Memorial Day Part 2

Last night we went to my dad and Joyce's for a delicious meal and fun times for the kids.

The kid table...

 My littlest love and me in our polka dots...

 Natalie had fun catching frogs and teaching the other kids how to catch them:)...

 "Little Miss Independant" or at least that's what her shirt says:)...

Layla is very much a girly girl and does NOT like  bugs.  Either does Gibs.  We have been working on getting them used to it and it does seem to be helping (as it is a little ridiculous how she won't even shoe a fly away), but getting this close to a frog was definitely a big step for her!  Although is she's like her mother, little creatures like this aren't nearly as frightening as a spider:).

 After a bit, the kids went from catching things out of the creek, to walking in the creek.  They were dirty, but had fun and that's what counts, right? :)

 Natalie very much takes on the mother duckling role as the oldest and the little ducklings happily follow behind:)...

 Gibs was a very dirty and tired kiddo at the end of then night!

 We got home and gave them baths right away.  Here they are all clean and tuckered out from their big day.

Memorial Day Weekend

We've had a great weekend so far spending time together with our family.  This morning we went to Holland's Memorial Day parade and tonight we'll be going to Grampy and Gigi's house for a bbq. 

Last night the kids enjoyed their first S'mores of the year...

 A little messy:)...

 Riding the gator through the sprinkler...

 They LOVE riding on it.  Gibs is still a little hesitant about driving it and would prefer that his sissy drive him.  Hopefully they still get along this well and she will nicely drive him around when she's 16 too:).

Enjoying a quick bite and McDonald's before the parade...

Uncle Steve and Aunt Heidi at the parade this morning...

 Spotting the parade coming...

 Greta liked watching it too:)...

Waving her flag proudly for all the veterans...

 Apparently the bands were soothing to her and put her right to sleep:)...

 Gibs loves his Uncle Steve:)...

5 Months!

Our little Grets was 5 months a couple of weeks ago already!  She is still a very good little girl and I can't believe how big she's getting!  She rolls all over the place and loves to try to get to her big siblings' toys.  She also loves grabbing at cords so it's definitely different now that I can't just plop her in one spot and expect to find her in that same spot--she always moves somewhere else and likes to get stuck under the couch (just barely--it's not that she can really fit under it completely, just her arm/leg) and such.  We loves her to pieces and love watching her big bro and big sis interact with her.  I thought this was so sweet at Tulip Time the other day.  They were all on the sit/stand stroller and both big kids were holding Greta's hand. 

She is still in size 2 diaper and 6 month and 9 month clothing both fits her.  She normally drinks about 7 oz in a bottle. She wakes up around 8/8:30 and then naps normally about and hour in the morning, eats "lunch" at 11:30/12ish and then eats around 3 (depending on how long she naps).  She then eats around 6, or sometimes 7.  If it's 7, then that is her last bottle, but if it's 6ish, then I feed her a couple more ounces around 7:30.  I don't quite dare to make 6pm her last feeding--I'm afraid she'll wake up early--although Layla and Gibs both had that as their last feeding, with her if she eats too early, she's up earlier (although I haven't tried it in probably a month or two).  She has tried real food a few times.  Soon I'll start giving it to her more.  The dr said by 6 months, so she's got a couple of weeks:).  She liked it when she tried but had a little bit of a hard time swallowing all of it.  The dr said that the longer we waited, the better she'd be at it, so I figured it wasn't a rush.  Bottles are easy:).  Last night we went to Russ' and Menards (such and exciting night out!) and we tried giving her formula at Russ' and she would NOT take it.  I'm not pumping as much out anymore so I need her to start getting used to formula while we're out.  At the parade this week I had to take a cold bottle along (since we were gone for awhile without being able to pump) and she did NOT like that either and drank maybe 1/2 an oz.  Last night I don't really think she drank any of her formula bottle.  So she needs to learn.  She then went from like 3:15 until we got home around 9 without eating, but she seemed fine with it.  Guess she's just stubborn--she knew that that was her only option:).  Thankfully she didn't even get crabby.  Here are some pics from last month of her trying food.

 We had some sweet potatoes, so we thought we'd see if she wanted a little.  She wasn't a fan at first, but then ate a little bit.

 She tried a little cereal before bed...

 Layla LOVED feeding her.  Layla also finished off the cereal that Greta didn't eat and loved it:).



30 Years Young

To celebrate my friend, Lindsey's, birthday and mine, we thought it'd be fun to get together with our friends.  We both turned 30 in March.  Well, then we couldn't find a weekend that worked for both of us (and our friends) to get together until last night which ended up being closer to Joe and Darrell's birthdays.  So really, it was to celebrate all of our birthdays.  We had great ideas of making it a murder mysterday dinner or something else fun, but then reality hit and life happened and with Lindsey being almost 8 months pregnant and busy with selling their house and with us just being busy with normal life things of having 3 kids and lots of doctors appointments and getting our house ready to sell, that just didn't happen.  We picked up Olive Garden catering for supper which was delicious and just hung out without kids which was nice since that doesn't happen often!

We weren't completely kid free b/c Deacon and Greta were there, but they just hung out together, ate and went to bed:).

Layla had a fun (well, I assume it was fun, we haven't picked her up yet) sleep over at Gavin's.  She was basically kicking Gibs, Greta and me out yesterday afternoon so that her sleep over could begin.  We went garage saling in the morning and she kept asking then if she could go to her sleep over.  She forgot a swim suit though, so she looks a bit like a boy wearing Gavin's:).

Gibs slept and Uncle Steve's and Auntie Heidi's.  We haven't picked him up yet either, but based on this picture, it looks like he had lots of fun too:).

Out with the Old

Life has been busy lately!  Last week we had a garage sale at Grampy and Gigi's so we had been busy clearing stuff out for that.  We're hoping to have our house listed for sale within the next two weeks so the garage sale was perfect timing for clearing out things we no longer need.  It was definitely bittersweet.  It was sad seeing the little baby things go but really nice to clear bins out of the kids' closets!  Our Rainforest playmat is now sold so I took one last pic on it.  It has definitely gotten its use!  Greta was still using it a bit, but less and less, so I figured the garage sale was a good time to clear it out.

Em and Mike had booked their cruise for the same week as the garage sale so we weren't going to do it, but Joyce said she'd help which worked great!  Theirs is the same time as the Bluff Lakes sales so it's busier than most, so it was really nice that Joyce helped and we could still do that sale. 

 The girls sleeping during the sale...(Greta is on the top)

This was during physical therapy last week.  She did so well on only her second time so she has already graduated:).  We have excercises to do at home yet, but her right neck muscle seems much better.  I was happy to not have to have any more appointments since now we'll be busier with helmet appointments.

 And this was this week during the helmet consult.  She was also able to get the head scan at that appointment since I knew we wanted to get the helmet for her so that worked well so that we didn't have to go back for that.  Hopefully next week she'll get her helmet.

 Gibs is really starting to talk a lot more and therefore be able to express himself better.  He was "reading" Good Night Moon (his favorite) to Greta the other day which I thought was sweet and yesterday randomly went over to her to say "love you" and give her a kiss.  Otherwise he mostly just ignores her:).

 And last night Layla was pretending to put (pretend) make up on Greta.  Greta seemed to really like it:).

 Layla put this matching sleeper on my old CPK Marcy.  Layla had it in preemie and in 6 months, so Greta and Marcy could be twins yesterday:).

 Make Greta look huge compared to the preemie one!

 And since Greta and Harper hadn't a pic together in a bit, here's their pic from Tuesday.