Lots of firsts

A few weeks ago Simone started eating rice cereal.  She has now had rice cereal, applesauce and bananas.  She LOVES food.  Here are some pictures of her eating for the first time.

She was a little hesitant..

She loved it!

 I pulled out the activity play thing from the basement because she is rolling around like crazy and I needed a place to container her while I am getting food ready for the boys in the morning and in the evening.

She really does like it a lot.  She is starting to have the funniest facial expressions.  I love being able to capture some of them with the camera.

I love this one!

Look who's sitting.  Simone is now able to sit up for about 30 seconds on her own.  I usually put something behind her, just in case she topples over.  She gets so happy with herself and then usually falls flat on her face.

 Here she is sitting this morning.  Then I got a rare picture of all of the kids together.

Joseph is such a ham, he always yells cheese as soon as the camera comes out, so we always get crazy pictures of him.  Samuel looks so huge next to both of them.  

Samuel took this picture.  

I finally got a good picture of my mom and Simone.  I love this one.

In other news,  Joseph peed in the potty for the first time ever.  He has had zero interest in going pee in the potty.  He usually screams when we take his diaper off and ask him to sit.  I haven't put any pressure on him, but I was wondering when he would start getting interested.  On Wednesday I took his diaper off because I was planning to give him a bath and I let him run around a little without a diaper on.  It looked like he had to pee so I asked him if he wanted to try.  I was talking to my mom on the phone and I asked him if he wanted to show Savta how he could pee in the potty.  He ran right into the bathroom and peed.  It was awesome.  We were all screaming.  I thought that would get him more interested in going, but he hasn't had any interest again.  I guess we will just see what happens.

In more pee news (I know you all really want to know about this, but this is exciting for me), Samuel has gone almost two weeks being dry at night.  We tried no pull up for three days and he wet the bed once.  I told him we were going to finish off the rest of his pull ups and if he is dry until the end, we never have to use them again.  He is so excited!  He also likes the fact that I give him some money to put in his wallet when he wakes up with a dry diaper.  He was never motived by food, but he is motivated by money.  Smart kid.  I told him that he only gets money when he works for it.  Money is not just given to him because he wants it, he has to earn it.  There are so many lessons for him to learn.

I can't believe it is almost April.  Happy Friday!

Sometimes life just gets in the way

I have had a very busy and rough February and March so far.  The kids were passing sickness back and forth for 6 weeks.  I have been exhausted.  Dave and I are in serious need of time alone and with each other.  We are hoping to get that this weekend.

Samuel is almost done with his Spring Break.  We have been having absolutely beautiful weather around here, so we have been spending a lot of time outside.  Today is the first day it really started raining.  It isn't bad out, but we can't play outside.

In the last few weeks since I posted last, Simone has gone from being swaddled at nap time and bedtime to just sleeping in a sleep sack.  She is getting used to having more freedom and it is disrupting her sleep, but now that she is rolling around like a crazy girl and works her arms out of the swaddle we figured it was time to make the change.  I am getting so sick of her waking up in the middle of the night.  She really has enjoyed the last 6 weeks of sleeping right next to me in bed when she was sick, so she is also adjusting to that as well.  Last night I let her cry it out around 12:30 because I am so sick of her waking up then.  She ended up rolling to her stomach, crying for about 10 minutes and then slept for another three and a half hours.  Hopefully she will just sleep through that 12:30 time now.  We will see.  I am not getting her anymore, so she better make the quick adjustment.

So not only has her sleep been changing, but last week we started rice cereal.  She LOVES it.  She is an eating machine.  We give her cereal at night when we are all eating dinner.  We have actually had a few nights were we are all sitting down at the same time, which is a big change.  I have also incorporated applesauce a few nights with the cereal and she loves that too.

I will post more pictures when I download them.

Here's to wonderful weekend.  We need it around here.

Pictures from Samuel's birthday

Oma and Simone

Simone in her craddle

Joseph pushing Simone

Joseph got jealous and wanted to get in the craddle too

Samuel and Joseph in the craddle 

All three kids

Savta, Oma and Simone

The ladies

Me and Samuel

Celebrating Samuel's birthday

Samuel and Dave blowing out the candles

Samuel enjoying his cake

Simone is 5 months old now!!

Joseph being a pirate

Samuel saying "Arr"

Simone is a pirate too!

Another 5 month picture

Oma, Opa and the family

Savta, Papa and the family

Me, Savta and Simone

Samuel having another birthday celebration

On his actual birthday with his birthday crown

He was pretty excited about his big huge cupcake

The Big 4!

Today is my favorite first born little boy's birthday.  He is 4 today and he is so excited.  He wants to sing happy birthday all the time.  I can't believe he is 4 already.  Time has really flown by.  I am hoping that four will be a little bit easier then three.  Three was quite a challenge.  Samuel is super independent, loving and stubborn.  He amazes me everyday.  He is so smart and funny and he makes me laugh all the time.  He drives me crazy too, but he wouldn't be a normal kid if he didn't do that.

He was so brave this morning.  We had his 4 year check up and he had to get four shots.  I normally do not give the kids more then 3 shots at a time, but Samuel is absolutely terrified of getting shots and I didn't want to have to come back in a month to give him the rest.  That would be way to stressful for him.   When he gets really scared he starts shaking like crazy.  His poor little hands, arms and fingers were shaking like crazy.  He got himself so worked up that he got a nose bleed.  He has never had a nose bleed before, but it just shows how much he is like me.  When I get super upset or stressed out I get nose bleeds too.  Anyway, he survived and was ready to go to school and take his big cookie cake that I got him.

He is such a big boy.  Here were his statistics:

Height - 43.9 inches (98%)
Weight - 46.40 pounds (97%)

Since I was going to the doctor for Samuel I made another appointment for Simone.  Last Wednesday when she finished her medication she broke out in a rash on her chest.  Over the weekend it spread all over her chest and back and looked pretty bad this morning.  I decided to get her in to have the doctor look at her too.  She still has fluid in the ear that had the ear infection, but he said it was looking better.  The doctor thinks that the rash is part of the sickness that she had and it might get much worse before it gets better.  If she still has it by the end of the week, I have to call him back and get her in.  If it isn't one thing it is another.  When is this going to be over!!!

And to round out the three kids, when we finally got home and started relaxing and I was feeding Simone I got a call from Joseph's school.  They wanted me to pick him up because he had a fever, runny nose and a little bit of a cough.  I swear if he gets super sick again I am going to be so pissed.  Right now I am trying to get him to take a nap and hopefully he will just sleep it off.  He didn't sleep well last night, so I think he may just be over tired.  We had a super busy weekend, so I think he may just be worn out.

Speaking of the weekend.  I need to post pictures later, but we had a wonderful weekend.  All the grandparents came in town to help Samuel celebrate.  We went to The Fresh Beat Band concert, which was so much fun and I am pretty sure the kids had a wonderful time.