Hours of Peace and Quiet

It's amazing what a difference a thumb can make.

The Old Man Bumped His Head

Believe it or not, we've actually had some rain down here. It's been wonderful... except for my 2 friends who are planning big outdoor parties for tomorrow. Andrew was so excited when he saw the rain. He ran to the sliding door, opened it, and sat there for the entire time I was nursing Keira, singing and just watching the rain. The best part was listening to him sing:

It's pouring.
It's raining.
The man... snoring.
mmmphmmmzzmmmhhrrrmm... morning.

OR (in the video above)...

It's raining.
It's pouring.
The man is katak.

I love the fact that he asks me for the definition of a word that he made up himself.

More Babies!

Last Saturday, Danny and Amy (Noah's parents) had their new baby!!! Abigail was just under 6 pounds and totally cute. The pictures do not do her justice. They are doing well (as you can see above... Doesn't Amy look beautiful?!... she had a baby 9 hours before this picture was taken!)

What a sweet mei-mei (little sister)!
This is Tyler (John and Amy's baby) who was born 8 days before Keira. They had a little playdate yesterday. They're cuties!

Here's Auntie Annie with Keira at our church picnic last Saturday. We have an identical picture from 2 years earlier of her with Andrew at the same picnic.

The New Cousins Meet

Here's my little 2-month-old! She's healthy and happy. Here are her 2-month stats:
length: 22.5 inches (50th percentile)
weight: 12lbs 6oz (90 percentile)
She squeaks and coos and is generally a happy baby. She sleeps well too, which is a huge blessing! Her and Andrew typically both go to bed around 8pm. That has been great for Gabe and I. We've been able to catch up on the last 2 months.
To Flo: For some reason, this picture of Keira reminds me of you. (not the pink flowers, though.)

I love the look on both of their faces here. :)

My sis, Sara, and her fam came to visit this week. It was a ton of fun. This is one of the few times we've set up a kids' table at our house. Andrew loved it and so did we! The 3 big kids had so much fun together. They were fun to watch and listen to.

This was the main reason for the visit. I finally got to meet my nephew, Elijah. He is 2 days older than Keira and so cute! I wish I had gotten a pic of him smiling. His smile covers his entire face! It's adorable! The two cousins seemed to get along well... :)

Speaking of cousins getting along well... Andrew and Annalise played together nonstop.

They're a couple of goofballs if you ask me!

Happy Mother's Day to Me

Happy Mother's Day to all of you moms out there. How did your day go? Good. I'm glad to hear yours went so well. Here's mine: (Warning: If you have a weak stomach, do not continue. Seriously, I'm not joking. Don't read this if you can't handle some pretty gross stuff.)

Gabe had to leave at about 8:00 to get to church. I was ready to have a nice, fun morning with my two little ones. We did the breakfast thing and the getting dressed/teeth brushing thing. Then, I sat down to nurse Keira. I figured that if we left as soon as I finished feeding her, we could get to church with just enough time before the service started for Andrew to say hi to Gabe. Perfect! I looked down at my little girl as she was nursing and thought, "Wow. She looks so beautiful today! Andrew looks good too. I should take a picture of the three of us before anything happens."

Meanwhile, Andrew was starting to have some looks on his face that seemed to indicate that it was time to use the bathroom. Yes, we are potty training. And yes, it has been going fairly well, though not necessarily on this particular morning. Andrew kept on telling me that no, he didn't need to use the bathroom. So finally, I dropped it and decided that even if he did, I could help him when I finished nursing his little sister.

I was still nursing Keira a few minutes later when I heard, "Mommy! uuuuuuuuhhhhh... Mommy!" from Andrew's room. I kept asking him to come to me to tell me what was wrong, but he kept insisting that I go to his room. Once he started crying, I thought that maybe he was stuck somewhere and I needed to help get him out. I half ran/half walked into his room while still nursing Keira to find Andrew stuck in the middle of the room. He wouldn't move because he had poop coming out of his undies (like I said, we're in the midst of potty training), on the carpet, and in my new white shoes (which he was wearing at the time.) Ewwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww! I put Keira down (now upset because she was still hungry) and began cleaning Andrew. He started to find it funny (which it wasn't), so I cleaned him up first and told him to go play somewhere else. Once I was done dunking underwear in the toilet, scrubbing the carpet, cleaning my shoes, and scrubbing my hands like crazy, I finished nursing Keira.

Quite a start to my Mothers Day, no? But wait, there's more...

At this point, we were going to be late for church, but only by a few minutes. And hey, these things happen when you're potty training a 2 1/2 year old, right? So I finished getting all three of us ready and headed out the door. We got down stairs, Andrew loaded himself into the car, and we had all of our luggage for church piled into the back. That's when I heard Keira make a sound that was all too familiar, the product of which I knew would be not too dissimilar from what I just cleaned up in Andrew's room. For a minute, I thought that maybe I could catch her in time before she made a big mess. Nope. I got Andrew back out of the car and scooted him and carried a poopy Keira up the stairs back into the house. It took another 5-10 minutes to clean her up. At this point I would not only be about 40 minutes late for church, but I would need to nurse Keira again once we got there.

So we went back downstairs, I loaded everyone back into the car, climbed into the drivers seat, and took a deep breath. As I was exhaling, Andrew (for the first time that morning) shouted to me, "Happy Mother's Day, Mommy!"

Thank you, son.

The End.

The above picture was taken Sunday evening. As I always tell my kids, "It's a good thing they're cute!"

RR Days and a Photo Shoot

Andrew's dream came true today. We went to the train station for Railroad Days, an annual train extravaganza in Fullerton. We got to board several different trains, see model train sets that were really cool, and even see a steam engine! It actually was pretty interesting for me too. But, for the most part, it was for the visitors under the age of 5 or over the age of 70. (by the way, this is Andrew's new pose for cameras. I'm not sure why.)

All three boys enjoyed the train tour.

Right across from us was a freight engine going by on the tracks too. For those of you who don't have boys, this is about as good as it gets when you're 2.

Keira's first ride in the big stroller. She loved lying down and looking at the patterns above her. This is her literally smiling at the plaid.

Below is a photo shoot I had with Keira yesterday during Andrew's nap time.

This is an outfit from cousin Nathan. We love it! Gabe thinks it's perfect for the NBA playoffs right now. It's very non-committal to any team... Go NBA!

Sometimes Andrew goes down the hall and comes back with strange things on. I just think he's so cute.

Chubby cheeks.

The following video is mainly for grandparents. It won't be exciting for everyone, but it shows off Keira's new sounds. I love listening to her. It makes me smile.

Smiles For Everyone

Above: Keira smiling

Below: Andrew smiling at about the same age (Do they look alike???)

Isn't she a sweetie? (btw, Andrew picks out her socks every morning. I actually kind of like his choice here, but they certainly do make a statement.)

Gabe's grandparents were in town yesterday. It's always so nice to visit with them. I think this is a good pic of them with Keira.

Look how much our hair is alike! Whoa!

Father-son bonding time.

A couple more random shots...

God, is that You?

Here's a good Andrew story:

I had just gotten off the phone with a friend who was telling me she had a headache. I told Andrew and we prayed for her. After we were done praying, Andrew was asking why we prayed to God for her to feel better. I was trying to explain God to a 2-year-old. I found that very complicated as I wanted him to understand the fullness of God and that He wasn't just a magician who could make people feel better, but also the Creator of the universe and Jesus' Father, and our Father, and Jesus Himself... I was in a little over my head, let alone Andrew's... I gave up after a while and started checking a voice message on my cell phone on speaker phone. It was my friend, Flo. "Hey Cheri. It's me..." Andrew gasped and exclaimed, "God!" as he pointed at the phone...
I don't think I explained God very well.

Here's a good delirious mom-of-a-new-baby story:

Keira just started only waking up once a night to nurse Saturday night. On Friday night, the following happened:
Keira woke up to nurse and was crying. I rolled over and nudged Gabe.
C: Hey Gabe. Could you get up with her?
G: Well, I think she is hungry and just wants to nurse.
C: You can't get up with her? I already have the baby in bed. How am I supposed to get Keira too?
G: I'm sorry. What?
C: You can't even help out with Keira while I nurse the baby?
G: Exactly how many babies do you think we have?
C: What? Ugh... Nevermind!
I got up and it took me halfway through nursing Keira when I realized that, in fact, there was no baby in bed with us.
The best part... the exact same thing happened the next time she woke up to nurse 3 hours later.
The next morning, Gabe (who earned about 1000 husband points for this) asked, "So... was I really confused last night or... were... you?"

I know all y'all want pictures. I know I have them. I'll share some soon.

Smiles!!!

Keira smiled for the first time on March 22nd and I've been trying to get a picture ever since. She doesn't like the light that comes on before the flash so every smile turns to a weird look right as the picture is taken. That's why I thought that a video might work better. This still doesn't show off her BIG smile. I'll try again soon for that, but I hope this will suffice for now. :)

On a less important note, Gabe and I play the grocery game. We use coupons and deals at the grocery store to see how much we can save. Last week, we just made a new record. Our total before coupons, etc was $92.19. After the coupons, it was $17.59. Not bad, huh? Anyone else here play???

Shout Out to the Fresno Fam

I guess after listing off 10 names, 2 more is too much to ask... we do love you, Nathan and Eli!

I spoke with my sister, Sara, today and she wanted in on the "Daddy swaddle", as it's known around our house. It works wonders for us (mainly Keira), although Gabe always enjoys a good swaddle every once in a while as well. :)

Happy Birthday!

Andrew has been learning and singing so many different songs lately. It's so fun! Here's a video of Keira too. I just think it's so funny how random baby's movements are.
ps Sara- Do these clothes look familiar???

I want to post more, but haven't had the time. Sorry folks. I'll see what I can do! :)

A Day at the Beach

This morning our friend Allie babysat Andrew for us so Gabe and I got time alone with Keira, which as those of you who have kids know, means we had time pretty much alone. We went to our favorite breakfast place over in Newport and enjoyed uninterrupted conversation for once in what seems like quite a while. We even had some deep theological debates. Don't worry. Gabe finally came around to seeing things my way. :) (In my dreams!)

Here are just a couple shots that we took while we were there.

Our debates bored her.

My First Day "Alone"

Keira's first time in a dress... let the dressing up begin!!!

Keira's first bath.

Andrew did a good portion of the soaping.

She actually enjoyed it quite a bit... at least she wasn't crying...

Can you see Keira's hair here? Isn't that awesome?!

Our friends, Gary and Carolyn with their daughter Lauren, came the other day for a visit. It was really good to see them and it was so cute to watch the two big kids play. They had a lot of fun together. It's always so special for me to see Andrew enjoy someone so much.

Gabe is having fun being a dad of two. I think he's got the hang of it more than I do.

This is Andrew's train that he sets up in his room. He asked for Keira to ride in the engine with him.

Nonnie and Papa came down for a visit last weekend. We went to the park near our house for an Easter party.

Andrew with his monkey tatoo. Doesn't he look tough?

Andrew during the Easter egg hunt.

Tuesday was Gabe's first day back at work without anyone being here to help me. This is the view of the house towards the end of it.

Cheri quote the day before this: "I don't expect much, Gabe. I just want the house cleaned up a few times a day."
Cheri quote when Gabe got home from his 4-hour work day: "I'm reconsidering taking the second one out of the womb."