The Important Things

My mom found this picture and I just love it! It is hanging in our living room and I don't care how the decor of the room changes, I'm never taking it down!

I can't even go to the bathroom...

...without one of the boys getting into something they aren't supposed to be getting into. The other day all 3 kids-I don't remember if I mentioned I've been watching Lily a 15 month old little girl the last few weeks-were playing nicely in the living room. The weather was beautiful so I had all the windows and door open, the doors of course were locked though. Since everyone was getting along great I thought I'd finally put away the basket of the boys' clothes that had been sitting in the hallway for days. I'm not usually so bad about getting their clothes put away but every time I think about getting it done they are sleeping. And I'm home alone with the boys a lot more now that Harvest is starting. Anyways...back to my story :p I figured I'd put Evan's clothes away quick because he didn't have a lot to put away and then I'd go check on the kids. I hung up his shirts then checked on them, they were fine, then moved to his dresser to put away everything else. Just I was putting his PJ's away I hear an odd sound. I go out to see what the kids are doing and Evan is standing at the sliding patio door with the screen door wide open. He was opening it, closing it, opening it, closing it. I yell at him-using his full name of course-and scare the heck out of him. Tell him No and send him to the corner then I realize I don't see Andrew...Andrew was OUTSIDE just walking around the patio!!!! I flipped! The only good part was that Andrew hadn't fallen or rolled down the stairs because he was happy as a clam strutting around the patio. But thank God he hadn't gotten hurt! And all I wanted to do was try to get the dang laundry put away! Needless to say that was about a week ago and the laundry still isn't put away. Now I'm too afraid to even try it! I don't know what I'd find the boys doing if I tried putting their clothes away again! Most days I can't even go to the bathroom without them getting into the DVD cabinet or pulling things off the china cabinet or dining room table. And all of that is part of the reason why I'm trying to get started on my fall deep cleaning a little earlier than usual.

Cleaning, Organizing, and more cleaning!

So I've kind of fallen off the blogging wagon the last week, sorry!! I've been trying really hard to get the house deep cleaned-something I only do twice a year. I reorganized the pantry since I hadn't bothered to really organize it in the first place. I'm now in the process of trying to de-clutter the dining room and the computer corner...important paperwork is always all over the computer desk and for some reason never makes it to the right file, so I'm going to get everything put away and work on a better organizational system.

I'd love to work on the basement, but that's going to have to wait for a trip to IKEA. I was going to just order the shelves I want online, but little did I know that I'd end up paying way more than the shelf and bins would cost me just in the shipping charges...it's highway robbery!!! But that just means that Josh and I are now planning a weekend getaway to Minneapolis to take the kids to the Mall of America and to go to IKEA. I'm pretty sure we're going to be taking someone along to help us with the kiddos, and so we can go have a nice dinner out alone. I would say we'd just leave the kids with Josh's parents but, well, we can barely get Evan to sleep in his bed let alone trying to get him to stay at someone elses house.

Once I'm done with the dining room and the computer corner, it'll be on to the bathroom and our bedroom. I absolutely hate cleaning the bathroom! I wipe down the sinks and the counter now and then. I've also been known to clean the toilet...but that's about it.

Our newest "furniture" purchase...

After listening to Josh whine about wanting a Lovesac, I finally told him if he didn't shut up and order one I was going to! So together we picked out one that we wanted, that was on clearance, and got it ordered. I have to admit, it is the most comfortable piece of furniture I've ever owned! Andrew and I fell asleep on it together twice last week lol! I've fallen asleep on it a couple of times during nap time. Not that all you do is sleep on it, but it is seriously comfortable and relaxing! Not that I want to get rid of our couches and just have lovesacs because that would be insane, but I'm definitely glad that we got it! :)

The kids love it too. It's fun to climb up on, jump onto off the couch, wrestle and roll on, and of course to snuggle on!!! Andrew just likes to rub his face on it!!! He's such a little goober!

Andrew's First Birthday Party!

I so am not going to win mom of the year after this part planning fiasco! I completely forgot to order Andrew a cake. Thankfully Target makes delicious cakes and had this cute cake premade. So I bought some icing in a tube and figured I'd write on it myself...it's been a long time since I've written on a cake...like since Foods class my Junior year of high school!!!!

I also got a couple dozen cupcakes because Target doesn't make smash cakes. So Andrew got his very own cupcake!

This is my favorite picture!

Dang this thing is so good!

He ate the important part...the frosting!!

Even though I was completely unorganized for Andrew's party, it still went pretty well. We did have to make do with no mosquito torches or candles, but all-in-all it was still a good evening. Thankfully most everybody was able to sit or stand somewhere in the main room once the bugs got bad out.

So I guess I've learned my lesson...next year I will have the boys' birthdays planned out much more in advance..like a month at least. Including invitations ready to send, cake/cupcakes ordered, decorations bought, party supplies bought, and the menu made. It can only get easier now as they get older right?!

Crazy Weekend!

I'll start this entry by saying despite some little snags, the weekend went by quickly and pretty smoothly. :p

So...Friday afternoon at about 4:30 my mom calls and asks if I'll let their dogs out...Saturday morning. Oh, and they were already in Fort Dodge at their friends house where they were staying for the night. Knowing I had a million things to do Saturday to get ready for Andrew's party, I still said yes. This was snag number one...

Saturday morning the boys decided to sleep in...until 9:30!!! Normally, I would totally be thrilled. But I don't like getting up to an alarm, I should rephrase...I don't get up to alarms very well, so I just get up with whichever boy wakes up first. They usually wake up by 8, so I was planning to be up at 8 to go let the dogs out and then come back home and start cleaning and decorating. Well the whole sleeping until 9:30 thing threw me off my schedule and I got up and immediately got the boys eating their breakfast and started cleaning. In case you hadn't noticed...I completely forgot about the dogs! :s

By 11 Josh and I are cleaning as fast as we can. Josh is vacuuming, I'm decorating the house and cleaning up the kitchen. We do a quick lunch and then take the boys outside for a bit to play since it was so nice out. I help Josh get the boys down for naps and then I head to Ankeny to get some last minute things at Target and to get balloons. I'm at the register at the party store, waiting for the cashier to run my check when I txt Josh. And that's when the you-know-what hit the fan...the last txt I got from Josh was from the day before and it says that mom wants us to let the dogs out in the morning. Yup...I didn't remember the dogs until about 2:30 in the afternoon. To make matters worse, I have the key to mom & dad's house in my Jeep and Josh is home since the boys are napping. I leave my balloons to be filled while I run across the the road to Target and do a quick in and out. I go back to the party store to get the balloons and I literally speed all the way back to Maxwell.

I get to my parents and run to the door. As soon as I unlock the door and walk in I realize that I got there way too late. Dexter had an accident in his kennel. I felt so bad for him. Mae Mae thankfully hadn't had an accident but she definitely needed out. I let the dogs outside to go potty and run, and then spent 20 minutes cleaning up some definitely not solid dog poo...Yuck! But I get Dexter's kennel-and the floor around the kennel-cleaned up and kennel the dogs back up. I speed across town to our house to finish party preparations...its now 4:30 & the party is supposed to start in an hour. Josh still needed to take the trailer back out to the farm and then go to Ankeny to get Dominos Pizza. We have a bunch of buy-one get-one-free coupons so we had a pizza party with a salad bar.

Josh leaves and I get busy doing the last of the dishes and setting out the rest of the plastic plates and napkins and other party items. People started showing up at about 5 and all I could think was...this was probably my most horribly planned party ever! I felt completely un-prepared and I hadn't even gotten a moment to clean up the bathroom! But oh well! We sat around talking until Josh got home with the pizza. Some of us went outside to eat on the patio while the kids played on the playset. And here is where snag number two comes in...we have tiki torches with no fuel. My nice citronella candles I ordered from Gold Canyon last year are at the camper...we have no way to keep the mosquitos away!!! Oooops! Before dog poo incident I'd been planning to have Josh run to the camper to get the bug stuff and then go get pizza...but we just didn't have the time!

Needless to say the party was great, Andrew made out like a fat rat, and we all went to bed exhausted!!!!! Thankfully we only do this a couple times a summer right?!

My baby is (almost) one year old!!!! :(

Tomorrow is the big day, Andrew will be one. I almost can't believe it's been a year already. A year since my second beautiful son was born. This time, this day actually, a year ago I was so thankful that my OB had written a note excusing me from work the rest of my pregnancy due to severe pubic bone pain. Because the day before I went into labor with Andrew was probably one of my most uncomfortable days ever. The baby was ready to come out and I had a lot of braxton hicks the two days before he was born. I was so thankful that my OB had given me some pain meds because I was actually able to get some sleep! Then the next day I went into labor. It was like Andrew knew that I'd gotten some rest and was ready for him to come out!

Andrew-he was 4 days old.

I never thought that Andrew would be walking so well by the time he was one. He is walking everywhere now! He's still a little unsteady, but he's getting pretty darn good! He can make it all the way from the patio doors in the dining room to the love-seat in the living room, which to do hat he has to make a big horse-shoe shaped trip. Although he doesn't always get the opportunity to go that whole way because Evan has decided that its pretty fun to walk up behind Andrew and stick his gut out to belly bump him so he falls down. It's so hard not to laugh because he looks so funny doing it! But of course we have to be stern and say no pushing. But it won't be long before Andrew is running all over the place and chasing Evan down to push him back!

This was the first smile I caught on camera, and man did it take a long time!

The last couple days I've been looking back at Evan and Andrew's newborn baby pictures, and it ALMOST makes me want to get pregnant again right now. Then I remember that I'm just starting to work on getting Evan potty trained, that Andrew STILL doesn't sleep through the night (he was up at 12:45 last night and I ended up in the living room with him trying to get him back to sleep.), and most importantly that I'm trying to get my thyroid figured out before I get pregnant again. Maybe next fall! :p