Good Morning!

Evan is still sick so I am home today. The boys are currently playing with trucks on the couch. I have not heard, "That not for you baby Wuke!" in the past two minutes which means that it is coming soon. All weekend Evan ran a fever with a cough and runny nose. He did not want to do much of anything so we saw a lot of Thomas and this show we have taped from the History Channel on freight trains. I attempted to call the doctor this morning and by 10 a.m. their voice mail system was full, I couldn't leave a message! There are a lot of sick kids right now. On Saturday night Evan went to bed a little late but made up for it on the other end. He slept until 11:45 a.m. He must have needed all the extra rest. The sleeping in was short lived because he was up at 5:30 this morning, not very chipper though. I hope everyone has a good day. It is cold here in Michigan so we will be playing inside. Evan just hopped up on my lap. Probably because he wants to watch snow plow trains or garbage trucks on YouTube! See Ya!

Jen

Messy Luke picutre of the day

This evening for dinner Luke had the leftovers from dinner at Hank and Kathy's Monday night. Kathy made this meatball soup with spinach, white beans, pasta, meatballs, and tomatoes. Luke inhaled dinner both Monday and Tuesday night. I guess I will be making meatball soup again in the near future! As you can see from the picture he made a big mess of himself as well. He went straight to the bathtub! You should have seen the floor and his high chair! As I was cleaning up from dinner tonight I thought about all the things that I did from the time I got home. It never ceases to amaze me the things that get done between 6 and 10 in the evening. Here is a run down...

1. Made dinner

2. cleaned up the breakfast dishes while dinner was cooking

3. cleaned out lunchboxes

4. washed breast pump parts and sterilized parts

5. sterilized nipples for bottles

6. gave Luke a bath

7. ate dinner

8. changed Luke's poopy diaper

9. nursed Luke and put him to bed

10. trimmed Luke's finger nails while nursing

11.cleaned up dinner dishes

12. gave Evan a bath while he was screaming

13. packed lunches while Greg got Evan ready for bed and read stories

14. watched Evan brush his teeth and gave praises

15. put Evan to bed

16. cleaned out fridge (there was food in there from Christmas!)

17.prepared the turkey burgers for Wednesday night's dinner

18. ran to the basement to put something away and realized there was water on the floor (yikes!), Greg got to clean up water from all the rain we had

19. washed all the containers that had food in them from Christmas (Greg went outside to do car stuff, tire pressure, check oil)

20. wiped down the high chair (yuck!)

21. threw in a load of laundry

22. started the dishwasher

23. wiped down counters

24. prepared breast pump for next day

25. sent out picture of the day (Greg folded clothes)

26. pump so Luke has enough bottles for next day

27. look at the clock and realize it is 9:30 and tell Evan to go to SLEEP!

28. Get ready for bed

29. do a little of my sudoku puzzle

30. fall asleep

31. woken at least two times in the night by Luke (I hope this doesn't happen)

32. time to get up for another full day!

I hope your day is just as exciting but relaxing! Happy Wednesday!

Tiredly yours,

Jen

Picture of the day 1-3-08

Good Morning!
Today's picture is of Evan in all the snow we got New Year's Day. Evan played outside for an hour and a half and had so much fun! It was just like a winter wonderland outside. The snow was heavy and wet so it stuck to all the trees and power lines. It was just beautiful outside. Luke got in on the action too. When I put him in his snow suit he cried but as soon as we got outside he got really excited. He liked sitting in the snow and attempted to eat it. He even like putting his bare hands in the snow but then cried after a few minutes because it was so cold! Greg made Evan a snow fort and he loved climbing the "mountain."

Oh, yesterday I left out one other thing that we did over the Christmas break. We went to a dairy farm. My dad's cousin runs a dairy farm. That was an education! Seeing what it takes to get a gallon of milk in my fridge makes me very grateful for the milk in my cereal and my tall nonfat vanilla latte. :) Evan liked seeing all the cows but LOVED all the tractors, combines and other farm equipment, of course! Dwight and Barb (the dairy farmers) were excellent hosts. After dinner we were sitting around chatting when they got a phone call that one of the cows was birthing a calf in the barn. Away they went and we followed. We got to witness a baby calf being born but sadly he died. The calf was really big and took too long to be born. They even gave the calf CPR! It really makes you aware of the circle of life. It is time for bed. Have a great Thursday.
Love,
Jen

Picture of the day 1-4-08

Brotherly love! This picture was taken Christmas Day morning after the boys got up. They were dressed in their Christmas jail bird pajamas as Hank called them. I wanted to get a picture of all three boys in their p.j's but the opportunity just did not present itself. Last night Evan and I were making pizza for dinner and I told him how proud I was of him staying dry all day at daycare. I said, "You went pee-pee on the potty and poo-poo on the potty like a big boy. So Evan how come you don't do that at home?" Evan's reply was very simple and to the point. "Because I don't want to." I was speachless. I really didn't know what to say. Instead my mouth just hung open. Ah, yes, the brutal honesty of an almost three year old. I guess it is good that he knows the difference. Well Grey's Anatomy is on tonight and it is new. I have not watched TV in several days so I am looking forward to the hour of downtime tonight. Have a great weekend.
Love,
Jen

Picture of the day 1-7-08

In this picture, Luke looks like he's surveying the train track and being very gentle at "Evan's" train table. This is the calm before the storm. As soon as Luke gets a good grip, he usually rips a big chuck of track off the train table and waves it in the air. Evan is less than enthusiastic about his little brother playing trains. Evan typically tells Luke, "No Baby Luke! That's not for you!" Then Evan looks to Jen or I to pull Luke away
and fix the track. Now that Evan has GeoTrax as well, we figured that Luke could play at the train table while Evan played on the floor with the new trains. Unfortunately, it hasn't turned out that way. Evan is very protective of both train tracks, even if he's not playing with them! He
doesn't mind if Luke plays with the trains, but if Luke messes with the track, Evan really doesn't like it. On the positive side, both boys seem to enjoy trains! The Henry Ford Museum is restoring the cab of the Allegheny steam train, and Evan is looking forward to going to sit inside! He is still concerned that the train is going to start up. Kathy and I have tried to convince him otherwise, but he is still cautious. We shall see!
The guest writer,
Greg.