february catch up

so february is almost complete and I have not been good at uploading pictures or doing blog posts this month. my camera is mostly put away since our counters are bare, which means I have not been snapping as many pictures as I should be either. but there are some pictures I wanted to get up on the blog and a few stories to share.

my favorite story was from the grocery story yesterday afternoon. I took the kids after nap time and I need to remember that going to the grocery store is HORRIBLE with the kids. it used to be that charlie wanted to go to this “stay and play” area where he would play and I would shop with just the girls – that is easy peasy friends. now, charlie wants to push those little green carts and help me – UGH!!! but I am trying to have a good attitude about it and let him help me. I used to make him sit in the big part of the cart, but one time while we were doing that he saw another little boy obeying his mom and pointed it out to me and said “mom – can you just trust me?” (which I am sure he has heard from me before) and it was too sweet to not just trust him and let him follow me and the girls with the little green cart. well let me tell you – it is not easy. my heart is pounding the entire time. I am constantly directing him from ramming his cart full speed into other shoppers or slowing down as he turns otherwise those stupid little carts tip over. anyway –that is just a little background for the best part of the story.

we were going past all of the easter candy and charlie asked what it was and I said it is easter candy. then I said – charlie, what do we celebrate at easter? he said – JESUS! and I was so proud that even with all the candy surrounding him his first answer was Jesus. it also probably helps that I don’t go crazy with the easter baskets, etc.

here is a picture of me and my honey badgers who are almost 2!!! ellie is on the left.

this is classic ellie. when she gets excited she makes this weird face. bill was imitating her.

becca came over for a bit with baby no no and the kids were going crazy over trying to “hold baby no no!”.

I love that Nolan is looking at ellie here.

charlie has been very active lately and came flying in.

baby no no had had enough activity.

claire was concerned and asking to “hoowd hoowd hoowd”.

 

the 2 best babysitters in the world are ready! as a side note – you may remember these shirts from last year. yes  - they are 9 month shirts and still work great! they also still wear 12 month onesies with no problem.

ellie’s turn.

 

charlie was ready to hang with Nolan. he loves him so much.

when Nolan wanted to be held by his mom – the kids attacked his car seat and cat toy.

after bath time is almost my most favorite time of the day – the kids are clean, jammies on, girls are allowed to have bapoos (which decreases the noise), kids usually play happily and probably most key – I know bedtime is ALMOST here.

one night we pulled out the blocks after baths and had a good time. 

ellie sat here and happily built her tall tower alone. I turned around and saw a pretty tall tower and encouraged her – she was so proud. I was proud of her patience, when she would knock it over she would just start again. something charlie has not mastered yet.

 

 

claire was doing little towers on the ground and knocking charlie’s towers over – made for unhappy times.

  

focused kid.

almost 4 year old!

day at welch

last saturday, we loaded up the kids and met Pappy at welch village for a day of skiing. since the chairlifts at welch are only 2 person lifts we need another person to meet us for all 3 of the kids to be able to ski at the same time. it worked out perfectly and I can honestly say it was the first time I left the hill and said “that was fun” not “that was utterly exhausting!”. this was helped by the fact that it was 35 degrees so I wasn’t worried about it being cold for the kids, the kids all did a great job of being motivated to get out and ski (so once we started putting on gear no one started crying like crazy)

ellie trying to pull out a chair to join in on these other guys conversation.

taking a quick water break. before we head out.

we skied about 5-6 runs and then thought the kids should come in and have lunch. now I actually had packed pb&js and snacks, but pappy took charlie up to the cafeteria and this is what they came down with. I am not complaining – I love onion rings and we devoured this tray.

claire trying to eat the sprinkles off of the tray.

back out on the slopes I tried to take more pictures.

at one point ellie and I were at the bottom of the hill and claire skied up to ellie and then just whapped her on the head. bill and I were like “what?”. then they had a sister showdown. a lot of staring each other in the eyes and trying to push the other one with their gloved hand. I would love if they never had these sort of interactions, but I don’t think that will be the case. thankfully the harnesses came in handy and we pulled them apart and tried to help them communicate love to each other.

bill and claire.

 

more sister standoff.

me and kindercare on the lift.

claire – love this picture! I was trying to cheer her up after she took a fall and got a little bloody nose. this was about 1pm so she was sort of shot for the day.

bill fixing eleanore’s goggles. they are so big for her face.

they can never decide if they want them up or down. even while skiing down they will change their minds.

charlie is skiing awesome! he is growing into such a big boy! he seems so grown up to me when I see him skiing alone and “chasing and racing” (basically where charlie goes straight and as fast as he can giggling like a mad man and bill makes big turns back and forth in front of him).

I wanted to capture one picture of the 3 kids together, but ellie had other plans. as soon as I would get them in a line she would start to move forward. ugh!

one more attempt. look at how good claire and charlie are.

one seestor shot! love these two girls.

what a great pappy! charlie adores him.

giving us a wave.

me and eleanore on the lift.

pappy and charlie behind us. it was such a gloomy day!

bill and claire coming down.

claire was spent after her crash so I took her in and ellie and charlie wanted “mooe ski!” so bill and tom took those two out for a few more runs. bill said ellie is a pro. he said she has this “rock solid, wide base, downhill skier stance and basically carves turns by looking in the direction she wants to go”. hmmm – we’ll see where that goes.  claire currently likes to wag it and look around and her skies are closer together and has a mild side slip all the time. they both seem to love it though because when they see the skis in the garage they both start chanting “ski ski ski”.  what a blast it was skiing together as a family. although it is a lot of work – I love doing things that we love with our kids and seeing them love it too. thanks pappy for helping us out!

 

that night – we took the kids to Rochester’s Social Ice.

the girls put their hands in their pockets to keep warm.

most things were made of ice. benches, animals, etc. it was cold out though so we didn’t stay very long.

charlie touching the ice sculptures. the only thing that bugged bill and me was that most of the sculptures were advertisements.

I did like the running shoe though.

after a quick loop – we headed to caribou for some hot chocolate. after spilling it midway through we cleaned up and headed home. we had a busy saturday!