November...late

Extremely quick recap of some of our November via some pictures of the wee ones.  My New Year's Resolution is to really make good use of this nice new laptop that I waited in a very long queue for on Black Friday and then gave to myself for Christmas! Ha! 

The twins are 15 months in these pics and have become great wee pals for the most part.  There is, of course, the occasional brief disagreement over who will get a certain toy, but unfortunately, Olive being the older and bossier of the two, she tends to win more often than not...when I'm not watching.  

I'm told I shouldn't have them on a bottle anymore and I will get them off it soon, but for now, it's making my life easier to still give them their milk in it before their nap and at bed time.  When I give them a wee dry snack in a bowl during the day the pair of them always march straight to the bottom stair outside the kitchen and sit there for a good 10 mins chatting nonsense to each other as they eat....it's wonderful to watch.

My wee Penelope Anne is very much a mummy's girl.  But she went through a wee phase there when she was quite attached to Ryan instead.  I really quite enjoyed the break from the clingyness and, who doesn't love watching their lovely baby snuggle into Dad?

Jack was absent from school on the first picture day at his school because of a small asthma attack at home due to a terrible cough.  So when picture re-takes came around I took a few pics of him at home before he left...what a handsome wee chap he is!  His picture turned out cute, but with his same wee forced smile he usually has! ha.

The babies love peas of every shape and size and Olive can frequently be caught nicking Penelope's when her's are all gone.  What a change it is having children who really love veggies....the boys weren't nearly as fond; it was all fruit with them.

Jack and Peter are still really keen on any kind of art project; Jack in particular is getting so into drawing and is great!  Here they are working on painting clay piggie banks.  The thing I loved most about this day was that Jack immediately searched our house high and low for any money he could find lying around, shoved it in his bank, and then asked me if we had enough now to go to Scotland.  It makes me so happy to know he's got such a deep love for Scotland already and for all his family there.

Peter is very excited to go visit Granny and Grandpa McArthur this summer too.  Here he is with his beloved 'Jake and the Neverland Pirates' toys that Granny had sent over.  They are spoiled rotten, even from afar!

Jack finished football, thank the heavens!  Don't get me wrong, I really enjoyed getting him involved in it and he made a lot of new friends, and enjoyed the practices (not so much the actual matches), but it was really difficult juggling the other 3 wee ones for that hour in the evenings while we waited for Jack.  Next year will be much easier, if he still wants to play again that is.

The twins are huge 'Peppa Pig' fans...taking after their brothers, and cousins in Scotland too.  My mum sent them a lovely Peppa and George, which they carry around a lot as well as their beloved blankies.  All of my kids have had a special blanket and toy they've been really attached too.

And lastly, the wee twinners looking cute in matching attire at church one Sunday, another of them in their favourite spot on the step with their snack, and a pic of the 'Book Wreath' I made that took blooming ages to make, but looks so pretty in my living room now that it's finally done!  

A favourite month

I've a couple of wee posts to catch up on, but for now I best put up a couple of nice Halloween themed pictures before this jolly day comes to an end!  

We went to our favourite pumpkin patch, Bauman's, with our friends near the beginning of the month.  It poured with rain like mad the entire drive there, but eased off almost immediately after arriving.  The great thing about this patch is that it's mostly covered anyway, so come rain or shine we were going to have a fab time.  

All three boys and little Charlotte played in a pit of walnuts, took a ride in a wee bumblebee train, slid down a massive pumpkin hill, jumped on bouncy castles, and made their way through a few haystack mazes.  Brill fun.

Last year we took a picture at this same spot, but left the sleepy 2 month olds in their pram.  What a difference a year makes...our wee lovelies were not to be kept down this time.

Look at these magic pumpkins that were there!  Absolutely amazing.

We took a quick weekend trip to Reno in the middle of the month to attend the baby blessing of our new nephew, Eli.  I'll write a post on that soon enough, but we imposed a little on our old friends from BYU at the last minute who live half an hour from Reno.   It was wonderful to see them; we miss them terribly.  

Ryan and Brett chatting away like old times...it was very nice seeing them together again.  I just can not believe Lindsey and I have given birth to all those children up there!  Haha! Ryan and I were married on the same day as Brett and Lindsey...it's mad to see how much our families have grown in the last (almost) 8 years.

And here's some final pics:  decorating Halloween cupcakes that we baked for family home evening, preparing for some pumpkin carving, and dressed and ready in our costumes for the ward's 'Trunk or Treat' Party.  If you can think of any great costume ideas I can use for my wee twinies next year, let me know.  I'm not sure if I'll be able to top 'Thing 1' and 'Thing 2'...they looked great! 

"The Happiest 5k on the Planet"...

The Colour Run's slogan was right! This run that I did, with two friends from my ward, was such a great time.  We pretty much laughed throughout the entire thing.  Sometimes at the ridiculous attire of others, occasionally that we'd actually paid money to run and get splattered in chalky stuff (although it was for a good charity), but mostly we laughed at the pure nic of ourselves.  But really, I think we all pretty much loved every minute of it.  

The run took place at the Portland International Raceway.  We parked downtown and took the tri met along with a ton of other colourful folks to our destination.

In the "colour zones", Anne and I made sure to get up close and personal with the people chucking the colour...we hoped it wouldn't be too difficult to wash out...well...Anne more than me.  She wasn't sure about going to work with multicolored hair, whereas I'm pretty sure my boys would love seeing me like that every day.

Next year, we're all taking our families with us.  It was way too fun to have them miss out again.
P.s. Jack laughed hysterically for a solid 10 mins when I arrived home and asked repeatedly when he could go get "colour attacked".

Footy practice

It's a miracle of sorts that I'm posting again so soon! I'll tell you one of the main excuses I had for not posting regularly.  I was using Ryan's old laptop and letters 'P' and 'O' on the keyboard had been broken off by one of our lovely wee ones.  I couldn't hack cutting and pasting those letters in anymore!  It was a bloomin' nightmare.  For Ryan's birthday we got him a Nexus tablet...which I kind of use more than him, but typing on that wasn't ideal either.  So, Ryan got me an ace wireless keyboard to use with the tablet; yippie! Problem solved.  The twins are taking their wee morning nap and Peter is playing with his superheros while I get a short blog in and wait by the window for Jack's bus to arrive.

Something I forgot to post about yesterday was Jack's football practice (aka soccer).  When he turned 3 we put him in a district program called 'Little Big Kicks'.  When we showed up to the weekly Saturday practice we found out that it was in fact just a bunch of teenage girls playing red light green light with the kids, etc.  Maybe I should have expected that, but still I thought they might have had an actual coach.  None of that really mattered anyway because Jack was terrified/overwhelmed and refused to play for the first 5 weeks of the 8 week program.  Then the last 3 weeks he had the time of his life!  We waited a year before deciding to try football again and so, he started in a "real" team at the beginning of this month.  There is an actual coach this time; Coach Murray, and about 6 boys on the team.  We started with closer to ten boys, but the numbers have dwindled as school started and some boys clearly hated being there.

Jack is thoroughly enjoying himself.  He is silly and laughs when he gets a good kick at the ball, and even when he's first out over and over again when they play a "musical chairs" type game but with targets to run to, he is always laughing and having a blast.  I have, much to my own astonishment, become a total side-line coach.  Oh dear! Sometimes I have to really stop myself from getting too into it...I'm the most embarrassing at their Saturday matches.  I feel like the coach hardly says a word to them when they're on the field, but he is really good at encouraging them when they take turns coming off during the match and at the end.  They don't keep official scores, but at our first Saturday match Jack was playing against his good friend, Joey's team and he was so devastated that they hadn't scored a single goal and the other team had about 20ish, that he came running to me crying.  It was hard for him to be losing so badly even though he's generally a good sport.  After a brief pep talk he was back in it and even though they never did score in that particular game he was ok with it in the end and congratulated Joey.  Since then they have done better at the matches, but I really hope he just continues to enjoy the sport (plus, I'm kinda liking it too.)

The only negative that comes from having signed Jack up for football, seems to be hanging out at his practices for an hour with the other 3 wee ones. Peter attempts to whack trees with enormous sticks. Penelope is constantly wandering away, and Olive nearly chocked herself to death at Tuesdays practice....she's really into tasting the bark and leaves that scatter the field.  And she thinks it's brill fun to run directly into any area the boys might be tackling in.  So I try and hold her for as long as my arms can manage before the body flailing and screaming just becomes too much or I'm utterly embarrassed.  It's always a real treat.

Aug/Sept....late as always

I want to make excuses for not having posted in donkeys again, but why bother...my life is busy and so is everyone else's.  On to a recap.

August 19th marked the 1st birthday of the wee girls.  I love getting to know their personalities, but really, it's a little weird how much their personalities also match their brother look-a-like's.  Olive is climbing up on the couches, the kitchen table, throwing marvelous hissy fits when she doesn't get her way, very chatty, and a total charmer.  Interestingly enough Peter continues to be much the same.  Penelope is still very needy, clingy, quiet, a great avoider of any potentially dangerous situations (sibling wrestling), and loves to give me wee kisses, which aren't actually kisses at all...she sniffs my face.  Jack isn't quite the same anymore, but can still be very needy and is extremely sensitive like Penny. 

For their birthday I made a Peppa Pig cake and we had our friends, the Stocks, the Platt's, Auntie Callie, Uncle Josh, and baby Zoe over for a couple of hours after church.  It was nice, and all the kids had a jolly time.  

Olive thought the cake was delish and Penny was somewhat disgusted by it.  So Olive nicked hers and helped herself to both.  I'm really having a hard time believing that it's been over a year since their birth.  I miss having a wee baby in the house, but definitely not in any rush to have any more any time soon.  We had my niece, Zoe, come stay over night a few weeks ago and oh dear, adding another wee 4 month old into the mix was total exhaustion! 

My not so wee Jack started morning kindergarten on September 6th.  He was feeling a little nervous and so was I as we attended the orientation the day before, but on the actual morning all seemed to go fairly well.  He let me take all the posey pictures I wanted but as we walked into the school I could tell he was a little unsure again.  I didn't realise he was supposed to go into the gym to meet his class and from there would go to their room.  The second we entered the gym he froze and dug his feet into the ground.  He was so overwhelmed by the room full of children/teachers that I had to lift him over to his class.  He began to cry and then so did I.  His teacher, Mrs. Haupt (our bishop's daughter-in-law), is so lovely, and came rushing over to tell me and him it would be ok. Haha.  I comfoted him for a minute and then left quickly to stand outside while she held his hand.  Moments later he was fine and on his merry way to the classroom (by this time another crying kid was holding Mrs. Haupt's hand).  When I picked him up he told me he had had the greatest time and couldn't wait to go EVERY day, Brill. 

By Monday morning he was asking me if he could ride the bus home.  I asked the office and that very afternoon the bus brought him straight to my door! Pure fab!  I guess they do that for all the wee kindergartners.  Jack thought it was amazing that he didn't have to wear a seat belt and it was nice for me to see how many wee pals he has too.  They were all screaming "Bye Jack" for ages as he got off the bus.  Every day has been a great success and I'm so happy with how much he's enjoying it all.  He just looks so bloomin' grown up!   He's such a good wee guy.  

Peter misses Jack in the mornings, but really, it's such a short time that he's gone and he's back before we know it.  He makes a big production of saying 'goodbye' to him in the morning when he leaves with Ryan, and he totally loves waiting for the bus to arrive.

Speaking of Peter...he's been having a hard time going to bed and staying there lately.  He tells us he's scared of shadows.  We have tried turning his wee nightlight off and just keeping the hall light on so as not to make so many shadows in his room, but that's not working.  If you have suggestions, please share.  He's driving me mad! I find him asleep in the ugly brown chair in our living room, tucked in all cosy in our bed, and occasionally in the twins room...everywhere but in his own bed.  It's actually quite comical wondering where we'll find him when we go down to bed.  The other hilarious thing is that he's usually got our wedding album tucked under his arm lying there conked out! He says it's his favourite book! Ha.