Elijah turned 2!

Hahaha.... I was laughing at the title.  I just realized I never posted on his big second birthday.  Guess I'm a bit behind on things.  SO here it goes...sorry little man, I have been having so much fun playing with you I forgot to stop and write down the memories.  Here is goes...I hope I remember it all well as my pregnancy/mommy brain has really kicked into high gear these days!!

We got to go home for your birthday this year.  We had a cars themed party-thank you so much to my in laws for letting us have a huge party and their house and for providing all the food!  We couldn't have done it without you! It snowed that day, so some people couldn't make it-but you also got to play in the snow for the first time and you had a blast!

You got to see all your grandparents and 3 out of 4 sets of your great grandparents.

 There was Mater on your cake and you were so excited that you had to take the car off the cake before you would even take a bit.  I don't know if you were more excited about the car or the cake!

You got to see balloons for the first time and you had so much fun playing with them and carrying them around the house it was hard to get you to put them down!

You got so many presents and were surrounded by so many people who love you.  We couldn't have had more fun.  You were so grateful and used such good manners-I wish we would have thought to get it on video.  At least we remembered to get pictures!!  Every present you pulled out you yelled thank you and ohhh! It was priceless.

I can't believe you are 2-where did my little baby go.  You are growing into such the little man!  I can't wait to see what God has in store for you.  I know you will go far and succeed at what you do.  You are a very determined little boy-with so much love to give everyone.  One of my favorite parts to the night was at the end when you had to go around to everyone at the party and give everyone a kiss(and no this was not prompted, you just love people that much).  I think you even made it around half the group a second time!  I love you little man!!

Happy Easter!

Like I said in my last post, I'm a bit behind! 

 

Happy Easter from our family to yours! I hope you all had a great Easter and took the time to remember what it is really all about.  There is nothing better than your Savior dying and rising from the dead so that you may be saved!

We had a great day of family time.  The kids got very small Easter baskets that morning-one because who needs more junk, and two because well it's not really about getting stuff, it is about realizing what you are given! A wonderful opportunity unlike any other!

We colored eggs, it was Elijah's first time doing it and he really seemed thrilled.  Athaiah sat in the high chair next to him eating puffs.  I can't wait to see her expression next year, because I loved his!

We had a huge lunch of ham, cheesy potatoes, surprise rolls, strawberries, and some mixed veggies! So our dinner was on the light side and we had some waffles with berry sauce! The kids love to eat this for meals and I love it as well, because in my opinion you can never have enough fruit!

28 weeks!

I'm so overwhelmed with the thought that in just 3 months we will be welcoming another little bundle of joy to our bunch!  People think we are crazy...and sometimes so do I!  I love our crazy, busy, beautiful life.  I haven't had much time to post recently and I would really like to get better about it! So sorry to everyone. Hopefully I will get on board here soon-life just seems to be moving way to fast!

I think about this baby and I just get so excited.  Elijah is already such a good big brother and he is always trying to help with everything.  I can't wait to see him with another baby.  If you ask him what is in mommy's belly- he will proudly say "baby tuck(Stuck in Elijah lingo)" He knows there is a baby in there, but unfortunately for him at the moment it is stuck.  He will quite often pull up my shirt, knock on my belly, and say "hello?!, Baby stuck, luv eww, bye bye." He will then put my shirt back in place.  Nothing more precious to me than seeing him really enjoy getting to know the new baby.  He wants to play with the baby-and for the first time the other day he got to see and feel the baby move.  His response was priceless "oh baby get me, baby movin" as he continued to poke and prod my stomach trying to get the baby to move some more.  Every time the baby would kick-he would squeal "oh no baby get me!" I loved seeing the joy on his face as he got to experience this.  It is one thing for Greg to talk to my stomach and play games with the baby-it is another to see it reenacted in your 2 year old.  Something so sweet and precious about it. I'm so glad that he loves this little one already-I have a feeling we will have to watch him once the baby is unstuck. He is constantly trying to pick Athaiah up and carry her around the house.  Usually the attempts fail and he says "baby sisa heaby" I love the way he talks and loves on his little sister.

Athaiah on the other hand has no clue what is coming her way.  She is definitely a mommy's girl and isn't quite so happy to share me even with her big brother.  It may take a bit of adjustment for her, since she will have to share a lot more of my attention.  We are blessed that she is already a busy girl and will probably be walking by the time the new baby gets here, hopefully that will keep her busy enough!

Our new little one so far is right between the two kids in how they acted while in my belly-I'm excited to meet it and get to know it's personality.  This one moves pretty consistently but not an over achiever by any means.  Elijah didn't ever stop moving and Athaiah moved twice a day to readjust her position.  It has been fun to see how different 3 pregnancies so close together can be! A great reminder that every child is different and unique and made according to God's purposes!  I look forward to finding out what this little one is...we are keeping it a secret this time, which has honestly been so much fun!!  I kind of like not knowing what to expect-something different....and at the same time a huge leap of faith for anyone that really knows Greg and I.  We are planners and like to know everything ahead of time so we can figure stuff out and have a game plan.  Not this time-we are winging everything.  This time I will hopefully be able to have my baby naturally-although if God plans differently we are very much ok with that....so because of that we do not know the date or time this baby will come. And like I said before the sex of the baby will also be a surprise.  I get more excited the closer it gets! We shall see if I can make it to the due date this time.  A lot of people don't think that will happen.

 I have a lot of humor this pregnancy-but I guess I have to...I'm pretty big this pregnancy compared to my last 2 but I have had them all close and am still within normal weight range. I have had plenty of people tell me I'm going to pop any day and plenty of people question as to if I'm having twins!  I actually don't mind the comments- I tell them I must be having another Elijah!! I love fat babies and would gladly take another one!  I have way more to worry about then how big I am...After all according to the Dr. I'm doing great.  I have gained 19 lbs and I'm currently measuring 29.5" and I'm 28 weeks, so really I'm not doing awful.  I have a 2 year old and a 1 year old to chase around and they keep me plenty busy and they are way more important to me than worrying about how big I am.  I have sleepless nights and sometimes endless days.  I have learned I can only rely on God and His strength to get me through.  I have needed him more and more as our lives become a bit crazier.  I'm looking forward to everything that God has planned for our little crazy family!  We can't wait to meet you baby #3!

Debt

...we have a lot of it.  Not something I'm proud of, but I went to college for 2 years total and my husband went for 4 years, and that alone can sink a person.  Then we decided to have kids, I love them and wouldn't trade them for the world... but alas more debt.  Well then the family was too big, so then we needed a bigger car-more debt.

We are strongly convicted in this area to get out of debt, it is a huge sink hole.  It has been a huge burden and the object of so many of our prayers.  We realize it is a sin to be in debt and we want nothing more than to just GET OUT! 

We have not taken the Dave Ramsey class although I have read a book of his-and man is it full of so many good ideas as to how to get out of debt.  We have applied a lot of them and have done a lot of things to creatively live on less money.  We have had some help, and we have had a lot of encouragement.

Well today is a big day... I just put the last payment for one of our medical bills in the mail.  This means we can now start applying the snow balling process that Dave Ramsey talks about all the time.  It is a wonderful tool-it just took us a while to be able to utilize this tool.  I'm so happy to say that starting next month we can start snowballing those payments by adding them onto our next lowest debt.  Debt here we come-we finally have some momentum going and it feels so good to get it moving!

One of my goals was to get at least one bill paid off-I can now check that off my list.  But I'm going to aim for 2! Let's see if we can get at least one more bill paid off this year.  I would shoot for 3 but I'm not going to get too excited...yet.  But God has always provided in miraculous ways so you just never know! Maybe we will get 3 paid off this year!

Demolition.

Demolition bathroom style has begun! YEAH!  The master bathroom is finally about to be tackled.  I can't tell you how very excited I am for this moment!

Of course there are always surprises, one of our first two are, one wall isn't a wall at all it was just drywall glued to the outside wall, and the longest wall in the basement was studded, but all crooked.  No wonder the walls looked so crazy.

Currently, the long wall is being studded.  I'm aiming for that to be finished by this weekend, so we can start getting the drywall up. We shall see how it comes along.  We only have weekends to work on this so it is a several week/month project since we also have 2 children to chase around in the middle of putting up new walls. 

Elijah has really enjoyed getting to see power tools in action, and he even helped us rip out some of the old drywall.  He loves to help and get his hands dirty whenever he can.  His big job this past weekend, was walking around the bathroom floor and picking up all the pokies(screws) and putting them in a bucket so no one stepped on them.  Daddy cut out the old gas line and so Elijah got to see some big spark flying and man was that cool for him.  I'm excited for this to be a good family project since Elijah loves to watch and help whenever he can.

Fun in the Snow

Running around, falling down, giggling, and laughing.  This is what all our snow days looked like.  Elijah had so much fun going out and playing the snow.  Daddy would be outside shoveling and Elijah couldn't get out the door fast enough to join him and play.  Red in the cheeks and he still would refuse to come in.  We had chili for lunch one day and a pot roast another. Two good hearty meals that I can't resist when it snows or gets really chilly!  Being in Kansas this year, I learned about a lovely new treat.  Snow Ice Cream!  Why have we never heard of this in MI?  All those years with huge snow storms and we never got to enjoy this wonderful treat.  Elijah lovingly called it snow cream and it will be our new family tradition.  Athaiah also enjoyed this, although her poor fingers were red by the time she was done because she insisted on eating it herself-which involves just her fingers.  I'm posting the recipe I used below for all those that haven't heard of this before...aka my MI friends and family!

Snow Cream:
1 gal fresh snow
2 c milk
1 c sugar
1 TBSP vanilla

Mix the milk, sugar, and vanilla together until the sugar is all dissolved.  Then pour over top of the snow and mix well.  We topped ours with some sprinkles because who can resist fun colored sprinkles.

Precious Times

My babies are getting big so fast.  I'm not sure I can keep up! In a good way, of course.  I have found myself a lot less connected to media recently(which I'm not going to complain about), because I'm thoroughly enjoying all the time I'm getting to spend with them.  They love to laugh and giggle at each other and they have become best friends.  Athaiah is always trying to crawl all over Elijah and love on him(of which he isn't always fond of, and other times welcomes it with a tackle).  Athaiah is trying to repeat every sound you make.  She is a smiley, happy baby just like her brother.  She is crawling all over the place and is soo fast.  Something we are so not used to in this house!  She is busy constantly, and doesn't know how to sit still.  As daddy says, she must take after her mommy. She also has started pulling up on things and bear crawling-I think our little pumpkin may just be walking by the time she is 1 year old.  
Elijah repeats everything you say and is trying to say small sentences now.  We can finally understand most of what he says which is amazing and so much fun.  Now we can enjoy conversations with each other and talk about all kinds of different things.  He has recently discovered a love of tractors, he got one for his birthday, and has become so crazy about them, with some of his extra birthday money we had to run out and get some more.  He sings and dances around the house and is mommy's big helper still, and he loves it.  He will start crying if I tell him he can't help with something(usually because I'm using the stove or something hot).
If nothing these past couple weeks have really hit me hard as to how fast time really does go.  The dishes can wait, but spending time with your children really is priceless and is worth so much more.  With my knee bugging me, once I'm down I stay down for awhile which has really helped me live in the moment with my kiddos.  It makes the phone just ring because I can't get to it fast enough.  It makes the chores wait because well that is a lot of walking to sweep and mop! The extra needed time with the children is amazing and I wouldn't trade it for the world.  I love hearing the giggles as we get into tickle fights, and play cars on the floor.  I love the snuggle time when they both crawl into my lap and want me to read to them. Life could not be better! I'm writing this just to remind myself and those around me, to stop and slow down.  Life really can wait.  Spend time with those you love and I mean really spend time with them.  Put down the technology, you will find something so much greater. 
If I'm slow on posting I will apologize to you, but it just hasn't been too much of a priority lately.  I do have some good new recipes and crafts I would love to post about-hopefully sooner rather than later.