update

It has been a busy couple weeks. With lots going on with school, activities, Dr. appointments, sickness, the holiday season and church callings.  So here is just a quick update of some of the things we have been up to. 

We have had some really nice warm days so we have had fun playing outside and and just enjoying the nice weather while we can.  Leila is really into hop scotch, every time we are outside she wants me to draw her a hopscotch with chalk. 

Greydon loves playing dress up and make believe so when this police outfit showed up from his Aunt Ariane for his birthday he  was in heaven and wouldn't take it off for hours. 

We FINALLY got rid of Greydon's binky.  I had been dreading this forever, to say he loved his binky would be an understatement.  Plus I was nervous that my sweet little boy would turn into a monster and no longer be my good  sleeper and napper.  We had been telling him for weeks that when he turned 3 he had to get rid of all his binky's.  So the day after his 3rd birthday he helped me gather them all up.   He did pretty good all day but refused to take a nap so I just let him stay up.  But around 4:30 he fell asleep on the couch and then woke up about 30 minutes later.  When he woke up he was a holy terror.  He was screaming for his binky, hitting me, throwing things, and kicking.  It was terrible plus Paul was leaving for the night shift.  I was at my ropes end so we decided he could have it for three more nights but not during the day.  The next two days he did well and even napped. so on the last night of him getting his binky I didn't mention his binky and he didn't ask for it and just went to sleep without it.  I couldn't believe it, I kept waiting for him to get up in the night and ask for it but it never happened.  He has done so well and is still my sweet little guy and still takes great naps during the day.  It ended up not being as bad as I thought it was going to be and I am so glad he is finally free of the binky. 

We had our first own little Thanksgiving dinner and man it was a lot of work.  I spent all day Wednesday and Thursday cooking and keeping up on the dishes so our kitchen wouldn't be a total disaster.  I now know why people to Thanksgiving together, so they can share the work.  I was pretty nervous about cooking a turkey since I had never done it before and Paul was going to be working or sleeping.  Side note: Paul got stuck with a really crappy holiday schedule, he worked Wednesday thru Saturday doing the night shift.  Anyway I decided to brine the turkey and it turned out great! But I was exhausted by the time we ate dinner hopefully  next year Paul won't be working and we can make plans with friends or even have our family come visit us for Thanksgiving.

The kids are so excited for Christmas and were begging to decorate the house, so a couple of days before Thanksgiving we pulled out all our decorations.  The kids favorite part was decorating the tree, they love looking at their ornaments that they have received each year.  The tree is  not very pretty this year since Asher pulls every thing off that is within his reach so only the top of the tree is decorated.   It kind of bugs me but its just one of those things that I just have to be ok with and realize there is a time and season for everything and right now is not the time or season for a beautiful fancy tree. 

I love sending and receiving Christmas cards and have sent Christmas cards for the last couple years, at least since we had kids.  But this year I had to make the decision that I just couldn't do it this year, first I didn't have a great picture to send and I couldn't afford to get family pictures taken (thanks to my wonderful dental bills) and then I really couldn't afford the cards and stamps.  I know there have been some great deals out there on getting cards for pretty cheap but I was never on top of it to actually cash in on those deals.  It seriously had been one of those decisions that has driven me crazy I so badly want to send them out but I've had to just tell myself that I can't always do every little thing because people are expecting a card from me and it's ok.

Paul hung our Christmas lights over the weekend and lucked out that our neighbors brought home a Cherry picker and told Paul he could use it to hang the lights.  It made the ordeal so easy and so much safer, he was done in less then 30 minutes.  It's wonderful to have neighbors who have access to all sorts of equipment. 

I finally finished Insanity a couple weeks ago and man am I ever glad it is over, by the end I was so burned out on it and was dreading the work outs.  It's not that the workouts were bad it's just that they were really long and took a good portion of the morning.  But I did see results and it was fun to take the fitness test every couple of weeks to see how much improvement I had made.  Now that it is over I feel like I can be a bit more balanced, while I was doing it I constantly felt like I was dropping one of the balls I was juggling, something in my life was always suffering (it usually was a clean house).  The picture below is what would happen while I would work out.  I would put Asher down for a nap and then I would go upstairs and work out in my room, leaving Greydon to run wild in the family room.

Leila started gymnastics a couple of weeks ago.  It is a pretty big sacrifice for us to have her in gymnastics, it is not cheap and pretty serious business.  I mean we are in Iowa home of Olympic gymnasts Gabby Douglas and Shawn Johnson so gymnastics is taken very seriously.  But it is just perfect for Leila, she loves it so much and is doing so well! And poor Greydon wants to participate so bad, after both classes he has left screaming his head off because he wants his turn. 

I am pretty much done with all my Christmas shopping just a couple more things I need to pick up.  This is probably the earliest I've been done with my Christmas shopping.  Thank goodness for Amazon prime, I've been able to get great deals, had family gifts shipped to Utah and I didn't have to haul my kids all over town.  We also had our elf Ely show up on December 1st he brought a letter for the kids plus breakfast.  The kids were so excited and love looking for Ely every morning.

Paul finally has some time off but instead of getting to enjoy extra time with him he has been studying for his Step 3 board exam which he is taking next week.  I can't wait for the day when his vacation time is actually a vacation. At least he gets a week off for Christmas and we can enjoy that time with him.

And then just a couple random pictures.  Both boys love playing with the bar stools and it drives me crazy but it was quite funny that they got stuck in them

Greydon loves going shopping with me especially if he gets to look at toys and try them out.  He really loved this kids chair at Costco

Last week I went and had lunch with Leila at school and then she begged for me to come to recess with her.  She refused to let me take any pictures of her so this was snapped when she wasn't looking.  I couldn't believe how good she has become on the bars, she was swinging all over the place and doing flips off them.  I guess having recess 3 times a day every single day gives you a lot of practice.  And I learned that she has convinced a bunch of her friends to push her on the swings even though she  knows how to pump on her own, such a sneaky little girl.