Christmas through February

So here I am again, trying to catch up on my blog. I'd like to promise that in the future I'd do better, but let's face it, I won't promise because I know I most likely won't do better.

Christmas for us was quiet. We tried going out for Chinese on Christmas Eve because Jake really liked doing it when he was younger. Unfortunetly everyone else in the greater Fayetteville/Fort Bragg area had the same idea. So we ended up at Applebees. When we got home the kids opened one gift each and Zach spread Reindeer food in our backyard (see above).
The day after Christmas we got a snowstorm and the kids loved playing out in the snow. They wanted to build a snowman, but this is North Carolina and there wasn't that much snow. So we built a snowboy instead.
This was just a fun picture to take. Jake caught Zach in the bathroom flexing his muscles in the mirror. This was us asking him to pose. Apparently he got shy and a little embarrassed when he got caught.

So I guess now is as good as ever to make our formal announcement. We are pregnant...again. Our due date is about October 4th. This is our little peanut's first picture at 6 weeks. They did an ultrasound because I wasn't sure of dates.

A couple months in review

It's been a couple of months since I did this. So I'm not really going to say much. Just a little here and there. As always I post all my pics on facebook for anyone who wants to look.
Back in the beginning of October we went to a Day Out with Thomas. The kids loved it. They got to ride on Thomas and do activities. A few being a maze, bouncy house, and, of course, toy trains. It was worth doing, and hopefully we can do it again someday. We carved our pumpkins early. Too early. They weren't any good by the time Halloween rolled around. But I think Jake did a great job carving them. And the glow sticks made them look great.

The kids picked out their own costumes. Brylee picked Jesse (from Toy Story) and Zach picked Iron Man. Their costumes made me laugh. Brylee's hat makes her look like an Amigo and Zach isn't an Iron Man fan. He has no interest in watching Iron Man. But he likes pretending to be him. Kids are weird. But all that matters is that they enjoyed their costumes.

We had fun trick-or-treating. We had the ward trunk-or-treat on Friday the 29th and the base only allowed trick-or-treating on Saturday the 30th. After about an hour and a half on Saturday the kids were wiped out. But when Sunday night rolled around they were ready to head out again.

We decided to decorate the tree early this year. The kids are so excited for Christmas we couldn't put it off for long. We let the kids decorate the tree then we redecorated it a few days later. If you look at the tree you'll notice big bunches of ornaments. We tried to get the kids to decorate higher and more spread out, but they didn't want to. What they ended up doing was loading up a few branches with as many ornaments as they could fit. They didn't move on to another branch until they couldn't fit anymore on. But as you can see on Brylee's face, they LOVED it.

This past Monday for FHE we did ginger bread houses (that's right. We're in Christmas full steam) . They aren't real ginger bread houses. Just kits we got from walmart. But they had fun watching me and Jake suffer trying to get these things together. And they love playing with them. Not bad for $5.

Today Jake and I had our very first Thanksgiving on our own. We had a couple of Jake's friends from work over and enjoyed grown-up conversation. Atleast I did seeing as I don't get much. The turkey turned out great. We were so nervous. We used a turkey bag and the directions on it were different from Butterball's instructions, so we guessed. But it was absolutely perfect. The only thing missing was family.

Merry Christmas everyone!

Our September

We've had a pretty fun September. Jake had a full month off starting the end of august. So here are just a few pics of some of the fun we had. I actually have all pics (excluding pics taken with a waterproof camera) on my facebook page for those who want to see.

Brylee had her 2nd birthday on the 17th. I think Jake was happy to finally be around for one. We didn't do anything spectacular, but we did have fun. We started with birthday syrup in the morning. Then let Bry open her birthday presents after breakfast. She got a Dora scooter and a bunch of dress up stuff. She actually wouldn't take off the wings for a couple of days. She even wore them while she napped. In the evening we had cupcakes and played at Chuck E Cheese for an hour. As I said, we kept it simple but had a lot of fun.

Earlier in the month we went to one of the Aquariums. The kids had a blast looking at the otters while Jake and I were spooked by one of their sharks. The thing looked mean. It was almost a 3 hour drive to get there though. So we figure if we do this again we're gonna budget it so that we could make a day of it and visit the beach while we're there. And the final thing we did this month was go on a family retreat paid for by the US Army. It was once again at the Great Wolf Lodge. It was originally supposed to be in Myrtle Beach but for whatever reason it got changed at the last minute. It worked out though. We knew what to expect for prices and was thus able to stay within the budget given to us by those paying for everything.

We had lots of fun. Brylee was old enough to do her own thing in the kiddie pool in the waterpark so I didn't have to hold her the whole time. Zach went down one of the adult slides with Jake giggling the whole way and Jake and I even had time to ourselves to enjoy the mini golf and the adult waterslides without the kids. One slide, called the Tornado, was especially fun. Jake had a freaked out look on his face the whole way. But that was probably because he was going backwards down a dark tube that has an incredibly steep drop at one point.

The Lodge also had an animatronics show every night at 8 followed by story time. I was actually surprised that the kids enjoyed it. Well, not Zach, but Brylee. I thought she'd freak out, but she enjoyed it as much as Zach did.

Pumpkin Land '09

Here it is. Pumpkin Land 2009. It's moved to a different farm this year. It was just the same only bigger with better parking. My Mom and I took Zach, Sophi, and Brylee. We wanted to bring Fina as well, but she had a soccer tournament she was competing in. The very first thing the kids did was ride tricycles. Zach only got a few feet before his handle bar came off and smacked him in the nose. He suffered from a bloody nose, on and off, the rest of the day.

This was one of Zach's favorite things to do. He made sure to ride in every cart before we left.

They had this wooden train along with trucks and other things for the kids to play on. And even Brylee could join in on the fun.

Last year they had a large slide made out of bowling alleys. They still had that only bigger this year. But I didn't get any pictures of Sophi and Zach doing that. They also had this small slide for younger kids that they enjoyed. Brylee went down a couple times on her own and loved it.

She even tried to climb back up. But got mad when she didn't succeed.

This is inside a large blown up pumpkin that they had thrown balloons inside for kids to play with. Zach had to be forced out so other kids could have a turn.

The Horse drawn carriage ride was Sophi's favorite. Brylee enjoyed climbing around on the floor and making noises when we hit bumps.

Zach and Sophi had fun in the ball pit. They would climb on the walls and jump in on top of the balls. Zach even thought it was fun to get buried by the balls.

At the end of the day we took a tractor ride to get our pumpkins. We had lots of fun, even though it was freezing by the end.

Apple Picking

We went apple picking back in September. We didn't stay long because it was cold. But we did get five bags of apples and still haven't used them all.

We let Zach climb a ladder to get some apples in the tree. He loved it of course, and didn't want to climb back down.

At first Zach just took the apples we were picking and putting them in the bag. But after we showed him how to pick the apples himself there was no stopping him.

First day of School

I'm sorry this picture is sideways. It's been so long since I've used this that I don't remember how to turn it and I'm on a time crunch.

Zach started going to Nursery School a couple of weeks ago. We thought it would be best for him to be able to socialize and get out of the house. So he goes to Busy Bear Nursery School 3 days a week. He wishes he could go every day. His teacher, Ms. Sherri, is great. She's been able to keep him involved. I don't know how she does it. Anyone who has experience trying to teach Zach anything knows that he has perfected the art of ignoring.

Unexpeced Weekend

So we aren't going to Myrtle Beach this weekend due to a couple of things that make this all work out for the best. Still sucks. But oh well. Earlier this week I was giving Brylee a bath in the sink and Zach decided he wanted a bath in the sink too. As you can see he got what he wanted. I couldn't resist. The thought of him bathing in the sink was too funny to pass up.
This is one of the reasons we didn't go this weekend. Zach woke up with his cheek swollen from a bug bite. And later this morning his ankle swelled up as well. He is now on Antibiotics, steroids, benadryl, and gets cortizone cream put on the bug bites. Hopefully this will work otherwise we get to go spend atleast 10 hours in the ER again.
I included this cause I think my baby is cute. She saw me taking a picture of Zach and wanted in on the fun.