Happy Birthday, Justin!

Today is Justin's sixth birthday! If you read the post on Rebekah's blog, you already realized that we are having technical issues with our hard drive and I cannot access my pictures. So for now this is a picture-less birthday post, but I will add the pictures as soon as the drive is back up.

Justin is 42" tall and weighs 36 pounds. His favorite activities are riding his bike, reading, learning his doctrines and Bible verses for Kids4Truth club, and playing with his brothers. I am homeschooling Justin for kindergarten this year, and we are very much enjoying it. Recently, there were two activities in which Justin dictated sentences to me, and I thought they would be appropriate to share on his birthday.

I like to play...

....baseball on the Game Cube.

....Runescape and Ice Age (computer games).

....on the swingset.

....riding my bike.

....with my guns and bullets (caps for the cap guns) and all my cowboy stuff.

When I am big...

....I am going to play paintball. (???!!)

....I will have a bigger mouth.

....I am going to drive a jeep.

....I am going to take Sara Kate on a date.

"There might be other things I can do when I am big, but I can't think of them now." - Justin

Oh, to be a six-year old! We love you, Justin!! Happy Birthday!!!

Aaron funnies

When Aaron asked me to push him higher on the swing, I naturally obliged him. And when he went higher than he's ever gone before (that I know of anyway), he tried to tell me about it so quickly that his words came out all jumbled. I love this age!! :)

"Mommy! I never bee'd this higher so much! I never go'ed so higher!"

"Aaronnette" modeling one of Rebekah's bonnets.

It's not raining buckets, but this bucket might be useful in the rain! :)

I love my little Aaron-bear! :)

Nancy

Aaron at Walmart

Since we have come home, I have been trying to restock my kitchen and pantry items gradually. I didn't really intend for it to start out that way, but I have been finding that I have a list, go shopping and come home to realize that I'm out of something else that didn't make it onto the list. As it turns out, my repeated stops at the store gave me a chance to take each of the boys with me on different trips (yes, I have been shopping 4 times this week, and no, they have not all been trips to Walmart!).

Aaron has been very patiently waiting for his turn with Mommy, and today the schedule worked out for me to take him to get a short list of items. As with the other boys, we started our "date" with a frozen beverage. Aaron's choice was a blue raspberry Icee. We had just gotten into Walmart to begin our shopping when I heard a small "uh-oh." I glanced down at Aaron, who was sitting in the front of the shopping cart, and saw that he had small mounds of blue raspberry Icee on his shirt and pants. Thinking that the lid had come off his cup, I immediately checked the cup and found it intact. So I asked Aaron what had happened. "I just blowed in the straw, Mommy, and it all shooked up." Hmmm.....lesson in what happens when we blow air into a straw that is stuck in a cup full of Icee.

After cleaning Aaron up, we proceeded to the office supply section of Walmart. I needed a new calendar that fits in a diaper bag since my old one was on a school schedule and ended at the end of June. As I was looking at the (pitiful) selection of pocket calendars, Aaron said, "Mommy!!" I looked up to see what had caught his attention.

Aaron: "Mommy, do you see that lady there?"

Me: (Holding breath wondering what will come out of his mouth.) "Where?"

Aaron: "There, right there the one with the orange shirt on."

Me: (Oh, yes, that one standing less than twelve inches from me!) "Yes?"

Aaron: "She looks like Hayley."

Note: She did not look anything like Drew's twelve-year-old cousin Hayley, but I was not about to dispute that fact in front of the orange-shirted lady standing at my elbow!

Me: (Whew! Crisis averted....that could have been bad!)

We then proceeded through the store to the baby department where I was searching for a different kind of bottle for Rebekah than what the boys had all used. I love the Avent bottles, but the nipples are bigger and seem to choke Rebekah. She had done well with the Gerber disposable nipples at the hospital, so I bought a package of the Gerber ones today. While I was comparing bottles and prices, Aaron continued to chatter, pointing out everything from Lightning McQueen cups to dresses we should buy for Rebekah.

Aaron: "Mommy! Look at that lady!"

Me: "Hmmm?" (As I glance over my shoulder to see a lady that is.....let's just say, not a petite size six.)

Me: Frantically, "Aaron, shhh. Not so loud. Lower your voice."

Aaron: (Totally not hearing or paying attention to me) "Mommy! She has a big bottom!"

Me: Slinking away as quickly as possible.

Ahhh....such is life with a three year old! If nothing else, it keeps me humble! :)

All's well that ends well! We came home and Aaron had a bath with Monkey Soap - his favorite! Actually, it is Curious George bubble bath, but Monkey Soap sounds much more fun! :)

Nancy

Random Picture Challenge

This week's random picture comes from November 2007.  If you want to play along, visit Brittany at Four Little Men and Girly Twins.  Aaron was a couple months shy of his second birthday, and this was the first time he had ever had butter cookies - you know, the kind with the holes in the middle so you can stick your fingers through them. :)  They were obviously a big hit!  :)

I had been working on this post for a little while, compiling a list of some of the funny things Aaron says. Since the Random Picture ended up being Aaron, I thought I would add a list of his funnies, too!

Aaron-isms

A bone arrow (bow and arrow)

wike (like) Pretty much any "l" sound comes out as "w."  Makes for some interesting interpretations!

The Brothers (Aaron's collective name for Zachary and Justin.)  No kidding, he uses this phrase just like a name!  "Mommy I going to play with the brothers.  Mommy, where are the brothers? Daddy, the brothers are sleeping." 

Aaron's favorite part of homeschooling is "scissoring."  The first thing he does when I say it is time for school is run and get his scissors out of his pencil box.  A piece of junk mail from the trash can occupies him for almost an hour!

Recently, we were going to a friend's house, and Aaron knew we were going somewhere, but he kept (literally, every 5 minutes or less) asking Drew where we were going.  Finally, after about 20 times of Drew saying you'll find out when we get there, Drew answered Aaron and said, "We are going crazy."  Aaron promptly ran from the kitchen to find me and said, "Mommy!  We are going to crazy!  That's gonna be fun, huh, Mommy!"

At breakfast one morning, Aaron saw a morning double on the fence near our bird feeders.  Any guesses?  Well, he correctly identified a mourning dove!!!

We have an animal sounds toy that makes various animal noises as well as plays a couple of songs.  One of those is "The Farmer in the Jail (Dell)".  Either my son has a really Southern accent, or he and his brothers have played police a few times too many!!

Sparry-goat - This one threw me the first few times I heard it until I realized that he was talking about his safari boat.  :)

Nancy

Catching Up!

I know it's been a few days since my last post, so this post will probably be all over the place catching up on what has happened. 

Sunday, we all made it to church in the morning, but Caleb refused to willingly stay with the nursery workers (without screaming loudly enough to be heard through half of the building!), so I ended up spending Sunday school and church time in the nursery with him.  He never did take a morning nap, which only compounded his grumpiness!  When he finally did fall asleep at 2:30 in the afternoon, I also took a nap.  Drew realized how tired Caleb and I were and decided to let us sleep through evening church.  Justin also wasn't acting like himself, so Drew stayed home to watch the bigger boys and let me sleep.  Good thing, because by late afternoon on Monday, Justin was complaining of a bad headache, a bad sore throat, and had a 101.5 temp.  When we got into the doctor on Tuesday morning, my suspicion of strep throat was confirmed.  :(  Since being on antibiotics, he is doing much better, although I can tell he is dragging a bit by the end of the day.

Yesterday was Drew's birthday (Happy Birthday!!), and Zachary decided that Drew wanted a carrot cake.  So, the boys helped make a yummy carrot cake with cream cheese frosting.  Mmmm!  We also (finally!) finished packing away the remaining Christmas things yesterday and are ready this weekend to set up the office for home schooling.

This morning, Justin was well enough to go back to school, which he was very excited about.  He said that he had a great time and that at playtime he and Sara Kate and Austin and RJ played football.

After dropping Justin off at school, we headed back to the pediatrician for the second time this week.  Today was Aaron's 3 year check-up.  He was a very big boy and only cried for just a second when his finger was pricked to draw blood.  Everything else checked out just great.  Aaron was born with two heart murmurs, and today the pediatrician said he faintly heard one, but the other is gone altogether!  He is recommending that we don't even need to return to the cardiologist for a follow-up visit!!!  :) Good news when you don't have insurance!  Both murmurs are described as benign, which means that they do not indicate any abnormalities in the heart.  So, the are "normal" murmurs, if there is such a thing.  :)  Aaron is 24.2 pounds and 34.75 inches tall.  We are slowly but steadily climbing up the growth chart!  Zachary on the other hand, is a back-breaking 46.6 pounds!!!!  No wonder I am struggling to fit him into my lap!! :)  Caleb topped the scales at a healthy 18.10 pounds.  He's going to surpass Aaron by his first birthday if he keeps growing at this rate! :)  No kidding, Caleb is wearing clothes that Aaron did not wear until close to his second birthday.

From the doctor's office, we headed to BJES (Zac's school) to pick up his books from first semester.  I was kind of bummed because they did not let us keep all of his reading books, and I argued that we paid for all the books at the beginning of the school year, so we should get them all.  But, the didn't budge, so now I have to buy the complete set of six to get the last 3 books that we need.  Grrrr.  They also did not have a math book or phonics workbook to give us because the teacher tears the pages out of each of them at the beginning of the year, and they said they did not have any others we could have.  SO, on to the resource center to purchase the books we did not have.....I was able to get almost everything we need (I think!) except for the set of reading books.  That will just have to wait as it is almost half of the cost of all the other books combined!  The bright side is that if I do homeschool Justin in first grade, I will have about half of the books that I can re-use from Zac.  If I am able to do quite a bit of planning over the next few evenings and this weekend, I would like to start school this coming week.  Hopefully it will work out that way.

While we were driving around town this morning, I was playing "what if" with Zachary and Aaron.  It's something we do once in a while and something we have fun with.  Sometimes it's "What if you were a bird, what would you do, where would you live, what would you eat, etc.?" But this morning, I decided to check with Aaron to see if he remembered what he should do if he were to get lost.  Nope!  I first asked him what Mommy and Daddy's names were so he could tell an adult if he was lost.  He remembered that Daddy was Drew, but I am just Mommy!  :)  Then I asked him what he would tell an adult if he was lost and couldn't find Mommy and Daddy (thinking he would say, "I'm lost" or "I can't find my Mommy" or something like that).  Nope, again!  Any guesses?  Well, you wouldn't have guessed it anyway.  The most important thing to tell an adult if you can't find your mommy or daddy is "I need to tell them I am scared of monsters!"  :)

What can I say?  He must be his daddy's child!  :)

Nancy

114 Kids!

Yes, you read that right....at lunch today, Zachary calmly informed me that he intended to have 114 kids when he was a Daddy.  Uh....yikes!  :)  The conversation went something like this.

Zac:  I want to be a daddy when I get big.

Me:  You are going to be a great daddy.

Zac:  When I'm twenty, cause I have to be grown up first.

Me:  Well, maybe a little older than twenty.  You need to finish college first and then find a nice girl and get married and then you can be a daddy.

Zac:  Mommy, what if I married you?  Then you can be my Mommy.  Can boys marry their mommies?

Me: (ahem) Zac, I think you will find a really nice, really pretty girl who is your age, and you will really like her.  Then you will get married and she will make a great mommy.

Zac:  Yep, that's probably good.  Cause you can still be my mommy then.

Me:  I'll always be your mommy.

Me:  (very unsuspectingly) So, when you are a daddy, how many kids do you think you'll have?

Aaron:  I want 3 kids.  Just 3.  We can play legos.

Justin:  I want 10 kids cause then there's lots of people to play with.

Zac:  I want 114 kids.

Me: (!!!??)  114?  Are you sure about that?

Zac:  Yep!  My wife and me will have 114 kids.

Me:  How will you put 114 beds in your house?

Zac:  No, Mommy.  We will have 116 beds cause me and my wife will need beds too.  :)  (I'll remind him of this comment in twenty years - hee hee!!)

Me:  Okay, where will you put 116 beds?

Zac:  Well, we will have bunk beds....lots of bunk beds....three beds high and two beds in every room.  Then there will be six kids in every room.

Me:  So that's....umm.....20 rooms, Zachary.  Are you going to have a house with twenty rooms??

Zac:  Nope, I'm going to live in a fire station, cause I'm going to be a fireman.  There's lots of room in a fire station.  I'm going to be a fireman....or a framer.  I might be a framer.  Or a fireman...or maybe both.

Me:  Okay, those are good jobs.  

Zac:  You know, that's why I'm having 114 kids.

Me:  Oh, why?

Zac:  Cause they're all gonna help me frame houses.  I need all those kids to help me at my job.

Me:  Wow!  That's a lot of workers!  How are you going to buy Christmas presents for that many kids?

Zac:  Oh, they aren't getting Christmas presents.

Me:  They're not?

Zac:  Nope.  The first kid will get a something to do when my wife or me tell them to quit wrestling and calm down.  They all need something to do when they have to calm down.

Me:  Oh, so what are you going to get them to do?

Zac:  (a little puzzled)  I'm not buying them toys.  They will get things to do, you know like stuff like books and stuff.  (I never really did get an answer to this one!)

Me: So, how is your wife going to take care of 114 kids?

Zac:  Oh, the first one will help the second one, and the third one will help the fourth one and they will all be buddies.  Then she won't have to do anything.  (Me thinking, "Yeah, right!!")

Me:  That sounds like lots of fun.

Zac:  (losing interest)  Yeah, we'll play a lot and work.....

And he was gone to play with toys in the living room.  I had all I could do to keep from laughing at some of the comments he made, but I didn't want to hurt his feelings.  I love it when the kids want to talk about their dreams for the future.  Zac, when you read this 15 years from now, I hope you enjoy it as much as I enjoyed talking about it!!  :)

Nancy

Bath Time Fun!

For the last year or so, the only person in our house taking baths has been Caleb.....until this week!  We had to ban baths in favor of showers when there was more floor (and walls!) getting wet than boys.  But, Justin was given a set of Thomas the Tank Engine bath toys for his birthday, and this is the result.....

Three silly monkeys having fun in the bath tub!

One very unhappy monkey in the bath tub with his brothers.  Contrary to what it may appear, this very unhappy face occured only when I pointed the camera in Caleb's direction.  Once the camera disappeared, so did the very unhappy face and out came the laughs, smiles and splashes.  It was very funny!  I wish I could have gotten some video of it.  :)

All in all, the kiddos had a great time in the tub and I was able to clean their bathroom!  :)

Randomness

I have been working at trying to record some of the cute stuff the boys have said in the last couple of days.  Aaron, in particular, has kept us rolling with some of his stories.  I'm sure I will be posting more of these cute stories and pronunciations in the next few weeks....

Zachary-isms:

tench ta pur: temperature

ter moniter: thermometer

bungled: bundled as in "I'm all bungled up in my blankets!"

Justin:

Justin is just being his cute self as usual.  He is really enjoying playing board games, and he and Drew played six or seven games of Chutes and Ladders earlier today.  It was so funny - when he had to go down the slide, he would put his hand over the bottom of the slide so Drew couldn't slide his piece to the bottom.  Then he would laugh hysterically.  It was so fun to watch.  :)

Justin also went on his first hunting trip with Daddy on Saturday.  They didn't see anything, but they had a great time.  Drew said Justin spent the entire time chattering about things in the woods, hunting, and all kinds of stuff.  While they didn't see any deer, they did listen to and watch a flock of wild turkeys for about an hour.  According to Justin, a turkey says "goggle, goggle!" 

Aaron:

Monday, Aaron was playing with an empty rubbermaid crate in the living room.  You know, the long, shallow under-the-bed kind.  It usually holds the kids' Thomas the Tank collection, but that was all over the living room floor, so the box was empty.  He was crawling with the box upside down hooked over the heels of his feet so it was dragging behind him.  As I was cleaning, I tuned in to his somewhat constant chatter and heard the following.

"I crawling on the floor with the box, mommy!" {Insert distressed sounding voice}  "Mommy, the box is following me behind my back!!!!"

Tuesday, on our way home from Zachary's open house, Aaron was in his car seat playing with a Little People car and a Little People girl.  The girl was contendedly getting in and out of the car and driving around Aaron's car seat.  Then, I hear a small "Uh oh" from the back seat.  The conversation proceeded as follows: {caution:  the following excerpt contains potty-training talk - not for the faint of heart}

Me:  "Um....uh oh what, Aaron?"

Aaron:  "Sher (Aaron's word for she/her) has stinky feet."

Me:  "Okaaayyy...why does she have stinky feet?"

Aaron:  "Because sher has stinky pants.  Ewww..sher has stinkys in there." (Looking at the bottom of the Little People girl)

Me:  "Does she need her pants changed?"

Aaron:  "It won't come out."

Me:  "What won't come out?"

Aaron - very matter of fact: "The stinkys won't come out of her."

Me: (thinking "what in the world do I say in response to that????)

Aaron - very vigorously shaking the Little People girl up and down:  "Mommy!!!! It's coming out!"

Me: "Um....what's out?" (cringing)

Aaron:  "The stinkys all comed out.  Whew!  Sher is all clean now, Mommy."

Where do they come up with this stuff??? :)

Sara Cake: Sara Kate (Justin's best friend)

Fwumbers: Slumbers (Aaron's stuffed bear)

ars cream:  ice cream

fwippers: slippers as in "I have my fwippers on my feet!"

Hope you enjoyed the funnies!! :)