Updates

Well, it has been a while. I can't apologize. I did write....but in my journal. The end of November and the month of December were wonderful, terrible, stressful, blessed months. A lot happened, but most of it was too personal for this public forum.

Annie:

I heard her calling, "Hep(help) me! Momma! Hep me!" When I walked in the room I found her like this:


















She thinks she is one of the twins...unfortunately for her it sometimes gets her stuck. She is so mischievous. One of her favorite games is to grab toys from her sibs, and run away shrieking with laughter while they chase her down and tackle her(which she also loves). She is my little shadow. Where ever I am she is my little satellite with a five foot orbit around me. She is only one month away from being legit in nursery....*cue Hallelujah Chorus* She has been ready for the last 6 months, and will get to hang out with the twins in there for almost a whole year....methinks she won't have any trouble with the transition.

She loves to talk on the phone, but her script never varies...

"He-oh Gwa-pa!(regardless of who she is talking to) Yesh. I oh ooh(I love you). Bye bye. He-oh Gwa-pa!"

We moved all the kiddos into the same room. I had my doubts about the arrangement, but Kenneth insisted. What do you know, they LOVE it. Not only that, but within a week they were all sleeping in the same bed. Blows me away every evening that they actually like sleeping in a pile.



Atticus:

A few nights back Gavin got extremely frustrated, yelled, "I'm so ANGRY!" Stomped down the hall and slammed his bedroom door.

A few minutes later Atticus(who had been playing quietly with his trains) looked up at me and said, "Mom, I so An-gwee!" with a serious look that I couldn't take seriously. Again, "MOM, I so An-gwee!" And he stands up and makes a big show of stomping down the hall and trying to slam his door. A little while later he came back, but as soon as he noticed me watching him, he quickly restored his disgruntled look, informed me once again that he was "an-gwee," and stomped once again down the hall. He did it at least 3 times, and again the next morning. Of course when Gavin did it, it infuriated me. When Atticus did it I was in giggles the whole time, I am sure at some point I will regret that.





























Atticus has also decided that he likes preschool. We do preschool once a week with some other kids their age in the ward. For the first half of the year Atticus was only interested in whether or not the other kids had cars at their houses. Then, in the beginning of January, all of the sudden he woke up in preschool. He participates, he is excited and learning. He pesters me everyday to go to preschool and pitches a fit on the days that Gavin gets to go to preschool and he doesn't. Oy vey.

He is an opinionated little cuss...and usually his opinion involves taking the opposite view of what ever I have decided needs to happen. He refuses to kiss me. He is my most momma's boy of the momma's boys...but suddenly he is very stingy with his affection. Apparently he is too old to kiss his mother. Unfortunately for him, his mother is still bigger than him and can wrestle him down and bestow kisses and hugs. Seriously, what a stink!

Gavin:



















He is putting the world together in interesting ways. He is full of questions, and because his father is an incredible teacher, if Gavin asks a question, then Kenneth gives him a detailed understandable answer. Gavin is getting a pretty good grasp of what is going on around him. This has led to some very embarrassing situations... Like when his preschool teacher was talking about baby penguins and baby polar bears. Baby penguins hatch out of eggs and baby polar bears are born....Gavin jumps in, "...like people. Like my dad put his _____ in my mommy's _____ and there was sperm and it turned into a cell, and that cell turned into Annie. And then Annie came out of my mommy, and she's our baby." Let's just say the teacher's eyes got big...and it went over the heads of the other kids....At least I hope it did, because Gavin also happened to mention to his classmates around Christmas that there is no Santa Claus....and Heavens to Betsy are we really the family that introduced sex AND ruined Christmas to a group of 4 year olds? Needless to say, we are now working on the concept of 'things you only talk about with Mom/Dad/Grandma/Grandpa.'






























We have been doing a lot of mani/pedi's around here. Jane needs to change the color of her finger nails at least twice a week(Thanks Aunt Stephanie for greatly expanding our nail polish supply). Jane revels so much in girly things that she sucks other people into her world. Atticus usually demands(and is gratified) that his fingernails AND toenails be painted whenever Jane gets hers done...He also asks every once in a while where his dress is.



Kenneth recently got some serious street cred with Jane. So if you need a chuckle just ask Kenneth to take off his shoes....





I am signed up for a fitness boot camp. My coach also plays amateur roller hockey. His team was in the playoffs so we went to the game. It was by far the best sporting event we have ever been to as a family. The glass goes all the way to the floor so the kids had an excellent view, and whenever someone or the puck slammed into the glass by us it was like Christmas, they were so excited. It was also low key enough that people were not bothered by 4 energetic kiddos running up and down the bleachers and all around the place.