My baby is fifteen months old! (almost)

Today I took a few pictures of my little Livi....she was in a perfect mood, and cooperated the whole time.  I  must note:  photographing ONE kid is much easier than photographing THREE kids.  She was a piece of cake!  All I had to do was make animal noises at her, and she laughed and smiled like I was doing "Eddie Murphy Live".
At fifteen months, this baby is:
-walking all over the place like a tiny orangutan.  She can spin in circles, change direction, jump, (which is weird....I don't think she should be doing this yet) and almost run.
-talking and repeating more words now.  "Dada" and "uh oh" are still her favorites, but she is working some other words in there, too.
-eating everything she can fit in her mouth.  Girl can eat.
-loving her brother and (especially) her sister.  She thinks everything they do is hilarious and repeat worthy.  If they jump, she jumps...if they are singing, she hollers real loud....if they are yelling, she yells, too.  It is hysterical.
-making adorable faces and doing lots of tricks like "stinky face", straining real hard when we ask "Are you strong?", pointing to body parts....
-still sleeping great and taking two naps a day!
-asserting her tiny will on us.  I think this one is going to be like her sissy in that department.

A sad day...

Today we laid to rest Shawn's grandma.  She was 89 years old.  It was a sad, sad day....but a sweet one, too.  So many kind people from her church came to the funeral, and even stood up to say a few words about her.  I was very moved by their words, and the words of her family that spoke....she clearly meant very much to so many people.  It made me think about my own life, and how I hope I am lucky enough to be loved by so many people, the way she was.  She loved her family, and had a servant's heart.  She volunteered hundreds and hundreds of hours of her time at her church, and with various ministries....lots of people have the good intentions to help others in need, but she REALLY put her whole self into serving others through ministry.  She was more than Shawn's grandma....she was like a second mother to him.  He is an amazing husband in part because of the influence of her and his mother....I think being raised by women made him sensitive and empathetic to others.  He spent more time with her than most people spend with their grandmothers, and for this reason her passing was especially hard for him.  I know she is one of the people in his life that he will always remember for loving him unconditionally.  She was SO proud of him and what he had accomplished in his life.....I know part of the reason he always tried as hard as he did to succeed was because of her....he told me that she always made a point to tell him how smart and wonderful he was growing up....I know that made a huge impact on him.
During the last week of her life, we have had some pretty deep conversations about life, and the afterlife.  We try to keep remembering God's words to us:
 "Rejoice and be exceedingly glad, for great is your reward in heaven..." (Matthew 5:12)
I have tried to comfort Shawn with that thought....that what his grandma is experiencing NOW is the really good part!!   God promises an eternity of happiness for His believers, and I KNOW she is with Him now....if we believe what God says to us, we have to look forward to meeting Him, and not think of that phase of our lives with fear.  This part is hard for us, because we have three tiny children, and feel like we are so far from that end...but really, in the scope of eternity, it's not so far away.  This last week was really hard on Shawn's family....his mother has been brave and strong and we are unbearably proud at her courage and how she is holding up.  She has really been a model of how to handle yourself with grace and love when you are having to let a loved one go and make hard choices....
This has been a week of lessons, and hardship...but happiness too.  Happiness that Grandma is no longer suffering, and that she is enjoying the beginning of eternity with her Maker in heaven!!  Tonight I had the twins in the car, and I pointed out the sky, and how beautiful it looked.  The sun was setting, and the clouds looked silver, and peach and orange and pink all at once.  They both studied the sky quietly for a minute, and then Hayden said, "Mommy, today was a special day."  I told her that she was right....today WAS a really special day.  

 Grandma on Christmas Eve with the twins...she LOVED Christmas, and loved spoiling her grandkids rotten!  

Grandma and Livi on the day of her birth....Grandma always made it to the hospital to welcome my babies into the world.  She was so proud of them! 

Comments from today...

...."Daddy, why aren't you talking?" -Hayden at dinner...Shawn laughed because he said that was a typical girl comment.
...."Mommy, don't leave!  Stay in here and talk about my swimming party." -Cale at bedtime....we spend ALL YEAR talking about the birthday party.
..."They were screaming me out of town!" -Hayden today at Momak's for lunch...irritated with the little boys on the playground.
...."Mommy, it's not a joke.  We have to put the TV on because boys love sports." -Cale, after I may or may not have questioned Daddy about holing himself up in our bedroom with the TV on.
..."We were playing ice cream shop.  I gave him two dollars, and some acorns....he just threw the acorns on the ground" -Cale, talking about playing with a friend at recess today.
..."MOMMY!!!  He keeps knocking the "How's your father?" soap into the tub!" -Hayden at bathtime....this is only really funny if you know our family terminology.  Whenever we scrub hineys, we call it "giving you a how's your father" (from Austin Powers) as in:  "Stand up so I can give you a "how's your father"  She was crying because Cale was running by and pushing the bottle of bath gel into the tub.

And these are just the ones I can REMEMBER from today.  They crack me up!  Even the baby is funny nowadays....wrinkling her nose up and shaking her head if she doesn't like something.

The baby is walking....

 Livi took her first steps more than a month ago, but then shelved the whole "walking" thing.  She literally walked back and forth to Shawn and I about four times, and then didn't walk again for six weeks.  Nothing.  Not a step!  Then, on my uncle's birthday, my whole family was over here for birthday cake and she started walking all over the place.  She was a walking fool!  Putting on a big show...smiling, laughing and clapping for herself.  I think she might be a ham.  (Shocker)  She was just waiting for a bigger crowd to show her new trick to.  Now, she does a bunch of walking each day, but still crawls when she needs to get somewhere in a hurry.

 As brilliant as (I think) my kids are, none of them were early walkers.  Cale went as far as seventeen months as a crawler....the kid would crawl past you talking but would NOT stand up.  My mom and I finally coaxed him into walking by luring him with lunch meat.  I am not sure what about this bothers me so much.....I know they are developing fine, but the late walking thing annoys me because it's almost like they are CHOOSING not to walk....their first act of defiance to get their mom's goat! Lots of people have said to me (with all three babies) "Why do you WANT them to walk?  Things get so much HARDER when they start walking!!"  I'm not sure what parenting planet these people live on, but in my universe, my crawlers are pretty much into everything before they learn to stand up.  Case in point, a month ago, I walked into the living room to find my NON WALKING baby standing on the side table next to the couch.  Standing up!  Like she was surfing.  To me, that is proof that her non-walking was directed at me.  If you can climb up the chair and balance yourself on the side table, you can probably put one foot in front of the other, my friend.
Anyway, I am glad that she is walking, because it makes things easier outside....no more carrying this baby everywhere....then again, it is one more "baby" thing that is gone forever and that makes me sad.  I will most likely never have another non-walking baby again.  -Sniffle-
I took these two pictures yesterday as she was walking all around the house.....just so you know, this baby is not taking after her non-shirt wearing Daddy, but is only topless because we had ravioli for dinner.  Secondly, how adorable is her fat baby gut?  I love that thing!!!

Pumpkin Patch!

We headed to the pumpkin patch Sunday to pick out our pumpkins....I remember the selection of pumpkins looking a little healthier last year, but my kiddos weren't going to be deterred by sickly, stemless gourds!  They started piling pumpkins into their little wagon like they were on "Supermarket Sweep".  Daddy had to go along after them and take out all the pumpkins they put in.  Always the annoying picture taking mommy, I tried to squish them all together for some adorable photo ops.  They weren't having it.  Despite a bunch of begging, pleading, and embarrassing hijinks by Daddy in the background, I still got a bunch of pics that include:  Hayden looking at the ground, Hayden sticking her tongue out, Cale pulling up his shirt, the baby trying to eat grass, kids holding random items in front of their faces and the baby sporting her chronically runny nose.  Sigh.  I would pay good money to get one, just ONE good picture of the three of my babies looking adorable, happy, and snot free. I have decided that the likelihood of getting a good family picture is directly inversely proportional to the amount of kids you have....You've got one kid?  A multitude of cute portraits are just a shutter click away!  Three kids?  Get ready for 175 pictures of tormented weirdos that look miserable to be out in public with you.  Since the elusive "perfect pumpkin picture" wasn't going to happen, we gave up on picture taking and went back to loading up the wagon with pumpkins we were pretending we were going to buy.  In the end, we ended up with six or seven pumpkins, and the babies think they all picked them out.  As we were leaving, we noticed a little train being pulled by a riding lawnmower, which looked like a load of dangerous fun, so we might have to head back to the pumpkin patch again before Halloween gets here.

Glamorous chores for me...

Yesterday as I was making the bed, I noticed that our wall unit air conditioner looked dirty.  On closer inspection, I realized it was REALLY dirty.  The little blades were virtually black, and it was making me almost gag to look at them....today, I decided to tackle that thing.  It took about thirty Clorox wipes and about forty Q-tips dipped in rubbing alcohol, but it is looking much better.  About the time I had accumulated a mountain of filthy Q-tips next to me, I realized the whole front of the thing snapped off.  Sigh.  That means I could have just washed it in the sink.  I don't know what I was thinking!  Anyway, sitting down by the air conditioner made me realize that the trim around it had never been painted.  I had to go find the paint that matched, and opened the can CURSING my old paint guy once again.  He put some junk (thinner I'm sure) in EVERY GALLON OF PAINT WE OWN....even ones he didn't open or use yet.  Consequently, every time I want to touch up paint, I have to stir the gallon for about twenty straight minutes to get it mixed again.  I really, really hate that he put that thinner in every gallon, because it is SO drippy to use.....I'm sure it makes it flow through the sprayer better, but it just runs off brushes....anyway, I digress.  (I could do a whole post on the lingering disappointment and angst I feel about our paint guy)
In the middle of those two messy chores, the baby did the poop of the century and that was a whole new challenge.  After changing her, we were playing on the floor and I realized my husband was right and Cale's pallet DID INDEED smell like pee, and that started a whole new job.
This post serves as a not so subtle message to people who think staying home with your kids is relaxing, or glamorous.  It's not.

Sisters

I had to post this picture, just because it is so adorable.

I heard the girls playing around the corner while I was getting dinner ready, and I peeked around to see what they were doing.  Hayden was putting this little hat on Livi (that Popee got from China) and telling her, "Be a good little Chinese girl and don't ever take your hat off."  In my opinion, she was a little too vigorous about smooshing the hat on Livi's head, but you wouldn't have known it by looking at them.  Livi was smiling so big, and looking at Sissy like she was the most amazing thing ever.  Everytime the hat would fall off, Livi would try so hard to get it back on her head, and then would wait and wait for someone to notice that she'd done it.  When we would compliment her hat, she would laugh and laugh....she thought she was being really cute.  She was right!!