Two Peas In a Pod

I decided to post this to concentrate on some warm, fuzzy sibling moments from this week, because let me assure you, they have been hard to come by! With both of the older two feeling sick and having fevers, they had some serious don't-touch-me-itis, only toward each other of course..... with me they couldn't seem to cling close enough! It was a little difficult to have three feverish children clinging to me when I was feverish myself, but, anyway, we did have a few moments of brotherly love, so let's just think about that!







Monday morning when I woke up and peeked in the kids room, I found them sleeping on the floor! After they woke up, Joshua told me that he thought we should put a "for sale" sign on their beds!





Later that afternoon, things were not going so well at naptime, until they gravitated into my bed! After that, things went nicely for them, but I ended up having to get up for lack of space and forfeit my nappie - my most precious commodity these days!







And this is last night. Joshua insisted that since Dominique was sick and "lonely", that he needed to protect her, so he slept in her bed. ;) (You can tell her poor baby head was all red with fever...)

So, the verdict for this morning is: no fevers for me, nor Israel, nor Joshua, and just around 99 for Dominique, but she seems to be feeling fine, so hopefully she will fully regain strength throughout the day for the dance with Daddy tonight! Pictures coming soon!

Quick Update

Well, we have been hit with the sickies. :( I think I am mostly over it, and the kids seem to be regaining strength too, but still have a little bit of a low-grade fever. Hopefully that will be gone by later in the day too. The fever and sore throat were really our only symptoms, thankfully. I definitely prefer that to the puking variety! Our old stand-bys of extra vitamin C, raw garlic, and echinacea tea seem to be doing the trick for taking care of it. I hope we are all well tomorrow night, because Dominique and Daddy will be attending a father-daughter dance, and Dominique would be devastated if they didnt get to go! She has been giddy-gigglin' excited about it for "ages" now (since I told her about it, about a week ago!).

But, we have been amazingly healthy all winter, which I am also extremely thankful for. A few sniffles here and there, but really nothing major.

I have a few pictures to post when I have access to the desktop. :) Until then, here is a little update on how the smallest member of our family is doing lately:

The picture shows an unborn baby at 10 weeks after conception: recognisably a member of the human family.
The baby measures 2 1/2 inches (61mm) from crown to rump ("sitting height"), and is growing at a rate of 1/2 inch (13mm) per week. The baby's face, at first broad, now becomes narrower; the eyes are closed for protection from about 10 weeks until the sixth month. The sex of the baby can now be seen."Nine weeks after conception the baby is well enough formed to bend his fingers round an object in the palm of his hand. In response to a touch on the sole of his foot he will curl his toes or bend his hips and knees to move away from the touching object." (What the fetus feels, Valman and Pearson, British Medical Journal, 26 January 1980) The baby will begin respond to touching on the skin by 6 weeks after conception, and by 12 weeks the range of responses is almost complete.
"At 11 weeks after conception the fetus starts to swallow the surrounding amniotic fluid and to pass it back in his urine. He can also produce complex facial expressions and even smile."

Happy Valentine's Day!

A little late in posting about it, but we did have a jolly valentine's day!

Here are the kids with the valentines they made for their cousins.









We studied 1 Corinthians 13 during the week and I had them write one attribute of love from the chapter on the back of each valentine: "Love is kind", "Love is not easily angered", etc. (In Dominique's case, she traced it.)















Then on Thursday, we had a valentine's party at Grandma Carol's house. It is a blessing in our family to have a built-in homeschool support group!

Here are the girls decorating valentines at Grandma's house, and the boys are in the background at the other table.






Many more failed attempts at getting a decent picture of Moriah and Israel together!

This is a typical sample.....










I did eventually get this one where they were actually at least looking the same direction!!!












At this age, though, they are much easier to photograph alone!












Israel was so happy to be walking around!



















Mom had the idea to have a "crazy hat" picture of all the kids together, so we all brought silly hats for them to wear. :)











And with crazy hats, you have to do some crazy faces too, right?












Then we feasted on many, many homemade heart-shaped pizzas, heart-shaped cookies, cupcakes with hearts on them, and a bunch of other stuff!















A picture of each of the valentine couples:


Aaron and Suzy












Fabio and Elizabeth













Scott and Amanda


















Mom and Jack
















And lastly, a first belly shot of this pregnancy. This was almost a week ago, at 8 weeks and 2 days along. Do you think it's twins? Or maybe just too much pizza??

Misc Catch-Up

Here are some recent hodge-podge pictures.

Dominique waving her "flag"! I am really getting tired of winter, but the kids still like playing in the snow. Of course, this week it has been too cold to even do that, but anyway, one day maybe it will warm up. (???)













I am so thankful that my little ones LOVE to read books, even right down to Israel!
On this day, the two older ones had their favorite Bibles that they were reading on the couch. So, Israel decided that he needed to join them, went and got a book, and crawled up to read with them. Too cute!







Reading books in the van makes the ride so much more enjoyable for them, and so much quieter for us!











We saw these deer just outside our window the other night! We got the kids out of bed to see them too. We turned on the outside light and started taking pictures and they were not scared away. :)









D9minique dropped and shattered Joshua's beloved piggy bank the other day....












I love this picture!













First attempt at feeding himself with a spoon! He didn't do too bad, considering. :) Kept him busy and happy for a good half an hour too, while Mama was busy fixing dinner.
















Sleeping beauties.
A couple weeks ago, Dominique decided to join us in bed about 6am and go back to sleep again. She did it every single day for a week, and then went back to her normal sleeping habits.....









Like Father, Like Son.














Israel would NOT look at the camera, so Fabio decided not to either. Again, like father, like son! :)




I have been feeling pretty decent so far, so I am thankful for that. My only "problems" are that I am typically so sleepy I can hardly function, and my apetite has been *quite* impressive! Just ask Fabio! I have been hungrier than usual with the others, but nothing like this time! I think I have been eating breakfast three times, lunch three times, and dinner three times, roughly. And snacks inbetween. :) Speaking of which, I'm hungry! I think I'll go make myself some food and try to catch a nap before the kiddos wake up!

Israel is walking!

Well, Israel took his own sweet time starting to walk, much to my surprise since he was my earliest crawler! I guess these little ones just like to keep us guessing!
Anyway, a couple days ago he took off, at 13.5 months old. :) No slow build-up here! Once he decided to go for it, he was off! And SO proud of himself to be such a big boy! It totally made his whole day - he was just so happy with himself!



































Look at him go!



























And go!










And go!




















So excited about his progress!

What a happy little guy! He is such a joy to have around!

Maybe this would be an appropriate place to include one of Joshua's recent comments about Israel.....
A few weeks ago, Joshua said to me with such a happy face, "Mommy, it is such a blessing to have Israel in our family! He helps us a lot! He cleans all the garbage off the floor so we dont even have to!"
Hehe, who needs a dog? LOL! Joshua was not being sarcastic at all - he was totally serious! I dont even think he knows how to be sarcastic.... :)


















And a video clip of the action:

Pulling Taffy

Does anyone remember reading about pulling taffy in Little House on the Prairie?
Well, being the down-home, grass-roots kinda family that we are, we decided it was something we had to try out! And ya know what? It's fun!









Here are my sister-in-laws Suzy and Amanda doling out the taffy to the eagerly awaiting young'uns.











Pull, stretch, fold. Repeat.




















Levi pulling, and looking excited about it!







This is just the kind of messy stuff kids love to be able to fondle! Gabriel's got rather.... sticky!












Dillon and Colton having a *surprisingly* good time!












Dominique pulled hers in a daintly, girly fashion.



















And Israel and Moriah decided to eat each other since we wouldn't let them have any taffy!
Hmmm... kissin' cousins!











This event took place at my brother Aaron's house and it was also our first opportunity to get acquainted with their two new bull pythons! As if the taffy were not excitement enough!

We also met their new dog, but I failed to get pictures of her. Probably because when she was around, I had my arms full of Dominique and Israel, who nearly got knocked down several times by the big loveable sweetheart..... :)