What is this strange thing on my finger?

Hope you got a good look...because it's gone now!

Shenanigans

Photo and video editing at www.OneTrueMedia.com

Thanks Nonnie and Poppie!

The babies spent their first night away from home without Brian or I this past Saturday. I'm happy to report all went well! In fact when we went to pick them up they were running wild and crazy in the yard. It's pretty clear they like the country!

The babies were a little uncertain as to what to expect. Luckily I informed them that there are no rules at Nonnie and Poppies. They can stay up as long as they want...and of course NO napping because there is too much fun to be had. (Hee Hee)

As for Brian and I? We spent the first night alone in our house in a long time. My best calculation is that it's been around 16 months. It was very quiet. Strangely quiet.

We reminisced about our "single" days (aka pre-triplet). What the heck did we do with all of that free time? We concluded we were lazy people prior to having children. We also concluded we should have enjoyed it way more!

We went to lunch, took a nap, went out to dinner, lounged on the couch, slept late, watched TV in bed, went to lunch again, and topped it all off with 4 friendly games of bowling. Packed a lot in, didn't we?

Kita was exceptionally happy, I'd say. She enjoyed her only child status again, and might have been a tad sad for them to come home. I'm sure the disappointment only lasted until the next meal. She is exceptionally skilled at post-meal disaster clean up. Almost as skilled as Jack is at flinging food from the ceiling to the floor.

It was fun, it was relaxing, but who the heck are we kidding? It's nice for a little while...but we were SO ready to get our little monsters back. While the house was quiet and orderly it also lacked an enormous amount of laughter, fun, and of course chaos!

We're back in the old routine. Hopefully Nonnie and Poppie recovered and it didn't take them too long to clean up.

So, for all of you "single" people out there...take some time to enjoy your life of freedom. And, to all of you "tied down" people with one or more kiddos...take some time to enjoy all of the love that surrounds you. (Just know that the amount of love you have is indirectly correlated to the amount of relaxation in your life)

We settled back into our old routine quickly. The weather is stinky so we're starting to get a little stir crazy. Hopefully it didn't take Nonnie and Poppie too long to clean up! Thanks again!


Don't worry, they immediately began to put things back where they were supposed to be.

Jack was pretty happy to see Pooh.

Bennie wondering when he gets to come back???

The mourning of a mullet.

There comes a time when a mullet just isn't cool anymore. We told Jack it was time for it to go. Time to step out of the 80's and embrace a new look. Not gonna lie, he looks pretty excited, doesn't he?


One last peek at his glorious Pat Benetar 'do....



Jack's giving Dad a few last pointers on exactly what he wants done.

Uh oh. That last minute of panic hits when he knew there was no turning back.

Looks Great! Dad did a fantastic job.


Bennie, sadly, wasn't a fan of his new haircut. Guess we'll take him to a real barber next time.

Christmas 2008...from Lily, Jack, and Bennie

Since Mommy is apparently NEVER going to get around to telling everyone how fantastic our Christmas was we thought we would try to get the job done.

We love our parents and all but they did not do a very good job of telling us how great this Christmas thing was. All we heard was blah blah blah...something about this guy Santa...blah blah blah...and that we better be good. Well, CLEARLY we are good so we just kind of stopped listening. Kind of like Mom at a stop light if it doesn't turn green real fast and she starts digging in her purse and then someone honks at her. Yep, just like that.

We woke up on Christmas Eve morning just like every other morning with no real indication that this was a special day. Jack had been a bit under the weather but was feeling much better, thank goodness.

We waited for what seemed like forever in our fuzzy pajamas. Then, it was pretty much like any other boring day at home. Except for Mommy running around like crazy...

Lily passed the time perfecting her yoga moves.

Bennie passed his time by just being darn cute...I think he was hoping we would pass on a good word to that Santa guy.


Jack kept trying to tell us something important...but we just couldn't make out what he was trying to say. It's hard to take him seriously with that mullet he's sporting these days.

So, along went our day without too much excitement. UNTIL...Bennie woke up from his last nap with a 104.2 fever! Bennie swears he wasn't trying to get extra presents but we're not sure. If that was his plan it totally backfired because he got a freezing cold bath instead. Jokes on him. This was Ben after his dunking. Unfortunately his polar swim made him afraid of the bathtub for a few weeks but he seems to be over the trauma.

Thank goodness Bennie got to feeling better because MawMaw and PawPaw, Nonnie and Poppie, and Mommy and Daddy had a party that night and we got to go! Here's us with our party hats on!

Bennie is obviously feeling MUCH better!

Lily's ready for her turn.


Sweet Missy sparkle pants.

AND they let us open one present each. We really just wanted to eat the wrapping paper but didn't want to hurt their feelings.

The day kept getting better and better!

All in all it was a very good day indeed. But, you know what the best part was? When we woke up in the morning...guess what? There were even MORE presents. So many that we couldn't count! We even got a really cool tent to hang out in.

And an even cooler red wagon! We are going to look so good riding around the neighborhood in that thing.



Notice our vanity plates?

So we think that Santa guy is pretty neat. We can't wait until next year when we get to meet him and have our picture taken with him!

Thanks to all of our fantastic family! We had the greatest Christmas ever. Boy are we excited to take it easy and relax, though. It's pretty hard being this small. It takes a whole lot of energy being this darn cute.

Being the creative person that I am I decided I would take our Christmas card pics this year. This was a seriously bad idea. If there's one thing I'm learning about one year olds it's that they don't seem to follow directions very well...and they simply will not sit still.

Take 1:
My Mom helped me with this attempt. We were both sweating and out of breath from chasing babies and hats and eventually gave up.

No one will look at the camera...and there are no smiles...


Got Jack to look at the camera, off with Lily's hat, and Bennie decides the tinsel is out to get him.

Bennie goes MIA, running from the evil tinsel.

Lily soon follows.

Scene change, Lily's hat immediately comes off, but look at that grin! Jack is pulling the tinsel apart and eating it. Bennie really, really hates tinsel.

Attempted to squeeze them in their bumbos with red towels. Mind you, they haven't sat in them in like six months. No one smiles, their legs look strangely deformed, and no amount of cropping will fix the odd angle of their bodies.

Take 2.

I come up with an idea that is bound to work. They certainly can't escape a giant box wrapped in Christmas paper, right? I am Seriously thinking I am a genius at this point and even have Brian on board to help me.

Hats immediately come off...and surprise, no smiling. How can you not like Santa hats?

What is this look? Don't they know Christmas is supposed to be happy?
Things begin to get rowdy.
The box actually falls over and out run babies in every direction (no babies were harmed).
I am making stupid noises, shaking a lamp in the air, and STILL NO SMILES??? I think Jack is plugging his ear.
At this point we gave up and everyone will be receiving a card in the mail with a picture that is four months old. Deal with it.

Here's My Excuse!

As you can see below, I really have been busy. Their birthday came and went, then there was Thanksgiving, and now Christmas is coming? Holy Cow. I have a faint feeling of always being behind these days. I'm hoping to catch up this week. I've started a list an entire page length and am slowly checking things off.

These little guys are keeping me busy. It seems they have sprouted extra arms. They can somehow spot the one thing in the room they shouldn't touch and are on it in less than 3 seconds. I'm figuring out I'm not that fast. We've had a few bruises, more than a few messes, and on unfortunate episode where someone (not naming any names here) ate the goldfish out of someone else's puke. That one almost made me puke.

Here's some footage of their newest tricks. Ben is almost running, Jack is walking, and Lily has taken the vertical route.

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Our days are spent eating, drinking, playing, and not nearly enough napping. We've been blessed to spend a lot of time with family over the past few weeks. We've all enjoyed our time together. It amazes me each time just how enjoyable these babies are. For kiddos who have always been on a schedule they are so flexible when we're not at home. They just go with the flow. They obviously have inherited Brian's easy going nature!

It feels like we've had a lot of changes happening around here. We've transitioned to whole milk with meals. They are doing a lot of self-feeding and meals have finally started to get easier. (I'm probably jinxing myself here.) We've got both playrooms up and running, one upstairs and one downstairs. We moved out the old off-white sectional couch upstairs (it needed to go), added a long gait, and moved our old set of leather furniture upstairs. This has really opened up the room and gives Bennie a chance to run laps. The real reason we had to move the furniture around, however, was Lily's climbing. There just wasn't a way to arrange the sectional that seemed safe.

They got new carseats for their birthday! One unfortunate...and unforeseen issue has come up, though. Car sickness. Ugh. It seems like everytime they ride in their seats I have to clean one of them. Those stupid seats weigh around 25 lbs and aren't so easy to get in and out of the car. Lily puked on the way to the zoo, Bennie puked on the way home from Thanksgiving, and Jack had his turn on the way home from my parent's house on Saturday. I'm talking projectile in massive amounts. I know one thing, I am NEVER feeding anyone strawberry applesauce again. After smelling it mixed with curdled milk for two hours on the drive home I am officially banning it from the applesauce rotation.