Molly Lately

Night 1 with Molly went SO much better than we anticipated.  She barked twice and we took her out to go potty and then she went back to sleep in her crate.  She has only ever had one accident in her crate, which is awesome!  And it only took a couple nights for her to get into a great routine.  We let her into the house for a couple of hours after the kids go to bed every night.  She dozes off under Jared or I's feet until we take her out to go potty and then into her crate for the night.  She then sleeps until 6 AM when I leave and I take her outside to eat and play in the yard.  She comes in a few times a day, but doesn't last very long.  She would MUCH rather be outside playing, which is perfect for our family.

If she ever acts out, we have learned it is because she is just bored, so we teach her a new trick.

Right now, she can, on command:
-Sit
-Stay(various versions of this one)

-Lay

-Crawl
-Shake
-Fetch
-Go potty
-Go bed
-Jump
-Heel

We're also working on rolling over and catching things.

I've been leash training her, and she has days where she does great.  Can't wait for her to be my daily running buddy in a few months.

The most wonderful time of the year

Well, to Jared.  Baseball season!

He is coaching t-ball again this year.  Emma and Maddie are actually on the same team, so that will be fun.  Jared calls coaching 3-4 year olds "herding cats".  :)

He had his coach meeting tonight and came home with the bag of gear.  The kids were so excited and couldn't wait to try on their shirts and batting helmets.  Maddie was excited to see a pretty purple bat in the bag.

Good thing we have a couple years to teach Briggs how to play- we'll probably start with teaching him how to wear his helmet the right way...

Emma Lately

Emma has matured so much lately.  I feel like she turned 4 and just grew up, whether I was ready or not. (I was not!!)

She is becoming so independent, and asks to walk herself over to her friend's house now, walk herself from the car to whoever is hosting pre-school and from the chapel to the primary room for Sunbeams on Sundays.  

She does a great job of dressing herself every morning now, usually matching and cute.  She always gets her own shoes on(still needs help tying them, though).

She loves her friends, and talks about them when they aren't around.  She cares about each one of them individually, and asks about them and worries about them.  Each of them are her "best friend" and she makes them feel that way when they are over playing.

She is very light on her feet.  Sometimes she does little hops and jumps and it surprises me how graceful she is.  I am NOT graceful, but we could have a dancer or something on our hands?  Or maybe just a fast, coordinated athlete?  She has also grown into her height for at least the moment, and is very coordinated and fast this spring.  Or maybe had lots of pent up energy from the winter??  T-ball starts next week, and she is SO excited.

Her imagination is so fun right now- and with her encouragement, she and Maddie can play pretend games for hours and hours.  Yesterday they were having so much fun, I didn't even bother to ask them to have quiet hour or naptime.  This is when they were pretending to be cats the other day.

She loves joy school and has learned so much with all the awesome teachers we have.  She especially loves coloring/painting and is very precise and careful with any project she is working on.  She usually takes twice as long to complete something she is doing than most of the others.

She is such a great help to me.  She loves to vacuum, make beds, sort toys, clean the kitchen table, help cook, dust, wipe down cupboards, put away laundry, fold laundry, etc.  Her example gets the other two excited about doing chores, too.

Her speech is improving so much, and with it her confidence is as well.  It makes us so happy to see her progressing because of her hard work.  Her hearing is still a little sensitive sometimes, but she seems to be pretty well adjusted to it for the most part.

Emma didn't miss a beat when she saw Kelsi.  She went right up to her and acted like no time at all had passed.  It was very sweet.  

Emma is such a little mother.  She gives him rides on a little tiny bike all around the house and yard, and he thinks he is pretty cool since she hangs out with him.  They were being silly and posing for this one. :)

Briggs Lately

We celebrated a half-birthday for Briggs a couple weeks ago.  It was an extra exciting one since he turned 18 months old and is officially in nursery!  On Easter Sunday, Jared and I were able to go to Sunday School together for the ENTIRE lesson.  Exciting stuff!  This sounds crazy, but for a little over 4 years, we have ALWAYS had a kid with us who was not nursery age, so that was a big deal.

Briggs is busier than ever.  Running, jumping, grabbing, climbing and crawling in, on, up, under or around everything.  Forget about turning around for a second and him getting into something- I don't even have to turn around!  He takes off sprinting and I better be ready!  Our house is pretty child-proofed(finally!), though, so that is part of why we have been hibernating.  It is safer there.  Did I mention that he tends to catch himself with his head?!  Poor kid always has some kind of bruise there.

He is talking like crazy.  You say it, so does Briggs.  He is by far my earliest talker and most communicative child for this age.

He loves horses, 4-wheelers, balls, tractors, trucks, dogs, cats, etc.  He watches princess movies with the girls and looks for those things.  Well, he kind of watches, he is definitely not sitting still, though.  Now that the weather is nice, he cries every time he has to get off the 4-wheeler.  A ride is NEVER long enough for him.

He loves all food.  After months of refusing them, he recently discovered cucumbers and cooked zucchini, though, and could eat them all day.  He also still loves a sippy cup of milk and bananas, those are daily staples for him.

In just one short month, we went cold turkey on the bottle and crib for Briggs.  He didn't seem to mind at all!  I was the one who wasn't ready for him to not be a baby, I guess.  He also decided he wants to potty train.  I'm still holding back a little on that one.  But he won't finish going #2 in his diaper because he doesn't like it.  He goes #1 everytime I put him on the potty, and is so very proud of himself.  I think he does it because he loves the high fives from his sisters and doing the "potty dance" every time.

Obsessed with motorcycles.  Did NOT want to get off of that one.

Still such a little book worm.  But he only wants to read sitting on the couch, bed or chair, and has to be positioned a specific way in order to be content.

The basketball.  He went through a week or two phase of REFUSING to go to bed without the basketball with him.  It was pretty funny- he would cry until he gave it to him, and then go right to sleep.

Big boy underwear and the potty dance playing behind him.

My little sister came home last night.  Briggs was definitely not sure what to think of this new person.  Honestly, he doesn't like most people, he is kind of a momma's boy, but he was starting to warm up after a couple of hours.  He did let her sneak up close enough for this next picture.  And then he saw her and scooted away.  That's what she gets for leaving him when he was 3 days old, I guess! ;)

April Fool's!!

April Fool's Dinner- Fried chicken and cupcakes.  They actually turned out better than I thought they would. Definitely fooled a few people.  Poor Drake was not impressed...

3 Little Monkeys

Piled up some pillows and spent over an hour jumping off the couch into them.  At some point, capes were added, too.  Way too much fun!

Accomplishment

We have been working with Emma on her speech.  A lot.  I can't even help but take a moment and correct her no matter where or what we are doing.  And Jared does the same.  With her desire to do better, it seems to be very successful.  We have a long way to go yet, but we're getting there!

Yesterday was "Emma's Day".  She got to stay up later than the others and hang out with Mom and Dad.  She went on a walk with me, played some angry birds with Jared, and folded a couple loads of laundry with us.  She loves folding/putting away laundry right now.  :)

I went in the bathroom to help her finish brushing her teeth and we did our nightly ritual of tongue exercises and sounds.  She has her "ch" and "sh" now, and we've been working really hard on her "la" or basically anything involving the letter "l".  She had an ahah! moment and it just clicked.  I think her tongue is stronger now, too, so that helped, but she was SOOOOO excited.  She ran out to show Jared.

She said, "Dad!!  Listen!  Lalalala!  I sound like YOU now!  I can do it!"

He praised her a lot and then said, "Emma, that is because you worked so hard."

She wanted to wake up Maddie and Briggs to tell them, we told her she had to wait until morning.  So then she turned to Molly(the puppy), grabbed her face and started "lalalala"ing to Molly.

I'm so incredibly proud of her.  It hasn't been easy, but she has learned how attitude + effort = result.  I hope she remembers that feeling and continues to have experiences like that in her life.