Laser Bean

I got in trouble again today, so here I am. :)

I babysat Jenni's girls for her last week so she could go to Vegas with her dad. (Speaking of which, keep the prayers coming for John please, they met with a specialist in Vegas, and got some hopeful news.)

So I had 5 kids 5 and under all day! It was actually not nearly as tough as you'd think. The only tough moments were when both babies wanted to nap at the same time, and were tired and sad. I had to just decide which baby to get to sleep first, and let the other cry while I did that. I went with Neely first, since I have the most experience getting her to sleep and knew I could do it faster. I got her to sleep in about 5 minutes, and then fed Payton and got her to sleep. Jess came home to help me with lunches for everyone, and other than that, it was smooth sailing.

The big kids were all really good and helpful. Paige played this funny game:
She was a mechanic, working under the chair, with a can of pencils as her tools. I didn't realize at first, but she pointed out to me that she was using a lid from a plastic bin as that thing that mechanics use to roll under cars. Pretty much a board on wheels, you know? She's clever.

I worked on Valentine's Day gifts for the kids this weekend. Well, really just Cason's so far. I bought fabric FOREVER ago to make him another robot, since the last one got destroyed in the washer. So I finally got around to making it. I worked on it yesterday, and while I was sewing one part of his body Cason came over. I wasn't hiding it because it was just a cube shape, I figured that if he asked I'd just tell him I was sewing a "box shape" or something vague like that, without telling him what it was for. Well when he walked over he goes "Whatcha doin' mama?" I smiled and said "Sewing." He smiled back and asked "Is it a 'prise?(surprise)" I said "Don't worry about it." and he goes "I'm not supposed to know it's a robot?" Haha.

Well, I finished him today, and even though he figured it out he's not getting it until Valentine's Day. And I at least kept what's inside the door on his chest a secret for now. :)
Speaking of his door, maybe I should have ironed the fabric before sewing him together, eh?

And speaking of ROBOTS, Paige did another "Robot Love" drawing the other day. So cute.
This was one of those times she wasn't really taking her time for lots of detail, like buttons and all that, she just sort of scribbled it down and handed it to me. I always notice that even when she doesn't include obvious detail, there's always something special she included. Like in this case, the boy robot just handed the girl robot some flowers, so he's holding his hands together in a shy pose, and he's blushing too. She pointed that last part out to me, she made him blush with a pen, so I didn't realize that was what it was at first.

Since Paige likes doing those drawings, I did a Robot Love picture for HER the other night, and gave it to her in the morning. She was SO grateful and happy, and kept telling me she loved me. Ha. The simplest things.

She also played "Adventure Girl and Adventure Dog" out front today, with Gia. They pretty much just explored the yard and bushes together. :)
While she did that, Cason explored. He found a rock that looked kind of like a bean. He showed me and said "LOOK! It's a laser bean." Haha.

Neely didn't feel great today, but the other day she had lots of fun out front, "riding" Paige's scooter. She kept putting her Little People in the basket, checking that they were in there properly, and then taking them out.

Definitely What She's Talkin' About

Somebody over here likes smoothies.
Also, eating in a big girl chair. Definitely NOT in her high chair anymore.
My receipt got thrown out, the one I'd been writing the kids' funny quotes on. :( The only one I remember is when a dance song came on the radio and Paige started dancing and said "This is definitely what I'm talkin' about." Haha.

Now, here's a pic of Cason in some of the cutest pajamas ever.

...and We're Back

Well I haven't been blogging, and I've had my first official complaint, so I guess it's time. Ha.

I guess I haven't been in the blogging mood. But I've still made sure to write a little note whenever the kids said something funny or cute. I like to remember them exactly, word for word, so I write it down wherever I can. The other day in the car I wrote them on a receipt, because it was all I could find. Unfortunately that receipt is STILL in the car, which Jess took to work, so I'll have to blog that stuff later.

We were out front the other day and Paige and Cason asked to sit on the block wall. I helped them up and Paige said "I just want to feel the sunlight on my feet." Ha.
We've stuck to our goal so far, of at least 15 minutes outside each day, even Saturday and it was pretty chilly and VERY windy.

Neely has been the one of our kids who latches on to a certain toy and always has it with her. It used to be the Veggietales carrot. lately it's the Fisher Price Little People, and sometimes this little toy dog. Yesterday she had fun balancing them on top of a tee.
She's also Cason's little sidekick lately. Where he goes, she goes.
Cason is getting more and more into drawing. Yesterday he drew Plex on the sidewalk.
Speaking of drawing robots, Paige found this toy robot Sarah found for Cason, and set him up to model for a portrait.
I love when she does that. She sometimes likes to rush through things, like drawing and coloring, when we're doing her workbooks. It always surprises me, because that's not really her personality most of the time, she's usually pretty detail-oriented. So I always like when she does something on her own like this, and takes her time.

And one other new thing around here: The older kids usually argue about who has to have their teeth brushed first at bedtime. So Jess has been doing rock paper scissors with them to decide. Last night Neely joined in too. She was so excited, smiling all big and hitting her hands together when they did.

She Felt Pretty

I'm not a fan of the tights under shorts trend for adults, but whenever I see it on babies I think it's so cute. And recently I realized it would be perfect for Neely, since it would look cute AND she can't remove tights like she does every time she wears socks.

So we tried it yesterday. As soon as I got her dressed I noticed she kept looking down at her outfit, smiling, and touching her shirt. She even did a couple little shimmies. I realized it was the first time she really noticed what she was wearing, and she was pleased. So funny. So then I tried a hairclip in her hair for the first time, and she liked that too. I had her sitting on the bathroom counter, facing the mirror, while I put it in her hair. She started smiling and flapping her arms and kicking her feet excitedly.

She felt pretty.

Lately...

Neely takes afternoon naps with Gia.
She also visited her first lake,
and approved. Jess says she's nautical.
Cason was the bird whisperer for a bit.
And Paige has decided she won't be waiting around for school to teach her to write in cursive.

Funny Faces with Caso

I've been noticing our kids each have things they say and do a lot, that I want to write down or blog about so I'll remember. But I keep forgetting to do it. So now I have several to do at once, especially for Neely, since she's starting new things all the time.

She still asks people if they're okay. This morning we were watching a movie called Castle in the Sky, and this robot was hurt. She was all into the movie, intense and so worried about the robot. She kept making worried sounds and saying "Oh no." Then she kind of leaned forward toward the tv and said "Bobot, zee okay?" I think that's how she says "is he okay". Then she goes "Yeah?" Haha, so so cute.

She loves to tell us all "Hug" and then come give us one. Especially Paige and Cason lately.

AND she learned to say "Yo Gabba Gabba YOOOOOOOOOOO" when she wants us to put it on. She says it more like "Yo GyaGya YOOOOOOOOO". They were giving high fives in one episode, so she learned to say that too. "I FIE!" I'll be feeding her and she'll stop nursing to tell me "I FIE", give me a high five, and then go back to eating. Haha.

She seems to pick up a new word nearly every day. About a week ago she said "Coco" several times while he was here for help with math. Then a few days ago Tyra was with us, and much to her delight Neely learned to say "Teetee".

Her own new favorite is "mine" for any time her siblings try and take anything from her.

And one that made me laugh was "I don't know" She kind of said it like it was one long word. Paige asked Cason something and Neely was listening and said "Idonknooooow" in her sweet voice.

As for Cason, his thing lately is asking me if things exist. "Mama, does Spiderman exist?" or "Mama, does Plex exist?"

And Paige likes to say "Speaking of which". AND she says it really fast: "Speakin'o'which". I realized I say it a lot, so I guess that's where she gets it. But she hardly ever uses it correctly. She just uses it to switch topics. Like during a movie, Jess left the room for a minute, and Cason said something to Paige about an exciting scene in the movie. Paige goes "Yeah, and speakin'o'which, where's daddy?"

She's gone on her first sleepover (outside of with family) at someone else's house. Her friend Maysen was having a birthday sleepover tonight, and Paige has been counting down the days and hours since she was invited. She looked super sweet when I dropped her off, with her gift, her backpack, and Hoppy.
A little while ago I realized we hadn't brought her epipen when I dropped her off. So I ran it over (They're like 2 houses away). Paige was shy and didn't really greet me at first, but after a minute she came up and wrapped her arms around my legs, and kept saying "My mommy" while looking at the other girls. So sweet, she was showing me off. I don't expect that to last long, so I was really pumped that she's proud of me for now.

Jess is playing flag football with the MCC team, so he had practice this afternoon. We went after dropping Paige off, so the other two could play at the playground while Jess practiced. Neely fell asleep on the way, so Cason and I hung out in the car until she woke up to go play. While we waited I asked Cason to take some pictures with me. I got one or two like this:
and then he got bored, so while I posed for real he started doing stuff like this:
He thought he was hilarious when I showed this one to him. He was laughing so hard. So I decided we should do funny faces since he loved it so much.

First we just said "Do a weird face"
But then he had plenty of ideas. Chipmunk teeth.
Puffy cheeks.
Elephant noses. I asked how that's done and he told me we pull on our noses and stretch them out.
One of these of course:
Fish lips. They're hard for him.
Scrunchy faces.
And of course his favorite-crossing our eyes.
I've never made him happier.

Quotes and Pigtails

I've been talking to Cason about how he feels. He gets frustrated or mad and just doesn't know what to do. So I've been trying to teach him to tell me what's wrong, like if he's angry or sad or frustrated. Today he told me Paige wouldn't give him a turn at Donkey Kong, and then he balled up his fists at his sides and told me "I...am...REFRIGERATED!!" Haha, I love him. I said "Frustrated?" and he goes "YEAH".

Neely has a few new things she likes to say. She's been greeting Gia first thing in the morning. I carried her to the living room and she saw Gia sleeping on the couch, and said "HI GIA!" But to the untrained ear it would sound like "EYE CHIA!"

She's big on giving hugs lately too. She'll run to me or lean her head against my shoulder and say "UG! UG?!"

This next one was SO cute. The other night, like every Sunday night, the kids got to pick a movie and watch it in our bed. We were all hanging out before putting the movie on, and Caso was getting a little hyper. He did this wild move that ended with him pretending to fall off the bed. It was totally faked, but Neely thought he really fell. She rushed toward him and asked "You 'kay? YOU 'KAY?!!!"

I got this little video of her saying "ug" in the bath the other day, and she even threw in a "too cool", which she LOVES to say but I'd never got it on video before this.

I know people love to do their little girls' hair as soon as it's long enough, but I've personally never been a huge fan of those teeny little pigtails. They of course look cute, because babies always look cute, but for one thing they make them look older. And I want them to look like babies as long as possible. But last night we put Neely's hair in pigtails for the first time, just to see if we could. Her hair still hasn't filled in on the sides completely, it'll probably take about 3 years like Paige's did, so they almost looked like fake pigtails we just attached to her head. Ha. She looked so confused when she looked in the mirror.
But don't expect to see this happening in person for a while. I'm keeping her a baby quite a while longer.

Totoro Livin'

Our MAIN New Years resolution Jess and I made together is to live a Totoro life. That won't make sense to you if you haven't seen the movie, and actually it might not make sense to you even if you have. Jess and I are both weird people, and usually get something different out of things than other people do. That's my favorite thing about him, I can literally only think of about 3 people that I feel like know me very well at all, and only ONE who REALLY understands me-and it's Jess. It's the same way for him. Sometimes it's cool in really serious ways, other times it's cool when it comes to little things-like movies. There will be some tiny little thing that makes me laugh or smile, and I know it's something most people wouldn't think twice about, but I always know Jess will have noticed the same thing I did.

Anyway, back to our Totoro life-basically the movie is just really sweet and calm and peaceful, nothing too exciting in it. So our goal is to try and live a simpler life, and let the simple everyday things make us happy. I think we do a pretty decent job of that at times, but I want to try and focus less on material things, spend less money, and just be more content with my everyday tasks, and focus on how blessed we are. Because MAN are we blessed.

For now we can't buy ourselves a little farm, so we're starting small.

We have our chalk Totoro drawing up to remind us. :)
Jess has been doing a good job of it. He's worked a lot in the front yard, making it look nicer, but also made the kids a cute little play area. He created a little hiding place for them inside the bushes against the front of the house, where they can play and imagine. I would have LOVED it when I was little.

He trimmed away lots of branches, making a clearing inside, and making sure there were no sharp sticks to poke them. He even made a SECOND little hideout in the other bush, with a little passageway to get back and forth between them. SO cool.

They love it in there, and have a box Jess gave them to put little treasures in. He also hung a little jar in there from a piece of yarn for them to put other treasures in.
While he was working on it inside, kind of raking it out smooth, Paige was kneeling next to him and thanked him for making it for them, and told him she loved him. :)

Oh, and one of my little Christmas gifts came in the mail yesterday. I have nothing against those little stickers people put on their cars to represent each member of their family, but I never cared to buy any. UNTIL I found Totoro family stickers on Etsy! Awesome! Nobody will know what the heck it is, but it makes US happy.

So we went to wash the car before putting them on. The kids begged for the rainbow soap.
The bigger two loved it.
Neely was a little scared. But she got through it, and we came home to put up our little Totoro Jess, Totoro Brandi, Totoro Paige, Totoro Cason, and Totoro Neely.
They make me smile every time I go to the back of the car to buckle Paige in. Speaking of which, have I mentioned how Paige tells people she rides in "the trunk"? Haha, that's what she calls our 3rd row. I always wonder what people think.

Kiki's Delivery Service

Cason's slowly becoming more interested in drawing and writing. The other night he drew us this "Spider robot and regular robot":
Don't mind the shadow, just my photography skills at work.

He also did a drawing of Plex, the robot from Yo Gabba Gabba, and it was so cute, he included the little antenna on his head with a ball at the end of it. I'll have to have Jess dig it out of Cason's art box so I can get a picture.

Speaking of Yo Gabba Gabba, look at how cute Neely is while watching it.
This morning the ice cream truck drove by. They've never bought ice cream from the truck before, and Paige thinks it's the coolest ever, so Jess finally made her dream come true. They were so excited, and Cason even got an Iron Man ice cream.
But my favorite thing lately is that for several days now Paige has spent the majority of each day pretending to be Kiki from Kiki's Delivery Service. That's one of our VERY favorite movies, JUST below My Neighbor Totoro. And Up of course. Kiki is a witch (but a cute nice one who doesn't do any magic other than fly around on her broom with her talking cat) who moves to a new city to do her year of training to become a full fledged witch. She starts a delivery service to support herself. So Paige has been "flying" all over the house on her broom with her stuffed cat, making deliveries for us. She also has business cards she had me make for her, and a little notebook and pen so we can sign the receipt every time. I must have signed my name 100 times in the last few days.
Here she is experimenting with different ways to attach her basket. :)