New Header?

It only took me like 2 hours to figure out how to do that, and the poor 4th child isn't even in it.  Oh well!  It was time for a change.

I want to get back to blogging more.  I feel like facebook has taken over and I don't want that to happen.  This has been my online baby book for almost 7 years and I don't want to slack off for the poor 3rd and 4th child.  But it's 11pm now so this isn't going to be that exciting, but here's a few things that happened this week.

Madeleine asked why we weren't doing school anymore after a 5 day break.  Um.... it's summer vacation Honey.  Mama needs a break.  She said she was ready to start first grade so I bought her a first grade workbook from costco and she is doing several pages a day.  For fun.

John Paul is somewhat motivated to learn how to read, especially now that we came home from the library with a stack of superhero easy reader books.  (The boy is obsessed.)  So he has actually got the reading lesson book (Teach your child to read in 100 Easy Lessons) voluntarily and asked for a lesson every single day this week.  Sometimes twice a day.  Well, OK!

Leo is in undies full time but he still doesn't understand that you don't go number 2 in your pants.  He demonstrated this lack of understanding at the children's museum yesterday.  I amaze myself what I can do with a baby strapped to my back.  He is also talking up a STORM, saying 4-5 word sentences, and is becoming more and more understandable (to people other than me and his speech therapist) by the day.  He is listening in on the reading lessons too.  He also knows every single letter and he can count to at least 14.  That one might be smart.

Sarah is pretty much the best baby who ever lived.  When she's tired I lay her down in her crib, turn on her mobile, pop in her giraffe paci and she goes to sleep.  She wakes up in such a happy mood.  She takes 2 good naps a day, sometimes 3, and goes to bed by 8 each night.  She can go days without ever crying.  She weighs about 16 1/2 lbs, is quite a good roller, and loves to hang out in mommy's wraps.  She is the smiliest baby EVER.  My friend calls her the invisible baby whenever we go places with her because she just looks all around, smiles, sleeps when she wants to, but never cries or fusses.  (unlike one of her brothers, who makes up for that in a BIG way.)

We still don't have a stove.  Did you know you can make hard cooked eggs in a veggie steamer?  Yes you can.  It hasn't really been that bad so far.  Ken loves to grill and we've used the crock pot and tomorrow I might bust out the old dusty waffle maker just for fun.

I am loving taking pictures.  Now my kids are so used to it they usually don't give me big cheesy grins anymore, so I've gotten some pretty great shots!  I'm taking a class in a few weeks and I love to read about and try different techniques.  An acquaintance saw a few of my pics on Facebook and asked if I'd take pictures of her son for his 2nd birthday.  I did and she LOVED em.  She wants me to take pics for her again and said several of her friends were asking who took the pics.  She also gave me an awesome compliment.  She said that every time she looks at previous professional pictures they've had taken, she doesn't have any good memories attached to the pictures.  Instead she remembers trying to get everyone dressed and out the door, and it being a big hassle.  But when she looks at my pics, she remembers gleeful bubbles and yogurt raisins and her son being relaxed and happy.  I thought that was so great.  And she ordered some really big prints of some of my pictures.  So glad I could do that for her!