Late night projects

Haley is not always a late night project but occasionally she can be. Depending on the rest she gets during the day and if she is a good eater I can plan on sleeping too good or not quite enough. But looking at that sweet face, whether at 3:00am or 9:00pm, she is fun to smile at and hold.

Awhile a go I mentioned that I spent a L O N G time one night piecing together Lego ships and castles. I decided to snap a shot of all the finished product the other night and boy is it a sight! I counted up all of the complete mini-figs we have and I think I got up to 42. I still had a couple that were missing a head here and a pair of legs for another guy. We have got Star Wars, Castles, City Legos; it is awesome and mind boggling.

Birthday Pillow case: This is my final project for Peter's birthday. I am pretty proud of it (except for maybe William's square). I made it for each of my kids so that they can have it to sleep on for their birthday month. On the other side it says Happy Birthday with balloons and stars. The side you see has a block for each of their months with some items that are either characteristic of their birth month or special things to them. For example, Peter has a snowman, heart, sports guy, a hores, bambi, and a killer whale. Caleb has fireworks, a rodeo horse, a flag, then a robot, soccer ball, a bike, and a sunflower. William and Haley were a little more difficult to create. I have no idea what Haley's interests will be and William he is a mix. He loves whatever his brothers have and yet he expresses some opinion here and there. I hope they will enjoy having the pillowcase and that they will feel special on that month because it is theirs.

Dino-Land: This is another project for Peter's birthday that I am proud to say turned out good. Remember a while ago when I mentioned a project that I had started, it got ruined in the washer, and so I had to start fresh. Well this is the final product and I think my boys will enjoy playing on it. They had a different dino-land that was tiny and made of a thin plastic sheet but they had fun playing on it. So I figured I would make them a larger one so they could all be together and make it a tad cooler with texture and 3D effects.
There is one other thing I made for Peter but did not take a picture of and that was a new blanket to sleep with. It is soft and cozy with footballs, and robots and a jumble of other colors that I hope he will like.
Now I am going to try and put aside the late night projects (for a while) and go to bed earlier. Just so that I can get up earlier and hopefully start working out and taking a shower in the morning. :) I am planning on making these cute dragon gloves for the boys and Haley but I hope to make those with the boys present. We will see how it pans out.

Lessons learned

Now by the title of this post you could assume a lot. But these are only a few tiny lessons Diedre has learned from having a girl. Please do not get too excited! Haley is after all only 3 months old, you cannot expect me to learn too much (I hope). These are more just things I have noticed about myself with a girl.
Number 1: Look at how freakin' cute and beautiful she is! I definitely love claiming my bragging rights. The lesson learned is on good pride vs. bad pride. Most of the time my pride is good but occasionally I verge into bad pride, I am learning the difference and how to hopefully stay on the good side.
Number 2: Having a baby girl with this beautiful hair is AWESOME! Yes, I have been gifted a few hair bows, but really the girl needs nothing. She is perfect with that hair, those occasional wisps coming off and the sweet little curl she seems to have.
Number 3: Dressing a girl in pink is fine. I am coming to terms with it. However, too much pink still makes me ill. There needs to be a balance in all things.
Number 4: Speaking of too much... lace... there is only so much lace that I can handle.
Number 5: Holding a baby girl in a dress is difficult. Pants and onesies are so much more manageable.
Let me think, any thing else? Ummm, start dinner way ahead of time so that you are not stuck with hot dogs or chicken nuggets or noodles multiple nights in a row. Less toys is always better for clean-up and laundry will NEVER go away. Lets just say I have not quite gotten my groove back. I wish I could say I have bounced back into a routine but it is not happening. This girl Haley likes to march to her own beat and do things on her time. No matter how much I may like to have control over the clock, she has her say. There is one important lesson I would like to learn and that is how to give all of my sweet kids the time they individually need and still be able to cuddle and smile all I want with Haley? That question is the big mystery to solve. For now though we are enjoying life's good moments and quickly getting through the hard ones.

Not Walking Yet But Getting Pretty Close...

Here's Rachel walking her dinosaur she got for her birthday. Unfortunately she can only go for a few seconds before running out of space... Hopefully we will finish our basement tomorrow and then she'll have more room to play in.

Christmas Eve

Sorry it took me a while, but here's video of Christmas Eve!

A pat on the back

I am pretty proud of myself right now. I actually was able to get the kids in bed and then I was able to check off project 1 of 3 for Peter's birthday. Yeah! There is still a little bit more to do on it so that is why there is no picture, but I will post a picture of said project when it is done (if it turns out good). I am pretty pleased with it so far. Especially since the first go-around it got ruined in the washing machine by some stray tissue or cotton ball that I was clueless about. But this second attempt is going no where near the washer. This baby is staying safe, at least until my boys get ahold of it and then there are no promises. Now I am going to bed, I should stay up and work on project 2 since I do not feel tired but I know that tomorrow I will kick myself. So, project 2 will wait until the next creative bug hits, which will hopefully be tomorrow night after my kids are sleeping sweetly.

Dads are awesome!

Rob will probably kill me for posting this but he is the best dad to these kids. Seriously, it is late Sunday evening, FREEZING cold outside and he is playing with the boys in the snow with their sled. WOW! I was just sitting here and Rob pipes up asking if anyone wanted to go out sledding. I thought he was kidding so when all the boys exclaimed yes will the utmost zeal I thought he would be in trouble for joking around. But he was serious. He was choosing to go out in the frigid night with the boys and let them have some fun. Now that is a cool dad. He is pulling the boys around on the icy street with a sled and letting them own the frozen world. Now that deserves an award or something.

Happy New Year!

We are hoping for lots of smiles and fun times around these parts. We also hope the same for you!