Our Three Lovelies

Elijah has grown into quite the creative little fellow. He is all about cutting, painting, coloring, and creating. His current task is to create a forrest in our house. He suggested this for Grammy's house, but she suggested creating a diorama after envisioning her home:) At our house though, he has begun cutting out animals to place around the house. The computer room has been designated the mountain lion room and he mentioned that people would have to pay to see this, so I can't wait to see how it turns out. 2011 has started out a little rough with a week of fever and cold followed by a week of health followed by a week of flu and strep. Hopefully we are done with being sick for the rest of the year!!

Gus, as I type is under the massive floor rug! He is definitely a crazy kid! We love him so much!! He is our destroyer er . . . should I say, his dinosaurs are the destroyers. Any time a dino is in his hand, EVERYTHING ends up on the floor flung around somewhere. It would be very easy to get irritated, but that is just Gus and you have to embrace who he is! His language is coming along and it is fun to listen to his new words. One phrase that cracks me up every time he says it is, "I thought you were a female!" Seriously funny (comes from Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs--one of his favorite movies). Gussy also loves his movies. The instant he wakes up, "Movie?" He is a sweet fellow!

Lily girl is just a super duper baby. She is smiling now in response to us (not gas) and is so content. When she gets fussy, we just lay her on the floor and she stops. She is an independent gal just like her momma!! She laughs and giggles sometimes and it is just the sweetest thing. Her brother Elijah can't keep his hands off her and adores her! We look forward to seeing if we will see her rolling around on the floor wrestling with her brothers or prancing around in princess gear! It could go either way!!

Baby Lily

Lily was born on Wed., Oct. 13. She came after being induced and only a few pushes. I have had to adjust to the fact that I have a baby girl and not a baby boy (a few slip-ups of him/he, buddy, etc.) but the pink, which I sooo dispised a few weeks ago, has really helped to make it real to me!

She is the sweetest little thing, even if she does have her nights and days confused. She sleeps constantly, which for a while worried me, but she seems to be doing well. She has dropped about a 1/2 pound since birth but I am hopeful that she will soon regain that! She has caught onto eating and thouroughly seems to enjoy that now, along with . . . sleeping, of course. A picture to come soon.

The Five DeFores?

Lily is due on October 15, but from the sounds of it, may actually make her presence known sooner than that which is, of course, surprising to me, who has never actually gone into labor without assistance from the doctors!

We are all anxiously awaiting her arrival, grandparents and Elijah maybe a bit more than me, as I have things that need to get done before she comes (conferences: booked every day next week; sub plans and generic lessons; washing; cleaning up the basement, etc). Tim let me know today that he was ready and then let me know that he actually KNEW where he was supposed to drive me in case I do go into labor:)

So, we will keep you posted on when Lily decides to come! I pray for a safe delivery and a healthy little 9 pound baby!

Gus, Our Seriously Big Boy

Gussy, as we affectionately call him, is a great little boy. He is so fun to play with and absolutely loves his older brother. He is very obedient to do what Elijah tells him to, unless he's not, in which case he very adamantly (and sometimes with a swipe of the hand to smack you), says, "Nnnnno!" He really does enjoy playing tiger and dinosaur with Elijah, has learned to play using his imagination, and play with play-do, thanks to watching and learning from brother.

Gus's vocabulary is so fun to listen to. Three months ago, he was starting to use some words, but in the past month, he has really advanced, speaking in sentences and using 2-3 word combos. Pronunciation is still not quite there which can be very frustrating for all trying to communicate sometimes.

Gus's favorite past time . . . BITING! Boy howdy, whether that kid is excited, angry, hungry, tired he BITES! It gets a little crazy sometimes when you are running away from him, while he chases you with his mouth open wide:) I am starting to think about Hot Sauce!

While Elijah is super excited for the arrival of his sister, I can honestly say that Gus probably is not! He smacks, steps on, and steals from his little cousin Levi who is 9 months old. I am pretty sure we will have to give him nice lessons or else Lily's going to have a tough couple of years until she learns to defend herself. All kidding aside, I hope that Gus adores his little sister and truly enjoys her presence. I will keep you posted!

Elijah, Our Big Boy

Elijah has become such a fantastic little boy. He is always asking if he has grown and letting us know that he is soo much bigger than his brother because he's older. We work to affirm his "bigness" even though he is only about 3 inches taller than his brother and only about 4 pounds heavier. But still, he is WAY bigger!

Elijah celebrated his 4th birthday this summer. He enjoyed having 2 parties on the same day and was even gracious enough to ask Vee, who came to BOTH parties, why she didn't bring a gift to the evening party, because, "You're supposed to bring gifts to parties!" It apparently wasn't enough that she had brought him 5 plus gifts in the morning. Fortunately, Elijah has Grandpa Jerry and Vee wrapped around his little finger and they just think everything he does is adorable!

Our little big boy started preschool on August 31. He has really enjoyed going and they do such fun things there. He is really in to dinosaurs and so has really enjoyed this past week where he got to go on a dig (ice) for a dinosaur. He showed us around at his open house the other day, which we enjoyed.

Finally, Elijah is still SUPER excited to welcome his new sister, Sassy Lily (she still has 2 names), in the next couple of weeks! He is going to be a great big brother, again. Hopefully, he will still be thrilled to have her, once he realizes she won't be able to do anything for like a year:)

The Boys

Our boys are growing to be sooo big! It is a lot of fun with the stages they are in. They are both able to do a lot, which makes this house a happening place!!

Gus is messy. That is the first word that would come out of Tim's mouth if you asked him to describe Gus. I keep telling Tim that he's not even 2 yet, but seriously, he's messy. Everything he touches, eats, drinks, plays with . . . is messy. There's no getting around it!

Aside from his messiness, he absolutely LOVES his brother. He does EVERYTHING his brother does, even if it is hitting Mommy because that's what brother just did and got in trouble for! He has learned how to make the smacking sound people make when they kiss, so he will kiss Tim and I all the time, our hands, our arms, our legs, everywhere! He also ADORES being outside. He would stay out there all day if we would let him!!

We have dealt with the vomiting issue by putting a mattress in our room and laying down with Gus at bed time. It is not the perfect solution, but it sure has released some stress on my part. He sleeps through the night and it's not a hassel to get him to bed (and no vomit to clean up). I have decided, though, that he has something wrong with whatever keeps vomit down, as he just seems to do it so often (even not at bedtime or when crying). We'll have to get that checked out.

The funniest thing about Gus, is probably his run. If you see Tim, ask him to demonstrate. He is a flimsy runner who makes noise the entire time running. It is quite funny!!

Elijah continues to amaze us with his imagination. He LOVES playing with dinosaurs and dragons and animals and playdough. He likes for people to play with him, though he does great playing by himself, but we sometimes get tired of playing with him because we are always the dinosaur that gets eaten or the zebra that is attacked. He loves "killing" animals and hunting. Tim recently got him a Cabella's Hunting Wii game so they could go hunting and a Sim's Animal Wii game. Elijah loves shooting the various animals as well as feeding little animals to larger ones. We may have to keep an eye on this, huh?

Elijah has started reverting back to a 2 year old, thanks to Gus. He no longer wants to sleep by himself, he wants Daddy to sleep with him, he wants to sleep in our room, and he wants to scream (like Gus) in restaurants. He also says, "Up, mama," if he wants to be picked up (that's what Gus says b/c he can't talk). Funny, yet kind of frustrating. He has also started having bad dreams such as the other night: E: Mommy, I had a bad dream. M: Oh, I'm sorry, let me take you back into your room. What was your dream about. E (in a very angry voice): This one kid . . . he wouldn't let me play with playdough . . . and I was MAD (as he stomps his hands on his legs). I guess if this is as bad as bad dreams get, we are good to go!!

So that's our news. The boys are looking forward to a new baby that is due in October. Elijah keeps asking if it is still in my tummy. He is REALLY hoping for a girl because as he said (in kind of a nasty voice), "I already HAVE a brother." We'll see in a month or so if he's going to be disappointed or not!!