Brooklyn Returns

The second week in January, we switched from watching Brooklyn Betensen twice a week to only once a week. She now comes to play just on Wednesdays. And the last couple of weeks she's been sick on Wednesday, so we haven't seen her in a while. When she came on Wednesday of this week, everyone was happy about it. Maybe because it had been a while. When her mom dropped her off bright and early at 7:30 still in her jammies, she actually got excited to see me, wanted to come right to me and wasn't sad in the slightest when her mom left. I was very happy about that because she's usually not so friendly toward me right when she gets here (which is totally understandable). My boys were still sleeping, so I asked her if she was still tired and wanted to lay by me for a while. She happily laid in between Brian and I and went back to sleep. Dex woke up first, but not until after 9, Ollie next at about 9:30, and Brooklyn and Brian didn't wake up until we had nothing else to do in the kitchen and had to come out into the living room at about 10:30! What a joyous, restful morning! Then they all played really happily together, all napped again from 1:30 - 3:30 (all at the same time, so even I got a little rest), and then we watched Super Why! and snacked on the chocolate muffin that was in Brooklyn's "snack bag" until her mom came. It was a really easy-going day, especially for a Brooklyn day, which was great because I've been a little crabby over the last couple of days! They were all super nice, sweet kids! The pics: Brooklyn and Dexy mesmorized by Super Why!; Brooklyn with her favortie baby, my very first Cabbage Patch Doll, Osgood that I got when I was 3 and kept for all these years; eating chocolate muffin, Ollie's only sad because I was trying to make him sit in the chair instead of carrying it around; and my cute boys being friends! It was a good day.











And just a cute story about my little Ollie from tonight so that I don't forget: We had kind of a crazy day. I watched Marie's boys so that she and Ryan could go out for a couple of hours. Because they were coming over, I put Dex in with Oliver for naptime. They talked like 2 little furbies for 45 minutes. Dexy finally fell asleep. It was quiet for a few minutes, then Ollie started making noise. I didn't want him to wake Dex, so I went in to get him only to find him totally naked, holding his diaper and the smell of poop in the room. He had pooped in his bed. I just got him out, cleaned him up and put his diaper on and let him play with his cousins. I had to wait till Dex woke to scoop up the poop and load all his blankets into the washer. Then we had one of our married friend couples and their little boy over for a fun homemade pizza dinner (somewhere in between all this I made pizza dough). They left at about 8:45, having a 15 month old of their own and understanding the need to not stay too long, but it was still kind of late. I fed Dex and put him in his bed while Brian just sprayed Oliver off in the shower instead of a bath like usual. Then I got Ollie all ready for bed, read only a couple of stories and said prayers. Here's the cute part. I put him in his bed and he very sweetly said, "tata milk?" I couldn't resist, so I said, "you can have some chocolate milk. I'll go get some. I'll be right back." I went into to the kitchen to find that Dexy was not in his bed where I had left him. He was crying so Brian had gotten him out. I shook up some chocolate milk, while Brian told me the deal with Dex so it took a little while. When I took it into Ollie, I found him sitting peacefully in his bed just waiting for my return with his chocolate milk. When he saw me, he very happily said, "ta-ta milk." I handed it to him and he laid down contentedly to drink his milk and go to sleep. It was just so sweet and precious how he was just pleasantly waiting for me to bring his milk to him. What a sweet boy!

Real, Professional, Family Photos

Well, we finally paid someone to take pictures of us. All of our family photos up to this point have just been captured by me handing my camera to someone and saying, "will you take a picture of us?" Needless to say, they have been good, but not fantastic. Brian has a friend who is starting up a photography business. He said that he would give us a good deal, so Brian got in touch with him and made the arrangements. We paid him $40, but could have paid more because the pictures turned out fabulous! It's so nice to finally have something that looks professional and stunning! Now I just want to go buy a thousand frames and hang them up everywhere! His name is Travis Green and I can get you in touch with him if you want fabulous pictures, too. And as a plus, he was super nice to us and our boys! Really, let me know if you want some family photos. I'm sure he'd love the business and I would love to support him. Anyway. He just brought the CD over to me and I couldn't wait to post them! Here are some of the great pics. The one in our blog header is one of these as well (obviously). This was on the 30th of January before I had my hair chopped off (agian, obviously). Seeing these pictures made me miss my hair somewhat. Only slightly though, because it will grow fast. Ollie is wearing the hat that Heather made for him in some of these because he loves it so much, that it took us a while to get him to take it off. Should have left it on though, because not only is it cute, but it was quite cold!

Spaghetti - Bowles Style

When we eat spaghetti, I use spaghetti squash instead of noodles and ground turkey instead of ground beef. It's more nutritious, but still delicious. In fact, Brian likes it better that way. And the boys dig, too. They, of course, wear only diapers when we have this for dinner. When we ate spaghetti squash the night of the 1st, Dexy in particular was loving it! He scarffed it down and even licked his plate clean. Then he finished what was left of Oliver's food. Unlike some of the big boy cousins in this family, it looks like we won't be asking Dexy the question, "how you get so big eating food of this kind?" At least so far, he eats healthy and he eats well and on top of that he still gets breastfed every 3 or 4 hours. No wonder he's huge (and so happy)!

Locks of Love, Finally

I have been talking about donating my hair to Locks of Love ever since Thanksgiving when Hollianne and Angela decided to straighten my hair for me. I hadn't straightened it for a really long time. When they finished and I could see how long my hair actually was, that's when I got the idea to donate it. But, everyone is busy and I have 2 little boys so I just kept not getting around to it. Then at Christmas time, both my mom and Cristina said that they would cut it for me, but alas, again it just didn't happen. My hair just continued to grow and be super long and massive. The situation was just never right - I needed my hair clean, straight (so that I cut keep more hair when measuring the 10 inches), and I needed someone willing to take the pluge with me and do the choppin'. Well, Brian has a friend whose just starting a photography business and was offering a good price, so we decided to have him talk family pictures for us. Brian suggested that I straighten my hair for the pictures so that we could have a record of how long it was before I donated it. So I did. Yesterday I washed it and straightened it and we got pictures taken (I'll post those when we get them in a couple of days - I'm excited to see them because I think they will be really good). Then today we went to the Bowles house for Sunday dinner as usual. And finally the setting was perfect. Hair clean? Check. Hair straight? Check. Daring person willing to hack off 10 inches of my hair? Check! Hollianne was there and when she asked if I was still going to donate my hair and I said yes, she got that classic, giddy Hollianne look in her eyes and I knew that finally the hair was coming off! She asked if I wanted to cut it right then and there and when I said yes again, she asked if she could do it. And I said, "go for it!" And go for it she did! She hasn't really ever cut anyone's hair before, but I was willing to let her try and it turns out that she did a good job. It's pretty short now that all is said and done, but I really like it. It feels so light and free. When we got home, I had to shower to get all the hair off, so I did it curly to see how it looked that way. I must say that it's much cuter straight. Good thing I got a Chi for Christmas! All I have to do now is mail in my braid. Thanks Hollianne for doing such a great job and for helping me finally donate to Locks of Love!

Both of These Look Familiar As Well

Here's Ollie rockin' down to a Metallica song with daddy. Now the reason that this looks familiar is because he was using a prop for a guitar. When I was little, my mom baby sat a little boy who had to have a "guitar" every time music came on. He would run around saying, "Where's my guitarh? Where's my guitarh?" That boy favored a triangle ruler, while Ollie is using a racketball racket, but it still just reminded me of that. Why the second picture looks familiar is much more obvious. Dexy has now joined the ranks of the Backyardigans lovers in our family. He thinks they are fabulous and of course, the rest of us do too!

Meal Time Helper

Oliver is getting to be a pretty good helper. He helps me put clothes in the washer or the dryer when I'm doing laundry, he helps get his clothes off and hands me the tubs when it's bath time, he helps get the chocolate mix when he wants "tata milk," and he's super helpful (as we have witnessed several times in the past) when it comes to making sure that Dex has food. Here's Oliver helping Dexy eat his applesauce. First he would feed a spoonful to Dexy, then he'd feed himself one. One for you. One for me. One for you. One for me. One for you. Two for me. They both ate a fair amount, emptying the bowl, and were quite happy with the feeding arrangement. But, Iguess that Ollie was still a little hungry because I opened the fridge to get something and when I turned around to put it away, he was helping himself to a stick of butter. I blame Grandma Oliver for this one - she once ate an entire sitck of butter as a little girl and must have passed the butter lovin' gene on!

I am Enrolling This Child in Gymnastics!

As soon as Ollie is old enough and I get the smallest amount of extra money, I'm enrolling him in gymnastics. He has amazing core strength, flexability, and a love of slightly dangerous things - it's a perfect fit. Watch this video of Brian and Ollie's new trick and you'll see what I mean. They call this one 'Ninja Boy.'