Party

A couple weekends ago we took Darcy and Ezra to Drew's cousin's little boy Delson's birthday party (Did you get that?) at a childrens gymnastics place and it was so awesome! Darcy was timid at first of course, but by the end we had a hard time pulling her away. I wish I could take her somewhere like that more often. It kept her so happy. Maybe some day she will be interested in playing with the other kids instead of just the toys. :) Delson's reaction to all of his presents was so cute. He seemed so excited about all of them and was so sweet to say thank you to everyone. I love that we get to be here close to celebrate with family like this.

Jumping

Going down the slide off the pirate ship.

Braden gave Darcy a ride on the bus.

Darcy and Delson jumping. (I should have gotten a better picture of the birthday boy!)

I'm sure this was Darcy's favorite part. She loved this parachute and getting to run under it and on top of it. We had a hard time keeping her out when it was time for that.

They had the kids lay in the middle on a color and the adults ran in a circle. So fun!

Most of the kids ready for their cake!

I thought this might scare Darcy. The first time she wasn't that excited about it, but later she wanted to do it over and over. It shot them down and all the way to the far fall.

Another little car ride.

Winter Wreath

I wanted to make a Christmas wreath that could last a few months, so I guess it's more of a winter wreath. The colors don't look very vibrant here and the snowflake ornament doesn't look as sparkly as it does in real life, but you get the idea. I got this idea from Pinterest, and I kind of love it.

Picture Time

Some of what's been going on around here:

Darcy wanted Ezra to lay in her bed with her, and they were just too cute together.

A little smooch.

Protein! I think it was Ashley that taught Darcy this awesome move, but the other day Darcy wasn't eating her meat at dinner, and Drew and I were telling her that it was good for her and it would make her strong. I ended up doing this move and yelling "protein!" and for some reason that did the trick. So if we ever want her to eat her meat we just do that, and she will eat it. Amazing! (Sorry about the missing shirt, but that's just how it is around here sometimes.)

Shirtless again, but so cute. She spotted this tutu skirt in her closet the other day and she has been wearing it to dance around the house to Christmas music.

I always put Ezra in his bumbo up on the counter when I'm cooking and Darcy loves to sit up there with him. Neither of them look very happy here, but I promise they liked it.

I'm only posting this picture because it was Darcy's first picture that she actually got someone in the frame.

Cousins

Haley and Brian brought baby Matthew over for a little visit the other day, which we loved of course. Ezra and Matthew are only three months apart, but that makes a really big difference at this point.

Ezra and Matty. I hope these two end up being great buddies.

I had to let Darcy get in there for a picture, and she dwarfs them both. :)

Painting

I am really struggling to come up with things to do with Darcy in the house all day long. Pinterest has been kind of helpful but most things we try only keep her occupied for a couple minutes. The biggest success so far has been painting with corn syrup. You just add a little food coloring to some corn syrup and paint away. Probably the best part for Darcy was getting to eat the paint as she went. :) I really struggle with letting her do the activities that make a big mess, but I'm slowly getting over that, and it worked best to let her wear just a bib.

Thanksgiving 2011

We had a great Thanksgiving with my family this year. We stayed at my parents' house which we rarely do. It was fun to be able to stay up and play games and talk at night instead of rushing home to get the kids in bed. We ate at my grandparents' house and had tons of delicious food. My grandma has taught everyone on that side of my family to be awesome pie-makers so we ended up with around 12 delicious pies plus a couple of other desserts. I almost died from sugar overload.

Everyone sitting down for our Turkey dinner.

Ezra couldn't eat the feast, so he did the next best thing and ate his hand. :)

These snuggly moments are rare, so I have to capture them.

I meant to do a whole post about this, but somehow I didn't get around to it. Here is our favorite new addition to the family Matthew James Webb. He was born on November 18th and he is so tiny and perfect. We are so excited for Haley and Brian, and we are so excited to have him in our family!

This picture is kind of fuzzy but I thought it was a cute one of my mom with Ezra. I love it when babies drape their arm over yours like that.

Emily and Nick came home and it was fun to see them again. Darcy asks us almost every day where they are, so it was nice to have a little break from answering that question for a few days. :) Darcy is such a good poser.

Emily with baby Matthew.

On a very cold day we went outside and played volleyball (Haley even played five days after having a baby! What??!). Darcy played in the big pile of leaves while we played and loved it. Here she is with Ashley.

Drew threw her into the pile, and I was wondering if it might scare her but she was happy to do it over and over again for pictures. I could never get a clear shot though.

She also enjoyed pretending to drive the lawn mower.

My grandma brought over a couple of my great-grandpa Jenne's old hats and Drew and Brian got to try them on. Drew was going for a french look and ended up looking really crazy and Brian was going for an angry Russian look.

My dad tried the beret on too and added these sunglasses for a nice touch.

2...Again

I just barely took Darcy to her two year checkup and I thought I would do a little update about her.

- She is about 34 lbs which is in the 95th percentile. I can't remember what her height was but I know it was in the 75th percentile. The doctor told me I am supposed to really crack down on her diet because her BMI is a little too high and we have a family history of diabetes. I almost cried right there in the doctor's office. She is really active and I was always so happy that she was such a good eater. I was shocked to have the doctor tell me that, because up until now her doctors always acted like if was a good thing that she was packing on the pounds. So we are trying to be really careful about not having too many snacks during the day.

- She has LOTS of energy! After she takes her nap in the afternoon she is non-stop action until bed time. Drew keeps asking her "What are you on?" I think she's just two. I honestly can not keep up with her though. I keep researching things that would keep her busy, but nothing lasts long enough! So I keep ending up letting her watch more Dora than I really want her to.

- She loves birthdays. She sings the happy birthday song all day long to everyone and everything (Grandpa, Ashley, Ezra, Dora, couch, ball, hot dog, etc.) And she has started saying happy birthday to people as a greeting. Haha. Brian has really enjoyed helping her solidify this as her greeting. When he sees her he says, "Happy Birthday Darcy" and she replies "Happy Birthday Brian" and then he gives her a hug or plays with her or whatever. Thanks for that Brian! :)

- She also says "good job" to us. She will ask me to draw something and when I do she will say, "good job mom." (Even if it was a terrible drawing.) She does this for lots of things like singing a song or playing a song on the piano, or kicking a ball, or making her some food item.

- Drew taught her how to dribble a soccer ball the other day, and she is actually pretty darn good at it and it is so cute.

- She loves to play with her little kitchen and cooking stuff and draw on her easel. She asks us to go upstairs to play with her all the time.

- She is potty trained!! (mostly) She is still wearing a pull-up at night and sometimes it isn't dry in the morning, but during the day she's a champ.

- She is very helpful and likes things to be in their place. If I eat something with a wrapper and just leave the wrapper beside me she will come get it and take it to the garbage. She likes to go get Ezra's clothes and his diaper if he needs a diaper change.

- She loves to jump on the trampoline.

3 Months

Ezra is three months old now. He is such a sweet boy and we are having so much fun with him.

Some things we want to remember about Ezra's third month:

- 14 lbs 3 oz. This is according to our home scale so I don't know how accurate it is, but if that's right he weighs less than he did last month which is pretty crazy to me and makes me a little nervous. Isn't he just supposed to gain tons of weight every month? That's what I'm used to with Darcy. 24 3/4 inches. Also according to my measurements and I really wasn't careful at all measuring his height, but according to that measurement he has grown over two inches. Hmmm...probably not right. People do always tell us he's really big though.

- We have got to figure out this sleeping situation! He wakes up 2-3 times in the night now and he used to wake up once. Not cool. He is a good napper though, and somehow I am really not dying from lack of sleep like I was with Darcy. Yesterday was Sunday and he fell asleep a couple hours before church started. Then Drew transferred him to his carseat to go to church and he didn't even wake up. He ended up sleeping until 20 minutes before church ended. It was about a five hour nap! It was so crazy and so nice to not have to worry about both kids all through church. We had a crazy last few days so he just needed to do some catch up I guess.

- He still loves to talk. He talks to the TV and anyone who talks to him. If you talk in a high-pitched happy voice to him he smiles so big and gets really excited.

- He has rolled over twice, which I really wasn't expecting yet.

- When he is sad (like when Darcy plays the harmonica) he sticks his lip out so far and it can really break your heart. He also lets out short little screams when he is sad or frustrated.

- He had his first haircut this past month. It was just too shaggy around his ears and the back of his neck. If he had any curl at all in his hair it would have been ok, but it's so straight that it just went straight out over his ears, and I just didn't like it.

Oh man I love that sweet baby face!

Hanging out.

Getting kissed by Darcy. He handles having her hair in his face so well.

Haley cut his hair and he was actually really happy through the whole things. He seemed to enjoy it actually.

Halloween

Darcy loves Dora these days. A couple weeks ago she watched the Halloween episode on Netflix and I decided she could be a black cat like Dora. So yesterday after I dressed her up I let her watch that episode again. She loved that they were dressed the same.

This is SO fake. I can't believe it actually looks like she's happy right here. She had just gotten done with the biggest melt down of her life. And really she was still kind of in the middle of it. She has always been the best eater, but this past week she decided she didn't want to eat anything but candy, fruit, and a few beans or peas here and there. Her diapers are suffering. So we told her she couldn't come to the party until she had eaten five bites of her dinner and it was like a war. It was so awful. I have never seen her so upset, and I don't know if I have ever been so upset as a mom either. It's getting better though.

I am normally not a fan of cats, but I love this one!

Drew's mom got this costume for Ezra and I thought he looked so adorable!

Cute little tiger face.

Darcy trunk-or-treating. About half way through she told me she was done and we went home.

This isn't a good picture, but the trunk-or-treat was huge. I have never been to one like that.

I always love pictures over the shoulder of babies when they're this little. (Drew pointed out to me after I had already done it that the whiskers on Ezra's face were redundant. But we were late and I thought they looked so cute so I didn't take them off. haha)

Drew and Ezra were in charge of passing out our candy.

Me and my little black cat.

Yay for family pictures!

When we got home I took Darcy across the street to a few of our neighbors and then she was ready to be done.

When we were done she trick-or-treated to Drew. :)