Livi's First Hairuct

While I was at Moms Weekend Away, Justin though maybe Olivia should have a little trim of her bangs. Her hair kept getting in her face and getting food in it because of it. So with all 7 kids here, he gave her some bangs (we were growing them out). She was looking down as he cut them so they are a little shorter than he wanted. At first I was sad I missed her first haircut, but the fact that we watched all the kids evened it out (when he had time to do this with all 7 kids I have no idea). She is still pretty cute though, short bangs and all.

Play Date

To finish up Christmas Break we had all the Holz's come over for a play date. The boys have been friends with Henry since we started the church, then they have little Annabeth who is 3.5 and Maggie who is a week older than Nolan. The girls and I had fun coloring and playing dress up while the boys played star wars and legos.  I am not the best at having other kids over for play dates, so the boys get riled up when other kids are here. They all had a lot fo fun thought and after we all had lunch together Jennifer came back and picked up the kids. Hopefully we can have them over again soon.

Basketball and Jungle Gym

We had another warm weekend and Tyler wanted to play basketball so we headed to the boys playground to play. While Tyler and Justin played some ball. the babies and Carter climbed all over the the jungle gyms. Carter fell off the high jungle gym once, but like usual was over it after a couple of minutes. The playground is a little big for the babies  but they still had fun just running around the fields  Tyler is becoming quite the basketball player as well. It was another fun morning of family time.

Park!

Its been so nice out lately the babies and I headed to the park while the big boys were at school. The babies love being together so they generally just follow each other around and stay in the same areas, which is very nice. However Olivia tries to keep up with her older brother, who tries to do what he has seen his older brothers do and I basically have a heart attack at all they think they can climb by themselves. Even though they are fearless they are both very good climbers so I need to relax a little. Olivia still hates the swing, but besides that we had a great morning. 

Favorite Things

Some of my favorite things right now:
Olivia loves watching Mickey Mouse and she says mouse so cute/ Its kinda lik e"ouse" but even cuter!

The other night I went to check on the babies and Nolan wasn't in his bed. I got nervous at first but then found him in Livi's crib sleeping with her - so sweet.

Livi's  gives the biggest hugs and squeezes - we love them

Carter and Olivia are such a sweet relationship. He is always playing with her - whether its row row your boat, playing dress up or just dancing with her. Its very sweet.

Tyler is acting older and more mature everyday. He is always helping out around the house, controlling his emotions so much better and is
just growing up to be such a sweet young man.

Blessed by all my babies!

Report Cards

We got the boys 2nd quarter report cards and once again we couldn't be prouder of our boys. They are both performing at or above grade level in every subject. We did get some comments for Carter to work on his teamwork in gym, but he is working on that. Besides that they were great reports. Carter did not do as well as before on of his assessments  In the beginning of the year he was far exceeding at this skill and this time he barely made the mark. We have been talking to his teacher about this and none of the kindergartners did well on it, so they think the scores are wrong.  She is also going to start challenging him more as Carter is the type of kid who will only do what is expected of him, not more. We expect him to have a years growth and since he came in so far ahead we expect him to leave ahead of grade level as well. Hopefully with his teacher and parents on the same page now this will happen. She has already allowed him to do extra work when he finishes other things (he usually is the first one done on his work and in the past she just let him look at books, now he can go work on first grade math skills). He also is one of the first kids in the whole school to finish the math curriculum they do on the computer which we are very proud of him for.  He is a very smart kid, you just need to make him show you that. Proud of both of our boys!

Carter School Update

Carter has a hard time adjusting to school. He doesn't always listen as well as he should and gets his card turned (its a behavior thing) a few times a week. I am happy to announce that he has been doing much better and seems to be enjoying it more that first semester is over. He is working really hard at his behavior so that he can sleep on the top bunk and I think he will get it soon. He also seems to be making more friends, Unless someone actually says to him "you are my friend" he seems to think he doesn't have any. However he always tells me about all the kids he plays with at recess so I don't know how true that is. This has been puzzling to Justin and I as he used to be very confident and always the leader with everyone being his friend. We are hopeful that his confidence will come back soon. Either way I am proud of him for turning his behavior around and doing better.

Moms Weekend Away

I have an amazing husband. I got to have a weekend away up in the mountains and he stayed home with not only our 4 kids, but also had Griffin, Noah, and Faith for half the weekend. Yes that would be him with 7 kids and two dogs all by himself. I am told the kids all did great and all the cousins loved playing together.  I had a wonderful time in the mountains, laughing a lot, realizing
 how great my husband really is, playing games, having long conversations with friends and getting less sleep than I would have if I were home. It was a wonderful weekend and I am so thankful to Justin for watching all the kids so I can enjoy myself with no worries.

Nolan's Legs

Nolan has been complaining about his legs hurting. At first he thought it was growing pains, but it seemed to happen at all times of the say and not just at night. He also started limping some, so we went to the doctor. We tested him for strep and it was positive. She said some kids feel pain in their joints when they have strep so we put him on antibiotics to see if that would fix it. Unfortunately it did not so we went back to the doctor. She ordered x-rays. After an hour doing x-rays (they did a ton of them and both Nolan and Olivia, who waited patiently in her stroller, did great during them) they found no masses or anything. They did however see a lot of poop and think he may be constipated and that is causing him to limp and for his legs to hurt. So now he is on a laxative and hopefully this will clear up everything. Its no fun to think something may be really wrong with your little guy.

Bike Ride

For Christmas Oma and Opa got Justin and I bikes and the babies a trailer. Since the bigger boys are getting so good at riding their bikes we thought this was the perfect family gift for us. It was finally warm enough and we got to do our first family bike rise. The boys did awesome. We went over 5 miles for out first ride!

Carter still needs some practice on the big hills, but he never gave up even on the hard parts Tyler loves going as fast as he can and the babies love the trailer. At first Livi was a little scared, but by the end of it she had fallen asleep in it. I can't wait to make many more memories on our family rides.