Catching Up...4 Months/Tulip Time/Birthday Party...

It's been awhile since I've blogged so I've got a lot of catching up to do!

Last week we had a garage sale at my dad and Joyce's house. We sold a lot of our own stuff (by "we" I mean Em and me) and a lot of my mom's stuff. It went good and we made a decent amount of money considering we hardly had any "big money" items.

Here's Gibson enjoying some relaxing time with Gigi while setting up for the garage sale...

Then last Saturday we celebrated Jonathan's second birthday with a party with our friends at Lindsey and Darrell's. Hard to believe he's 2 already! That means that in less than a month Layla will be 2!

Birthday Boy blowing out his candles...

His cute construction theme cupcakes and brownies...

All the kids at the party...Jonathan (who you can only see the top of his head--poor Birthday Boy!), Alden (standing), Ava (not so happy about the picture--sitting on the floor), Layla, Gibson (ready for bed in his jammies), Ella, Mason, Kali, Madison and Rex...

Random pic of Joe with the kids...

Gibson looking tough with Dad...

And this week we spent quite a bit of time downtown with the kids, however, we didn't get that many pictures. We took some pics Tuesday night and a few during the day on Wednesday, but that was about it. Joe was sick on Thursday so I didn't feel like heading into town with the kids by myself so Em's niece just danced with her and then last night was cold and rainy so the kids just stayed home with Grandma and Grandpa.

Gibson was excited about going to his first Tulip Time:). He has Gavin's old shirt on here b/c I hadn't quite finished his:). Gavin's Auntie Becky was nice enough to make Gibson's costume for him (Em and I just helped with some of the simple stuff)! It turned out great!!

Layla, Gibson and Gavin Tuesday night before we danced...

Poor Gibson kept slipping further down:)...

Em and I with the kids (too bad Elv decided to run after something as Joe took the pic--he even had a plaid bandana on:D)...

I didn't even get a pic with Gibson's hat or wooden shoes on (he was borrowing them from Gavin)...I couldn't find his hat that night--it had slid to the bottom of my diaper bag...

Layla had fun dancing with us at the end of the dance...

Too bad you can hardly see Layla in these pics! My hat had slid back on my head that night so after we got done dancing the inspector came up and talked to me. They are so much pickier with costume inspection now than they were in high school! She said that if I was in high school she would have kicked me (and therefore my group) off the street because my hat was falling off--it didn't even fall off! I understand them wanting us to not look sloppy, but seriously, do they need to kick you off the street for that?? You'd think a talking to would be enough!

Good thing they aren't picky about kids' costumes or Gavin would have gotten kicked off the street for wearing his hat to the side:)...

We street scrubbed on Wednesday and then stayed to watch the parade. Gavin and Layla were both pretty sleepy looking during the street scrubbing but came to life once the parade started (they are both a bit shy). Layla loved waving hi to all the people in the parade and dancing to band music.

Waiting for the street scrubbing to begin with Gavin's cousin Ellie...

Gavin took his Cabbage Patch Simon along so Becky (and her girls) were nice enough to let Layla take their American Girl doll along for Layla to hold. Layla enjoyed cuddly with her during the parade and nodded off a few times during the end of the parade route.

Grampy and Gigi came to watch the parade too!

Gibson was a good boy and slept the whole parade. He woke up just as the parade was ending as it was time to sleep...

It was a fun week and I'm glad that I danced again this year. I'm also glad that I didn't plan on going to the parade today as it is cold and really windy!! Joe did have a rough day one of the days this week. He had not been feeling well, but had to run out to quick get something and while he was out a mini van pulled out right infront of him. He couldn't stop on time so he ended up being able to avoid hitting the mini, but then ended up going in the ditch. Thankfully his truck was okay--and obviously I'm very thankful that he was okay and that he didn't hit the van! It was at a pretty busy intersection and yet only one person stopped to ask if he was okay!! The mini van didn't even stop! And then to make things even worse, when we were driving to Tulip Time that night an SUV stopped abrubtly infront of us (b/c the car infront of him stopped suddenly) and we rear-ended it!! Thankfully the SUV was totally fine--we hit his hitch. The Focus however now has a lovely whole in the grill. But again, I'm thankful we were all okay and I'm really thankful that our insurance company didn't need to find out about another accident:). I swear we have hardly ever been in any accidents, but our poor kids have now been in 2 already this year! Layla cried when we hit the SUV, but Gibson just remained sleeping:).

Oh, and speaking of cars, we FINALLY found a new one! It's only taken us since January:). It was actually one we had looked at about a month ago and it seemed to fit what we were looking for perfectly, however, they then decided that they didn't want to sell it since they couldn't find anything that they liked. Well, we then found a couple after that that we liked okay, but that didn't seem quite right (too much money/not that good of condition/etc). Then right when we were about to give up and just settle for something since I'm sick of driving the kids around in the Focus and Joe is spending lots of money driving his truck to work everyday, those people called us back and said that they had found a van that they liked and wondered if we were still interested in their Tahoe. We were and now it's ours!

This was from a couple of weeks ago when I was baby-sitting Gavin. Him and Layla were enjoying watching Mickey with no pants on during snack time:). Whenever we hear the song that talks about "dancing with no pants on" we think of Layla. As long as she does that at age 2 and not when she's any older, that's okay:). She has started to really love watching Mickey Mouse Clubhouse lately. She even asks for Mickey more than Elmo now:). Our cable company installed some sort of box now on our tv for free so we get more channels (we just have basic cable) and we get On Demand so that is how she is now able to watch Mickey. I too have been enjoying the extra channels and the On Demand--that's why we've never wanted expanded cable--too many channels makes me want to just watch more tv!

And our little guy turned 4 months on April 30!! I know I say this every month, but seriously I can't believe how quickly the time is going! He's at such a great age--he's very content and easy to take out--for the most part he always still just stays in his carrier, he can't move yet, he just drinks a bottle 4 times a day (8 oz each) and he sleeps great at night. It is fun to watch him grow and learn new things. His typical schedule is eating at 7:30am, napping for like an hour, eating at 11:30am, napping for a couple of hours, eating at 3:30, napping for like an hour, and then having his last bottle at 7:30pm and going to bed around 8/8:30.

I think they have the same little grin:)...