Waiting for Daddy

When Ashton went outside to play today I noticed that he was standing by the fence just looking out. I thought that's nice, he's really taking it all in...the trees, the birds, the sky, cars etc. When I looked outside a little later to check on him, he was still standing there so I went out to him and asked what he was doing. He said:

"I'm waiting for my Daddy to come home."

My sweet boys miss their Daddy. But we know Daddy has to work and this time it was far away. We talk to him on the phone and through Skype. I know he misses them at least as much as they miss him. Ashton will get weepy sometimes and say "I love my Daddy" with his little puppy dog face. Kevin has been showing his feelings a little differently by acting out more, being more defiant and he gets sad and frustrated so much easier these days. He is not quite himself. Less than a week left I think. We probably wont know until a couple days before when he will be home, but it will be here soon and we are all looking forward to it. Being a single Mom of 3 kids is hard work. I would never choose to do this alone and I'm so glad I don't have too (besides a few weeks here and there).

Ashton starts soccer Thursday morning. He is really excited. He is excited for Kevin to come watch him. Ashton has been watching him play tennis and T-ball, now its his turn to have Kevin watch him.

Here is my little "builder"...

A picture is worth a thousand words.

This is what Jordan thought of his first bite of cereal.

Saturday night we went to my friend Tonya's house for dinner. We met back in 2003 when our husband's were in Iraq together. They were part of a Marine Corp reserve unit based in Eugene that was activated right before the war started. We were a huge support for each other when they were gone. She has two super cute little girls ages 4 & 2. I brought Jordan's baby cereal with me so that she could help me document this milestone. As you can see he wasn't too sure about it. I tried again Sunday night and I got a better reaction, but I still don't think he actually swallowed any. If it did go down his throat, he start gaging. He is only 4 months old, so maybe it will take him a little while to figure it out. Hopefully soon. I'm hoping it will help him sleep through the night, then we can move him into his own room.

Here is a little video of the occasion:

Here is Jordan before he knew what was coming...

And in case you forgot, here he is after...

Here are all the kids enjoying a snack:

They were playing with Jordan and he loved it. I just love his smile!

"Play Ball!"

Kevin is officially a T-Ball player now! This is just the start of many years of sports in our house I think. He had his first practice Thursday night and had so much fun, and for his first time he did great! I'm pretty excited because baseball is a sport I actually know something about. I played softball for 9 years. Both boys have also played indoor soccer, but I have never played soccer and don't know anything about it really. Kevin played tennis for a little while which was fun. I know a little about that just from playing one year in high school, and I loved it. I gave it up to be a cheerleader though (which is were I learned a little about football & basketball) Kevin has a great arm. They even made him throw underhand so he wouldn't knock someone in the head. He hit the ball off the tee so well they ask if he'd been practicing. I'm really glad he liked it. His practices are at an elementary school so Ashton was able to play on the playground. I had Jordan too and he was getting hungry and pretty fussy. I tried to hold him off thinking 'how can I nurse him on a playground?!' I was getting "looks" and realized the practice wasn't ending anytime soon, so thankfully I had my 'Hooder Hider' with me and plopped down on the end of the slide and Jordan nursed away while I hoped some kid wouldn't come barreling down the slide and run into us! I'm so glad Ashton is such a good boy. I didn't have to worry about him the whole time.

Here is Kevin with his fancy new cleats. I'm hoping we will be able to pass them down to at least one little brother. Lucky Kevin, he gets all the new stuff :)

I got a few shots of Kevin at practice. They are a little blurry because I was holding Jordan too. Kevin is the youngest one on his team. Its a 5-6yr. old team and you have to be 5 by April 30th. Kevin's 5th birthday is April 28th.

Notice he hit the ball and the 'T' is still standing!

He LOVED the helmets. He wanted us to get one for home.

Thursday night Aunt Bonnie came over again and offered to babysit while I had some "me" time. I decided this would be the perfect opportunity to have a date with one of my boys. I've been wanting to have some one-on-one time with them for awhile. So Kevin and I left Asthon, Jordan and a bottle with Aunt Bonnie. First we went to Athletes Corner and got him his new cleats and his first protective "cup". Yes, even t-ballers have to wear one on the field! This boy stuff, I tell ya. The nice man measured Kevin (no not that!...his waist) and handed us the right size. I said "Hey look Kev its green, you like green!" and this is for you Uncle Brad: Kevin said "Its KAWASAKI GREEN!!"

After shopping we went to Red Robin for dinner. He likes playing the video games there, so we played first then ate. Dinner was pizza, lemonade and a chocolate shake! Quite the treat for Kev since he doesn't get lemonade or ice cream that often. It was so nice to have conversation with him without ANY interruptions. So nice! Ashton was a little sad when we got back because he missed us. Next time it will be his turn.

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Jordan had his 4 month check-up today. He weighs a whopping 13lbs. 12oz. which is only in the 25 percentile. My boys have always been at least 75%. But he is long at 27.5". That is in the 95 percentile. He is a long a lean boy. The Doc said I should start feeding him rice cereal. They say to start 4-6 months and I was going to wait, but it sounds like he needs more food. So we will be trying that out soon. Hopefully it will help him sleep longer at night. He still only sleeps about 5hrs. straight then eats every 2-3 at night. He is rolling over both ways, reaching for toys and mouthing them and talking a little. He's pretty quiet when he does talk. The 'Baker' gene hasn't quite made its way through yet :)

This and That

Last Thursday Jeremy's cousin Edie came over with her son Tommy who is 7 or 8 months old. I feel as close to Edie as I do my own cousins. It was fun to visit and see how Tommy has grown. Here is a picture of all the boys:

Thursday night we decided to enjoy the sunny weather and went on a treasure hunt after dinner. The boys always seem to be on their bikes, so this time I suggested they walk so they can really take in all the things around them. Here is Jordan all bundled up. He took a nap the whole time:

The boys hunting for 'treasure'

Here are the treasures they found

Saturday we picked up my 12 yr. old niece Jessica and she spent the night with us. It wasn't too relaxing for her with 2 little boys running around and the baby, but I think she still had fun. We made cookies, watched 'Grease' and 'Legally Blond' and she styled my hair in an array of beautiful pony tails. Here are her and Jordan. Talk about two beautiful kids:

While she was here we gave Jordan a bath. He is always so nervous during baths, but this time he did really well and actually relaxed a little!

This week we also brought out the exersaucer and bumper jumper for Jordan. I think he really liked it. See for yourself...

He hasn't figured out how to jump yet, but he likes to hang out, swing around and chew on his toy..

Here are some more cute pictures I got of Jordan recently that I had to share. He is 4 months old and rolling both ways. I will lay him down under his play gym and when I come back he is facing the opposite direction and completely fipped over! He is not good enough to just flip back over whenever he wants, so I usually have to come to the rescue.

So it sounds like Jeremy will be coming home next Saturday. Making what was going to be a 5 week trip into a 3 week trip. Good and bad. Bad they don't have as much work as they thought, but good that we get to see him sooner! It also sounds like he may be gone for a long while in May/June. We'll see. These things always seem to change as you can see.

The boys have been fighting a green runny nose and Kevin has had two red eyes. It hasn't really been goopy, so Im not sure if its pink eye or not. Jordan has also had a runny nose and the sneezes. They are all in good spirits though which I am thankful for. Im hoping Kevin will be able to go back to school on Friday, if not he and Ashton will both be coming with me to Jordan's 4 month check-up and she can check them out too!

Until next time.

Not Me! Monday

Welcome to Not Me! Monday! This blog carnival was created by MckMama. You can head over to her blog to read what she and everyone else have not been doing this week.

Last Saturday when we sprung our clocks forward I was not actually excited about this because it meant ONE less hour until Jeremy comes back home to us. Nope, Not Me. I mean really, whats one measly hour when you have 839 more to go!

When I noticed there was only a couple spoonfuls of peanut butter left in the jar I most certainly did not toss in a handful of chocolate chips and proceed to eat it out of the jar with a spoon, Not Me! That would do no good in getting rid of this baby belly I most certainly do not still have!

While nursing Jordan on the couch I definitely did not say "sure!" to Ashton when he found some Kix under the couch and ask if he could eat them. That would be gross! I wouldn't let him do that, Not Me! Even if he needed a snack and I was in no position to get him one at the time.

I did not have to change MY jammy shirt AND pants along with Jordan's jammies in the wee hours of the morning because he peed everywhere while changing his diaper, Not Me! He hasn't done that in months, why would he do it now and especially in the wee hours of the morning? Not my son!

I did not let the kids sleep in their clothes one night this week. I am not that lazy, Not Me! Even if they were wearing comfy sweats I wouldn't have been so proud of myself for thinking of such a great idea of just letting them SLEEP in their sweats to save myself a step of getting them into actual jammies, Not Me!

And finally I did not have to put rubber gloves on to pick shredded dirty diapers off our lawn. That would be disgusting! Our dog is not so gross that he would actually want to EAT any dirty diaper he can get his paws on. I did not learn the hard way that dirty diapers need to be COMPLETELY contained in a can WITH A LID and not in a garbage sack sitting outside the back door. Again, that would be disgusting having to pick up poopy diapers all over the lawn. I did not have to do that, Not Me!

Boy I feel better, how about you? What did YOU not do??

All You Need Is Love

This morning at breakfast the boys were at the table while I was putting peanut butter on Ashton's pancakes and on Kevin's waffles and this is what I heard...

Kevin: "Ashton, I love you"

Ashton: "No, Mommy loves me!"

Kevin: "Ashton did you know that the whole family loves you?! Mommy, Daddy, Jordan AND Me, we all love you!"

Ashton: "I love Jack" (the dog)

Kevin: "Mommy loves Jordan, Me AND you!"

So cute. What a way to start the day! That boy is full of love and I love it! I'm so glad he knows that they are all loved. I hope that because there are three of them, that they never feel that we love one more than the others. I can see Kevin growing up to be just like his Dad...always hugging and telling his siblings and his Mama he loves them. They have a great role model. Thank you for that honey! We love you and miss you bunches.

So Far So Good

We have already had a busy week with lots of company, and its only Tuesday night. I have a feeling it might slow down after this week, but we'll see. I like to keep busy, it makes the days go faster. Though I don't want them to go too fast...when it comes to the kids it already goes too fast. I want them to stay little. I really do enjoy taking care of them and playing with them and listening to the cute things they say.

Kevin has been hearing me talk about planning a trip to see my sister in Montana while Jeremy is gone. Hopefully during spring break when there is no school or MOMS to keep us busy. Its too much to fly and too much to train (we have to pay for 3 tickets now) So I'm hoping my other sister will take the 10hr. drive with us so I don't have to do it alone. I don't think I will do it alone, so there is a chance we might not go at all. So I was telling Kevin that it was too much money to fly to see his cousin Titus and he said "well I have an idea! We can put MY money with YOUR money, then we can fly there!!" If only it was that easy. He continued: "When we get home I'll get out my money and you get out yours and we will count it!" So we did. This is all the quarters Kevin laid out in groups of four...

I have a change jar I keep all the loose change I find lying around. It usually comes when Jeremy empties his pockets on the counter, money found in the laundry or change that always seems to be falling out of Jeremy's pockets. Its my jar for that special "something" that I can't really afford, but really want. Between the two of us we have $107! $7 of which was Kevin's. I had actually saved $100 in that jar! I had no idea! It would make a little dent in the cost of the train. I looked and so far I have found that its $166 for 3 coach seats on the train, one way. But we still would need to pay for the sleeper car upgrade (its a 10hr. train ride overnight). A plain would be the least painful because it would be the fastest, but its also the most expensive. There are a lot of other things at play, so we'll see.

Sunday night my parents agreed to come over and watch all 3 boys while I went to the movies with a couple girlfriends. (Thanks Mom & Dad!) We saw 'Slumdog Millionaire'. It was pretty good. Cool music. A good love story. But also sad to see how so many little kids live in India. Here are some pictures from that night (Mom brought cookies over for the boys to decorate after dinner)...

Monday our friends Tammi & Kellen came over after preschool for lunch and some playtime. Kellen is in Kevin class and they are also a part of Moms Club with us. We are carpool buddies too.

Monday night my friend Elizabeth and her two boys came over for dinner and some playtime. Her husband was busy that night so it worked out well. She knows I'm not much of a cook (to put it nicely) so she brought this yummy couscous dish for us and I took care of the kids food. I took a picture of what we ate because it looked so pretty!

Here is everyone at the table. Her boys are almost 4 & 2. They all had fun playing hide-and-seek, playing in the fort under the table, race cars, balls and rocket ships.

Today after school the boys were invited over to the neighbors house to play and have lunch. So Jordan and I got to have a quiet lunch to ourselves. The neighbor boy Rowen is 4 and so sweet. Both boys LOVE him! I took this picture of he and Kevin last summer. I thought it was so cute!

Tonight Jeremy's Aunt Bonnie came over to help out. She watched the boys while I went out and bought a garbage can, because ours got stolen and I need somewhere to put all the dirty diapers until Monday when we get our new one (if they are not contained, Jack (the dog) will make a mess of them all over the yard. yuck!) I also went to the grocery store. Its so much faster without kids. I had to feed Jordan when I got back so while I nursed him Bonnie got dinner together for the kids. I'm glad she was here because I had to feed Jordan, the big boys were hungry too and Ashton was running around with a very stinky dirty diaper and I couldn't do anything but sit in the rocking chair and feed Jordan. She was a great help. She even folded a basket of laundry! Thanks Aunt Bonnie! She is on the calendar for a couple days a week. It's nice to have that to look forward to.

So far work is going well in Arizona, besides the fact that Jeremy hurt his back on his first shift. He is still able to work, but I hope he doesn't push it. Prayers that it feels better soon. I'm glad his mom is there to take care of him if he needs and it. She has also been feeding him which is great!

Here is one last picture of all 3 boys playing together...