Back Home

So this weekend we moved back into our house. We have been living in my moms house and have had our house on the market. It was just easier to have our house 'staged' and it was easier for grandma to have the boys at her house during the school year since she was watching them so we moved out of our house and into hers. Now that the school year is over and basically our house isn't showing much we decided that we wanted to move back in. Well that along with other reasons.

The boys have been having a blast getting reacquainted with the house. We are currently in the process of moving them out of their old nursery and into the guest bedroom. Right now the guest bedroom has their cribs in it and bags and boxes of clothes and other junk. The little nursery has all of my school tubs in it. We need to rearrange the attic and minimize all of ourSTUFF.

Anyway, here are a bunch of pictures of the boys getting to know their home again.

M telling you how much his Mama loves him. Up to sky!
G playing with his house.

The boys kept going in and out under the table. They liked that they could walk under there. They still made their squish face getting ready to bunk their head. They never did.
The babes hanging over the baby/dog gate checking in on the pups.

G stuck under the dinning room table.

G really starting to not like being stuck.

G deciding it's not so bad being stuck. He found a cheerio from breakfast. YUM!M playing with his ball.
The boys kept trying to walk in between the chair and the couch. Each time they got stuck.

M trying to get out from in between the chair and couch too. M in awe of the table lamp.
G throwing his ball.

M stopping to smile, telling Mommy he loves that he can run through out the dinning room and living room.
M deciding he's getting tired.
M ready for his nap!

Grooms Cake

This is the FIRST time I got a cake done at a decent time. I am normally up until 4 in the morning working on them. This one was done and I was cleaned up by 10:30. SO COOL!

The cake was ordered by a bride that wanted to surprise her hubs to be on their rehearsal dinner. Hubs to be LOVES golf so she thought a golf themed cake would be perfect for him.

This cake is filled with buttercream and cut up Snickers. Cutting Snickers is NO fun at all.

I started with a square 12x12 cake. Then I cut around the edges and used some of the 'garbage' (that is never garbage... hubs and I like to use that under and on ice cream YUM!) to make a mound.

I stopped taking pictures after icing the cake. I got into this cake and wanted to get it done 'quickly'. So I only have finished pictures.

The groom has a springer spangle named Calli and the Bride ask if I could try to make her. I tried. I think it came out ok.

This cake was a lot of fun. I know why it took half the time as normal... it's only 1 tier but I did make a bunch of different 'things' for it.

My Baby Experts

There is this GREAT baby boutique about 25 minutes away from us. It's the place where I bought my awesome twin nursing pillow. I've also bought cloth diapers, cloth wipes, other cloth diaper supplies, nursing bras, and some just fun little items.

The Birth Boutique has everything you could possibly imagine. It has items for mom and for baby. There is baby gear, baby clothes, maternity clothes, nursing clothes, the best (in my opinion) nursing bra fittings, cloth diapers, and so so much more.

The owner, Shari Criso is an award-winning author of the "Simply Breastfeeding: The Criso Method" DVD program. She even has a live tv show for new parents called "My Baby Experts". During her show she has these awesome give aways. Well on her last show she announced that they just kicked off a really exciting and fun fan contest for the month of August. A fans chance to win an iPad2 or $500 cash!

How cool would that be! I would love to win an iPad2! I can just imagine all the fun the babes and I would have with that. If I could even handle letting them handle it. haha I would love to put little kid music videos on their. The babes LOVE music. They love when I turn the radio on my phone. If M finds my phone he picks it up brings it to me and say usi (music). Can you imagine how much they would love the iPad2!

Floor Time

We've been having a lot of floor time lately. I bet you thought that would be over after 6 to 8 months. Well, it's NOT!

Our floor time often looks like this...

Hey at least they help each other up after tackling em down! :)

17 Months

WOW! My babes are 17 months old today. I just can't believe that they are getting so big so FAST!

The boys know SO many words now!

Mama

Dada Dadee

Maa (Matt)

Jay

Cha (Charlie - Grandma's dog)

Sota (Soua)

Jersey (Jesey)

Mil (milk)

Wa (Water)

NONONO (in the cutest voices! with the biggest kissable lips)

Chers (Cheerios)

Buna (Banana)

Ish (Fish) (Goldfish crackers)

Dog

Nigh nigh (Night Night)

Poop

Pee

Muus (Music)

Peas (Please)

More

Ett (Eat)

Ead (Read)

Book (not said perfect)

Buoon (Balloon)

Plane (not said perfect - just not sure how to spell it the way they say it)

Ball

Bird

Amen (said perfectly in a baby way. the sweetest word you will ever hear from a babe)

Jesus (there is a picture with Jesus and the children at His feet-the boys point to it and say sus)

I'm sure there are more words that I've overlooked.

They will count to 10 - of course they repeat after me - so I know they can't actually do it but it's fun to hear them say their numbers.

They know a bunch of different animals and their sounds.

Dog - woof woof (they will even howl a bit if the dogs do)

Sheep - baa (G does the baa with a gruff in his throat. It's too cute!)

Cow - moo (this animal and sound has to be prompted still)

Duck - quack quack

Pig - oink (they don't say pig but they know the sound it makes - they don't actually say oink, they pull the sound out like a grown up would do. Hubs always does it with the real sound and not the word so that's how the babes do it)

Horse - neigh (this animal and sound has to be prompted also. This is another sound that they do and not say)

Parrot - squak (they don't say the animal name - they call this animal a bird- sometimes they will tweet sometimes they will squak)

Monkey - (they don't say monkey, but tickle their armpits and say the sound)

Tiger - (they don't say tiger, but growl)

Again I probably overlooked some animals and their sounds.

The boys are master walkers! They do still trip and fall, but that's normally only if they are super tired.

They run so fast. They love to be chased. When they are chased they squeal.

They give super big kisses before bed.

They will sometimes fold their hands when we pray.

They will put their finger in front of their mouth and say shhh. They do this when one of them is not sleeping and I go into the bedroom to get him. I go in with my finger in front of my lips saying shhhh. They giggle and say shhh back.

I'm sure there are so many more things I could tell you about the babes but I'm not sure what else to write. If you have any questions about them or what they are doing ask away :)

Here are some pictures that I took this evening with my new lens. I just threw it on my camera and started click. I haven't really looked into it yet or figured it out. I know the pictures aren't that great but I thought I would share some 17 month photos any way.

Mama and G

Dada and M

Dada and G

G (If you notice G's forehead you will see 2 bite marks. When the babes are in their cribs 'taking' their naps the bite each other. M has had a huge fascination in biting G's head lately. I am actually happy that they are biting each others heads rather then their fingers or arms any more. The can't clamp down nearly as hard on the forehead as they could when they bit those other places.

M

Hanging Out

Lately we have been doing a whole lot of hanging out.

The boys and I have been tormenting their uncles (my brothers) just about every day this week. They are leaving to go back to their high school in MN tomorrow so the babes and I stand at the top of the stairs and yell MATT - JAY until they come up to see us. The yelling takes a long long time because they are too busy watching tv or playing their video games. :(

When the babes and I play I am always sitting or laying on the floor. I don't often sit on the chair or couch. If I sit on the floor the babes will run up to me and kiss me or hug me or bring me a book and sit on my lap. If I'm on a chair or the couch they ignore me. I LOVE my kisses so I stay on the floor. Often Daddy and I will pretend to sleep on the floor when we are playing. Then one of the babes will come up and jump on us, or poke us to get a reaction. G has started to pretend to sleep on the floor too.

The boys LOVE their dogs. They have 2 of them. Sota and Jersey.

Sota is short for Minnesota. Since hubs is from Minnesota we thought it would be a perfect name. She was a gift to me from my hubs and my mom a few months after hubs and I got married. My mom was afraid that I would get preggo right away and didn't want me too (we were still in college) so she thought the dog would help take care of that. Sota has always been such a sweet mild mannered fluff ball. She would get very excited if people were around, but would eventually calm down and just lay on their lap or by their feet. She has always LOVED children. We tried to keep kids around her because we knew we wanted them one day. Of course she DOES NOT like our kids. It's so sad. We keep her in the kitchen most of the time. The boys love to go to the kitchen gate and give her kisses through the webbing. Sometimes she kisses back and sometimes she snaps at their fingers. You just never know. We do let her out when the boys are napping or go to bed for the night. We try to let them all play together so that she will hopefully like them one day.

Jersey (of course named after New Jersey-where I'm from) is the most gentle loving dog ANYONE could ever come across. You need to know I'm TERRIFIED of dogs. The first day we had Jersey hubs had to run to the store and left me home alone with him for a couple hours that night. I sat in the corner crying trying to stay as far away from him as I could. Not anymore. I'm not even the in the littlest afraid of this mush ball. The boys adore him. He lets them climb on him, pet him, explore him. Of course one of us is always with them just to be smart (safe). He too is normally in the kitchen during the day but I take him our to play every once in a while. He gets so excited when he's playing with the boys that his tail smacks them in the face and he runs them over. After the initial excitement he just lays on the floor with them and gets lots and lots of kisses. *We do let the dogs out of the kitchen when hubs gets home. I didn't want another dog...I actually wanted to get rid of Sota. I felt like it was way too much for me to take care of all four of them throughout the day so I leave them in the kitchen. Don't worry I feed them and let them out several times a day - and once the boys go down for naps they can join me in my daily tasks - but once they boys wake up it's back into the kitchen for them.

M and Jersey

M giving Jersey a kiss

G kissing Jersey

I've never met a babe that doesn't like to play airplane. You know lay on your back and put your babe on your legs to fly. M & G are not huge fans of it. They love to be thrown, they love to swirl, and they love to look at airplanes, but they just don't love to lay on your feet or knees and pretend to fly.

G being thrown.

M being thrown.

Just to add to the randomness of todays post...

I got a new lens for my camera and it arrived today! I am so excited. I haven't had a chance to use it yet... well that's not the total truth... here is a picture I was able to take

I can't wait to try it out on the babes!!