A few family pictures

Goodness, it is hard to get a picture of our family where we are all in the picture and we're all looking at the camera.  Let alone a picture where we look somewhat put together, ha :-)  So I asked my sister is she would be willing to take a few pictures of us as quickly as possible one Saturday morning.  So we quickly got dressed, bribed the boys and headed out to just do that.  And despite it starting to rain at the end, we managed to get a few shots where we're all looking.  Hooray!  We used one of the as our Christmas card this year so that was fun.  Thanks Amanda for the quick mini-shoot!

I am so ridiculously blessed!  My life is so far from perfect, but I get to spend it with the man I love and three boys who have my heart.  The worst days are still good days.  Thank you Lord.

4 Months - Ethan

I am so late in posting this but I wanted to document the first 4 months of our sweet little Ethan's life.  He is the perfect addition to our family and we are smitten with him.

Height:  26 1/4 inches

Weight:  15lbs 5 ounces

Likes:  Being on your tummy, jumping, being tickled.  You love taking a bath, you've started to love your Floppy.  You light up watching your brothers, you love it when Daddy comes home.  You seem to enjoy being out and about watching other people.  You love your mama and love to have "You are my sunshine" sung to you before you sleep.  You also love eating your hand!

Dislikes:  Being on your back, driving in a car.  You're not a huge fan of your playmat although it's a bit better than before.  You don't like to have sudden loud noises around you.

Eating:  You are still nursing usually about every 3 hours.  You're still waking up once at night between 3-5 after having a dreamfeed.  You used to take that occasional bottle once a month when we went on a date, but this month you weren't a huge fan of taking one for your Poppy and GongGong.  We haven't started solids with you but we planned on starting when you were at least 5 months, sometime after New Years.

Sleeping:  Your routine is so much better now.  Before you were super spotty on your sleep habits but you are much better.  You usually go to bed around 7:30-8pm, wake for a quick dream feed at 10pm, sleep until around 4:30am to eat, then sleep until about 9am.  You nap for 40 minutes to 1 hour in the morning and are much better at taking a nap in the afternoon longer than 1 1/2 hours, its stretching to 2 or 2 1/2 most days.  You also take the occasional evening catnap depending on how you napped earlier.  You still sleep on your tummy most of the time though mommy has been playing hardball with you when you roll over to your back and you don't like it.....you have to learn sweet little one!  Your sleep with your noise machine, paci (sometimes) and your Floppy, though Floppy is nowhere near your face.

Personality:  You are so observant.  You are laid back but very quickly can scream like a crazy man to get attention or 'throw a fit'.  You're smiling and laughing and we can't get enough of it.  You're very vocal and are constantly making noise which concerns this mama that a house full of 3 boys is going to be quite loud :-)  You are a smart cookie and like to imitate our sounds, like when we tell you I love you.  You also said dadadadadada and I captured it on video, so sweet!

Milestones:  Your first Thanksgiving, your first roadtrip back to Spokane, you starting playing in the exersaucer, your first family mini-vacation to Portland.

Ethan Samuel, you are so adorable, we have a hard time not squeezing you to death when we hold you because we love you so!  We have the greatest time watching you grow and we know you're going to change so much in the next few months.  Thank you Lord for our sweet Ethan!!

Ben's preschool picture

I just had to document his preciousness.  He is the perfect combination of little and growing up.  And he has my heart forever.

Ethan's routine

When we went for a weekend visit to Spokane, by the end of the few days, I was at my wits end.  I could not get Ethan to nap more than 40 minutes the entire time.  And this was consistent with the way he had been since he was about 5 weeks old.  There was only 1 day from the time he was 5ish weeks old where he napped longer than 40-50 minutes.  Frus-tra-ting!!  And I'm not one of those mamas who won't let him cry a little bit to try to get him back to sleep.

So, on our drive home I told Peter that I was going to have to start a really regimented routine with him.  I was kind of hoping to have a 3rd child that would have a more flexible child to be able to adapt to his brothers, but I knew it needed to happen.....at least for a short while!

I started waking him up at the same time every morning, regardless of whether or not he was still sleeping.  And I started putting him down for a nap at the same time and trying to feed him around the same time.  I wasn't feeding him every time he woke up if it hadn't been 3 hours so he didn't associate getting to fuss from a nap with getting to eat.

And I'm happy to say that after a long week of adjustments, he responded so well and much more predictable and happy.  The fussy time in the evening was much more manageable, I felt like I could understand when he was tired/hungry/etc and it was a great thing overall.  I think transitioning to 3 kids was super easy in some regards, but trying to establish a routine midst a 2 year old and 4 year old too.....that was harder for me.  But we were finally starting to figure it out!!