Back to life, back to reality

We've had a pretty crazy couple of weeks. Now I am sitting down to my Christmas music, kids napping, computer time and trying to catch up on life. I have almost no pictures to show for any of our current craziness, but will try to catch you up somehow!
*we are having a BOY!!! Champ (no middle name yet) Hunter, due April 30th, 2010.
*Canon had his first birthday, first "real" haircut, and first trip to Dallas in a forward facing carseat! hurray he did so good!
*we moved out of our house - we filled a POD in one day, and had all of our furniture left!! Phillip made about 15 trips in the ZOE van to a friends basement! (thanks Cossey's)
*we lived with Phillip's parents for a few nights, went to Dallas to see our sweet niece Brooklyn!!!, came back to Phillip's parents, went on a ZOE girl's retreat, and then finally moved into an apartment last night!
*there has been lots of cleaning, moving, laundry
*all three kids including myself have a cold...no fun! it's hard to get rid of when you are moving all around
*Avery and Atley are sharing a queen size bed
*They are doing wonderful with potty training, despite our crazy life. thank goodness!
*Atley had her first eye doctor appointment. She got many tests and her eyes dilated today. Please pray for healing in both her eye muscles by January, and no surgery required! (sometimes either of her eyes will turn in, broadly known as a lazy eye, but it has a more specific medical name and diagnosis)
*I've been so out of touch that I still don't really understand or know what happened to MckMama's son Stellan?! could someone fill me in :)
*I'm adjusting to life in a two bedroom apartment, sharing a room with my one year old, and using couches, dishes, furniture that isn't mine. I will be very excited for a brand new house!!!
*Despite circumstances, Jesus is my JOY! Man, if I let every little thing get me down I think I might just live under a rock some days. Praise the Lord for freedom and life in Him!
Pictures to come:)
Shelly

Annual Pumpkin Patch Picture

Each year we go to the same pumpkin patch and take a picture in the same exact place. Well, as I'm learning, each year it is getting a little more difficult. I love pumpkin season, FALL, and all that it entails. Here are a few pictures from our trip this year.

The girls holding hands this year...and below was last year. They sure have grown!

Mommy and the girls

Playing in the pumpkin wagon

Sweet Canon...who will turn ONE tomorrow!!!

Sweet Avery loves to smile for the camera

Sweet Atley likes to smile too, but usually looks away before you have time to snap the picture :)

2009
Each year we keep adding one more to the patch
2008

I always love these kissing pictures :)

This was where we take our family picture every year. Our attempts were so difficult that Phillip didn't even get in the picture this year! We took another one in a different location. Two year olds are sure on the go!


The annual Pumpkin Patch Pictures:

2006 - pregnant with the twins

2007

2008 - very pregnant with Canon

2009 - 12 weeks pregnant with #4

We can't wait to see what next year will bring! Our life is full, and blessed. Praise the Lord!

What I'm loving right now

Fall colors, smells, activities
Christmas music!
my new little niece, Brooklyn, will be born Friday!!
the pumpkin patch
college football
the homecoming parade
pumpkin spice lattes
not being at all surprised, but still joyful, of the Lord's provision in our move and decisions
TOT school - it is going great
not really leaving the house Mon.-Wed. and staying in PJ's all day, every week!
my hubby let me sleep in today
being more in love with my husband all the time
my morning (afternoon and night) sickness is SLOWLY, but surely going away
it's getting dark earlier at night
the girls are doing better potty training (finally!)

my little boy standing and happy, almost ONE YEAR OLD!

My "little" girls all bundled and ready for the homecoming parade!

Even though I'm not enjoying packing, I do like that they all love playing in the boxes so much

cutie in his new carseat! he LOVES it and looks so cute and big in it! He literally couldn't fit into his old one with all the winter clothes I've been bundling him up in!

Sweet Atley posing for the camera, showing off her pumpkin shirt. I was made fun of for my smile until I was about 18, so hopefully she will grow out of this before I did! :)

Avery posing for the camera. Her hair finally fits into one ponytail and it is so cute! I made them all pumpkin shirts a few months ago and can't wait until the weather is nice so we can go take our annual pumpkin patch picture!

Spending time with my hubby (and all our friends) for a really fun limo ride, picture taking, salsa dancing, nice dinner, scavenger hunt date!

My Pumpkin Patch

What 11 month old doesn't want to eat the pumpkins?

I love this time of year, packing, moving and all. We are slowly packing and will move out the week of the 23rd-29th. We will stay in a rental apartment until we move into our new house in March...just in time for the new baby to arrive! Lots of change ahead for our little, growing family. The Lord is taking care of us, praise His name!!

oops

Opps, to say the least, has been happening a lot around here lately. On Friday when Phillip and I got to Walmart, I remembered that my cell phone was ON top of the car! Well, it wasn't there by the time we got to walmart and had fallen off somewhere between there and home. We looked and looked when we got home...but to no avail. Phillip went that night and got me a new one...what a sweet husband!
Then on Sunday afternoon the kids got locked in the car, with the keys! Right after I had buckeled them all up, I shut the door and all the doors locked! I realized right away I was in trouble, the keys were on the floorboard, the kids all buckeled in, Phillip was out of town, I had no spair set of keys. I was a little panicky. I tried to get Avery to get out of her seat to help me unlock the door, but she was confused and this eventually led her to tears. I had called Phillip immediantely and he had a friend coming over who does this all the time. I was pretty calm when 15 minutes later he showed up and began working on the passenger side door. After that door wouldn't cooperate and unlock from the inside he said this might be a problem. It was then I started to get really nervous. It was like Canon could tell from inside the car, and he started screaming. Avery had fallen asleep by this time, and Atley was content just watching Mr. Paul pry the door open and mess with the locks. By this time Phillip's dad, and our family friend Joe Brooks came over. When nothing was working and Mr. Paul, who does this all the time, couldn't figure it out, I was about ready to break a window. One more man to the rescue, Brad Gilbert, who helps us buy and fix all our cars. He said he'd be over in 5 minutes and he knew he could get it. 4 men, a golf club, and an hour later, the door FINALLY opened! Canon was screaming for more than 30 minutes, and when I got him out he was COVERED in sweat! Poor thing! Avery was still asleep, and Atley was content to just sit there. What a sweetie! Needless to say, some lessons were learned on my part. Get a second set of keys, always double ckeck the doors before you shut them, and don't let your two year olds play in the front seat :)
We haven't gone anywhere since Sunday, I'm staying away from the car:)

More Big News

Well, first of all, we sold our house today. We are moving in ONE MONTH! We don't know exactly where yet, but I'll keep you posted. I am so happy to be done with the house showing part of this, but there are quite a few months of change coming up for us. Not to mention I am now 9 weeks pregnant and definitely feeling sick more often. But, the Lord gave us this baby, and His timing is perfect.
Secondly, the girls are finally sleeping in big girl beds. I wanted to hold off as long as possible because well, they are twins, girls, best friends, love to talk, play, laugh, jump, read books together, pretend to be mommy to each other, and more....and the idea of them being able to have free range of their bedroom once the lights were out was more than overwhelming. But really, they were doing all of this anyway in their cribs, so I figured it really couldn't get any worse so why not! They did great the first week, and this second week has been more of a struggle. Especially nap time. But they are learning, and I think this comes as a blessing since we will be traveling, moving, and needing to be flexible in the next few months, and now we only have one in a crib instead of 3! It also helps that their big girl beds are actually their cribs, just with one of the sides off.


We also started TOT School. I found THIS blog a while back and have been planning and preparing to start this with the girls...on a mini scale. It is so fun to have a few easy, structured, planned activities to do with the girls when Canon goes down for his morning nap. They are learning some simple skills that they would be learning in preschool, but since they are home with mommy, they are doing TOT school:)
Here are our Tot Trays. See the website or email me to find out more information about this.

Canon, sweet boy, now has 6 teeth! And he is only 11 months old today!

Atley playing "dominoes" as part of her tot school on the first day.

Avery is waiting for school to begin

GO MIZZOU. Phillip and I are going to all the home games for Mizzou again this year, thanks to the sweet Willitt family. All the kids dress up in their Tigers gear every Saturday. You can't tell but Canon even has a Tigers outfit on,and the girls have on cheerleading outfits. So cute.

BABYFULL

ATLEY, AVERY, CANON, + 1 MORE! I'M DUE AT THE END OF APRIL!!!