, I'm just playing. If, I find that the grandparents enjoy it and I want to use it more, I may consider paying. We shall see. In the meantime, enjoy the photos.

Birthday + Christmas = Too Close

Grace doesn't realize how frustrating it will be for her to have her birthday and Christmas together yet, but she will some day. She is just now getting old enough to REALLY develop her personality. She has been LOTS of fun this past month. One of the "likes" she has adopted is that of Soya's ponies. She is constantly stealing them from the older girls producing squeals of disgust from them and giggles and smiles from Grace. Too bad for all three girls...Grace has no presents coming to her for a year. So, they'll all have to learn to share. :)