Cool!

This is quite possibly the coolest construction set ever!

Love Those Baby Humans...

hmmm, that just doesn't sound right. Oh well.

We met Erin and Ben at the cool playground this morning. We were the only ones there. The weather report said 60s and sunny. A great day to spend at the playground, no? No. It was foggy, but I thought the fog would burn off in the sun. No such luck. After both boys slid down the slide we realized the slides were all wet as were their pants. It was not as warm as I thought it would be either. It was 47 when we got out of the car. After about 45 minutes of playing I noticed Ryan was practically shivering and fussing a bit. He held his hands out for me to look at and gave me a pained look. I asked if he was ready to go home and he said, "Y-yes." Given this came from the boy who has never ever suggested or even hinted at leaving the playground of his own accord I knew he was miserable. We invited Erin and Ben back to our house and offered dry pants for Ben. I was actually surprised they accepted(no offense Erin). I was happy that we wouldn't be cutting our play date short. I actually had not thought about the state of my house when I asked them to come. Luckily the play room was not in as bad a shape as the rest of the house and we spent our time together there. The boys had lots of fun playing with just about every toy we have down there. Dr. Ryan examined a somewhat dubious, but fairly willing Ben. I have to teach him not to cut off people's tonsils with the scalpel. I guess that was the closest thing he could find to a tongue depressor. Ben seemed to really like Ryan's Hess trucks. Lily did her little baby thing and offered lots of big smiles. When it was time for our friends to go Ben wanted to stay and he made that pretty evident. It actually made me feel good that he had a good time. Ryan didn't want Ben to leave either. He told me after they left, but it was pretty evident by his body language and the big sad face he was wearing. I said they could come back and play another time and he suggested tomorrow. It's nice to see them wanting to be with each other. They started having play dates when they were just little bits that were on the floor in proximity to each other when a "play date" was more of an excuse for their mommies to have adult contact during the day. Gradually they started doing more things and even noticing each other. Now I think they really are the best friends Erin and I preordained them to be when we started all this baby stuff.
Soon we will get to start the Lily/ baby human too friendship:-) I can't wait! I know I should play favorites, but I hope it's a girl and they are best friends through their whole lives. That would be so cool. I didn't really get the opportunity to have a friendship that lasted my whole life being an Air Force brat. I always thought those kinds of friendships were so cool. At least I found Erin in my early adult life:-)


needed more words

*****Note to add that blogger is stupid and ruined all the hard work I did linking to tons of playdate pictures from my blog and Erin's. It combined linked words and erased the old links. I am far too tired and annoyed to fix it now, but I might check what links survived and try to make sure the highlights were hit.****

busy, busy, busy

Is it just me or is December the busiest month of the year? This past weekend we spent the day at my grandma and grandpa's(aka mom-mom and pop-pop) house for Cookie Day. It was a really good cookie day. The best in recent years I think. Ryan and Zach had fun decorating the cookies. When they were done they played with the other kids. My cousins' children are old enough to play now. Lily was so good. She managed to use the rocking chair to climb up on the couch by herself. You should have seen the look on her face when she made it. She was so proud of herself. Climbing the stairs is old hat now. She needed a new challenge. I'm thinking she will be a dare devil like her big brother. She managed to charm everyone with her huge grin and cheery disposition. Ryan impressed a few people by figuring out the first letters of words. I don't think too many people were around while he was doing it though. I got more than a few comments on how good they were. After Zach was done decorating cookies he spent most of the rest of the time playing video games and some time playing with the 10 year old daughter of my uncle's girlfriend. Jay and I managed to have adult conversations and even spent some time together! Since we were there from 11-8:30ish it was a pretty long day. I think it wore down Ryan's immune system because he started the day with a slight cough and a runny nose and ended it with a fever and hacking up a lung. We medicated him before bed and tried to come up with a plan if he was too sick for church.

Lily needs me...to be continued.

Zach is 8!

Zach turned 8 today. He seemed really happy to get his Nintendo DS. He brought cookies to school to share with his class and said he had a really great day. Though the highlight of his day seemed to be pictures of the Galapagos Islands that his computer teacher brought back from his vacation.

Now if you will excuse me I am going to bed. Lily is finally asleep and I have a huge headache and I'm nauseous. Don't go there... Ryan is sick too. 'night.

Lily 9 Months

Lily has done so much in her short 9 months. She has now been in the world for as long as she was in my "tummy." She did a lot in there too, you know changing from a zygote into a baby that was ready to come out and see the world. Amazing. No less amazing is all she has accomplished since she joined us out here. She has learned to smile, giggle, make lots of different sounds, recognize faces, voices and names. She has learned to roll over, bear walk, pull herself up, cruise around the furniture, stand up by herself and she even took her very first fawn like steps toward becoming a walker! All this from the little, tiny baby that didn't do much besides cry, kick her feet and swing her arms without much control. Baby humans are so fascinating. Other babies are also fascinating, even plants fascinate me. Like the Narcissus(paper whites) Ryan and my mom planted about 2 weeks ago as bulbs that are now over 9 inches tall! Sometimes I just sit and marvel at God's creations.