happy mother's day!

i like big butts...

so, honestly, i have debated about putting this picture up for a long time... should i? or shouldn't i? i guess i should...


welcome to the world of jack's backside... man... check out those thunder thighs... and not to mention the chub on the booty. gotta love it!

love

when she is not trying to pick him up or roll him over, raegan really loves jack... aka: lover shnuckums/lover baby/jackabees/jackman... all nicknames raegan calls him on a daily basis.

yeah, i can sleep anywhere

i love bugs... and all things creepy crawly

ok, so grace is my outdoor girl. she loves bugs and animals and apparently, toads too. here are few bug stories for your enjoyment...



we found this toad in our driveway in missouri after my mom's birthday party. grace was so excited... can't you tell... and did not want to let it go! she loves frogs! well, this one peed on her, so she promptly dropped it, only to snatch it back up again and not let go. we have to tell her that the frogs/bugs/worms have to go back to their homes so that they can be with their family. that's the only way she will give them up. while in missouri, papa found several tree frogs and toads for her to play with for a few minutes. she was loving it!

a couple of days before the toad in the driveway, the girls were outside riding their bikes and playing. we had the garage door open, and inside the garage was a little june bug. grace found it and asked if she could hold it. i told her that this was a nice bug and she could. enter child #2 who hates all things creepy crawly. as grace is bending down to pick it up, raegan runs into the garage and steps on it. while raegan proudly announced, 'i killed it!', grace started to cry.

and finally, yesterday i spent the morning mowing the grass (which was about 10 feet long thanks to massive amounts of rain while we were in missouri) and spraying ant hills that popped up in our back yard. i told grace and raegan to stay away from the piles of dirt while they were playing in the back. well, after a snack of mini chocolate muffins, raegan comes running into the house crying, 'get it off, get it off.' she runs to see me and says as she is crying, 'i have an ant on me, it's going to eat me.' upon further investigation, i realize that it is not an ant, but a chocolate muffin crumb stuck to her hand... so, i tell her, 'it's not an ant, it's your muffin!' so she eats it. nice.

missouri fun

while bryan was in honduras for 2 weeks, the girls and i took a trip up to missouri. yes, i drove all by myself with 3 kids for 9 hours. a nightmare? acutally, no... i found that when equipped with a dvd player, snacks, and coloring book, grace and raegan can entertain themselves for hours on end. yay! jack was also a great traveller this trip. he slept and slept and ate and slept. we arrived on friday afternoon and headed out to the middle school to surprise nana at work. my dad met me there as a distraction so she wouldn't see us come in and man was she surprised. she wasn't expecting us until monday, and so when we walked in, it was great fun!

one of the main things grace and raegan look forward to at nana's is pancakes with syrup and whip cream.


and no, the whip cream is not optional. they like it on the side, so each piece can be dipped in the whip cream. its more like... would you like a little pancake with your whip cream?

jack loved papa! and while we were there, jack became a big fan of fans... he was ever mesmerized by the ceiling fan.


here are a few more of papa and jack hanging out.



while we were there, my mom turned 50! so, we had a little get-together at the roberts' house. we ate yummy mexican food and had strawberry short cake for dessert. at the party, the girls spent the whole time outside with the trampoline and bubbles.


we had a great trip and were sad to leave at the end, but glad to get back to normal and to see bryan!

we only cut our hair when other people do...

taking a page from the tang book of hair care, we decided to cut jack's hair as well. rat's nest? no.... just really long hair. yes, we pulled out the clippers and probably took off 2 inches of hair on top... and the result? see for yourself.

and we have a thumb sucker

as much as bryan and i have tried to prevent this, apparently, we have no control over what he does when he sleeps. fortunately, jack is related to a dentist.

happy easter!

and don't ask me what is up with these kids' cheesy smiles...

yay for nursing our babies

at least they promote modesty while they're nursing... and i'm not quite sure why they were in the laundry baskets... i have yet to nurse a baby while sitting one.

flat head?

well, we have noticed that jack has been getting a bit of a flat head. hmm... to try to remedy this little problem, we have started to sit him up instead of lay him in his swing or on the floor. so, we pulled out the old exersaucer and purchased a bumbo. jack seriously loves the bumbo and will sit in it forever, and he has started to play with all his toys on the exersaucer. hopefully, these two things, mixed with some extra tummy time and a daily head massage, will prevent him from having to wear... 'the helmet'. only time will tell.

pizza... again

so, lawton has opened its own version of chuck e cheese or incredible pizza... it's called... laugh out loud pizza. ever since bryan told the girls about it, they have been asking when we were going. paul and his kids were planning on coming this past weekend, but due to some crazy weather in kansas, they had to postpone their trip. well, not only were the girls crushed that they couldn't see their cousins, they were pretty sad about not going to mt. scott either.... so we planned a trip to laugh out loud pizza. they had a great time! bryan took the girls around to play on the games and their fun jungle gym thing. i hung out with jack and watched mizzou lose to connecticut...

dentac birthday ball

so, it was time for another army ball. how fun. this one was much smaller than the meddac ball at christmas and only for the dentac. we had a fun time. bryan and cpt. michael hoffman were the mc's and they did a great job. they call themselves... 'hoffpool'... nice.


and here is laura furdek, me, and paige dahlke. this is our lovely book club... small numbers, but big time fun!

gotta love him

ah, the zoo

so, last week we went with some people from our ward to the oklahoma city zoo. what fun! the kids loved it and the weather was so nice. unfortunately, carting around 3 kids didn't allow me very many opportunities to take pictures... and i guess that is a good thing since the kids were not interested in taking pictures anyway. see below.


at least the animals were interested.



we did see the sea lion show, which the girls thought was entertaining and all in all, the trip to the zoo was a success. however, i think their favorite part was... playing on the big rock (i was taking raegan to the bathroom when the pictures were taken, but shoot yourself over to kim strupp's blog to see the pictures on the rock!)

happy birthday bryan!

yay! bryan turns 30 today! unfortunately, today his day will be spent at work... attending a ce class tonight... and on call. nice. well, at least we got to celebrate on saturday with his awesome chuck norris themed birthday party! (don't you love our shirts?) yes, we love chuck norris... just a few tidbits you may not have known about chuck norris.

*when chuck norris was born, the only person to cry was the doctor. never slap chuck norris.
*chuck norris' smile once brought a puppy back to life.
*chuck norris doesn't take showers. he takes blood baths.
*chuck norris' tears cure cancer. too bad he has never cried.
*chuck norris destroyed the periodic table because the only element he recognizes is the element of surprise.
*chuck norris does not need to mow his grass. he simply stares at it and dares it to grow.
*there is no use crying over spilled milk. unless it is chuck norris's milk. because then you are going to die.
*when the boogeyman goes to bed, he checks his closet for chuck norris.
*chuck norris doesn't sleep. he waits.

happy st. patrick's day!

and this is how we spent our saturday afternoon...

... sleeping in various places.

grace fell asleep while watching a movie...


raegan fell asleep while going to the bathroom...


and jack and i fell asleep on the couch...

it's finished... almost

at christmas, my dad and bryan began a project of making grace and raegan some bunk beds. my dad brought all the wood and materials, as well as the tools needed to get some bunk beds made.


they worked so hard to get the beds done and by the time their trip was over the beds were pretty much ready to be put together. bryan only had to do a few more things to get them ready to assemble. so, bryan has been working in his spare time to finish and about a month ago he got everything done. all we need to do was put a polyurethane varnish on the beds... the catch? for the varnish to set you need ideal weather... it had to be above 60 degrees and no wind. hmmm.... as most people in the lawton area know, in the winter when the weather gets above 60 degrees we also have high winds (20 - 30 mph) and fire danger. it is a rare day when the weather is warm and it's not windy. so we waited through a month of warm and windy days here and there. then, last tuesday, finally, it was in the 70s and no wind. luckily, bryan had been home sick that day (we were passing around the rota virus in our family) and i told him we had to get the beds done. and we did! yay!


so, when i say they are almost finished... we are still waiting for the stairs to be made (my dad is working on them in missouri) and the rails for the top bunk. so, grace and raegan are sleeping on the bottom bunk together. and all i can say is... they love them. around 7 at night grace will start to say that she wants to go to bed just so she can sleep in her new bed. thanks dad and bryan!

and this one's for the grandparents....

who keep asking for more pictures of jack.

oklahoma sky

we had some thunderstorms a few weeks ago, and bryan took this picture. there is a rainbow in the sky and the storm had just passed us, you can see all the dark clouds behind grace and the sunlight shining on the grass. it is pretty fun to see how much the sky changes as the storms pass by.

happy valentine's day

ok, so i tried to get these pictures posted a little closer to valentine's day, but i guess that didn't really work out. so, here they are. on saturday we decided to make some sugar cookies and decorate them. the girls love to exercise their creativity by decorating with sprinkles. yum.