Getting better

We think Lucas's vision is getting better. It's still hard for him to find you and focus, but when he does, he sure does. He is so smiley and giggly when he sees and hears people. You can tell he enjoys it when he can see things. He looks all over, his eyes exploring and taking in whatever it can. I take him back to the eye doctor in a few weeks.
In these pictures he is focusing on the little mirror and toy on his chair. He wasn't able to really focus on something this close before. I love his face! He's so focused and so exited.

Circus

The boys and I met up with Kristin and Kelsey at a Circus that came to town tonight. The acts themselves were pretty good, though sometimes lacked a little excitement. However, there was so much time in between each act. Seriously circus people, we have little kids here to keep occupied. Kristin and I got quite a few laughs. First off we both got "free child admission with a paying adult "coupons. The adult admission was $15. Gulp. No wonder the boys got in for free. ;)

They had a ton of gimmicks, and people walking around trying to sell things. I obviously know where they make their money. You'd hear the guy over the speaker saying, "Raise your hand if you want....." and of course all the kids would go crazy raising their hands and go running to ask their parents for money. The boys were pretty good about it. I did give into Connor asking to buy one of the bags of peanuts they were selling for $1. One of the bags had a ticket in it for a $1 elephant ride (which were normally $5 per kid and $7 per adult. We were not the lucky winners. We also had some cotton candy.

It was entertaining to say the least and something to do.

After the circus we went to the softball diamonds and watched daddy play softball. He was subbing for a team. It was extremely windy outside, so I stayed in the van with Lucas and the boys sat on a bench. Connor loved chasing the foul balls and home run balls.

Back at it

It was my first day back today. I didn't want to put Lucas in his car seat and then got a little teary eyed handing him to Matt.
However, when I got to school I received many wonderful "welcome backs" and a few thoughtful gifts. Matt and the boys sent me flowers. The kids were great, the staff was so kind, and an hour into the day I felt like I never left.
I sure was in a hurry to get home though and see those boys. ;)
It's funny, for awhile there I used to stay as late as I could until I had to pick the boys up from daycare taking advantage of time to get some stuff done. It was always hard to get stuff done at home. I find myself wanting to go pick those boys up a lot earlier now.

Weekend

Lucas rolled over for the first time Friday afternoon. He was on his tummy and rolled over. I happened to taking pictures of him because he was doing such a great job holding his head up and he surprised me with a roll over!


Friday night the boys and I and Grandma and Grandpa went to the House of Bounce. Grandma and Grandpa had never been there. Boy, the boys sure have one hip Grandma. She got a wrist band and went in and on everything with them. They had a blast. We ate at Perkins on our way home. The boys fell asleep in the car.


Saturday I went into school for a few hours to get ready for Monday, my first day back at it. I got very overwhelmed. We'll see how it all goes. When I got home we played around the house with Grandma and Grandpa who were over helping watch the boys because Matt is still gone.
Grandma and Grandpa left in the afternoon and the boys and I played a TON of games the rest of the night. We also fell asleep together watching the Twins. Jacob and Nolan fell asleep in the living room, so I put them to bed. Connor slept in bed with me for the night and I of course fell asleep before him, he told me all about how the game ended when we woke up this morning.
Lucas slept through the night again last night. Woo hoo.


Today we went to church, went out for breakfast and then went to watch Diane dance in a competition in the cities. The boys were bummed they couldn't go, but I didn't know what to expect. With three of them that can run around you never know. They stayed home with my friends Justin until Matt got home from his trip. However, the competition is a set up that they could totally go to. She has another one in a couple of weekends and the boys really want to go. I had no idea what to expect, but the thing was huge. Diane did great, she is a beautiful dancer and how awesome that she can do something that she is still so passionate about. Some of the ladies that were up there dancing could have possibly been my age and it made me miss dancing. Though I'm not very good, I really enjoyed it when I was younger. Kelsey loved the dancers and was really interested. I think they have a future dancer on their hands.

Happy Birthday daddy!

We miss you and bummed that we’re not with you to celebrate. We love you and hope you have a super day.

Connor says Happy Birthday daddy. I love you. You are the best daddy ever. Thanks for playing catch off the rebounder with me. I’m so glad you got that for us.

Jacob says Happy Birthday daddy. I love you and hope you have a good day. Thank you for playing memory with me.

Nolan says Happy Birthday. I love you. Thank you for playing choos choos with me.

Lucas says I love to snuggle right into your big inviting arms and chest. I also love to give you big smiles when you talk me.

Those darn females...

We've been taping and watching the series Life on the Discovery channel. Anybody else watch these? They're pretty amazing and all about the diversity, survival, and behavior of animals and plants. Well, they sometimes talk about and show the living things mating. They don't go into detail and are very appropriate. I'm not sure what Connor actually understands, I should probably talk to him about it. He hasn't asked though, so I thought I'd let him stay innocent for a little while longer. This morning we were watching a little bit of one on Deep Ocean Creatures and it was talking about some creature mating. Connor looks at me and says, "Hmm.....Mommy, you know what's funny? When animals get married (his version and understanding of "mating" and "reproducing") the female is always in charge and the males always fight over the females". Funny how he picked up on this.

Yep, that pretty much sums it up Connor. Reality! ;)

We celebrated Matt's birthday last night since he won't be with us to celebrate it tomorrow. We went out for supper, had ice cream cake at home, and then he opened his presents. It's fun when the boys can pick some of the presents out themselves. They all made him a card and are really into this lately.


I finished painting and hanging up stuff in our bathroom tonight. It actually looks "homey and relaxing" now.


Jacob, Nolan, and I played outside a ton today (baseball, sticky paddle, soccer, sand box), and then some more when we got home with Connor. They were all pretty tired tonight. Jacob asked me for some "wet' water today so that he could pour it into the sandbox. Opposed to the dry water that I normally give him?! ;)

The boys and I went into my school this afternoon to chat a little with my sub. I'll have to go in this weekend to get a few things ready. I'm in denial at the moment though and hoping that maybe it's all a dream and I get to stay home longer! I'll be pinched soon I'm sure. I am excited to see my coworkers and students though.




What can you make out of 3 boxes that mattress pads came in? I'm not sure, but I'll let you know when it's finished.



Connor said to me, "Seriously mom, I really know what I'm doing. I have a plan. You'll see."


Where's Nolan?


BOO!

I normally feed Lucas and he falls asleep before I put him down to bed. However tonight it was just me so I decided to put him in his crib while he was still awake so that I could snuggle with the boys a little (I haven't been able to do this a ton because I'm normally feeding Lucas). I was halfway expecting to have to go get him and hold him some more. I went in to check on him after putting the older boys to bed and he was sound asleep. This would be a great habit to get him into.

Seriously? Another picture mom? I already smiled for you. Enough please.

13 weeks

Lucas is 13 weeks today. I cannot believe this much time has come and gone. It makes me sad. Especially thinking about the fact that it could be the last time I get to do some of these things (hold my "baby/infant", rock him to sleep, nurse, watch the developmental changes, see the first smile and connection). However, I am not giving up hope that I can work my magic on Matt someday again! ;) HA! ;)

He likes to hold things in his hands, however it's a bummer that he can't see them very well yet. That's part of the fun for them at this age. Thankfully they make noises.

When he does track you and focus on you, he smiles a ton and loves to talk with you. He LOVES hearing voices and listening to people, and then interacting with you.

He pushes off with his feet on everything, in fact he's almost rolling over on his left side when he has something to push off with.

Knock on wood, but last night he slept from 8pm until 4 am. Maybe he knows I have to go back to work and wants to make things as easy as possible for me. ;)

Spring Cleaning

I am trying to do some spring cleaning this week before I head back to school. I have wiped all the baseboards, washed the floors, clean the bathrooms, and dusted. I want to finish putting together the master bathroom and wash all the windows and screens. I am having nightmares of what this ........is going to look like in five years. Heck, even in two years. I feel like I'm constantly doing it. I have visions of sweaty, muddy shoes, pants, jerseys, etc....all over my laundry room floor. I think we need to add on to it. ;)


The boys have been begging me to plant the garden. It's such a hard call. Normally we always wait until the golden rule of Mother's day (we'll wait to do our flowers until then). I finally caved into their begging and it's been so nice out lately.
We had a blast with it on Monday and the boys were huge helpers. We'll see how it turns out however, because some of the seeds were placed too close together I think. I wanted to let them do it on their own though. Lucas just hung out in his car seat the whole time telling us stories, or so the boys like to call it when he's making his noises!




This has begun already.I don't remember it being every Saturday AND Monday last year, but it is this year. It's amazing what one year can do for development and confidence. Connor is a maniac out there on the field.



I was able to help out in Connor's class one more time this morning. I helped make Earth day t-shirts for them to wear on Thursday. I am going to miss this opportunity, but so glad I was able to do the little that I was. Kindergarten is so fun and easy to be a part of (no, not easy as a teacher, just easy as a parent to volunteer). I am so fortunate that Lucas is a good baby which allowed me to be able to bring him with.

my I LOVE YOU

I was reading a post by a blog I follow sometimes (http://holpeterson.blogspot.com/) and she posted the words to this children’s book – You are my I Love You. I can’t take credit for it, but I sure can share it because it touched me and I LOVE it.

I am your parent; you are my child.

I am your quiet place; you are my wild.

I am your calm face; you are my giggle.

I am your wait; you are my wiggle.

I am your carriage ride; you are my king.

I am your push; you are my swing.

I am your audience; you are my clown.

I am your London Bridge; you are my falling down.

I am your carrot sticks; you are my licorice.

I am your dandelion; you are my first wish.

I am your water; you are my deep.

I am your open arms; you are my running leap.

I am your way home; you are my new path.

I am your dry towel; you are my wet bath.

I am your dinner; you are my chocolate cake.

I am your bedtime; you are my wide awake.

I am your finish line; you are my race.

I am your praying hands; you are my saying grace.

I am your favorite book; you are my new lines.

I am your night-light; you are my star shine.

I am your lullaby; you are my peek-a-boo.

I am your good-night kiss; you are my I love you.

(Words by Mayann K. Cusimano)

These guys sure are my I LOVE YOU.

Ginskey Feet

Gotta love these little feet!

Nerd Fest 2010

I attended another scrap booking weekend. It was in town again, which is so convenient, and I went with my friends Melissa and Wendy. I finished Jacob's book...woo hoo and did one, yes one, page in Nolan's. I'm on a role. Wendy's husband referred to it as Nerd fest so we joked about it all weekend. A few other funnies so I remember - were urgent texts and "it smells like hot dogs or some type of sausage product in here". Too funny. Always a good time with these ladies. We're going to try to do this quarterly! I might actually get caught up someday.

Saturday night Matt and I went to the St. Mary's auction and had a great time. We bought a few of Connor's classroom donations. He really wanted us to get something and even offered to give us $50 of his own money to put towards it. We told him he could keep his own money! ;) We came home with more than we planned, but that's OK, he was happy.

Wow was it nice out today! We were going to start planting, but got occupied with a few other things. Maybe tomorrow.

This is my last week of maternity leave. Live it up.

A couple pictures from the weekend.

Working on our vocab

Jacob, Nolan, and I were buying some seeds yesterday. If the boys were in charge we would have had everything and anything in our garden this year. I had to say no to many things. Jacob grabbed some "pumpkinlanterns" as he called them and I had to tell him that we haven't had good luck with those. We finally decided on what we wanted and continued on our shopping trip.

We were playing memory last night and I drew the whale (picture of a killer whale/orca) and Nolan said to me, "No mommy, that's not a whale, that's a shamu". OK then, it's a shamu.

Connor comes out of the bathroom and says, "Mommy, I'm getting into a really good habitat of washing my hands".

Twins Opening Day Game, Monday, April 12th. 2010

Monday we were bad parents and went to the Twin’s game on Nolan’s birthday. Knowing we were going to be gone for a good portion of the day we celebrated on Sunday and then did our traditional birthday morning stuff before we took them all to daycare and school. It was a crazy morning!

We headed up pretty early because we knew there would be a lot going on, plus we weren’t too familiar with it. We found a perfect parking spot in a lot about a block 1/2 away, however it also cost us a decent amount of money.

We hung out in the plaza for a little while and then went and got in line by one of the gates.

There was this commotion that started in front of us and we realized that we were at gate 34, named after Kirby Puckett, and Kirby Jr. moved to the front of our line. The cameras were all over him. At each gate the first person through it was the person it was named after.

We were some of the first people in the stadium (was told by a few people that we were on TV at a couple different spots) and headed down to the field to watch the Twins warm up. It’s crazy how close this stadium has the fans to the field. It’s awesome.

The boys got t-shirts (you’ve seen them in many posts already) of these three guys from Natey and Diane for Christmas. Connor is Morneau, Jacob is Cuddy, and Nolan is Mauer.

After we watched them warm up, we walked around a bit, went and found our seats (HA! which were 5 rows from the very top row of the stadium. We were WAY up there, but we still had a great view. Thank goodness our season tickets are much better! It didn’t matter though, it was just awesome to be there.)

Trying out our seats.

I got the biggest kick out of these trees in center field.

I love that it’s open and almost anywhere you go you can still watch the game. Even while you’re in line getting a hot dog!

The 5 men the gates are named after: (Harmon Killebrew Gate 3, Tony Oliva Gate 6, Kent Hrbek Gate 14, Rod Carew Gate 29 and Kirby Puckett Gate 34 –Kirby Jr. represented)

The Twins taking the field officially for the first time

We even got to see the sign light up when Kubel hit the first homeroom.

We had a great day. The forecast was saying rain for many days beforehand, however it turned out to be a beautiful day with sunshine and all. It’s going to be a fun baseball season. We can’t wait to go back and to bring the boys.