Thomas and Mary

It is cool to see relationships forming more between the older two and Thomas. Remember this:

 Now it looks like this:

He still LOVES his morning bottle. He literally wakes up with his lips smacking and making a sucking motion. He also thought it was fun to try to feed Mary.

 

It's mostly just been Mary and Noah playing while Thomas hangs out with me during his baby stage, but now he is becoming so interactive they are finding ways to play with him! They will run and hide and he will laugh as he crawls to get them or they will crawl around on the floor and play "follow Thomas" while he crawls in front of them. Sometimes now Mary will even ask to have playing time just with Thomas:) Girl, just wait until he starts stealing your toys!

Vacation time

We were so blessed to be able to go on a weeks vacation to Myrtle Beach! It was a very laid back time and the kids had a blast. I really felt that it was perfect timing to get away from regular life (moving, unpacking, etc.) and have a change of pace. 

 We stayed in a beautiful 6 bedroom home with my family (see picture below if you want to know what it's like to stay in one house with six kids ages 6 and under...pretty chaotic fun). My family from Georgia stayed near us so we got to see them some too! My cousin made these cute little treats for the kids:

 Here is Noah saying cheese:

 Whoever thought that was a good word to say to make kids smile was absolutely wrong. And here is Thomas' homey-don't-play-that face:

 Typical Mary smile:

 She asked me to take a picture of the tigers so we could remember them. But I said I didn't just want a picture of a tiger so she had to get in the picture too! These two spent most of the week together:

 You know we had to have a donut day. And this stud had a great time with his dump truck that his aunt got him:

 Their aunt also got them boogie boards! Noah...didn't really do water so he kind of just sat on the sand:

 But Mary was all in:

 

 Hey it's a picture with me in it! And my handsome little guy who still NEVER wants to leave my side. And who also usually likes to have something in his hand at all times.

 Searching for sand crabs = fail. Fun with flashlights and getting to stay up way past bedtime = success!

 This is the aforementioned picture of what it's like having 6 young kids in one house. That's three babies! Luckily all of them are sleeping at night and mostly through the night so we were all able to sleep!

 On our last night we kind of had a mega-photoshoot. It was probably the most beautiful of nights while we were there so I was able to get some pretty shots like this one of my cousins daughter:

 Thank you sun for cooperating quite nicely! And here is a picture of all the kids that were there from my family:

Me and the little warrior:

The new place we call home

Although I still feel a little dull ache sometimes for our old home we are really happy with our new house and neighborhood. We noticed a difference immediately in the new neighborhood. In our old neighborhood we would wave at people as we drove by and sometimes they would literally just turn away. We only met a couple of our old neighbors and one that we talked to said they had been living their for 30 years and didn't even know most people's names! Crazy. We wanted something different this time around so we decided that we would take the first opportunity we had with each neighbor to introduce ourselves.

This worked amazingly well and most of the time we didn't even have to initiate. The young couple right next door came over to meet us! The older couple on the other side was very friendly and brought their grandson over to play the first week. We already knew two families, etc. We feel connected here already and it's been 3 weeks.

We want to make some treats for our neighbors and write a letter to introduce ourselves so hopefully we will be able to get that done in the next week or so. We also try to say hi to people who are out when we take walks. Hopefully this can be a friendly neighborhood and we can continue to feel like we belong here!

The big move

Well I feel like life has finally calmed down enough to sit for a bit and update the blog. We originally set out to buy a fixer upper and now I'm really glad we didn't. Our house is in great shape but we still have so much to do to make it "our" house. At least we are mostly unpacked now and feeling a bit settled. The kids seemed to be having trouble with the transition: not sleeping well, being irritable and whiney, and generally just not acting like themselves. I thought they were over it, but today on our way home from small group (which is right by our old house) Mary said, "mommy I really want to drive by our old house. The one that we lived at for a long time. It's been enough time at our new house." In that moment I felt so sad. I told her that I miss our old house too! And I really do. Someone once told me that in any life change there is part of your life that in a sense dies. It kind of feels like that; our old house, neighborhood, and places we went often are in the past. Not that we can't still go to those places...but we will have to drive out of the way to do so.

Anyway, this post is supposed to be about the big move! That day was pretty exciting for me as it was the first time I personally was buying a house.  There was so much anticipation and I was SO ready to be done with the process. Here is a picture of us right after we closed on our old house:

For about 30 minutes there we were multiple thousands of dollars richer and completely debt free, but homeless. So that's an issue. It was actually quite fun to close. The realtors and title agent knew each other and were really laid back and fun about it all so there was just a great attitude in the room. And the people we bought from and sold to were Christians! What are the odds? We found ourselves talking to the couple who bought our house about how they go to church at Church on Fire and how we did young life and they knew what it was, etc. All around just a cool day.

A couple people came to help us paint that first day:

 And then we move our stuff in...

 

And that's just the family room! I keep having to remind myself that it took about 5 years for us to get our last house into shape the way we wanted it. I don't need to do everything in one week! We are just so excited to make this house ours that sometimes it's hard to wait:)

Happy Birthday Thomas!

So we moved a week ago and Thomas turned 1 before that! I lost my SD card reader in the move...so I'm just now getting around to adding new pictures. Anyway, we had a little party at the park with family the day before his actual birthday. It was a sweet day for me and I think T enjoyed it too.

 Here are the pictures I took for his one year photo shoot:

 Education
He has learned SO much this month. He can say Dada, Mama, Papa, bye. It's like a mental explosion from 11 months. He will go looking for people when you ask where they are and he will do things over and over and laugh at himself. He also looks for me ever 10-20 seconds and he completely loses it if I leave the room. I didn't think it could get worse than it was but it did. Ah well.

Physical Growth
He took his first step a little before  he turned one but he's not really walking yet either. He still loves to crawl. He loves to walk while he holds on to things though! He seems unusually strong sometimes. Like the other day I was sitting in a chair outside and he crawls over, grabs two fistfuls of my shirt and yanks himself up onto my lap. I was so shocked he did that! He also got 4 teeth in the past week which brings him up to 8.

Spiritual Growth
I've been praying for all of them a ton this month. Thomas has been teething forever and he is NOT a happy teether. Mary and Noah have been at each others throats fighting. So it's really worked to send me straight to God for help. I just keep praying that the spirit would convict Mary and Noah that treating each other poorly is not OK! I pray that Thomas will get his teeth and quit acting like a crazy person. A cute crazy person, but still.

Social Development
He has reverted to only liking me and about 2 other people in the world. And it's strange who he chooses to go to. He still loves playing with his brother and sister though and will follow them around the house all day! Mary has started helping him walk around and he just laughs at her so much. He is much more fun to interact with as well so it makes his constant clinging to me a joy.

Here is a blast from the past to remind me of how quickly my little ones grow!