Avery Is One!

WARNING: There are ALOT of pictures in this post!

Today we celebrated my niece Avery's 1st birthday out at mom and dad's. It was just the family, minus Cody and Shawna because they were sick. It was laid back and casual and we had ALOT of fun!

Avery loves to climb things!

Lauren was so sweet and bought a slip n slide for the kiddos to play on. This was the first time for any of them to play on one of these, but after a few "examples" from Kyle and Josh they were ready! Ethan caught on really fast!

She also got this baby pool (in the shape of a hippo) for the babies to splash in. Danica wasn't sure about the slip n slide yet, so she opted for the pool at first.

Isaiah's turn

"Ooooo"

Ok, so the story behind the pullup: Dani was wearing this pullup and mom didn't want to dirty the swim diaper, so she sent her out in this. It was fine at first, but as we all know, pullups/diapers absorb water quickly. Soon Dani was walking around with a loaded behind!

She could care less...at first.

Dani's turn

Wipeout! (she was fine, got up smiling!)

Go Isaiah!

Now it was getting uncomfortable...

Grammy, time to change!

I love this face!

Isn't she gorgeous?

Look at that cutie!!! LOVE those legs!

After awhile, Avery got brave enough to touch the sprinklers.

Avery's turn

Isaiah thought it was so funny to try and drink the water from the sprinklers.

After the kids all got dried off, it was time to open presents and eat cake! As you can see, Avery wasn't too interested in the presents...she sure did like this ribbon though!

4 of the 5 grandbabies

Avery got her very 1st baby doll. Do you think she liked it?

Avery loves to play with this toy at our house, so she got one of her own. Isaiah thought she needed to be shown how it worked...

While mommy was getting the cake ready, Avery showed her true thoughts...can we say nap time??

Check out the foot on the table!

Happy Birthday to you!! We love you Avery!

Ice Cream Run

Lately Josh and I have really been working hard to stay on track with our Dave Ramsey budget. So we haven't been eating out much or going to costly places. Tonight we decided that after we ate dinner (at home) we would take the boys to get some ice cream. It was a much needed treat for all of us!

Crafty Mommy

Recently we have really been into crafts (thank you Lauren for inspiring me to be more interactive with the boys during the day!). In particular, learning (or re enforcing for Ethan) our letters and talking about what words start with that letter, and then doing a craft that corresponds with it. This is our elephant we are making for the letter E.

Then we started on the letter F. We covered it with "feathers". The boys liked that!

There will be much more to come on crafts. We are trying to do 2 letters per week, along with a craft for each letter. My goal is to complete the upper case and lower case before the holidays. We'll see!

Today was my littlest brother's 10th birthday...hard to believe that I have a 10 year old brother. Morgan was here visiting before he leaves for Afghanistan so I thought we should all get together before he left.

We usually meet at my house for a brother/sister dinner but this time we went to Ashley's apartment for swimming and volleyball. Unfortunately, the pool was being serviced so we didn't really get to swim...well I didn't swim. Some of the gang got in the baby pool with the boys...not me...

Anyway, we all played some volleyball, yes, even me. Landy cooked some burgers and hot dogs and we had a cake for Nick. It was a fun time...will be a while until we are all together again!

Landen and Mom

Aunt Ashley

Uncle Morgan

Happy Birthday Nick!! We love you!

Josh and I have been talking alot about how its been 2 years since Ethan was potty trained but is still wearing pullups to bed. So we decided to try waking Ethan up around 10pm, or before we went to bed, and making him go potty, in hopes that his body would get used to it. A week has gone by, and no improvement.

Tonight we went in and this is how we found Ethan sleeping! So funny! He is his daddy's son! We are going to keep at it and hopefully see some changes soon.

Michael Travis Is Here!

The big day has arrived! We have all been anxiously awaiting the arrival of baby Michael for months now...and the time has finally come! Mike and Kristina went to the hospital early this morning for their scheduled C-section. Everyone was all smiles!

Grandmas

Now it was time! After baby Michael was born, Mike brought him over to Kristina for a quick mother-son bonding moment before they took him away for all his many tests. You can see the calmness in her face from the relief that he was here safe and healthy!

First father, mother, and son picture
Michael was 5min 26sec old here. At first he looked just like Ellie!

Ebrom feet

After 3 hours of recovery and not yet seeing her baby, they finally wheeled him in to Kristina's room. Her face says it all! So in love!

Then he was off to the NICU. He was covered in tons of cords, monitoring every part of his little body. He looked giant compared to all the premies in the NICU with him. That just tells us that God had grown this boy healthy!

Kristina's first time in the NICU holding him.

Proud, and happy, mom and dad

Big sister got to visit that evening. She wasn't able to see baby Michael yet, because she wasn't allowed in the NICU. She was extreemely happy to see mommy and daddy though!

Aunt Ashley and Uncle Chris

First time Grannie was able to see Michael.
So sweet

Due to unexpected tragedy in their home, Mike and Kristina stayed at the Ebrom's for the first 2 weeks. Here is the first picture of Kristina and her babies!

In love

4th of July

I was very excited to dress the boys alike today in their red and blue attire. Unfortunatley, I forgot to take pictures! Kathryn did get this one of Ethan and Claire...and its too cute! Happy 4th everyone!

Toy Story 3

Today we went to see Toy Story 3!! Such a cute movie! The boys really like the first two so we thought this would be a nice treat for them...and that's just what it was...lots of soda and candy and popcorn, thanks to Grammy and Papa! We had a great time!

So cute!

I just love this picture of Isaiah...I had to post it!