Video: Carter making up games

These are some of the sweet moments I get at home with Carter when the big kids are at school. Notice how QUIET the rest of the house is... I LOVE IT!!  And I love this sweet boy and his cute games.

He was playing peek-a-boo with his sippy cup for almost 10 minutes straight (a LONG time in toddler world!!).



Then I was trying to get Carter to say some words for me but then it just triggered another little game! LOL How silly!

Almost walking!!

Oh I've been soo anxious for Carter to walk again. And to be able to really play outside with Eli and Hannah and to walk to and from the car by myself so I can carry the other things I usually have. But the Dr did say it was going to take at least a couple weeks. And it has. But now, just finally this week, Carter started putting actual weight on his foot, then taking steps with his toes curled up, then standing flat-footed, and now taking hobbly steps all by himself and even doing SPINS! It's about as exciting as when he first was learning to walk at 1 year old! And now here he is again! So excited for him!!

By the way, I've been realizing how I need to get some video of him before these days pass me by! He's been learning lots of new words lately and I want to try to capture them on video in his cute little voice before he grows out of it! So more video clips will be coming...

Happy 5th Birthday, Eli!!!

I feel bad not get anything posted yesterday on Eli's actual birthday but we were so busy having fun and playing together here at home (and working on a Shutterfly album before the coupon expires today), I just didn't have the time.

Eli at 5...

* Has a very sweet heart.  He just asked me to cut an M&M in half so he could share it with Hannah.

* I made him a get-well sign when he was sick a few months ago and he just laid in bed staring at it.  It was several weeks later til he finally took it down.  He said he'd make me one whenever I get sick.

* One day when I was sad and crying on my bed he came to me and gave me his bear telling me it would make me feel better.

* He still sleeps with his blankies and stuffed animals.

* He is timid in large groups and usually stands back just observing.

* He loves the water.  LOVES water slides and will go again and again.  However we did skip this summer of swim lessons.

* He loves building, usually airplanes and rockets.

* Is big into superheros, especially Spiderman and Superman.

* Is good with his numbers but is slow with reading though we are making progress.

* Will draw elaborate pictures of just about anything.

* Loves bunk beds. (he told me to write that on this list)

* We've started reading "adventure books" together in the Magic Tree House series.

* Is very active and aggressive, usually too much so, with Hannah and Carter.

* Is best friends with Hannah and they do everything together. They spend very little time in their rooms. (although as I read this to him, he said Asher is his best friend, not Hannah)

* He has first-born syndrome and often tries to be me by reprimanding Hannah or Carter for something. He's pretty responsible and usually plays the big-brother role quite well.

* He finished his first year at preschool and was considered a delight to his teachers and became friends with several of his classmates. He is proud to be heading to Kindergarten this fall with all-new kids.

* He also completed his first year of the AWANA program at our church AND his participated in his first year of VBS, along with Hannah, which they both LOVED!

* Just the past couple of weeks I finally stopped napping him in the afternoon.  He'll do a little bit of quiet time but mostly we spend that time playing games together, practicing his reading, doing computer games, working on a project, or reading in his adventure books.

We love you, Eli, and are so proud of the young boy you are becoming!!

Here's a little interview I did with him yesterday on his birthday. It's in 2 parts because the camera shut off on me during the first one...

Video: Carter's first steps

This video was taken about 3 weeks ago... Carter's first steps!  Not THE first steps but a glimpse of where he began.  NOW he's fully walking and can stand up from the floor quickly and everything!  It's AMAZING how fast he's changing!  It's time for a new video soon!

Video: Happy Carter

This is actually from October!  I meant to get this up but videos take awhile to load so I just didn't.  But before too much time passes, you must see this...

Beginner reading

I've just barely started beginning reading with Eli. I've introduced a couple word families to him, and already I can tell he's going to do a great job as he learns to blend together more and more words.  We've also done a couple easy, repetitive type books.  It's so fun listening to him read a whole "book" by himself!

Note: Now after the fact, I realize when Eli said "boat" instead of "sail boat" I could have told him to re-look at the first letter of the word and figure it out from there, but while taking the video, I wasn't thinking that fast!

On the go!

In the past week Carter learned to walk with his push-cart toy thingy.  Look at him go!

Because I'll miss this someday

Imagine how wonderful videos like this will be to look back on when the kids are all grown up! Just to hear their little voices singing sweet little songs! So it's been my quest to capture these moments before they're gone!

"Jesus Loves Me"

"ABC Song"

Now I need to get more of Hannah talking and doing her thang. I had a cute one but accidentally deleted it on the camera. So we'll try again with something else!

Eli and Insulation

I've been trying more to capture some of the kids talking, because some day when they're older it will be so cute to look back and listen to their little voices as they're still learning to talk. I love hearing Eli explain things so here he is explaining some of what's going on in the dining room right now.

Smiles for YOU!

We use our nice new camera (Nikon D40) for all our pictures but we still use our old camera (Olympus something-or-other) for taking video. Well, I finally just uploaded all the video that's been on there for awhile, so there will be several coming in the next couple weeks.

This first one is of Carter smiling and cooing the other day. He's a cutie!

Jump, Hannah, jump!

This video is from several weeks ago. Hannah's learning how to jump, and it's my all-time favorite thing to watch kids try. I remember this with Eli, and it's fun to see it again with Hannah. Enjoy!

Show me your smile!

When you say to Hannah, "show me your smile!" she makes this face:

Here's video. Short and so sweet!

Just for the record she makes that same face when you say, "show me your teeth!" silly girl! Here are just a couple other pics from recently. Not particularly smiley in these but still so sweet!

My little musicians.

After nearly 4 years of not playing AT ALL, I finally got my French horn out again and have been playing just a few minutes every couple days. I'm surprised I'm not in as bad of shape as I thought I would be. I have no endurance, but the sound quality is still pretty much there. The kids love when I get out my horn, and I've let them play around on it too. The fact that Eli can get any real sound out at all is pretty fantastic, in my opinion. And what Hannah does is just adorable! Enjoy!

Video time!

Just some videos of the kids from the last few weeks.

Out on the town



silly girl



Hannah dancing




the kids playing ball together

All in a day's work.

Yesterday was a big day for Hannah! She...

#1 Learned how to go down steps! All of them!


#2 Learned how to get down off the couch.



#3 Puts her toy phone up to her ear.


And another video just because she's so darn sweet!

A message for Emily.

When we lived in Connecticut, Eli was good friends with a girl named Emily who was a little over a year older than him. Here's his little message for her today:

So big!

I've been meaning to get some video of Hannah and now that we have real Internet at my parents' house today, I can finally get them uploaded to Blogger. She's seriously the sweetest baby ever! Enjoy!

So big!


Rocking out

Before we know it!

Hannah has been pulling herself to standing for probably almost a month now, but here she is starting to walk along too as she's pushing a box across the floor!

On the move!

It's official! Hannah learned to crawl today! Amazing how children learn new things daily! Just this morning she was still just getting up on her knees, maybe pushing with her feet to scoot a couple inches, and then plopping back down to the floor. But by bedtime she really had it and was moving across the room on her knees! And here's the proof:

Happy Smiles

I'm in the process of transferring over a couple of the latest videos of the kids that I had posted on MySpace. So if you've already seen them there, well, you get to enjoy them again!

Remember the Reading Rainbow song from when you were in elementary school? well, we sing it all the time and it's one of Eli's favorites! =) Here's us singing the first verse of it 2 times through.

Here's a video from just the other night at the dinner table Kevin was making the pop sound with his finger in his mouth. Ignore all the junk on the table, and enjoy the baby laughs! And the funny thing is Kevin did this several times before Hannah even started reacting to it at all! =)