Ivy is 7 months

Sweet little Ivy is 7 months old! I totally missed the 6 month update because we were at camp. She is starting to get really fun...I love this baby stage. 

 Ivy sits in her high chair like a big girl and has started to eat solids--she likes all the fruits and yellow/orange vegetables, and does not enjoy green bean/pea purees although she will eat a regular green bean. She LOVES puffs and mum mums. When we first got home from camp, she threw a fit any time I put her down to get anything else done, and especially if she couldn't see me. But then I learned I could put her in her high chair and put some puffs on her tray and she will stay occupied for a while trying to pick them up and put them in her mouth. Every once in a while she's actually successful.

I love this picture of Ivy and Chad. She still loves to be held and will go to anyone, but she definitely has her preferences. If someone else is holding her and she hears my voice or sees me, she wants her momma. 

In her 7th month, Ivy finally started sleeping through the night on a regular basis. I was up pretty much every night, at least once a night all summer, and by the time we got home I was beyond tired. So our first night home I told her goodnight, closed her door, closed my door, and wouldn't you know it, she woke up at 8:30 the next morning. Probably was awake some other time during the night too, but the point is that now she sleeps through the night. :) 

Ivy also got her first two teeth at around 6 months. She is also rolling over both ways and can sit up by herself for short amounts of time. 

Now that I'm back on schedule, I'll try to post her 8 month update in a couple weeks.

Ezra at three

Our "baby" turned three while we were at camp this summer. Oh boy, is he a fun, funny, challenging kid. After a few conversations with friends I am convinced that every three-year-old is challenging, to say the least. Ezra is physically growing like a weed, and his little mind is so sharp. He is testing his boundaries like never before--when he gets in trouble and has room time, I'll go in and ask him if he's ready to obey (he can come out when he's ready to obey), and he would rather say "I'm ready to come out" or "no" than concede to me. He is a great big brother--so sweet to Ivy, but also pesters her quite a bit. I have to make sure he doesn't sit on her when she is playing on the floor. But it's just a matter of time before she starts crawling around and playing with his toys before he sees her as the pest. 

 One major milestone that Ezra has hit is that he has finally gotten the potty training thing down. It took over 4 months, but he seems to have decided that he doesn't care to go to the bathroom in his underwear on a regular basis anymore. Thank goodness! We were growing weary of the clean-up.

 I can't believe that Ezra is three. It's so fun to watch him grow and learn.

(Ezra on the new tricycle he got for his b-day)

Three years old

Ezra and his friends Trevyn and Aiden all have birthdays within a month of each other, so we had a joint party for all three of them this year. They all love dinosaurs so that was the theme of their party. We had it at the church gym and the kids had a great time running around, riding their tricycles and scooters, and playing with balloons. Happy birthday T, E, & A!

Our summer so far

What a great summer it has been. We are so thankful for getting to be in the mountains during the hottest part of the year, with so many people that we love, and getting to be a part of this ministry. I will try to condense the last 7 weeks into one blog post, so get ready for a lot of pictures.  

This sweet little girl is just shy of 6 months old. She is getting her first tooth on the bottom...I can feel it just about to break through. She is sleeping better at night and takes 2-3 naps a day depending on how early she wakes up in the morning.

She constantly has a scratch on her face by her nose. Yes, I clip her fingernails.

We have traded out the baby swing for her jumper. She loves to reach for things. She has also started watching what we eat and wanting to eat it too. Last night she was screaming at me because she wanted some of the cake I was eating, so like any good mom, I gave her some. Just a little bit. :)

She has rolled over about 4 times. This is what happens when we put her on her tummy. She is an extremely laid-back baby. "You want me to lay on my tummy? Okay."

We started food about 2 weeks ago because she was looking so longingly at us while we were eating in the dining hall. So far sweet potatoes, apples, pears, bananas, and prunes have been a success. Green beans...not so much. We mix everything with oatmeal and she likes that.

Cutie pie on the fourth of July

Gramme is here visiting but has to leave today. :( We have all enjoyed being here...but I bet she is tired of being on kid duty.

Ezra is a boy, for sure. He loves lizards, and there are plenty of them around here. This summer we have seen quite a few horny toads too. And they are slow enough for me to catch.

Overexposed but sweet picture of my baby boy

Wishful thinking...Ezra enjoys wearing his rain boots, rain or shine.

My favorite guys

We have started taking Ezra fishing. Haven't caught anything but I wish we would soon...Ezra would be so excited. But the rule at CBH is if you catch it, you have to keep it...which means cleaning it. I am not sure I'm ready for that so I won't take him fishing by myself. Fish guts don't appeal to me.

This picture cracks me up. The theme for the banquet this year is "Join us on the Blue Haven Bayou for a Redneck Reunion." I think Shawn and Chad have matching wigs. All of our babies showed up in just a diaper, and as you can see below, we have another bun in the oven! What a surprise!

The whole family

And a normal family picture

 So that has been pretty much our summer in pictures. What these pictures don't show, for the sake of my mom, is all of Ezra's sicknesses/injuries. I have been making a mental list:

2 bloody noses (one of those he walked in front of a kid swinging and got kicked)
1 busted nose complete with 2 black eyes
Numerous bloody knees from falling on the rocks
Bee sting on the ear lobe
Pink eye
Fever
Diarrhea
Just this morning he dropped a rather large rock on his toes, and now he has a couple of purple toenails

I think that's about it. But this summer won't be remembered by all of Ezra's injuries...we will remember the wonderful friendships we have made and strengthened, the great staff this summer, the fun time with family, and the blessings that God rained down on Camp Blue Haven. I will probably update again once we get home.

Ivy is 5 months!

Well, it's been a month since my last post, and I don't have any pictures that I can upload right now for this one, but I wanted to post real quick about Ivy at 5 months.

Ivy is still super happy and laid back. She will smile at anyone who will talk to her and shows no stranger anxiety. She is happy in her bumbo, her beco carrier, on her play mat, and in her swing. Of course she loves to be held and is much more cuddly than Ezra was. She doesn't like tummy time. As a result, no rolling over yet.

She is not sleeping near as well since we got to camp. She wakes up at least twice a night. No fun...but not much I can do about it since we are all essentially sleeping in the same room. I get up and feed her every time, just so she'll be quiet and go back to sleep. Naptime is okay. She will take a good morning nap, but right now she is in my lap kind of cranky because she woke up early from her afternoon nap. I think it's because it's too hot in her little "room" in the afternoon. Anyway, I'm taking advantage of the night wakings/feedings by getting some reading done. I have finished two books on my kindle since we have been here.

She still is a good eater. She must be really good because I had to go to Target last week and buy her some 9 month clothes to get us through until we can go home and get her some of the ones in her closet. She nurses about 3 times during the day, take a bottle usually once, and nurse twice at night. We have not started solids yet. Too much trouble. When we get home, she'll be a little over 6 months, and we'll start her on them then. She does watch us eat with GREAT interest though.

She is on about a 3 1/2 to 4 hour schedule during the day. Wakes up around 7, eats, sleeps from 9-11, eats, sleeps from 1-3, eats, sleeps from 5-6, eats, goes to bed around 7. Her night waking times vary, but it's usually around midnight and 4.

I am thankful that Ivy is super easy. It makes this year at camp pretty doable for me. Ezra is old enough that he doesn't require me carrying him everywhere, and he has some independence, and Ivy is content to go where I go, strapped to the front of me.

That's about it for month #5.

4 months

Our pretty girl is 4 months old! 

 She smiles a lot, and that makes us smile a lot. (photo below not typical)

 She loves her daddy. I think he likes her pretty well too.

At 4 months, Ivy is...
-Sleeping through the night sometimes but not every night. I'll take what I can get. Other nights she wakes up around 3.
-Eating 5-6 times a day (depending on if she eats in the middle of the night)
-Taking 3 or 4 naps a day usually lasting between 1 and 2 hours
-Smiling a lot, babbling a lot
-Laughing! I love this stage.
-Holding her head up well. We are working on tummy time and rolling over.
-15 lbs (70th percentile), 24 inches long (50th percentile), and her head is 75th percentile. 

Ezra 34 months

I'm posting this a bit early since I won't be able to post much once we get to camp. 

Whew. This month has been full of so many ups and downs. We are still working on getting Ezra fully potty trained and it has been frustrating and emotional but also a great time for him. It's so fun to see the pride in his face when he acts like a big boy. 

Ezra is extremely independent these days. Basically, if he doesn't think something is his idea, he doesn't want to do it, so we have to make him think everything we want him to do is his idea. It's an artform, really. :) He is so cute, quirky, and funny. He is getting much better at expressing himself. He repeats everything we say. Sometimes it's cute and sometimes not so much. 

Some things I want to remember...
This afternoon Ezra and I were playing catch outside when he turned his hat backwards, put his hand on his hip, looked at me smiling, and said, "How I look?"

Things he's saying these days...
When he goes to bed at night, we say I love you, then he says "I love you more" and we say "I love you most."
"Leave me alone!"
"I love you. Have a good day." (at night)
"I see you in the morning too."
"Are there any cars coming?"
"Does that sound like fun?"

Here is Ezra with his superkids teacher, Ms. Lyneil. He loved her and she was a wonderful teacher and an Aggie...even better! (also, she is the mom of three boys so she just did a great job with Ezra and always gave me great advice). Thursday was his last day and I was really sad about the end of his first year at "school." It just feels like he is getting so big and I know I will be dropping him off at kindergarten before I know it.

 Ezra and his best buds Aiden and Trevyn

Big boy!

As of yesterday morning, Ezra is diaper-free! We are so proud of our big boy and we can tell he is proud of himself too. Good job Ezra!

To granny's house we go

We went to visit my mom for a few days, and as always had a great time there. What's not to love about hanging out in the country? 

 Ezra and Ivy with cousins Bonnie, Kellen, and Noelle

 My mom keeps Noelle during the week so she and Ezra played a lot together. One day we all went on a walk on the road behind my mom's house. Ezra and Noelle ran ahead most of the time and had lots of fun.

 Still having fun...

 And then they realized that they had to walk allll the way back the way they came. So Chad carried them a lot of the way.

 This little girl just chilled while the big kids played and the adults relaxed. She got her fair share of being held as well...did I mention Chad's mom was there too? Between two grandmas and an aunt, she got lots of attention.

 Noelle and Ezra hanging out in the playroom.

Superkids program

Ezra had his program at school a couple days ago. The theme was "picnic in the park" and the classes sang a lot of songs about bugs. A few weeks ago Ezra started singing a song with the words "Head, thorax, abdomen" and I found out at his program that this was one of his class's songs. He got up there and got shy this time. 

 He sure did clap when the audience did though.

 Toni and Charlie came to watch Ezra.

From the last few weeks

 Ezra has been obsessed with his easter eggs. The whole easter egg thing caused quite a lot of drama in our house (Ezra wanting all the candy at once, wanting to take his eggs everywhere with him, etc.) Then he figured out he could put egg halves on his fingers. Endless uses for these things.

 Ivy is loving her new perspective.

Ivy is 3 months

Well, it's official, Ivy is no longer a "newborn." And that is perfectly okay with me! I love watching my kids grow and do new things. And I love it when a baby can hold their own head up. :) I am also partial to sleeping, and she is getting better about that all the time.

This little girl is so happy and laid back. People comment all the time about how smiley she is. All you have to do is smile and talk to her and she will give you a crinkle-nosed open-mouth smile. It is so sweet. She loves to talk to anyone who will listen. She likes to just look around and observe. She especially loves it when Ezra gives her attention, unless he is running right over the devil when singing "roll the gospel chariot along" and Ivy's head gets in the way of his fist. Then she is not a happy camper. Totally hypothetical situation.

I would say Ivy is a really good sleeper. She is used to laying down awake and will put herself to sleep most of the time, unless she is overly tired and then she won't have it. But she is also perfectly fine with being held and rocked, so if I wait too long to put her down, I will just hold her for a little catnap. She has also slept all the way through the night about 4 times, and most other nights she wakes up around 4 a.m. so she is almost making it through the night. I really don't mind her waking up, because I can feed her pretty quickly and she goes right back to sleep. I usually wake her up at 8 a.m. because most days we have somewhere we need to be by 9. Her naps vary from one hour to sometimes 3 hours. At this point Ezra took pretty short naps and was still up multiple times a night to eat, so Ivy is a piece of cake compared to Ezra.

She is a good eater. I feed her anywhere from 5 to 7 times a day, depending on if she wakes up at night or not. She goes about 3-4 hours between feedings during the day. She will nurse or take a bottle.

Ivy is also pretty good in the car. Sometimes she gets tired of sitting there, but once again, it's nothing like Ezra. Longtime blog readers will remember that for the first few months of Ezra's life he HATED. HATED being in the carseat. No fun. I avoided going anywhere that I didn't have to go, and if we went grocery shopping it was out of the carseat and into the front carrier. On long car trips, Ivy will sleep most of the time unless she is hungry or just a little restless. 

I don't know how much Ivy weighs but she is a good size. We'll go in a few weeks for her 4 month appointment but my guess is she's somewhere around 13 or 14 pounds. She's wearing size 2 diapers and on the second set of snaps in her cloth diapers. She could stand to move up to size 3 diapers though. She is also in 3-6 month clothes or 6 month size (like Carter's). No shoes fit her yet though...she has tiny, skinny feet and long toes. Sadly, she is losing her hair.

This month Ivy went to Bible class for the first time and has been once since. The teachers have told us that she does great and seems to like all the singing. I pray that she continues to enjoy going to Bible class like her big brother does. We also visited my mom's house for a few days and Ivy enjoyed lots of attention from granny, gramme, her aunt Erin and cousins. I'll blog about that later.

That's about all I can think of for her third month. She is such a sweet joy and we love her so much.