I Love My Kids

Yesterday afternoon, at about 3:30pm, Tyler wandered out of his bedroom. He'd just woken up from his nap. Instead of sleepily wandering down the hall to say hello to me, he stood in the doorway to his room and broke into song. The tune of choice? I Like To Move It, Move It.

I tried to stifle the giggles as I looked down the hall to see what would happen next. After he ran through the chorus once, he dropped his blanket at the door and walked out to the living room. I stood in the kitchen and watched him dance around the room singing the chorus over and over. Eventually he stopped and came over to say hi to me.

I love my kids. Period.

(Picture taken with my cell phone on the Zoo Train. L-R: Jackson, me, Chase & Tyler)

Monkeys and Ice Cream

Where do my children get all their energy from? Seriously! Wouldn't it stand to reason that because their bodies are about 1/4 of mine that they should have a smaller reserve of energy? I know I'll be 29 in a couple of days, but come on. I should be able to keep up a little bit better! Maybe they somehow transfer energy from me to them... hmmmmm...

Anyway, they put on quite the display at a park last week. Lots of running, jumping and climbing. Perhaps I should just stick with the "monkeys" nickname after all.

Silly Things They've Said

The boys' are talking all. the. time. right now. Seriously. All the time. They're trying out new words and repeating everything. I've contemplated calling them The Parrots from now on instead of The Monkeys. Here are a few of the funny things they've said in the last week or so (at least the funny things I remembered to write down).

Jackson, while rubbing Pop Pop's head - "Fuzzy head! Fuzzy head!"

Jackson, to Nick when he put a towel around his waist - "Daddy, you look cute!"

Chase to Nick - "Mommy has a hard time parking now." (Little punk ratted me out!)

I said to Nick that I love it when Chase raises his eye brows, so Chase raised his eye brows several times for me.

Tyler - "Daddy lawning the mow!"

Any of the boys - "Mommy, I be a good boy and stay in bed." Said, of course, when the exact opposite had happened.

Crazy kids keep us laughing with their words and their actions!

 Chase

 Tyler

Jackson

I Love Zoo Pictures

Last week, when my parents were here, we went to the zoo. I don't know what it is about pictures from the zoo, but I just love them! Here are a few of my favorites from the day.

Pop Pop, Tyler & Jackson

 Hmmm... carrot stick in cheese sauce? I dunno about this Chase.

 Oh Tyler, animal cracker in cheese sauce is worse!

Aunt Laura teaching Jackson how to flash the "peace" sign.

 Jackson, Aunt Laura, Grandma, Chase & Tyler

I

It's our zoo tradition to take a picture with this elephant.

L-R: Chase, Jackson & Tyler

Couple of lovely little notes for you now....

1. I've finally caught up on our 365 Blog, so there are lots of cute pictures to view over there!

2. I bought the domain name www.threetimesthegiggles.com, so now you can just type that in to get to our blog! Until I get things figured out, you MUST type in the www or it won't work. You can also continue to use the original blog address. Fun times :)

I Heart Faces - Smiles Entry

For the first time, I'm entering a photography contest over at I Heart Faces! Here's my entry for the "Smiles" theme.

My, How We've Grown

This past weekend I made a decision. Over the next two weeks I'm going to do some serious decluttering in hopes of having a rather large yard sale soon. Saturday afternoon I tackled the boys' playroom. In 2 hours I managed to find a full bag of stuff to donate, a full bag of stuff to throw out and 4 full laundry baskets of stuff for the yard sale. Wow. The playroom definitely looks better now though!

At the very top of the closet in their playroom I came across something that nearly brought tears to my eyes. I found a preemie outfit. I couldn't get over how tiny it was! I'm quite certain it wouldn't have fit the doll I played with as a child, and yet when the boys came home in that outfit it was a bit baggy on them. Wow.

Simply taking a picture of the outfit on it's own really wouldn't show you just how small it is though. Taking a picture of it next to a pair of the boys' current PJs would though...

Know what else is a good visual reminder of how far the boys' have come? This picture of the boys when they were 3 weeks old followed by a picture of them from this morning - laying on the very same blanket they did 2.5 years ago.

I bet you can guess where this is going. Yup, it's my final plea for donations for this week's March for Babies. I think sometimes we (even myself!) forget just how tiny and fragile the boys were as preemies. That's easy to do considering how big they are now. We've come a long way in the last two and a half years! You know what though? Today another 1,500 babies will be born too early. Not all of them will be as lucky as my boys were. Some parents will have to say goodbye to children they just met and some will spend months in the NICU at the side of a baby who is on a health roller coaster. 

If you haven't donated yet and you have $5, $10, $15 or more to spare, please donate. Babies are counting on you! Donate here.

Random side note - how do you like the extra large pictures? Too big? Just right? 

We Finally Bought A Van

Yesterday was a momentous day for our vehicles...

In the afternoon my beloved Neon hit 100,000 miles (I've had it for 8 years next month).

Then we traded in our old 1996 Jeep (the dealer only wanted to give us $1,000 for it but I told them we needed $2,000 or no deal).

Then we bought a new (to us) van! Woohoo!

That, my friends, is a bargain of a van. It's a 2008 Kia Sedona with just under 36,000 miles on it and the sticker price was just $12,980. I knew vans for that price could be found, thanks to a handy dandy spreadsheet I made while researching vans, but I also knew that price would be hard to come by. When I saw one listed for that online Tuesday afternoon we jumped on it. 

I'm glad the years (2.5) of longing for a van are finally over. I'm glad the weeks (2.5) of van research are finally over. And I'm glad the months (6) of spending mass amounts of money on the Jeep are over!

The boys checking out the van at the dealership.

Yesterday I lowered my March for Babies goal to $500. Then I hit $500, so I raised it to $600. Today I checked and I am right at $600, so of course I feel the need to raise it to $700! Have you donated to help give babies a healthy start to life?

 

Park Pictures

We're having a ball with the grandparents visiting! Monday night we took a picnic lunch to the park, where Tyler had lots of fun (and thrills) on the tire swing.

Chase on the merry go round. Kinda looks like he's not sure if he's going to be sick or if he's having fun...

Signing Time Medley - Video Clip of the Week

Here's Mr. Chase entertaining us with a medley of Signing Time songs!

Winner & Food for Thought

My best laid plans rarely seem to work out.... Anyone else like that? Example: instead of saving up big bucks this month and next for a van, we shelled out $1,400 yesterday for repairs the Neon needed. Ouch. Example number 2: I planned on ending the giveaway at 6pm yesterday so that I could write everyone's name on slips of paper and have the boys draw a winner last night. Instead we took a picnic dinner to the park and didn't get home until the boys' bed time. Whoops!

So I had to rely on good old Random.org to pick my winner.... (drumroll please)

Brossettelewis, who takes care of herself by bathing daily, is our big winner! 

Shoot me an e-mail lady and I'll get you all hooked up :)

I find it appropriate that Brossettelewis won as I was going to refer to her blog this morning anyway! You see, she had twins who had TTTS (Twin to Twin Transfusion syndrome), which is a very dangerous condition. Obviously she has become a big supporter of the March of Dimes as well. Check out her recent March for Babies post HERE.


Here's something for you to think about...

Even if you weren't a preemie, you and your children have benefited from the March of Dimes.

The MOD first goal was to beat Polio, and it was successful.

The APGAR scoring system for infants became standard practice around the world thanks to Dr. Virginia Apgar's work with the March of Dimes.

The MOD funded the very first bone marrow transplant to correct a birth defect (1968)

MOD discovers that alcohol consumption during pregnancy causes birth defects (1973)

MOD funds first in utero treatment of a birth defect (1973)

MOD launched the national campaign urging women to take Folic Acid during pregnancy (1995)

MOD led the effort to have newborn screening (heel prick) for at least 21 of 29 life threatening, but treatable disorders.

Today I made the decision to lower my March for Babies goal. I thought for sure I could hit $1,000 but here we are a week and a half from the walk and I'm not even half way there. So now my goal is $500. I KNOW you all can get me that far at least! Team Three Cuties is rocking the donations this year - we're up to 13 walkers now and have raised $1,155 as a group. Woohoo!

Donate here, please.