Brooklyn's TWO!!

Our little girl turned 2 January 28 and we celebrated her all day!  I still can't believe she's already 2.  It seems like just yesterday we were bringing her home from the hospital.  Brooklyn has a very spunky personality, but is just as sweet as ever, too.  She loves her big brothers and wants to do anything and everything they are doing.  She's a very determined young lady and knows what she wants.  She has learned to express herself in various ways, but still manages to do it with a smile on her face.  We've noticed the past few months Brooklyn has developed a compassionate heart for others.  She is very aware of what's going on around her and gets concerned when something doesn't seem "right".  

Brooklyn started going to the same Kids Day Out school Miles goes to twice a week when she turned 2 and she LOVES it!  She can have a timid, shy personality in the beginning, but by the time I'm walking out the door she's playing with friends or working on puzzles.  She has done very well being around other kids and is playful with them.  

She is a momma's girl at times, but wants her daddy when he's here!  Brooklyn has learned to make silly faces along with having a fascination with shoes and bows.  She prefers to pick out her clothes so we've already started giving her options to choose her daily outfits.  Brooklyn has started showing an interest in potty training, but we're taking it slow.  We'll take her to the potty when she tells us she needs to go and sometimes she does go, which is very exciting!  We're just taking the approach of no pressure, but willingness is great!!     

So this year, Brooklyns birthday fell on a Tuesday, which meant her and Miles were at home all day so we had fun playing together!! Brooklyn LOVES playing with play doh so I pulled out all the goods and let her and Miles create and make all kinds of things.  I fixed her favorite meal for lunch and we cuddled up to watch a movie, but that only lasted 30 minutes so instead we played outside in the bounce house.  Brooklyn got lots of calls from family during the day and loved talking on the phone!  After dinner and once daddy came home we gave Brooklyn all her gifts to open and she was so excited.   I'm not sure if the shoes book, the minnie mouse guitar, high heels and princess crowns, or the new backpack for school was her favorite, but she sure was excited to open them all and willingly shared her gifts with her brothers!  

Happy 2nd birthday sweet girl!  We love you!

 

Family Pictures

In November we had our yearly family pictures taken by a new friend here.  We went out to her property one day and spent about 2 hours.  For the most part, the kids did great.  But, with 3 little ones, it almost seemed if two were smiling, one wasn't.  If two were looking at the camera, the other wasn't.  Even with this happening, we still were able to get some great pictures!  

 

A New Year

We celebrated the new year with some sweet friends and had a ball hanging out with everyone.  The hosts had games and entertainment for everyone and the food was delicious!  Kids were invited, but since my mom was still in town, we opted to spend part of the evening with her and our kids, ended up putting them down for bed, and then going to our get together.  

The girls spent a majority of the evening inside playing random games and entertaining little ones, while the guys found themselves outside in the garage playing ping pong tournaments and pool.  It was freezing outside but that didn't stop all the kids from riding bikes and racing each other on scooters.  

We've been so fortunate to have met some great people since we moved to Borger and they've been gracious enough to accept us into their group!  It seems the people here are use to others coming and going and welcome anybody!  We appreciate it.  Most everyone in our group goes to our church, which is how and where we met a large majority of them.  There are some sweet girls around here!  

It was a fun night and we were lucky to have my mom here who was willing to keep our kids so we could have a night out!  

Miles turned 3

Our sweet Miles turned 3 December 30th and we celebrated him all day long!  The night before his birthday, we put some candles in his homemade RKT he and his cousins decorated and sang happy birthday while family was still at our house!  I'm pretty sure he appreciated all the attention!  After opening a few gifts, said our goodbyes, and put everyone down to bed, Anna and I decorated the kitchen with streamers and banners for the next day!  

Miles' actual birthday, I let him pick and choose anything and everything he wanted!  He got to choose his breakfast- cinnamon rolls, picked whatever play activity we did (play doh, legos, and trains), ate mac and cheese for lunch, watched Little Einsteins, willingly took a nap- he was tired from all the cousin playtime all the days before, then anxiously waited for daddy to come home to wrestle with him.  Since we still had cake left over from Aunt Anna's bday, I made jumbo sized cupcakes and let my kids decorate them for Miles birthday.  He loved it and was more then willing to put his fair share of M&M's and jelly beans all over his cupcake.  We let him open presents after dinner since daddy was there to watch!!  Trust me-- he wasn't doing without all day since he was still enjoying all his new Christmas toys.  He opened a remote control airplane and a new Power Ranger and was soooo excited!!!  Thankfully, my mom got to stay a little while longer with us and was able to celebrate Miles' birthday with us!

It's amazing to see how much Miles has changed this past year, yet his fun, adventurous, spunky self is still there!  Miles can be the most easy going, go with the flow and just do whatever kinda kid, and then he can be the most focused, driven, specific, know what he wants and doesn't stop until he gets it kinda kid and we actually love that about him.  Brooks and I have learned a lot this past year about the best "techniques" to help him be a success and have strived very hard to teach Miles how to be okay with expectations and appreciate them (as much as a 3 year old can!).  We love Miles compassionate heart and generous attitude that he seems to always express towards us and others.  Miles goes to mothers day out/school 3 times a week and loves it.  He has some neat friends at both his schools and looks forward to hanging out, playing, and learning on those days.  He also LOVES, LOVES, LOVES our church, the preschool workers, those friends as well.  He likes to be a helper and wants approval with anything!  He's pretty silly and generally makes us laugh daily with his funny faces and gestures.  He looks up to Gavin and has just decided that he enjoys teaching Brooklyn things versus pushing her around.  They truly are buddies!

Happy Birthday Miles.  We love you! 

Part of December

December began with us celebrating my 31st birthday.  It was a very low key day that I spent with Miles and Brooklyn home from school, but they were sweet enough- with daddy's help- to have my normal bday breakfast (blueberry muffins and lil' sausages) ready and I got to open gifts before Gavin went to school and Brooks went to work.  Our elf, Zippy, made his appearance and decorated the kitchen for my bday.  So sweet! 

Now that we are home in the USA we had the opportunity to get a REAL tree for Christmas and we were so excited to go and find a tree to bring home.  When we lived in Houston, we would go to a tree farm, find the perfect tree, and cut it down ourselves.  We couldn't find anything like that nearby, so instead we settled for a "tree farm" where real trees were already cut and we just selected one.  It was kinda easy since we knew we wanted an 8-9 ft tree and there really was only a few trees for us to choose from, so while it took us an hour to drive there, we spent 10 minutes getting our tree!  It was freezing outside, which made us grateful that we didn't have to walk up and down rows and rows of trees to choose from!  The kids were given hot chocolate and popcorn while our tree got wrapped up and off we went to do some Christmas shopping!!

We had two parties back to back one weekend and unfortunately I only managed one picture, that Gavin took and not everyone was in it!  But still, we opened up our home one night for our small group from church and had an ugly sweater party.  After dinner and visiting we played a few games and laughed a lot!!   The next night, Brooks' entire work team, their wives and kids all came over, we ate gumbo, and enjoyed getting to know everyone.    

Sunday morning at church all the kids sang for a special Christmas program.  Brooklyn and Miles weren't really sure what was going on, but they were comforted by some of their favorite girls!  Gavin had fun and sang as much as he could from the songs he knew the words to.

We battled a stomach bug that passed through all of us and was pretty brutal to experience.  However, our kids are pros at dealing with stomach issues and knew exactly what to do.  It actually makes life easier, except for watching them being sick!  Don't be fooled by Brooklyn's picture below-- Miles had been teaching her what to do when it was her turn to be sick and she was practicing!  

Brooklyn's growing up and getting into more and more things.  One day, I found her in the fridge trying to get string cheese all by herself. Another day, while we were out Christmas shopping, I went into the bathroom and somehow the two little ones got out of their seat belts, moved their stroller to the sink, and started washing their hands on their own!

 

It snowed a few times and we are slowly getting use to the weather.  The kids love seeing snow covering the ground and our house, but don't enjoy the cold as much.
   

December meant time for Christmas presents so I made personalized gifts for all the kids teachers and gave them each a recipe for a sweet treat!

Gavin's school held a Christmas sing a long program and each child was assigned a certain song to sing as a group and a character- Gavin was an angel and a cute one at that!  Brooks and I loved listening to all the Christmas songs being sung and how into it the kids were!  

 

An amazing part of December for us was getting to be with Brandon as he graduated from college!  We drove to Waco one weekend, met up with all the family, and celebrated Bran getting his bachelors degree from Baylor.  It was such a fun experiencing, not just celebrating Bran's huge accomplishment- I mean the guy went through a lot to get to this point- but the fact that he made it to this point!  It was just awesome!