guenther journey

January Recap

2012-02-01T09:07:00.000-06:00

Since one of my New Years Resolutions was to blog at least once a week (which I have been doing!) I also wanted to add to it that I want to do a post at the end of every month of a 'recap' of what we did that month or big things that happened. Again, mostly for a reminder for me in the future when I'm trying to remember what age a child was when something happened or putting a photo book together and can't remember anything! :)

Milestones/Special Events:
*Of course our biggest event this month was Grady's 3rd Bday on January 27th!
*Brynlee was 9 Months on January 1st.
*Brynlee cut her 2 top teeth! Technically, 1 of them isn't all the way poked through yet, but she ws working on them all month it seemed like! That brings her total count to 4. 2 on the bottom and 2 on the top.
*We celebrated the Luehring Christmas on January 7th!
*The kids spent their first night at Gma & Gpa Guenther's alone, without Mom and Dad.
*Paul and I got to spend a night in Omaha with our dear friends Luke & Becky!
*Grady went to his first Husker Bball game, first Husker game of any kind, actually! He LOVED it! Keeps telling us he wants to go back again some day. (Luckily for him, we are sharing Husker baseball season tickets with some friends this year!)
*Brynlee is getting very close to walking. She stands on her own for awhile, but drops to her knees immediately if she realizes it, or if she wants to get somewhere.
*Grady got pink eye! 2 days before his bday, yuck! Did pretty good with letting us put the drops in, he was scared of the anticipation of it, but then when we actually had to put the drops in, he was fine. (Brynlee never got it!)
*Went to Madison's 3rd Bday party!
*Grady went to the dentist for a check up AND to the doctor for his 3 year check up. (Weight: 30.5 lbs. Height: 38 in)
*We signed Grady up for preschool next year. He will be in the 3 year old, Tuesday/Thursday morning class at Cathedral of the Risen Christ.
*We bought a van! Yes, I'm a mini-van momma. Paul talked me into it. I can't argue that it is the best space for the money and mileage and everything. So far we are LOVING it for the ease of getting the kids in/out! So much easier! And, I LOVE the automatic doors and remote start. I'm getting too lazy to open my own car door.... :) We traded in my little white 99 Grand Am. Paul is much happier with the wheels he gets to drive to work now, and he has a radio again! And doors/mirrors that aren't taped together....
*We did some painting/redecorating of the house. The blue stripe is gone downstairs and we painted over it in red, so we now have a Husker room! It is coming together quite nicely! Can't wait to add more in the future!

Looking forward to February to:
*Grady starts swimming lessons!
*We are going to Elmo Live! And, I am going to Mamma Mia!
*Luke's 3rd Birthday and party!
*We are going to be Aunt/Uncle/Cousins again! Cassie & Andy are due on Feb 13th. Can't wait for that baby to come!! We were just talking with Gradyn last night about it because he said to me, "When Brynlee was born I went to the hospital with Ashley and had a balloon." (After we saw a newborn baby after being born on TV (Tori and Dean!!) and we were talking about how when Brynlee was that little.) So, now we are very excited to go see our new little niece or nephew in the hospital!
*A get together with college friends!
*Hopefully, a little down time after our busy January! :)

Zoo cake awesomeness....

2012-01-29T23:05:00.001-06:00

Even Zebra print on the inside!

3rd Birthday Extravaganza

2012-01-29T22:56:00.000-06:00

Candles & Waffles for breakfast!

G's favorite! Mac & Cheese at Noodles, for a Birthday lunch!

Cherry on Top for dessert!

Bday present from Mom & Dad.

A bike!

And, a Leapster game!

Out for birthday dinner at Red Robin! They sang to him, got birthday balloons, AND a Sundae! He LOVED the singing part and was SO excited for them to come sing and while they were singing. He could have cared less about the Sundae part though. He's not much for ice cream. He still got to have another favorite meal: Grilled Cheese. AND, more Pop! Since it was his bday he got to have pop for lunch AND dinner!

Presents from Aunt Shari! (Aunt Ashley was also there to go out to celebrate with us!)

The Zoo Party!

Starting with The Food!

All of Gradyn's favorites!

(He is so weird. When I ask him what he wants for supper, he will usually say peas, applesauce, green beans, corn, etc.)

Craft Time! They made a door knob hanging with zoo animals and letters to spell their name or first letter of their name. G didn't really care about it, he didn't want to sit still!

The Pinata fun!

And, precious Brynlee! :)

Pics of the awesome cake (made by Aunt Shari, of course!) coming soooon!!!

Birthday treats for daycare

2012-01-29T22:18:00.003-06:00

Brownies with GREEN frosting and M&M's

G's first Husker game!

2012-01-29T22:15:00.000-06:00

Paul's been going to lots of Husker Basketball games this season with some friends. A couple weeks ago, we ended up being able to use all 4 tickets so Paul, Grady, and I went. It was awesome, Huskers won in a thriller!

Huskers vs. Indiana 70-69

Birthday Week!!

2012-01-26T16:58:00.000-06:00

Well, it's Grady's 3rd Birthday week! We have already been celebrating each day!
On Monday he had his party at Kellan's house, since he won't be there on Friday, his actual birthday. Grady and I made a 'cake' to share with his friends for snack. Per his request we made brownies (his absolute favorite, not a cake or cookie lover) with green frosting, and M&M's. Pictures to come soon!

He has also had a present to open every day, part of our bday WEEK celebration! :) Pictures soon of that also. So far he has gotten: baseball socks, dinosaur pajamas, a baseball nightlight, and fruit snacks.

His party with family/friends is on Saturday night. Zoo party!

He had his 3 year check up yesterday. (And then woke up with Pink eye today! which we are assuming came from the Dr. office. Yes, go to the doctor and come home sick...)
He was very freaked out at his appt. He started screaming, clinging to us, hysterical, as soon as the nurse walked in. We were kind of shocked because he did SO good at the dentist a couple weeks ago and every time we have went for Brynlee's appointments he was loving it there. So, we thought it would be no sweat, had been talking about everything the doctor would look at, etc. He was excited to see if the doctor found bunnies or snakes in his ears! But, seriously freaked out. We had to hold him down screaming just to get his length measurement. He is such a scaredy cat! It made me so much more thankful (and even more admirable of families of chronically sick kids) that he is a healthy boy and we don't have to go see the doctor much.
He eventually calmed down a little, and everything looked good. He is doing fine with everything, and the doctor agreed with us that his potty training regression recently is just his little naughty streak/game playing and we should just ignore it and wait it out. Her comment: "oh, he's a smarty". Yeah, too much for his own good! :)

His 3 year stats:
Weight: 30.5 lbs.
Height: 38.25 in. (although I have no idea how accurate that is since he was kicking and screaming while I held him down)

We were a little surprised he only weighed 30 lbs, but we have definately noticed that he has stretched out lately and gotten a little thinner because a few of his pants (that fit better all winter) are falling off of his tiny little hips and are annoying to try to keep up all day, even after we roll the waste band! If only his mother had that problem... :)

Can't believe it has already been 3 years!!

Happy 3rd Birthday Lovey!

Pink Nike's!!

2012-01-17T15:59:00.000-06:00

Baking Day

2012-01-17T15:45:00.000-06:00

We did a ton of projects this last weekend!! Most of them had to do with food/the kitchen! The best kind! The kids stayed Friday night/Saturday with Ron and Doris and we got to get a ton of stuff done at home.

Paul and I made 60 Runzas and 30 Pigs in blankets, also a loaf of bread that we had left over. We used 30 hotdogs (obviously), 15 loaves of bread, 7 pounds of hamburger, 2 bags of cabbage, 1 bag of mushrooms, an onion, and 3 packages of sliced cheese! I didn't get any pictures taken of it because we were running late to go meet R&D to pick up the kids. We literally took the 2nd to last batch of Runzas out of the oven at 4:59 and we needed to leave at 5:00. The last batch got put in the oven to bake when we got home. Along with an extra loaf of bread! The house smelled SO good all day! Nothing beter than the smell of baking bread!

Then on Sunday morning, Gradyn and I did some baking after church. (*Note my new pretty yellow mixer in the above picture!)

We made: Oatmeal/chocolate chip cookies (a mix from a Christmas gift he gave us from Kellans!), apple/cinnamon muffins, and waffle mix for the waffles we made later that night for supper.

I also have a great video of Gradyn telling me what we are doing, but I don't feel like waiting 2 hours for it to upload to blogger....grrr!! And, I am too lazy right now to get it on youtube... :) Maybe someday I will have the time to upload my cute videos here! hopefully!

I especially loved this baking session picture/video because it portrays how festive we are for lots of holidays at the same time. He is wearing a Santa apron, he also is wearing a skeleton shirt, and you can see our Valentine placemats on the table in the background. We celebrate everything all year round! :)

The other projects I WILL get pictures of as soon as they are completed. We (and by we, I mean Paul) painted a wall in Gradyn's room AND painted a stripe on it. He also painted over the stripe in our basement that was a light blue as part of the North Carolina room the previous owners had. It needs some touching up but already looks sooo awesome! We also did some redecorating with some pictures/wallhangings and I have been doing a few pinterest projects for the toy room that we also got put up! I am loving doing all of this! It's totally making me want to do like a million other projects around the house. I'm trying to stop for awhile....per Paul's orders... :)

"Mommy, Say Okay!"

2012-01-17T15:08:00.000-06:00

is what Grady says when you are telling him to NOT do something and he still wants to do it. These are common terms heard coming from his mouth:

"Mommy, Say Okay!" - after I told him to stop going down to the end of the bed, under the covers, and that he needed to get on his pillow and go to sleep.

"Talk to ME!" - when he is asking a question (repeatedly) or saying something that we aren't sure needs a response, so we aren't responding. He especially does this in the car, in a very frantic voice. The nerve of us to try to have a conversation without him!

"No, don't say that!" - when we are telling him he can't do something, or scolding him for something.

"I was just...(fill in the blank)" - he has an excuse for everything! We can hardly even start to scold him anymore without him shouting out a quick rebuttal for why he was doing it. Oh my.

"Daddy said okay" - already pitting us against each other. He makes sure that he does not get in trouble for anything if he can get one of us to say okay, even if he knows the other parent will say no, or has already said no. When did he get so smart??? :)

"I'm just going to...(fill in the blank)...OKAY??" - trying to get approval for what he wants to do so he can guarantee not being in trouble for it. However, HIS version of what he is 'just' going to do is not always accurate as to what he 'actually' does! Oh, how this scares me for the future with little boy antics!

Can you tell he knows what being in trouble is like? He also knows when he is gets in trouble and has to go to timeout he does not get to watch TV that night OR play the iPad. Kellan says it kills him when he has to go to timeout at daycare and he instantly knows what is coming that night. Especially because a lot of the things he gets in trouble for are impulse things that he immediately regrets and knows was wrong. Typical 2/3 year old stuff....
He pretty much only has to go to timeout at daycare about 1 day a week. He learns his lesson very soon after he doesn't get to watch his beloved Nick Jr. for a night. And now that he is obsessed with his iPad games/shows/apps, he is doubly dissappointed. He told me that I couldn't be on the iPad either! Little does he know that is part of his punishment, being jealous of ME on the iPad! haha!

More new toys and fun at the park!

2012-01-10T22:31:00.001-06:00

Grady got this Little People Zoo for Christmas this weekend and he loves it! So does Brynlee! :) He has really been into the Little People lately. He also got an airplane that is awesome! That is all the Little People stuff that we have, but he plays with a bunch of them at daycare.
It has been SO nice lately! We've been to the park a couple times which has been so nice to do in January! I only get pictures of my child that can't run away yet! :)

Paul's Craft Night

2012-01-10T22:28:00.002-06:00

Just had to embarrass Paul and show that he helped with Grady's bday invitations!! :) I'm not going to complain about the help, but he DID help at the end at the most fun and easy part...and was not quite as anal about getting them perfectly straight and positioned...but I'm not complaining... :)

Christmas Eve and tons of toys!

2012-01-10T22:26:00.001-06:00

Just playing around with blogging from my phone and decided I should post more pics! These are from Christmas Eve and the huge mountain of presents the kids were blessed with! And that pile is only from 3 of our 8 Christmas parties! I have made a few trips to Target for some organizational things for our new toys! And we made another play area in our basement. So we are all set to PLAY!!

New Pinterest projects!

2012-01-10T22:17:00.001-06:00

So excited about my new find on Pinterest! These were so easy and fun! Made on Picnik, saved as a picture, and them printed them at Target. Picked up some cheap $3 and $5 frames and we have some new decor for the toy room! Brynlee's birth announcement is not done yet, but will be hung right next to Gradyn's.

Brave big boy

2012-01-10T22:12:00.001-06:00

Gradyn went to the dentist yesterday! He did SO good! And had a great report of no cavities and everything looked awesome.

Party Animals

2012-01-01T20:35:00.000-06:00

We are all about Zoo animals and animal print this month! We are having a Zoo Party for Grady's 3rd Birthday because he loves the zoo and animals so much! I decided to make some cutesy invites this year!

The magic of puffs!

2012-01-01T19:58:00.000-06:00

These things have been essential to the upbringing of both of our kids. Gradyn loved them, but I think Brynlee loves them even more!! She is definately not nearly as excitable as Gradyn, but when you bring out the puffs she just goes crazy! I love watching her reaction every night! We do not allow her to even see them until she has eaten her other food or she won't even look at anything else. We also can't make the mistake of opening up the pantry door during the meal or she will get super excited just thinking that she might get them! And then she will be distracted with whining at the door the rest of the meal.
We take them everywhere we go!
Oh, the magic of these sweet little puffs.

Guenther Family 2009

2011-12-30T10:22:00.001-06:00

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Brynlee 9 Month Stats

2011-12-27T12:21:00.000-06:00

Brynlee had her 9 month check-up yesterday at the Doctor's office. (Even though she doesn't turn 9 months until Jan 1st, it was nice to sneak her appointment in when we were both off of work.)

These are her stats:

Weight: 18 lbs. 6 oz - 50%tile
Height: 28.25 in. - 75%tile
Head: 17.5 in. - 50%tile

We were surprised that her height was 75%tile! She is a little tall for her age, which I think seems weird since her cheeks are so chubby, we don't think of her as being tallish. We were not surprised by 50%tile for weight. She seems pretty much average and right on for clothes sizes and stuff. She has been a little above 50%tile until now, she was right on, so I guess percentilewise she has dropped a little.

She is doing great in every aspect! The Doctor said it looks like she is pretty advanced in everything, especially the mobility aspect! haha! Which, we already knew. She is getting closer to standing on her own and will move from person to person walking with only holding on with 2 fingers. The doctor was also very impressed that she will repeat 'words' back to you. She will repeat bye-bye, da da, ma ma, ba ba. Not every time, of course, but most of the time! Grady always tells us, "She is just saying ba ba, she wants her blanket!" or "Brynlee can't talk Mommy, she's too little" after he hears me try to get her to talk back to me! haha! (On another note- Grady has also started to mimic how she talks and talks in baby talk, which can be somewhat annoying to his mom and dad, but Brynlee loves it!)

She got the 2nd dose of her flu shot at the appointment, which she was not happy about, but did great. She stopped crying as the nurse was leaving the room, looked right at the nurse, stared her down, and then looked back and me and started crying on my shoulder again. It was so funny! She did NOT like that mean nurse!

Next on our list with Brynlee: Start giving her some meats, variety of foods. We've been pretty hesitant to give her meats or other table foods yet since she wasn't ever eating baby food very well. We wanted her to be better with the baby foods first and feel like she was getting some nutrition. And by "we" I mean "I" because Paul has always wanted to just skip the baby food since she wouldn't eat it anyway, but I'm the one who said no. She will eat ANY table food we have given her. There is nothing she doesn't like so far. Even pickles! So, I knew that if we kept giving her "good" table foods that she would never eat the baby foods! We usually hide her snacks, puffs, other table foods we are eating until she has eaten a little bit of her baby food or she will refuse it.
She LOVES pancakes and waffles as much as her brother does! She does a great job of eating everything and has only had 1 or 2 times total in the past couple of months that she has started to gag/choke. VERY UNLIKE HER BROTHER! HE still throws up once or twice a week (at least) because of this...and because he is so picky and will only eat like 5 different foods....and because he eats so fast and crazy and has no patience.... But, this post is supposed to be about Brynlee! He's another story! :)

So anyway, at 9 months she is doing great!!!! We are SO blessed!!

A Very Merry Holiday!

2011-12-27T12:05:00.000-06:00

We had such a nice Christmas! It was crazy, busy, and fast, but we got to see lots of family! The kids got tons of great new toys and Paul and I also got quite a lot of nice things that we are pumped about! Hopefully I will have time to add some pictures soon.

We started on Thursday night with a dinner at our house with my sister and Dan. We ate and then opened a few gifts. Grady got a new Ducky game that he is really excited about! Every time this weekend when we would tell him that someone is going to come to our house (at some point in the future) he would always ask if they could play his Ducky game with him!

Friday afternoon we left for Paul's parents house! We hung out with the fam, played games, ate, etc. all night and then on Saturday morning Grady got to do his favorite thing ever! Ride in the tractor with Grandpa and help feed the cows!! He then got to go play at Isaac & Luke's house! We had our Christmas lunch and presents on Saturday afternoon. The whole family went to Christmas Eve church and then to Gma Betty & Gpa Ken's for the whole Guenther family Christmas. Grady especially loved it there! He was SO in his prime running around with Isaac, Luke, Will, & Shelby. Brynlee was also very entertaining, crazy enough! She was chewing on this Domino piece all night and then she started to put it in her mouth and spit it out and would then belly laugh like it was the funniest thing she had ever seen. She did it over and over for about 5 minutes straight! It was hilarious! And she does not laugh very easy. She is pretty laid back/relaxed and it takes a bit to get her to laugh! She had the whole room watching and laughing at her! I got a video of it and will hopefully be able to post it soon too!
We left to drive back to Lincoln around 10:00 on Saturday night (and Brynlee did great until 10:00 with no evening nap!) and were back at home in time for Santa to come!

Sunday morning we woke up to lots of great presents from Santa!
Grady got: a tool bench, a Leapster, a marble tower game, some baseball guys action figures, and a Cootie game.
Brynlee got: a pink ride-on pony, a cabbage patch doll, a peek-a-boo doll, a baby grand piano/musical thing, and a push-toy/wagon.
Brynlee's toys were the biggest hits with both of them! Especially the pony and piano.

We also opened presents from Aunt Ashley & exchanged our presents with Ashley. (who stayed at our house all weekend)
We were at my Aunt Lori & Uncle Scott's house by 9:00 to have breakfast with them! It was awesome to start the day out there AND to not have to worry about breakfast on our own that morning! We also got to see Aunt Shari and Josh.

We then left for West Point for the Hagedorn (Paul's moms side) Christmas around 11:00. We got there in time to finish lunch, play some games, open presents, eat more good food, hang out. Again, the kids did great with no naps. Brynlee is such a trooper! She as so tired all 3 days, but just sits so nice and content. Give her some more puffs or crackers and she is happy as can be. Her only downside is that she won't sleep very well in new places. Especially for naps. It's hard to get her to nap when we are at places like that. She sleeps great in the car though! She had a bad night at Paul's parents for the first time. She wouldn't sleep in the pack in play. She went to sleep at first, but then she got woken up when we came to bed and was scared of not knowing where she was. Paul slept the whole night with her in the twin bed. He tried to put her back down and she would just scream. I felt bad for her because she was scared! She's just a hard age to travel with right now too. It was nice to only be gone for 1 night! And, we are sort of dreading going to my Dad's next weekend....for that reason...

Yes, we are heading back for MORE Christmas parties next weekend! We are going to have our Christmas at my Dad's on Friday night and will then head back to Lincoln for a New Years Eve Party with more family at our house! We love to Party!
Then on Jan 7th, my mom's side of the family is getting together! All weekend! And, it will be in Lincoln so it will be super nice to NOT have to travel that weekend at all! And, we can go home for naps!! :) Oh, the little things that make parents happy! haha!

We hope everyone had a Very Merry Christmas!

Sneak Peak

2011-12-19T10:26:00.000-06:00

Ok, I changed my mind. I decided to put up a few pics of the kids that AREN'T included in the Christmas card. So, keep in mind that these aren't even the really good ones that made the card!! :)

Dang It!

2011-12-19T10:07:00.000-06:00

Well I'm already a week behind on my goal of blogging once a week!! The time just gets away from me!

But, get ready for some Grady & Brynlee picture awesomeness!!! Very soon. We had their pictures taken a couple weeks ago and they turned out AWESOME!! I was very worried about how it would go. Especially at 3:00 in the afternoon, which is normally when G would be napping....for 4 hours. But, we had Kellan put him down early that day so he would at least get a somewhat good nap in before pictures. And, Brynlee had also taken a pretty good nap, so that worked in our favor!! They both did awesome!
Grady, of course, had to be the comedian and think he was hilarious to get out of the poses she had him in, as soon as she walked away. Oh he thought he was SO funny! Which, was annoying to mom and dad...
Brynlee was sweet and smiley like usual! My only dislike of her is that her hair is at such a hard length right now! It is too long for a headband to look good without hairs sticking out everywhere or bunching up. But, it is too thin for clips or barettes to stay in. So, her hair looks funny in many pics, but everything else looked good!

I'm going to wait to post them until after Christmas and all of our Christmas cards are out! Sorry, no sneak peaks! :)
I am WAY behind this year. I normally have everything done and out by the first week in December, but we couldn't get in to do our pictures until Dec. 8, so I'm doing them as fast as I can! I don't like this feeling though! I tend to do everything WAY in advance as fast as possible and this is killing me! We keep getting such cute pictures and letters in the mail and I LOVE getting them! It is a race to the mailbox every day!! :)

What else we've been up to:
Last weekend we were at home all weekend. It was so nice! We went to the Zoo to the Winter Zoobilee event they had. We met our friends Tyler, Anslee & Harper. Grady loved it, as usual! We got to ride the train, 2 times! And the camels were back out!! No penguins though....he made sure to tell everyone that...
Then on Sunday I went to the Best Christmas Pageant Ever at the Community Playhouse with Doris and my Aunt Lori & Aunt Shari. It was SUPER good! Such a fun Christmasy thing to do too!!

This last weekend we had Paul's work Christmas party on Friday night. Then on Saturday we had the Houtwed Christmas party in Grand Island. It was a really fun time! Lots of great food, funny stuff during present opening, and my Grandma Marlene got the new car she has ordered from Arizona.

Yesterday we discovered our new hobby. Well, our once a month awesome routine we are going to do! Paul's parents have a Sams Club business owner membership and they added us to their account. (Which I'm super bummed that we didn't think of doing when we first moved to Lincoln.) So, we went to Sams! I love it there! I know, it is weird. But, I always find such good things that you can't get other places! I'm not a huge fan of buying in bulk b/c typically we don't have the room to store it and I am a person who can't handle a lot of clutter/stuff. My fridge/cupboards need to be orderly and in place.... So, I don't necessarily buy a lot of bulk items (except diapers, wipes, baby food) but I just love a lot of the different food items they have. So, it was really fun! We had both the kids with us and it was lunch time, so the trip got cut shorter than I wanted, but we still couldn't get out of there spending less thatn $300! It is crazy! But, I guess we shouldn't need more of the things we got for quite awhile!!!
Then, after our trip to Sams (which is on the opposite side of town from our house) we went to CiCi's pizza. Paul loves that place. I love that G eats free. And, I love their brownies and breadsticks! The pizza is just good enough to make it a good place! :) So, we decided our once a month Sams trip will also be followed by eating at Cici's Pizza! There isn't one on our side of town, so we have to live it up while we can. haha!

We are getting super excited about Christmas and the upcoming weekend of celebrating with LOTS of family! We have 4 different parties we are going to on Sat/Sun so it will be great to get to see everyone! Everything is done and ready, except for 1 Pinterest project I need to finish up, which actually doesn't need to be done until January 7th, when my family meets for Christmas....So I have time! :)

This is a picture of Gradyn & Brynlee with my Grandma Marlene from our Houtwed Christmas on Saturday. I thought it turned out SUPER good!!

First Words!

2011-12-09T13:43:00.000-06:00

'Bye-Bye'

Yes, Brynlee has said her first words at 8 Months! And Yes, I am counting them as 'words'. She says 'bye-bye' IN CONTEXT, every single time! Now, in all honesty, it does sound more like 'EYE-BYE', but SHE knows what she is saying and I know what she is saying. Every time I wave and say bye-bye, she repeats it back to me! And, she also gets really excited (possibly b/c of how excited I get (and Kellan gets) about it) and she also waves back! But, the wave is not every time and it is a wave towards herself, which is so adorable!

Crazy Memory!

2011-12-07T11:54:00.000-06:00

Blogging 2 days in a row!! Woot Woot!!

Just had to share a Grady story I just remembered:

Last week when Grady and I were eating dinner, (Brynlee was still taking her evening nap and Paul was gone out of town for work.), he picked up his cup and said, "Let's do cheers Mommy!" So, I did "cheers" with my cup to his. I thought it was really cute and funny and just thought to myself that he must do that at Kellan's so that is where he learned it.

Then he says, "We do cheers at Grandpa Dan's house."

My jaw dropped.
We did that at Gpa Dan's house LAST THANKSGIVING! As in, over a year ago. How does he remember that?!?!
He seriously has a crazy good memory. So good it's scary. :) We have to remember to always be on our best behavior!!

Which leads me into another story:
Last night when Paul was trying to give Brynlee bites of banana baby food (he had also given her some corn bread so he was sneaking in banana bites) she got upset that it was a bite of banana instead of the corn bread that she loved. Paul says to me, "Oh she was pissed about that bite, she wanted corn bread.". Grady starts yelling, "Pissed, Pissed, She's Pissed Daddy!"

Even funnier, Paul didn't even realize that he had said "pissed" and then he didn't realize that Grady was repeating it until I pointed it out. Then he quickly tried to tell Grady he had said something else, but Grady didn't believe him. :)

We've Been Busy

2011-12-06T17:08:00.000-06:00

So my blog gets pretty neglected these days. I NEED to make sure to put it on my to-do list once a week so I can write about what we have been up to! If nothing else, than for a journal for myself to go back to and remember what we have done with our lives. As I was trying to come up with a recap of our year for a Christmas letter, I was thinking about how easy it would be if I could just go back to my blog to remenisce. Now, I just need to remember to actually post things that I can go back and read!! I guess I will add that to my list of New Years Resolutions. I never make resolutions, but I actually have 3 things on it already!
1. Blog more (goal of once a week)
2. Take more videos and pictures
3. Get on a consistent routine at the Y

Anyway, this is what we've been up to lately (and a few kiddo updates!). I know I posted about our Halloween fun, but I don't think I had even put much before that about our fall. So, I think I will go back and recap our entire fall (more for my future benefit!). :)

September: Had all of our college friends come for a Husker party, Went to Wichita for my cousin Holly's wedding to Jeremy, Went to West Point for a weekend with Paul's family, took all of the grandkids to Omaha for pictures, Paul helped shingle Gma Bert & Gpa Ben's roof, started Toddler Team-up at the Children's Museum (a once a week play group).

October: The Deaver's came to visit for a weekend, went to the Roca Berry Farm to the pumpkin patch, went to Vala's pumpkin patch, went to the Omaha Zoo (Gradyn's favorite place ever, the zoo!), Went to Fairbury for my Gma Marlene's 80th birthday party, all of us were sick (Paul the worse) and we got everyone who came to our house that weekend sick too!, Went to Boo at the Zoo, Went to the Children's Museum's trick or treating, went trick or treating to our family in Lincoln.

November: Went to Holdrege to visit the Deaver's for a weekend! Also got to meet up with some NP friends in Kearney, which was awesome!, cleaned out our storage room (took a whole weekend), decorated for Christmas!, went to Lawrence to visit Paul's brother Mike with the whole family, went to Fairbury to my Gma Marlene's on Thanksgiving noon, went to my Aunt Lori's in Lincoln for Thanksgiving night, went Black Friday shopping with Ashley for 16 hours (3 hours sleep...), went to West Point for the weekend for Isaac's 4th birthday party!

The first weekend in December: Ashley and her friend Amanda came to stay with the kids and Paul and I had a "weekend away" in Omaha! It was so awesome to just have time to relax, eat out, sleep in, go to a movie, have no responsibilities!! I haven't even been away from Brynlee until then, and it had been probably about a year, or more, since I had been away from Gradyn (except for when Brynlee was born) so it was well past due to have some kid-less time! Of course I missed them like crazy and couldn't wait to get back to see them, but it just makes everything better when you can have a break. We need to do it more often. I am just SO not used to having help so I have a hard time asking for it. And, I need to let go a little more I decided.... Maybe that should be my 4th resolution..... hmm...

Brynlee Update:
*She turned 8 Months on December 1st.
*She is quite the little mover! Always up jumping, bouncing, cruising around furniture, walking while we hold her hands, starting to push the push-toys, always moving. She crawls around very fast now and will follow all 3 of us around the house until we stop and she can pull herself up on our legs. Even Grady! He, of course, doesn't stand still long enough for her to get up, so then she falls to the ground. It doesn't even phase her, she just keeps on going, following him wherever he goes next! We are looking for her to start walking in the very near future! Crazy! She is only 8 months old!
*She LOVES puffs. The Gerber kind, any flavor. She gets super excited when she sees the can! She also loves most any cracker. She is STILL a stubborn little turkey about eating her baby food. We are STILL mixing it with oatmeal cereal to get her to eat it. Although last night I did get her to eat some squash/pear mix by itself!! It was a stage 2 food, which I think she will eat better since it is thicker. Hopefully we can continue on that path b/c it is a pain in the butt to make cereal to mix with food at every meal! She does awesome with any table food we give her too and LOVES meal time!
*She is still an awesome sleeper! 11-12 hours a night, straight!! Naps at home are awesome. Naps at daycare are hit or miss. She is a very light sleeper, so sometimes she won't nap very long at daycare.
*She is usually very very happy and smiley! She has a low-key temperment and is just SUCH a good baby! We always say how we were owed her after her brother.....
*She is starting to wave bye-bye and will mimic bye-bye when we say it. I'm trying REALLY hard to get her to say Ma Ma, but no luck so far! She does babble back at me, but no luck on the 'm' sound.
*She is entering a little bit of a stranger danger phase. She LOVES her daddy and lights up, yelling, kicking like crazy when she sees him. She does get excited for me too and wants to be right at my side a lot, but she especially gets excited for Paul! We are really noticing lately when we are in a big group she wants to be at our side and won't leave, which is strange for her since usually she will crawl all over. At Isaac's birthday party I had to put her down to play a game and then went back to sit down when my turn was up. She saw me go sit down and immediately took off to come over to me again.
*She LOVES her brother! Seriously, still too much. She needs to cry or learn to push him off of her! She loves to be tackled, tickeled, whatever he does to her....
*She is really starting to respond to music, will dance and sing along with it.
*Her hair is really starting to grow in thicker. It is lighter than it was when she was born, but still a dark brown. The new growth even looks darker. We need to put it behind her ears quite a bit!
*She is wearing pretty much 9 month or 12 month clothes. Some 6 month things still fit her, but most are too snug. I would say she is about average height/weight, but it's hard to tell b/c we know a lot of babies who are bigger than her that are younger, so that makes me think that she might be a little smaller than average. I think her constant movement really make her burn so many calories! :) I wish I had that happen to me!!
*We will go for her next check-up at 9 months so I'm excited to see what her 'stats' are!

Grady update:
*He will be 3 on January 27th! He has known his birthday since the summer, and always said it the right way, but now he always says "January 27th Gradyn Joseph Guenther". I guess he thinks they all need to go together..... But, at least he knows it I guess!
*He is still such a little ball of fire! So dramatic! So manipulative! So challenging! But also, SO loving! He is the light of our lives. He is so funny, smart, and talking so much that we are constantly telling him to talk quieter or slow down or just be quiet for a minute.
*He is now working on mastering all of the letters of the alphabet. I would say he only has about 10 to go. And most of those are letters that 'could' be mistaken for something else or that are close to others. He is also getting some of the letter sounds! The kindergarten teacher in me is SO proud! He still doesn't really want to sit down to practice writing them though. Mostly b/c he can't sit still for more than 5 seconds... But, he will sit still for learning activities like his letters, which is weird. He knows all of the shapes, most numbers and he does love to sit and tell us them.
*He loves to play on my iPad, and honestly that is where he has learned the most! There are so many awesome apps that he uses all the time that teach him so many things!
*He LOVES Nick Jr. He would watch it 24-7 if we let him. He knows what the order of the shows that come on at night are. He gets super mad if we shut it off. His punishment when he gets in trouble at daycare is that he can't watch TV that night. He HATES that. So, usually he only has 1 bad day at daycare a week (if that) because he definately learns his lesson when he can't watch TV. It has become a problem with how much TV he wants to watch. So, we have made it a rule that he can go in our bedroom and watch TV when Brynlee goes to bed. That has been a nice little routine for him in the evenings. Especially b/c that is the ONLY downtime we get at all.
*He is still a super picky eater, which is annoying, but I try to not be annoyed since I am also a super picky eater... :) He loves his staples of pancakes, mac & cheese, roast beef, turkey, peas, green beans, CORN(still loves!), sausage (patties with pancakes), mini-corn dogs, some noodles, spaghetti (sometimes), applesauce, and cereal.
*He LOVES the farm and going to help Gpa Ron feed the cows. He talks about it all the time and is always telling us he wants to go there. He loves to ride in the tractor with Gpa and help him. He does love to play cows/tractor/farm at home too.
*He loves trains, and will play with them sometimes at home, but mostly loves to ride on the train at the zoo and watch them in real life.
*He has also recently started loving dinosaurs and can name them all. We had no idea he could do that! Again, from TV. Dino Dan.
*He really wants to go to a Royals baseball game, the Zoo, and the park. We keep telling him that after Brynlee's birthday he can go do all of those things again. He knows that her Birthday is April 1st, so he will say aftter April 1st he can go. :)
*I know there are about a million other things I could say about him and tons of stories! Hopefully I will have time another day to post some of his funny stories!

Chicken and a Chick

2011-11-07T21:07:00.001-06:00

A few pics of our Halloween fun as a Chicken and a Chick.

It was adorable.

We went to Halloween Hurrah at the Children's Museum!

We went to Boo at the Zoo!

We met Madison there!

We went Trick or Treating at Aunt Shari's!

we.have.so.much.candy.

seriously.

3 huge bowls full.

yum.

TEETH! And No Paci!

2011-11-03T16:49:00.003-05:00

Brynlee finally has 2 teeth! Both at the same time, bottom middle. She has been showing signs of teething for several weeks so we are so happy that 2 have finally popped up! And, we are very glad we can blame her "off" behavior on the 2 teeth! She is still not quite back to sleeping through the full night every night. But she is much better. She is eating like a horse! I think she is just so hungry at night b/c she has been eating so much! She goes right back to bed after eating, but we were so loving not having to get up at all! Well, I should say Paul was so loving it because he is usually the one who gets up to feed her. Although it does still wake me up... :) haha! He hates when I say that when he was the one who actually got up with her! I have a problem with being able to get back to sleep after I am up (since it is usually around 5:00 to 6:00 am) so Paul gets up with her since he can go right back to sleep always. She definately loves her daddy too, maybe that is why! hmmm... :)

In other news: Brynlee doesn't take a Pacifier anymore!!! She will not take it at all any more. If you try to give it to her, she gets even more mad! So, she is paci free, at 6.5 months. We are happy about this because it means not having to get rid of it later when she is older and it is harder to do (although it was pretty easy with Gradyn). But, the down side is that now we pretty much can't get her to sleep anywhere besides putting her down in her crib. She was never a baby who let herself fall asleep in your arms (neither of our kids are!), we can't rock her, she won't cuddle, etc. But, at least the paci would provide a little calmness to let her relax in your arms. Now she won't at all. So, when we are out and about, we pretty much can never expect her to sleep.
She does suck on her bottom lip in place of the paci. She also does that when she is hungry. If she sees the bottle she starts sucking on that bottom lip.
I'm wondering if the paci was hurting her when she was first starting to teeth and that why she refused it???? who knows, but she will not take it! We have tried several times when she is hysterical or when we are trying to get her to sleep, but it just makes her freak out more. So, I guess no paci for us anymore!

She officially turned 7 months old on Tuesday. Getting so much more mobile (as if that was possible), acting older, and growing so fast!

Halloween pics coming soon!!

Brynlee hates baby food!

2011-10-24T10:52:00.002-05:00

So for the past 5 weeks or so we have "attempted" to give Brynlee some veggies and fruits. We started with the veggies. The very first time she got a small taste in her mouth and acted like she was gagging. Very dramatic. Every time the spoon touched her lips, same thing. We still attempted every night. We did peas for 4 days, then green beans for 4 days, then carrots for 4 days, then sweet potatoes for 4 days. Finally she would at least tolerate the sweet pototoes. As in, she would allow the spoon to go in her mouth and not make a complete gagging gesture and face. Every veggie got about 5 or 6 spoonful tries a night. She would not allow it.

We had high hopes when we moved on to the fruits. Especially since the sweet potoates didn't go AS terribly as the other veggies. Our high hopes quickly vanished the first attempt at pears when she did the same sour face (no gagging though!) and still refused to open her lips. We have now tried pears, peaches, and bananas. Still refuses everything.

She WILL eat her cereal and LOVES it! She is sometimes hesitant at first to see if it is a veggie or fruit we are trying to trick her with, but as soon as she realizes it isn't she opens her mouth wide asking for more and gobbles large bowls up fast! And yes, we have tried tricking her many times with spoonfulls of veggies or fruits in between cereal bites. She spits it right back out.

She loves the little baby mum mum rice patty things. She will gum french fries and chicken nuggets, mostly playing with them, but still opening her mouth and tolerating it.

We are getting more and more tempted to go right into table foods and skip this baby food stage altogether b/c it is a gigantic waste of time...and energy...and emotions...

We know she hates her high chair, so we have tried to have her sit on our laps to eat. Same response.

We know she is super active/busy/wants to be on the go at all times, so we have tried to limit interaction/distractions when she eats. Same response.

We haven't tried to put some of the fruits and veggies INTO the cereal yet, which is our next attempt. Mostly because we wanted to NOT feed her cereal at night anymore and we just wanted to do the fruits and veggies. We will try that method tonight to see what happens.

Other than the refusing to eat ordeal she is still the best baby you could ask for! Pulling herself up to standing on EVERYTHING! She is pretty much crusing around furniture now. We have had debates on if she will be walking by Christmas. I am moving it up to December 1st.... She will be 8 months on Dec. 1.
She is sleeping anywhere from 11 to 12 hours a night, so awesome. She is happy, talky, smiley, lovey, all the time! She is the love of all of our lives, especially her brother. :)

Love Love Love

2011-10-15T16:44:00.000-05:00

I so love this video of my 2 Lovey's. I love how B is smiling and laughing with him, and I love how G says "cheese" at the beginning and end. I took this after he had been singing her songs and playing Patty Cake with her for awhile He is always at her side talking to her, singing to her, playing with her, wishing she would talk back to him. She is pretty much always asleep by 8:00 every night, which G gets annoyed with b/c he wants to play with her! If he is downstairs while she goes to bed he comes up and asks me where she is and then says, "No I want to play with Brynlee, I don't want her to go to bed!" He is seriously such a good big brother. It is awesome. And, such a relief since he is so crazy in so many ways! It will be his dream come true when she can actually run around and play with him someday!

Awesome story:

At Brynlee's 6 month check up G got his flu shot and B got her 6 month shots and then her flu shot also. We were a little nervous with G getting a shot b/c he hasn't had one since he is old enough to know what is going on so I knew we were going to have to do some good sweet talking to get him revved up for it. Well, luckily he saw a bandaid while we were waiting in the doctor's office and wanted the bandaid. So, I had some quick thinking, and told him that he WILL get a bandaid b/c he is going to get a shot and you get a bandaid after you get shots! Well, he was SUPER excited then! He was yelling at the nurse who kept popping in and out, every time she would leave the room he would yell, "Wait! I need my bandaid!" So, he was excited to get it. We had him do his shot first so he wouldn't see B crying and getscared. He did okay as I put him up on the table, I pretty much just laid his bottom on the table while he clung to my neck b/c he was scared to lay down. He mostly just said "Ouchy Ouchy!" over and over as the nurse was giving it until it turned into crying/screaming. He was a little excited about his band aid, but mostly still clinging to me. As I was comforting him, it was B's turn to get her shots. As soon as he heard her start crying he sat up (although still crying himself), and wanted to go over to comfort B! It was SO CUTE! He was laying over her, through his tears telling her "It's okay Brynlee, I'm right here. It's ouchy for a little bit then you will get a band aid!" So.Adorable.
Of course, B cried for like 1/4 of the time G did.... :) And she got 3 shots....
He was a little jealous that B had 3 bandaids and he only had 1.

Unfortunately G was sick for a few days last week, which we are wondering is a reaction to his flu shot. He is finally back to his old self. Although still demanding medicine. He only had it like 3 times the whole time he was sick, but now he thinks he loves it. He was faking sick the other night so he could try to get some. "Mommy I'm gonna puke." "(fake coughs) see, I cough." Didn't work... :)

Brynlee's 6 Month Check Up

2011-10-15T16:20:00.001-05:00

Brynlee had her 6 month check up last week. She is doing great! She still has some congestion/coughing which she has had since she was 2 months old. So far we have all decided it is something she will outgrow or possible a sign that she will have allergies or possibly asthma issues when she is older. It doesn't bother her at all. She has always eaten well, slept well, played well, been happy. Also her lungs, ears, etc. have always been clear at the doctor.

These are her 6 Month stats:                                    Grady's 6 Month Stats:

Weight: 16 lbs. 7 oz   (60%)                                    Weight: 15 lbs (5%)
Height: 26 in (70%)                                                  Height: 24.5 in (5%)
Head: 16.75 in (51%)                                                25%

She seems so much bigger than G was, but she isn't really THAT much bigger than he was. He was just so much more petite which made him seem smaller I think. He is still pretty petite in his hips/waist. Trying to find pants that fit him this fall has been an issue. He needs the length of 2T, but they just fall right off of his waist! I was hoping he would be able to do 2T's finally this fall, but 18 month is still best for him...or 12 month. But that is another story!

She is a little above average in everything, which I was not surprised by based on the size of clothes she wears and the way they fit. She is pretty much in all 6 month clothes, but some 12 month stuff fits okay if it is smaller fitting. She is quickly growing out of the 6 month stuff though, I'm about ready to bring out the 9 month sleepers, which very fittingly are mostly all fleece! Should be perfect for the colder weather.

She is still really trying to pull herself up on everything. Why can't she just be content with crawling for awhile!! Do we really have to be pulling ourself up already?!?! :) She crawls all over the house and follows me everywhere! She is kind of an unusual crawler and never scooted or army crawled, went straight into crawling on her hands and knees.

She is doing great at Kellan's for daycare. Kellan loves her and says it is so much fun to have a little girl, she is used to little boys now! (Her son is 12 months, and the baby before Brynlee was a boy.) Grady loves having her there and is always asking where she is if he can't see her or has to go up and say hi to her. Which is what he does at home too! He is such a sweet big brother! Thankfully!

Happy Fall!

2011-10-02T16:46:00.001-05:00

These last few months have flown by and we have been super busy! No time for blogging! :)

So, here is a quick recap of what we have been up to this fall so far.

Brynlee: Turned 6 months old yesterday and is now crawling! She is super advanced with her movements and activeness. We weren't quite ready for baby proofing yet, but ready or not here she comes! She is also pulling herself up onto things, which is NOT a good thing since she is not strong enough or sturdy enough to support herself. She has taken quite a few tumbles already and I see many more in her future. She is a mover and a shaker! Not unlike her brother...hmm...

She doesn't have any teeth yet, but has been drooling and gnawing on things like crazy, so I'm just waiting for one to pop up!

She is still her laid-back normally happy self. A great sleeper. We don't give her a bottle at night anymore at all. She was always a once a night bottle baby, but these past couple of weeks we cut it out completely. She sometimes fusses a few times in the early morning hours, but goes right back to sleep with her paci.

She starts going to Kellan's for daycare tomorrow. It was so awesome to have my Aunt Lori watch her until now. We will miss going to pick her up there every day, especially Grady. He loved to go pick her up with me! But, we are excited to have a longer night since we will just have 1 stop to make to pick up kids. And, it will be fun to see how Grady does with having her there with him all day. :)

Grady: Still as wild and crazy as ever. We started a Toddler Team-Up class at the Children's museum this week and he showed me once again that in a room full of kids the same age as him, he is the craziest one. Seriously getting worried about preschool next year...hmmm....

He has also been having lots of bad behaviors when we are around his cousins and friends. He definately wants to show off that he can be disobedient to his parents and he LOVES to be the clown and thinks he is hysterical. I DO love his sense of humor though!

Although he has his craziness, he is also the sweetest, loviest little boy. He is so sweet to Brynlee. And, he says the nicest things and thinks of the smartest things to say. He is also starting to be such a "big brother" to Brynlee and likes to tell her what is going on or what she can or can't do. She is going to have quite the boss. :)

He is seriously such a smart little boy and figures things out so quickly. He also remembers EVERYTHING. Scary. :) He knows all of his colors and shapes (even the hard ones), and knows most of his numbers 1-10. He is starting to recognize a few of the letters, and he LOVES to tell us when he sees letters. He can count to 20 and loves to count for us and sing the alphabet song for us multiple times a day!

He is loving to play on my iPad and does several games and puzzles on there every night. I think that is another reason he is learning so much so fast, that iPad has tons of great games and letter/sound things that he loves! He also loves to go to the spelling and reading things that are too hard for him and he refuses to get off of them, but needs help (obvioiusly), but that is another story! :)

Here are pictures of what we have been up to lately!

We took Grady to the Air Show! He loved to watch the planes!

We went to Wichita for my cousin Holly's wedding!

Cutest little dancing couple! Grady & Madison

Playing at the park! We have been going on walks to the park every night since the weather has been so nice!

Grandpa Steve, Zoya, & Great-Grandma Marlene came for dinner last week for Grandpa Steve's Birthday!

I love this shirt!

Crazy boy!

Playing at the Children's Museum before our Toddler Team-up Class!

The Deaver's came to visit!!

We went to Roca Berry Farm to the Pumpkin Patch, it was so awesome! Perfect weather and perfect activities for the kids! We could have spent all day there!

Go Huskers!

2011-10-02T15:42:00.000-05:00

Brynlee's 4 Month Pictures!!

2011-08-27T07:56:00.002-05:00

Big Week!

2011-08-26T10:55:00.000-05:00

We have had a huge week at our house! Lots of big milestones and just a much better routine in general!

1. Gradyn is potty trained!! We started Monday and by Tuesday afternoon he was pooping in the toilet on his own! (Sorry if this is too graphic for some...) ;) He was VERY interested all day Monday, although he only went 1 time in the potty chair. So, we were a little discouraged after Monday. Then on Tuesday when I went to get him from daycare she said he had gone EVERY SINGLE time in the potty chair and was going in their by himself to go by the end of the day! yay!! At one point she didn't see him in the main room so she yelled out to him and he yelled back from the bathroom, "I'm going poopy!" lol The rest of the week has been great! We are still reminding him most times to go(just because it makes me nervous...), but he sits down and goes right away: takes his pants down, wants to dump it out in the toilet, flush, and then pulls his pants back up. He of course always reminds us of his treat he gets afterwards, an M&M at home and a cookie at Kellan's. (Kellan is our now sitter who we LOVE!) So far this week we have been keeping him in a pull up and then putting underwear on over top, just in case, but I think there have only been maybe a few times that it has been necessary. Yesterday he started to poop but didn't quite get to the potty chair in time. Kellan found him with his pants part way down on the chair, poop everywhere! At least he had tried to get there! We are so glad it has went so well! We knew he has been ready for a few months now, but with Brynlee being born and then the move to Lincoln we waited until things settled down a bit. AND I think doing it at Kellan's has really helped him. He is the type of kid that is a jokester (some might call it naughty...) and would play games with his mom and dad and think he is hilarious. So, I totally think it helped him to have Kellan be the leader of it since he didn't know her that well and would listen better. But, don't worry he has alraedy found his timeout spot at Kellan's for not listening! Only took him a good 2 days to warm up. We were not surprised. Only 1 kid in diapers! Yippee!

2. Brynlee started eating cereal! We have been giving her oatmeal cereal since it will be easier for her to digest on on her stomach since she had stomach issues in the past. But so far she hasn't shown any signs of it bothering her. She has eaten well. Our only problem is that her mom and dad wait too long until she is tired to give it to her at night. (For some reason we have been a little preoccupied...) So then she tends to just get fussy and want the bottle and to go to bed. We are moving up her cereal time next week! We can tell already she is going to be a great eater! Still pretty much only takes 4 ounces at a time with the bottle still though.

3. Brynlee is sitting up a little bit AND scooting all over the room! She is SO MOBILE for 4.5 months! The only reason she can't quite sit up that great by herself yet is b/c she is too wiggly and moves all over the place so she won't sit still. She scoots backwards all over the room and turns herself in any direction. She can't quite move forward as well yet. She gets up on all 4's and rocks and is REALLY wanting to crawl. We are already starting to baby proof the house for her! Wasn't quite expecting to do it this early, but I guess we need to. I'm not ready for her to be into everything, but it does make her SO much happier and I am glad about that!

4. We have finally settled into a nice bedtime/sleeping routine AND Gradyn has slept in his own bed every night this week! Brynlee had a few bad nights last weekend (part of the reason we started the cereal). She still only ate once a night (which she has been doing since like 6 weeks) but she would just fuss awake and want her paci back. Now she is back to only waking up once a night to eat and back to sleep she goes! AND the best part is that she has been waking up so happy and talks in her crib before we come get her! I love to listen to that!

I still need to update with B's 4 month stats from her check up AND even more exciting her 4 month pictures! They turned out great!

Mouse Pad

2011-08-23T21:34:00.001-05:00

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Busy, Busy Busy

2011-08-18T21:49:00.000-05:00

So basically we have been SUPER busy these past few weeks. I am SO ready for things to slow down and actually sit and relax for awhile. Most people know I love my TV, and I haven't really watched anything for the past 3 weeks!! I'm going through withdrawels! haha! Thankfully I have my Oprah Behind the Scenes of Season 25 that I have recorded and have been watching a lot of while I unpack. I love that show!!

Well we got moved, unpacked, and mostly settled. We pretty much only have the decorations and wall hangings to find a place for now and we will be done and ready to relax! That is this weekends project, along with a few minor details in other rooms.

We are loving the house and all of the space we have now! I especially LOVE the location! It is SOOO nice to be so close to lots of things. Especially Super Target. I have pretty much been there every day since we have moved, keeping them in business, don't worry! :)

What we DO NOT love is the blanket of dog hair that was covering our house when we moved in. We are definatley not pet people, but after this experience I can pretty much guarantee we will never have a pet indoors. It was/is so nasty. We have vacuumed multiple times, had the carpets cleaned, and febreezed a ton and it still stinks AND we are still finding dog hair everywhere! It is so frustrating! I hate not feeling like Brynlee should even be on the floor and how much it smells down there for the kids. We even bought a new vacuum, especially for removing pet hair. Hopefully that helps! I'm pretty sure the people who lived in the house before us did not clean, possibly ever.... That is how bitter I am about the whole dog hair situation. I know, very little problem in the scheme of things, but it is ruining my enjoyment of the house. Feel free to give us any tips on how to get rid of the hair and most importantly the smell.

As far as our jobs go, Paul started his new job on Monday. He is a Specialist in the State Office for the Farm Service Agency. So, the same agency he has always worked for, but this position is in the state office. Basically he is support for the loan officers around the whole state.
I started my new job on Wednesday. I am working for the Lincoln Diocese in the Catholic schools as a Training Specialist in the Educational Technology. So basically I train teachers on technology things and also am a support staff for some of the technology, like Blackboard and Smartboards. Definately a very different job and environment than what I am used to. Going to be an adjustment for awhile. I am loving the welcoming atmosphere of everyone I have met and I have already met lots of great people I am excited to see again.

Gradyn and Brynlee started at daycare today. We found an awesome gal, Kellen, for them to go to! She is a lot like Doreen, our old daycare provider who we LOVED. She does a lot of preschool activities and projects, which is perfect for Grady. He loves it there and didn't want to leave the first 2 times we went to visit! I am so excited that we found her! And, she is really close to our house and on the way to work! The only obstacle was that she doesn't have room for Brynlee until October 1st, so Brynlee is going to my Aunt Lori's (who has an in home daycare) until then. Which, just so happens to be in the exact same neighborhood as Kellen! Yay! It worked out perfectly! So, we will each drop off 1 kid on the way to work and it will depend on the day on how they get picked up. Today I was running late so we each picked up one, hopefully in the future I can pick up both of them.

Other than that we have just been settling in and trying to get things organized. I forgot how much work goes in to a new house and how many things you need to get to make it work. I will try to take some pics and post soon! I'm so excited about Grady's room, we are doing a baseball theme, and for the kids Play Room in the basement. It will be so nice!

Oh, and Brynlee also went for her 4 month check up last week and had 4 month pics taken! New post of that to come soon!

We're Moving

2011-07-27T07:15:00.000-05:00

So the lack of updates recently has to do with the fact that we are Moving! It is definately very bittersweet for us. We are so excited to be in Lincoln, close to lots of family but we are also so sad to leave our friends in North Platte! I am very sad to leave my job at Hershey and especially all of my friends there! Thank God for Facebook so we can all still stay in touch.

This is a brief recap of our past couple months:

June 24 - Paul accepted the job in Lincoln. He will be working for the same agency (Farm Service Agency, a branch of the USDA) but in the State Office. He will not be doing the same type of work. He will be a "Specialist" who will help the loan officers around the state and focus more on certain things, can't really remember what they are.... :)

June 25 - Met with our realtor to start putting our house on the market.

June 26 - Painted, Organized, Cleaned, Painted, Painted some more!

June 28 - House officially goes on the market!

July 1 - We left for vacation in Denver with Ron, Doris, & Ashley! Had a blast going to baseball games (the Royals were playing the Rockies that weekend), the Zoo, the Children's museum, shopping, eating out, etc! (Pictures will hopefully come soon....)

July 4 - We got an offer on our house!!! We were on our way back from Denver when I got the call. I was riding with Ashley and we were almost to Cheyenne so I called Paul and got in with them so we could discuss the offer and get back to our realtor.

July 5 - House sold! Only took 6 days! Woo Hoo!!!! We are so blessed that it happened so fast because then we could start OUR househunting.....

July 8 - Started looking at houses in Lincoln......all weekend long.

July 10 - Found a house! Made an offer!

July 11 - Offer was accepted! Well, we accepted their counter offer, but it was done!!!

July 15 - Went back to Lincoln to go to the inspection of the new house. Everything looked really good, just a few minor details to fix. Sellers agreed to fix everything. (The buyers of our house didn't ask for an inspection, so we were lucky there! Not that there is anything wrong with it or that needs fixed at all! :) )

Rest of July - packing, getting things organized, planned, etc. AND, trying to have FUN since summer is almost over!! boo!
Oh, and I have also been busy looking and applying for jobs. I have an interview tomorrow, hoping a couple other things start working out also! If not, I will substitute and wait until something comes along.

We are closing on both houses on August 10th. But, we are moving into the house in Lincoln on the 7th and the buyers of our house are moving in on the 8th.

At this point we haven't done much packing, just all of our wall hangings and decor. This weekend we are planning on trying to get a lot of packing done! Well, as much as the kids will allow! :)

We are getting excited to get moved and get everything settled. We are also SOOO excited for how much more room we are going to have in our new house! We are basically adding 2 more bedrooms, 1 more bathroom, and a basement! The kids will have a toy room, which I am really excited for.

Here is a link to pictures of the house:
http://midlandsmls.rapmls.com/scripts/mgrqispi.dll?APPNAME=Midlands&PRGNAME=MLSPictureDescriptions&ARGUMENTS=-N147779630,-N10090410,-AE,-N0,-N0,-ARR,-LFalse,-N0,-AMIDL

Hopefully more pics of the kids coming soon! I have still had such a hard time getting pictures to upload on here this summer!! I have tried numerous times!

more summer pics

2011-06-27T09:14:00.000-05:00

and more to come later....
i've been having a heck of a time getting blogger to upload pictures. grrrr!

A few summer pictures!

2011-06-23T22:00:00.000-05:00

Summer Fun!

2011-06-22T12:30:00.000-05:00

Well, I still can't get my pictures uploaded so I will just give a quick run down of what we have been up to so far this summer. Hopefully I can add pictures later. I just don't want to forget anything, it already seems like a blur!

Memorial weekend - spent in NP hanging out at home, went to Jeffrey Lake to Luke's parents house on the Sunday. It was so fun, as usual! The weather was cold, but we still had fun just hanging out and eating lots of good food!! We also were part of a garage sale on that Friday, and had a friends wedding in NP on that Saturday.

Date Night! - We left Brynlee with her first babysitter one night (and Gradyn) and Paul and I went to a movie with 2 other couples. We saw The Hangover 2, which we thought was really funny, and it was awesome to find great babysitters to use in the future!

Jazzercise - I have been going to Jazzercise every morning. It was the perfect solution for me to start exercising again and that has babysitting to take the kids to for that hour. And, it is perfect for me to jump back into working out after the c-section and after not working out for almost 10 months due to Miss Brynlee making me sick. It feels so good to be back in it and I do really like Jazzercise and the full body workout. The kids to great at the child care too! Grady had a tough first day and even ended up crying until he threw up, which is typical for him and his temper.... But ever since then he has done great!

Weekend in Sidney - We went to visit Ashley in Sidney for a weekend. We went to the circus, ate out, played at the park, went to the pool, went to chuch, hung out, watched a movie, and of course a trip to Cabela's. It was fun!

Children's museum's - We went to Kearney to meet Becky and the boys at the children's museum with my friend Andrea and her 3 kids, Tayten, Addilyn, & Braislee. I had Addilyn in my class last year, Braislee and Gradyn go to the same daycare, and Andrea teaches first grade with me and is one of my best friends so they all know each other well. Oh, and Becky taught Tayten piano too! We are all connected. :) The kids had a lot of fun AND we had an awesome lunch at Valentino's AND great shopping afterwards!
We also met Andy, Cassie, Luke & Isaac at the Lincoln Children's museum last Friday. More fun playing! We have only been to the NP children's museum once this summer! We are slacking there.

Playgroup - my group of school girls has been meeting once a week to get together to chat while our kids play! It has been awesome! We have lunched, played at the park, played out at Andrea's house, and did the Kids Costume Parade together. It is so nice to chat with adults and break up our day!

BBQ's - One weekend we had 4 different BBQ's. Lots of fun, except for Grady being embarrassingly naughty! Seriously....like the type of naughty when you don't want to claim him as your child...

Wedding - We traveled to Wateroo, Iowa (8 hours from NP, even more the way we took so we could go to Pender first) for Paul's cousin Brianna's wedding. Very fun weekend! Brynlee traveled AWESOME! Luckily for the girls, she was in the girls car! The 3 little boys went in the boys car and they were not so lucky from what I hear, again mostly because of Grady. Why is he so much more difficult than all the other kids his age??? I'm hoping Brynlee's good behavior will teach him some day! ha! The wedding was very pretty and good to see family. Grady ran and ran and ran and ran outside of the reception room, he would not stay in it and kept running way off, so we didn't really get to enjoy the first few hours of the reception (to the point where I was ready to leave b/c it was pointless to even be there), but once the dance started he was a little better and of course LOVED the dance! I wonder if Brynlee will be as in to music and dancing as he is! He has all of his CD's and DVD's memorized and even knows what comes next on every one. He knows all of the dance moves on his Wiggles DVD's and shows them off very often. :)

We are pretty much on the go all day long! I purposely made it that way for my sanity! Especially with Grady being as challenging as he has been this summer. We have only been to the pool a handful of times due to the rainy/cold weather! Hopefully July brings lots more pool days! It is a challenge at times with both of them, but as long as Grady is "caged" in the baby pool area it helps a lot. I just hope Brynlee will nap and try to keep her out of the sun. She doesn't mind the water though, the few times I have dipped her in. Grady still loves the water and is a little fish! The only challenge is to keep him from running into the locker room, big pool, parking lot, basically anywhere he isn't supposed to go he will! That is why we need his "cage" and even then he stands there and tries to open it or waits for people to go in or out so he can escape. Oh, the joys of a naughty little boy! hee hee! :)

Pictures coming soon, I hope!

Dominic's birthday party

2011-06-22T07:46:00.000-05:00

So blogger won't let me upload any pictures, so for now I guess I will just write about what we have been up to. Going back to May! It's almost July and I need to update from May! My computer time has been much less due to the 2 precious children.... :)

On May 22, my birthday!, we went to Holdrege for Dominic Deaver's 4th birthday party. It was a really fun day and the first time we had been to Holdrege to see the Deaver's new house and hang out. Of course the boys all loved to play with each other, as usual. Grady slept the entire way home and went right to bed and slept all night when we got home. He was worn out from his big day of playing!

Hopefully I can post some pictures soon!

Life with a 2 Month Old & 2 Year Old

2011-06-04T15:36:00.000-05:00

People keep asking us how things are going with 2 kids. We have been saying the first month was really hard and the second month was MUCH better! Thankfully! There was a moment in the first month when both kids were screaming after a long day of screaming and naughtiness that I told Paul we will not be having another baby, we will adopt a 2 year old! ha! :) Luckily Gradyn has adjusted much better, has been a little less "willful disobedient", and has learned to deal with Brynlee much better. And even MORE luckily, Brynlee has not been crying as much. She hasn't really had the tummy problems she was having anymore, which is a huge relief from the crying! There are still times when she wants to be held and nothing will make her happy, but usually she is just tired and takes a little bit to fall asleep. Otherwise she has been pretty easy. Cries when she is hungry or tired and it is pretty easy to tell the difference. (Although as I have been trying to get this blog post done she has been pretty fussy for the past hour, but that is not usual for her.)

And most importantly....she is a Rock Star Sleeper!! She has consistently slept at least 5 hours straight a night from about 2 weeks old. Now she has been doing anywhere from 6 to 9 hour stretches every night. It has been hit or miss, however, if she will go back to sleep after that or be up for awhile. Which, sometimes has us up at 4:30 or 5:00 a.m. for the day. We couldn't ask for much better at 2 months old! Her brother gets up a lot more than she does!

Brynlee officially turned 2 months old on Wednesday! 9 weeks old on Friday!
Things she is doing these days:
*Smiling ALL the time!
*Starting to coo and laugh a little bit
*Rolling over from tummy to back (started doing this at 6 weeks old)
*We also caught her yesterday rolling from back to tummy, but Gradyn could have helped a little
*Holds her head up great
*Wants to stand up all the time, just like Gradyn did! Probably a sign we will have another jumper/runner, watch out! Dr. said she is really strong at her 2 month check up.
*Always wants to be facing out, sitting up, watching everything
*Sleeping 6-9 hours at night usually, and then another 1.5 to 2
*Doesn't really sleep at all during the day except for cat naps, occassionally a long nap
*Loves her swing! Lifesaver for mommy.
*Is really starting to be a wiggle worm, doesn't really ever sit still or stop moving when you are holding her, another sign of her crazy brother. Mom and Dad starting to get scared. ha!
*Drinking 4 ounces at every feeding! She is such a good eater! Gradyn only drank about 3 ounces at every feeding EVER. She has already surpassed him at 2 months. I guess that is why he still needs 12 month pants at 28 months old!

Brynlee's 2 month Stats:
Weight: 11 lb. 3 oz. - 60th percentile (wow!)
Height: 22 in. - 30th percentile
Head: 16 in. - 90th percentile (our kids have huge heads! we'll assume it's because of their huge brain!)

She is definately looking more and more like Grady and Paul. I think when she smiles big she looks a lot like Paul, especially.

Smiling pictures coming soon!

Gradynisms

2011-06-02T08:09:00.001-05:00

"I too big" - when chickening out from going down the big slide at the park
"I too big" - when unzipping his pajamas and wanting to take them off, even though they fit perfect
"Help Daddy, I too big" - when needing help zipping his backpack up
"Come on yellow shoe!" - when mommy is trying to shove his shoe on his foot
"Good job Mommy!" - when mommy successfully gets the yellow shoe on his foot
"That's my Tempo the Tiger Room" - pointing at the entry room where his toys & DVD player are set up
"Yeah it's right THERE!" - after mommy asks, "that's your tempo the tiger room???" (Tempo the Tiger is a song DVD)
"Daddy's softball all done?"- 2 days after the softball game when we were talking about the park and he realized he never got to go to daddy's softball game because the weather got bad
"Binlee Take!" - what he says Brynlee's name is (he can't pronounce his K & T sounds, which Kate has both, and he switches to the other position...does that make sense??)
"Gradyn Bopes" - how he says Gradyn Joseph
"Thank You Mommy! Thank You Daddy!" - after he got his new DVD player hooked up in the car. Ours has been broken for several months now and he has been doing sooo good without it, due to not traveling very much and only traveling when he can sleep. But, we have a VERY long roadtrip coming up so we thought we should invest in one for our sanity on that trip. It was sooo cute how thankful he was! It melted my heart! We were about 3 blocks from our house when he said that b/c he was so excited!
"Binlee don't push!" - after falling down from running into the couch (Brynlee is on the other side of the room at 6 weeks old....)
"Grandpa feed cows, Grandpa drive tractor" - whenever we see a tractor or anything that resembles a tractor
"Keeetchup" (ketchup) - when asked what he had at lunch for Doreen's. He then said "Keetchup with tator tots, chicken nuggets, milk" He is obsessed with ketchup and always says it first if he ever has it with a meal!
"No, Isaac & Luke's guitar!" - when mommy asked if he wanted to wear his guitar shirt that is the same shirt that Isaac & Luke have
"I watch Madison" - when he hears sound coming from the computer. We watched a video of Madison a couple weeks ago so now he thinks she is on all the time. :) That dang On Demand TV is ruining kids! ha!

Stay tuned for more Gradyn antics!

Brynlee's newborn pics

2011-05-21T08:02:00.000-05:00

Brynlee was 2 weeks old for her newborn pictures. She did not cooperate very well. She wouldn't relax and let herself fall asleep and she was pretty fussy. We kept putting the pacifier in and then yanking it out to try to catch a few good pics. But, we did end up getting a few good ones!

My Aunt Shari made the cacoon and hat and the yellow hat and diaper cover!

Lovey & Naughty

2011-05-17T12:21:00.000-05:00

Grady is definately a mixture of Lovey and Naughty right now! He can be so nice and sweet and "tries" to be a loving brother, but then he can also be so naughty.

Nice things:
1. He loves to take Brynlee his blankets and stuffed animals! He covers her up with both of his blankets and throws all of his stuffed animals on her until you can't even see her anymore. Then he wants to lay right next to her/on her. I love it when he takes her his blankets because I know that means he is being very nice and loving to give up his own blankets!
2. He says "Thank you Mommy/Daddy" all of the time without being asked to.
3. He starts talking about all of the people he knows (especially Dominic, Isaac, Luke, Grandpa, and Becky) when we are in the car and wants me to take him to go see those people.
4. When I am laying in bed with him he rolls over to hug me and kiss me. :)
There are more nice things he does I just can't think of any specific examples right now!

Naughty things:
1. He has bitten Brynlee twice now. Once was "maybe" fake, we couldn't tell. Once was FOR REAL and left 2 bruised teeth marks on her finger, which she still has 3 days later.... That was very naughty!
2. He already blames Brynlee for when he gets hurt. Yes, it has started already and she is 6 weeks old! The other day he had stumbled into the couch and fell down. He turned to Brynlee and said, "Don't push Brynlee!" What a brat. Can you imagine what it will be like when she is old enough to actually do things to him????
3. He screams/yells all the time! We have REALLY been trying to put a stop to this. Of course he screams when he is mad or excited about something especically, but he also yells for his normal talking/conversation/ when he wants something. I'm sure it is just another mechanism to get our attention and make sure he is heard, but it is getting to be soooo annoying! We have done lots of modeling on talking in a normal voice, which does help at the time.
4. He throws a fit if you do something that he thinks he needs to do. Such as: flush the toilet, turn off the lights, get a diaper for himself, get his clothes for himself, turn off the TV, get his shoes, get his own snack, etc. The degree of fit varies, but it is usually running around screaming.
5. He takes Brynlee's things and throws them or runs away with them and hides them under the ottomon. He especially likes to take her pacifier, socks, and medicine. This has actually gotten much better the past couple weeks, he did this more when she first came home. And of course, thinks he is being hilarious!

With summer 3 days away I am REALLY hoping that naughty list continues to get shorter and the nice list gets longer!! :) We are going to have a "mini boot camp" the first week or 2.....

I want to be like my sister....

2011-05-17T12:02:00.000-05:00

Grady can't handle Brynlee laying on the floor without going to lay down right next to her. He usually runs up and backs himself up to the blanket so he can plop down backwards next to her. Sound dangerous??? Yes! Sometimes he doesn't hit her, but sometimes he does. Then once he is down he has to lay right next to her, touching/kicking/smothering her. (He has always loved to touch and be close to people so I guess this doesn't surprise me.) Then once he has laid next to her a little bit he likes to roll over and try to hug her which means he is basically laying on top of her. SO, because of all of this, she has to be watched basically 100% of the time when she is on the floor, couch, etc.

Especially if he knows we are watching him and we have already told him to be gentle, he of course is 50 times more rough and tries to touch her even more.

This particular day he was pretty good about giving her space and just laying next to her, but of course I was standing there watching the whole time.

I LOVE this one!

Can you tell how dramatic he is??? Look how hard he "smiles" for the camera! :)

Fun in Omaha

2011-05-17T11:50:00.000-05:00

We went to an Omaha Storm Chasers baseball game a couple weeks ago. It was a lot of fun! It was sort of for Paul's birthday and my birthday too I guess. My sister and her friend Amy stayed with Brynlee so we just took Gradyn out to eat and then to the game. We met Andy, Cassie, Isaac, and Luke there for a fun night. Of course, one of the players Paul wanted to watch got called up to KC the day before!

We went out to eat at Red Robin, which is one of my favorites even though I get made fun of for it all the time! :)

We had a good time hanging out at the hotel, swimming, eating breakfast, etc. Grady LOVED the swimming pool and hot tub, of course! We were the only ones in it on Saturday morning so it was a lot of fun to take over the whole pool.

Brynlee didn't actually get in the water because it was pretty chilly for her, but we did get to put her in her adorable swimming suit!

Ready to go swimming!

He always wants to hug/pick her up/tackle her!

Future Photog

2011-05-11T13:55:00.000-05:00

These are pictures that Gradyn took one day when he wanted to play around with my camera:

"Binlee!" (He can't pronounce his r's very well yet...) :)

"Mommy and Binlee"

"Daddy and Binlee"

"Daddy's shoes"

"My chair"

"Grady's shoes"

"Daddy's leg"

"Daddy, Mommy, Binlee"

Sad Day

2011-05-11T13:47:00.000-05:00

Our BFF's - The Deaver's - moved away a couple weeks ago. We already miss them so much! Grady especially misses Dominic and I especially miss Becky. It's going to be a long summer without them! :( But, we are so happy for them to move a little closer to family and pursue their dreams! :)

This is our "last supper" at Pizza Hut, of course, with both of our families!

Easter

2011-05-11T13:43:00.000-05:00

We forgot to take pictures of the whole family at the beginning of the day on Easter, but here are some of the kids. Gradyn had already changed his clothes, so only Brynlee is still in her Easter dress, but oh well! She actually has quite a few cuter dresses but they still don't fit! Hopefully they will by the time we have a couple weddings next month!

I love this picture of G kissing B!

Family Walks with the Wagon

2011-05-11T13:38:00.002-05:00

Paul's 30th

2011-05-11T11:45:00.000-05:00

Paul turned 30 on April 21st. We celebrated with an outing to the bowling alley with family, a couple weeks late. We celebrated on the day of his birthday by going to the children's museum to see the Easter bunny, going to an Easter egg hunt, and going to lunch at A & W. We also went to church that night since it was Holy Thursday. The one thing Paul wanted for his birthday is to go to dinner without kids, which we still have not done! So, maybe this month that will be our goal. If we can get a babysitter lined up, which might be hard because they have all moved away. Hopefully we can try out someone new and get them lined up for more outings!

We also went to the Omaha Stormchasers baseball game last Friday night, which was also a bit of a birthday present for Paul!

Anyway, here are some pictures of the bowling. Gradyn really liked to bowl! He did NOT, however, like to wait his turn to bowl NOR was he able to stay in the bowling area where he was supposed to stay. We spent the majority of the night chasing him around, back to where he was supposed to be. But, when it was his turn to bowl he enjoyed watching his ball go down the lane! He also LOVED LOVED to dance to music they had playing and spent most of the night dancing around. Like usual.

Here he is watching his ball, so intently!

Grandpa Steve & Irina

Grandma Doris & Shari

Brynlee's version of bowling.

The 30 year old...

The babysitters, Great Grandma Marlene & Zoya

Birthday Month!

2011-05-05T09:48:00.000-05:00

Yes the new blog background is in honor of my Birthday month! And Yes, I still get excited about my Birthday and the whole month of May actually! Even when I'm turning 29....
As I just explained to Ashley this week May is such an awesome birthday month to have, for anyone, but especially for teachers! The weather is starting to be awesome, school is almost out, and summer is here!! Not to mention birthday celebrations!

So Happy Birthday Month to anyone else with a May birthday! And a special shout out to Melissa and Dominic! :)

1 little Guenther Girl.....out of 8

2011-05-02T09:45:00.000-05:00

Brynlee is the first Guenther Girl in Paul's family. Paul is one of 4 boys (Paul, Andy, Mike, Joey) and the first 3 grandkids born were boys (Isaac, Gradyn, Luke).

1 girl out of 8.

She is going to be one tough little girl! :)

(Especially with her big brother beating on her all the time....even at a month old.)

1 Month Old!

2011-05-02T09:39:00.000-05:00

*For pictures of Brynlee's baptism, go to next post*

Brynlee was 1 month old on May 1st, the day she was baptized. Here are some pictures of her in the gorgeous baptism dress my Aunt Shari made for her! These pictures don't even do it justice, it is so beautiful! I should have taken some of the dress by itself, but haven't yet. There are so many cute little details. She also made the booties and the headband to match! It was perfect!

Happy 1 Month Birthday Brynlee Kate!

Brynlee's Baptism

2011-05-02T09:28:00.000-05:00

Brynlee Kate was baptized on Sunday, May 1st!

Here are some pics of the blessed day:

Godmother, Great Aunt Shari.

Godfather, Uncle Mike.

Happy Easter!

2011-04-23T10:44:00.000-05:00

We went to see the Easter Bunny at the Children's Museum. Grady was terrified. We could finally get him to stand beside the Easter bunny after he was holding Brynlee and with Paul forcing him. He also warmed up a little bit after he saw the Easter bunny dancing to music, which is a Grady favorite!

Spring Time Cuties

2011-04-23T10:39:00.000-05:00

I just really liked the green colors they were wearing this day so I did a little photo shoot!

The Long Hair!

2011-04-23T10:35:00.000-05:00

I wanted to try to get a few pictures of Brynlee's LONG hair, just in case she looses it all! :) She has already started to loose a little off the top of her head, so we probably won't be surprised if she looses it all, like Gradyn did. He was pretty much bald by 4 months. Here's hoping Brynlee is lucky enough to keep her thick, long, dark hair!

This pic was mostly for the butt ruffle, but it kind of shows her hair! :)

Here you can kind of see how she hast lost some off the top.

Look how long it is in the back, goes over her shirt! :)

It's thinning out a little on the back of her head where she lays.

Big brother hamming it up for the camera!

An attempt to get a pic of the 2 of them. Gradyn likes to tell us he wants to hold her, but then when we put her on his lap he quickly turns away and tries to get down without warning. We are trying to work on telling us he is all done holding her instead of just throwing her off!

Wedding Fun!

2011-04-18T20:21:00.000-05:00

Aren't these the cutest little boys???

Grady, Luke, & Isaac posing for a rare nice picture together!

Brynlee got to wear her tutu to her first wedding!

Isaac's favorite thing to do at the wedding: Grandpa let him hold Brynlee!

Grady's favorite thing to do! DANCE!

Bath Time

2011-04-18T20:17:00.000-05:00

Brynlee's first bath at home!

She did NOT like it!

2nd bath at home. We tried a different approach in the big bath with Grady! She enjoyed this more, but still didn't love it. She hates being naked. She hates having her diaper changed. So, maybe if she grows out of that she will enjoy her bath someday! :)

Hanging out at home with Brynlee

2011-04-18T20:13:00.000-05:00

We have been really enjoying our time at home with Brynlee! Paul has 3 weeks off and I have about 5.5 weeks until I will go back for the last week of school before summer vacation. Paul's mom stayed with us the first week we were at home which was nice since I was moving really slow and recovering from the c-section. I am finally able to move around pretty normally and am getting faster each day. It was nice to have Doris here mostly for our meals! :)

Leo Deaver and Brynlee! :)

Grady has been doing really well with her for the most part. He is always excited about her and loves to tell us what she is doing, tickle her, and point out all of her body parts. However, he has been very naughty towards us and spent quite a lot of time in time out lately. He just loves to push and push and NOT listen when he KNOWS you don't want him to do something. He does it 10 times more if he knows you don't want him to do it. His favorite things to do are take her paci, socks, or mittens off of her and run away with them and then as soon as we tell him to bring them back he throws them under the ottomon. So, we have been working on that! I think he also gets pretty bored at home with us because he loves his friends at daycare and is a very social person anyway. He went to Doreen's 2 days last week and we are planning on him going 2 days this week too. When Paul goes back to work I think he will go every morning and maybe come home after lunch for his nap and the rest of the afternoon. We'll see how it goes.

Here he is loving on his sister!

Brynlee's cousin Isaac LOVES her! He is always asking to hold her and also loves to give her a bottle and watch everything she does.

Brynlee Kate

2011-04-18T14:00:00.000-05:00

Our baby girl is here! Brynlee Kate was born on April 1st! Yes, an April fools baby. We had many people ask, is this for real or a joke? Yes, I really went into labor early! We were scheduled for a C-section on April 5th, but she decided she wanted to come early. I started having contractions at about 3:00 AM on April 1st and they continued to get more consistent as the morning went on. We went to the hospital around 8:00 and by 10:30ish we were scheduled for a C-section at 1:00. The Dr. wanted to see my contractions be more consistent and I had eaten a little breakfast so he wanted to make sure that had enough time to digest that too. SOOO, much to my disappointment AND discomfort, I labored all morning. That was NOT supposed to be part of the deal of knowing we are having a c-section! The Dr. was running late on a surgery he did at noon, so we didn't even get called to go back for surgery until around 1:45. She was born at 2:07.

Here are a few pics from the hospital. I will try to get more posted soon!

Elefun with my friends!

2011-03-23T15:20:00.000-05:00

Dominic, Jackson, Patrick, & Grady. Baby Leo isn't quite ready for the Elefun craziness! :)

Almost 37 weeks!

2011-03-18T12:07:00.000-05:00

Gradyn giving "Sister" a hug!

We attempted at some kiss pictures, but Paul was not quite fast enough to catch it!

As soon as he saw me pull my shirt up for some pictures he had to show his belly too and wanted a picture of it!

I will be 37 weeks on Sunday!

10 more days of school!

17 more days until the c-section is scheduled! (April 5th)

We are definately in countdown mode!

In some ways the pregnancy has gone fast, but in others it has been slow. I think since after Christmas it has gone fast, but I have also felt really good since Christmas so that helps a lot! Before Christmas I was still having lots of morning sickness all day long.

I think we are pretty much ready for this little girl's arrival! Her bag is packed for the hospital, room is ready, and supplies ready to go! Hopefully I am remembering everything a baby needs. It has only been 2 years, but it seems so long ago when we were doing newborn stuff!

My doctor's appointments have been good! No problems! I go every week now. Last week he wanted to start watching my blood pressure because my bottom number is usually in the 80's, which isn't high but he still said he wants to watch it. But, this week it was 82 and he said it was fine and didn't act concerned. So, who knows! :)

The heartbeat has always been perfect (130 this week). I'm measuring perfect every time (a tad small if anything). And everything else looks good! Much more uneventful than with Gradyn! He had already been delivered by this point and had caused lots of problems before and after his birth. I'm hoping that this is a sign this baby will be much more well behaved than he is! :)

I think we have a name picked out. Well, maybe. Paul says he is for sure on it, but I go back and forth! I just can't decide, it's a lot of pressure!

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

2011-03-18T11:51:00.002-05:00

Oh Chuck E Cheese.....

2011-03-14T12:35:00.000-05:00

We took Isaac, Grady, & Luke to Chuck E Cheese to play on Saturday afternoon. (Paul, Andy, Cassie, Ron, Doris, and I) It was NOT near as cool as I remember it from when I was a kid. I'm not sure if that is because I was a kid and everything was cool, or if it is because it is just not near as good of set up as it used to be. And, the boys were a little young for most of the games, it will be good for them in a few years. If I work up the nerve to go back that is! Basically the only thing that was good about it was that the boys got to play and run off some energy since we would be sitting at a basketball game the rest of the day.

The "show" part of it is part of 1 big open room that has the games and everything. When I was little that part was separate and much more entertaining. The worst part was it was just so packed and I swear 200 degrees in there! I think my big pregnant body was just not in any condition to handle those circumstances. I should have planned better. I am not able to stand up and walk around very well anymore, for long periods of time especially so it was too hard for me to be able to follow Gradyn around and do stuff. Not to mention how hot it already was and I have been so hot this entire pregnancy. So, I had to take a lot of sitting breaks by myself and finally just went outside to get some cool air and sit in the car. However, I think Gradyn seemed to enjoy it as much as he could. He doesn't like loud, busy places and always gets really grumpy so he was in a daze for a lot of it. But, it was something a little more active for the boys to do. Luke pretty much hated it after the first 15 minutes when Chuck E Cheese (the mouse) came up to talk to him. He was scared to death the rest of the time and kept saying "I don't like that mouse" and crying. Poor guy! It seemed like Isaac had a good time from what I could tell!

Here are a few pics:

Fun with Madison!

2011-03-14T12:18:00.000-05:00

I think this bathtub picture is my favorite ever of Madison & Gradyn! Last time they took a bath together Gradyn did not enjoy it at all. This time he loved it and they were both excited to take a bath!

They also got to play outside for a little bit!

Weee! Madison was pretty trusting to let Gradyn push her!

Snack time with Apple Jacks! Yum!

I think Gradyn had 3 bowls to Madison's 1. His method is to shove his mouth as full as possible and keep it full until his plate is gone. That is why he still throws up his food 3-4 times a week! He is so impatient! We are really working on chewing and not allowing him to get more until he is ready, which causes a lot of tantrums. Maybe by the time he is 3 he will be able to eat normally...

Lincoln Children's Museum

2011-03-14T12:07:00.000-05:00

This weekend we got to take Gradyn to the Lincoln Children's Museum. I had been there with him last summer so it was cool to see how his play has changed since then and the different things he can do now. Last summer he pretty much went through and destroyed everything! He would walk into a room and start throwing it off the shelves, etc. This time he was able to actually play very well with everything. He is really good at pretend play, plus he loves to get on all of the vehicles they had and act like he is driving. He also LOVES the "ground squirrel" area where he can climb in and out of holes, go through tunnels, etc. It was a really fun morning!

Oh, he was also obsessed with the water area. He loves water wherever he can find it! We had to drag him away from there because he was soaked.

The Little Fish

2011-03-10T11:54:00.000-06:00

We have taken Gradyn to the Rec Center swimming a couple times this winter. He loved the water so much last summer that I thought we would take him more, but with my feeling sick for 3/4 of the pregnancy and with Paul hating anything to do with water, we have only made it 2 times. He was a little scared the first time, he must have forgotten what it was like from the summer AND it was Girl Scout day at the pool so it was very packed and very noisy which I think scared him too. By the end of that visit he did warm up and liked it, but he still wanted to grip Paul and I really hard. We actually left that day in a screaming tantrum because he wanted to go down the slide so bad, which he is not near old enough for! You can see in the picture below how it is a huge tornado/tunnel slide.... He was obsessed with it and we literally left the pool/parking lot with him kicking and screaming. Nice, huh? :)

BUT, the 2nd time we went he LOVED it from the start! Even at home when we told him we were going to go swimming he was running around screaming "Daddy we're going swimming!" "Come on Daddy!" (Can you tell who is slow moving about going to the pool?????)

This time he jumped right in the water and was so excited the whole time. He couldn't decide if he wanted to be in the big pool or little pool and kept wanting to go back and forth. He also did quite a few of the "moves" he learned in swimming lessons last summer and was like a pro again. We need to try to go back again in these next few weeks before the baby comes. Because, trust me, it will probably be awhile after the baby comes before you see me in a swimming suit again.... :) haha!

Oh, and this time he didn't even hardly notice the slide, mostly because there weren't any other kids going down it for him to be jealous of. We didn't have to leave in a tantrum! He was actually super pumped up when we left because he got to shower at the rec center too, which is another of his favorites. He thinks it is pretty awesome to have 4 or 5 different showers on at once spraying at you.

Aunt Ashley was also there to play!

He was "skiing" on her legs and loved it!

"I'm skiing!!"

He kept going back and forth between the big pool where Ashley was and little pool where I was.

And, see the huge slide in the background that he was so obsessed with? I guarantee even if he was big enough to go down it he would get to the top and freak out, which is what he does at the park. He is such a chicken!

Swimming! He is getting really good at kicking and using his arms at the same time!

This is where I spent most of the time, waiting for him to come back to the baby pool area and splash around.

No, I don't think this is a glamorous shot, but it is the most recent pic of the baby belly so I thought I should post it. Ignore everything else please. :)

Dr. Seuss Birthday

2011-03-03T15:43:00.000-06:00

It was Dr. Seuss's birthday yesterday so we celebrated at school with lots of fun activities! The kindergarten classes dressed up as Thing 1 and Thing 2!

3rd grade students came to read Dr. Seuss stories to the kindergartener's!

We also did several different activities in our classroom, had green eggs and ham for breakfast, had an ice cream party with the whole elementary and also did Jr. Jazzercize for fun in the afternoon!

Our "preschooler"

2011-03-02T22:10:00.000-06:00

When Grady turned 2 our weekly email updates started saying "your preschooler". I was so sad when I saw this because I didn't think a 2 year old is considered a preschooler already! Aren't they still toddlers???? They grow up fast enough already!

However, since he has turned 2 I can really see how he could be considered a "preschooler". First of all, he is SO LUCKY to go to such a an awesome daycare! They do some sort of project every day where he is learning so much! They cut, glue, color, make crafts, use markers, paint, bake, etc. I was shocked when she told me she had him use glue to make a Dr. Seuss hat this week! She said she drew a line on the paper and told him to follow it with the glue and he did really well to glue on the stripes on his hat! I have NOT been brave enought to try projects like that at home, let alone use glue! They have also been working on using scissors to cut small lines and strengthen their hands. I LOVE that they do all of those things!

Like I have said before Grady is obsessed with songs and sings all the time. He can probably sing 10 or more songs from start to finish and knows most of a lot of others. He pretty much never shuts up. It is so fun now to hear him walk/run around singing his songs, or when he doesn't even realize he is doing it when he is playing.

AND FINALLY, his newest accomplishments that he loves to tell us all the time are:
He can count to 11 and He can say the whole Alphabet by himself!!!
Oh, and he also knows the letter G and can write it himself (not perfect looking of course)!!
And, he official knows the colors: Blue, Yellow, Red, and Orange. For everything else he always says Yellow. I guess it is really fun to say!

So, I guess using the phrase "preschooler" for him is more fitting than I thought. Next step: Working on recognizing more letters!

Diaper Shower

2011-02-27T21:54:00.002-06:00

Baby Girl's Room

2011-02-27T19:19:00.000-06:00

Finally some pictures of "Sister's" room. We call her Sister. She doesn't have a definate name yet. We have a list, but still not narrowed down. And, I kind of want to keep browsing to see if I find something else I like.

Anyway, this is what her room looks like so far!

Her name will go in pink letters above the crib, eventually.

And, the TV will be removed from the room too!

Grady is excited for Sister to come and check out her room!

I am happy with how it has turned out so far! The only thing we are going to try to change is the pink stickers that came with the bedding set that are on the walls do not show up very well since it is pink paint. I am going to get some more brown circle stickers to replace some of them. Especially in these pictures, it is hard to see them, so picture the pink spots with brown! :)

Baby Shower at School!

2011-02-27T19:08:00.000-06:00

My friend Andrea planned an awesome baby shower with my class at school. She is one of my close friends and I get to have her daughter Addilyn in my class this year and she teaches first grade in Hershey. The kids loved being a part of the baby shower and thought it was really fun!

One of the mom's made a diaper cake that was really cute!

The piggy bank in the above picture was part of a "shower game". The kids all put a penny in the bank and made a wish for the baby. We had a lot of good ones! Some of them were: I wish the baby was here right now, I wish the baby could fly, I wish the baby was magic, etc. It was cute!

Paul and Grady got to come to the shower since it was Paul's Friday off. Grady LOVED being with all the kids and running around exploring. He especially loved the pink cupcakes!

My class at the shower!

The kids also got to write what name they think I should name the baby. The most popular was Princess. :)

Among the other choices were: Sally, Elizabeth, Jacquelyn, Jane, Ella, Ally, Hannah, Lady, Briley, Deonna.

Baby Girl Guenther was blessed with some cute little presents too! A couple blankets, a couple outfits, and a cute teddy bear.

It was a really awesome shower!

Knock Knock Jokes

2011-02-24T22:57:00.002-06:00

One of Grady's new things to do is tell Knock Knock Jokes. He especially loves to do them in his bed when he can knock on his headboard and we are laying in bed with him.

This is a small portion of his comedy tour:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Oaw5zZNXTeM

2nd Video of his Knock Knock Jokes:

(No More Monkey's Jumping On The Bed!)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0kSsebvs1Cg&safety_mode=true&persist_safety_mode=1

Sorry they are sideways. I couldn't get it to turn!

Luke's 2nd Birthday/Grady update

2011-02-24T15:04:00.000-06:00

The 3 little boys on a Mule ride!

Our nephew, Luke, had his 2nd Birthday Party last weekend! We went back for the weekend and got to do lots of fun stuff! Gradyn got to do one of his favorite things! Ride in Grandpa Ron's Tractor!! Every time he sees a green tractor he calls it "Grandpa's Tractor". We also got to ride around in the Mule and watch the cows eat and even watch Daddy, Andy, & Ben chase some cows into another pen. I don't really know what they were doing, but we sat and watched them run around and yell at cows for awhile. :)

Luke's party was a basketball theme so we got to enjoy a basketball cake, soup supper, and fun games!

Luke & Isaac trying to give Grady a hug when he first got there.

The Birthday Boy!

Some of the "crowd" watching the fun and games!

Luke got lots of cool presents!

One of his presents was an Elmo music player thing. Grady LOVED it! He danced, sang, and did actions to every song for about 1.5 hours! (From 9 to 10:30 at night....) Can you tell how much he LOVES music??? He is obsessed! He can now hear 2 notes of a song from his CD's or music toys and yells out what song it is immediately. He can also sing all of the words and does the actions to them. Paul has heard him say what song comes next before it even comes on. We have a pretty musical little boy I guess! We do a LOT of singing and dancing in our house every day. Good thing he also really likes to play catch, hit off of his Tee, and play basketball too (although not near as much as Luke does...). :) He also really likes to play with his cows and tractors. He will come get Paul and say "Daddy get up! Come play cows!"

Speaking of giving orders to Daddy, he is getting to be quite the boss. I guess that's what comes with his vocabulary expanding so much! We hear quite often, "Mommy Come On" or "Get up" or "No Daddy! That is Mommy's blanket!"

He is VERY particular about making sure the right things go in the right place. I really love it, but it drives Paul crazy somtimes. He knows what things are Mommy's, Daddy's, and Grady's and makes sure we have what is ours at all times. Paul tried to use "Mommy's" blanket the other day and Grady threw a huge fit and yelled at him until he got his own. haha! He does this quite often with many things. I secretely love that he has OCD qualities coming out!

We had his 2 Year Check Up a few weeks ago:

Weight: 27 lbs. (40th %tile, highest he has ever been!)

Height: 34 inches (30th %tile, also the highest he has ever been!)

Head: can't remember the measurement, but 75%tile (same big head he has always had!) :)

Everything was fine at the check up. He likes to stand on his tiptoes a lot, which she said is from running so much, so we are just supposed to watch that to make sure he doesn't do it all of the time and that he can go down on his feet. Try to correct him when he see it. I don't really notice it when he has shoes on, just with shoes off and mostly when he is really excited. He does still pretty much run everywhere so we think it is also mostly from habit of running, which is a good thing to be on your toes!

We are probably going to stop services with the Early Childhood program. He is only being seen quarterly at this time by the physical therapist and at this point we have no more concerns about his development. He is still not quite as flexible as other kids his age, but he can still do everything he needs to do and is advanced in every physical category. He is very advanced in the other categories that she tested him on for his 2-year checklist. He is functioning at a 3 or 3 1/2 year old level with almost everything else. So, that was nice to see! Maybe that means we can skip the Terrible 2's! haha! We do notice that he plays with the older kids we know, and at daycare too, and is more on there level so I guess that is because he is a little more mature. This can be a good thing AND a bad thing I think!

His vocabulary and languge is just amazing us every day with all of the new things he can say and tell us about! And we can just see how his little brain is working with some of the things he comes out of the blue to tell us and talk about. Some of them are so funny! I do think it is almost getting harder to know what he is talking about now that he is mostly speaking in full sentences all the time. I used to always know what he is saying and now it takes me a little bit sometimes if I can't figure out the whole sentence and what context it is in reference to.

He is labeled as the "class clown" at daycare! Oh No! As a teacher, my first response was, "He is going to drive his teachers crazy!" He is always trying to get a reaction, loves to tell jokes, make you laugh, do silly things, always wanting to be funny. Takes after his Daddy for sure! But, I know Paul was MUCH more shy as a child so it will be interesting to see what Grady turns into and if this "clown" personality continues! We, of course, think it is adorable right now!

He has moved into a "big boy bed"! We moved his crib into the baby's room a few weeks ago so he now has a full size bed that he loves! The transition went very smooth and MUCH better than we expected! He has always had to go to bed on "his time" and that has stayed the same as with the crib. If he isn't ready to go he will come stand at the door and we can hear him trying to open it and sometimes he starts to call for us. We know that he is not ready if he does this and go to let him out. He runs out, reads some more books, plays a little more, etc. and then we try again 15-20 minutes later and he usually goes right down. He has never gotten up in the middle of the night, he wakes up and cries from his bed until we come in there.

The best part about it is in the morning he gets up on his own and runs into our room while we are getting ready! I love how excited he is to run in and see us! It is so much happier than him crying from his crib wanting up!

This week we also cut his pacifier. He are going to try that method. We cut the tip off on Sunday night and then Tuesday night cut a little more. Our plan is to keep cutting until there is nothing left. So far so good. He has still went to sleep just fine at bedtime and naps. He definately plays with it and looks it over more, but can sleep fine. He was holding it in his hand yesterday at daycare when he was laying down to nap so we are hoping that it turns into he will just hold it for the security of it and can sleep without it. I'll keep you posted! Our goal is to have it completely gone by the time the baby comes, so about 5 weeks or less.

Baby update to follow!

Happy Valentine's Day from the Drama King!

2011-02-14T11:51:00.000-06:00

Too bad Gradyn is EXTRA crabby this Valentine's Day and the whole weekend before! I'm sure he is testing our "LOVE" for him and has found out that we love him so much no matter how obnoxious he is. We are hoping it is only because he seems to be getting another 2 year molar. He was in the process of getting 1 and now it looks like there is another one poking through. That better be what it is and not his "new" personality....

We left 3 places this weekend while he was throwing a kicking/screaming tantrum because he didn't want to leave. One was at Wal-mart because he didn't want to leave the game room, which has happened a lot in the past and actually every time we have left Wal-mart recently. He actually tries to run away while we are on the other side of the store to get to that game room because he knows it is there! We pretty much always leave with Paul throwing him over his shoulder and kicking and screaming the whole way out.

Then I thought it would be fun to take him swimming yesterday at the Rec Center, which he was SO excited for! I wasn't sure if he would even remember what swimming is because we haven't been to the pool since summer but he was so excited and kept yelling "swimming" and talking about it the whole way there. He was very hesitant at first, I think because it had been so long and there were a TON of kids there, but by the end he was his old "fish" self.
BUT, he realized there is a slide at the pool. It is a huge tornado water slide for big kids. So, of course he really wanted to go down the slide. He threw a couple fits while we were swimming because he wanted to run over to it but we would always distract him. We thought he had forgotten about it and at the end he even said, "I go home" when he was ready to go home so we got out and got ready to leave. Well, apparently he remembered. We drug him out of there screaming hysterically, kicking, refusing to let us put his shirt on, yelling the whole way to the car. Fought with everything he had not to get in his carseat. Then he did his new thing of trying to make himself throw up to manipulate us.... He didn't end up throwing up, just screaming hysterically, yelling "Slide!" the entire way home. Which, luckily is only about 7 blocks.
It is so hard to take him to places that he likes because he does not want to leave them! He is SUCH a drama KING!

We were hoping a really good night sleep last night would help him but not so much. The 20 minutes he was actually up this morning before he left for daycare were terrible. He literally throws a hysterical fit for things that he would normally just ask for nicely, especially in the mornings when he is at his best. Doreen might have a LONG day at daycare!

Let's all pray he is back to his "LOVEY" self in no time!

Rock Star Birthday Party

2011-02-03T20:10:00.000-06:00

We Have A 2 Year Old!

2011-02-03T19:23:00.000-06:00

Grady's 2nd Birthday was on January 27th! We celebrated in the morning by opening a couple presents before daycare, he took cupcakes that he helped me make to daycare, we went out to dinner, and he got to open more presents at home!

This is his favorite gift from us, his card! It plays the Mickey Mouse Clubhouse song, which he thinks is ultra-cool!

The Birthday Boy at Dinner!

This is how he shows he is 2. Also could be confused with picking his nose... But, he does yell 2 as he does it! :)

Birthday morning!

Hide & Seek

2011-01-26T16:04:00.000-06:00

This is where we found Gradyn after he ran off at the store the other day. He is getting pretty much impossible to take with to the store. He runs and runs and runs and runs away and looks back laughing hysterically like he is such a comedian. And YES we have tried straping him in the cart, which works for about 2 minutes and then he is screaming, hanging off the side of the cart wanting out. Even if we put him in the basket part he tries to climb out over the side. So, we tend to let him out and have him be our "helper" and push the cart, put groceries in it, etc. He LOVES that! But at times feels the need to take off running, and he is FAST.

This particular day he had taken off and Paul followed him down the aisle. By the time Paul got to the end he couldn't see what direction Gradyn had turned so Paul knew he was in trouble with catching him. He looked both ways and couldn't see him when all of a sudden he heard laughing right next to him. He looked over and there was Gradyn sitting in the pop laughing about how sneaky he is. Little brat! Paul laughed and called me over to look at him, which of course I replied "take his picture!"

Paul got out his phone to take his picture, which Gradyn loved and then threw 2 more fits while we were at the store that day to go back and take his picture again.

The terrible 2's have started! Tomorrow is his 2nd birthday! Can you believe it???

Playing in the Snow!

2011-01-26T15:42:00.000-06:00

We have had a lot of snow this month so Gradyn has had a few chances to get out in the snow, but only really a couple times at home because it has been so cold! They go out a lot at daycare though, so he does get lots of time outside there.

He is smiling in this picture because he is OUT of the sled! He does not really like sledding very much. It may be because of his driver, Paul. The first time around a corner Paul made the sled tip over and Gradyn fell out. After that he was pretty scared of sledding and yelled, "All Done! All Done!" the whole time.

Notice how scared he is in this pic????

Helping Daddy shovel our big driveway! He now has his own shovel so he can be a big helper!

Christmas Vacation Pictures!

2011-01-02T15:02:00.000-06:00

For a detailed recap of our Christmas, please read previous blog post.

Here are some pictures of our Christmas festivities!

Our Christmas Vacation!

2011-01-02T09:25:00.000-06:00

We had a very long Christmas vacation this year away from home! Because of bad weather our trip home got extended at the beginning AND at the end. We did so many fun things and had a great time seeing lots of family! I thought it would be easier for me to remember everything by breaking it up by days and then posting some pictures in the next blog post. We are in desperate need right now of getting back on a normal schedule. Grady's normal bedtime when we were gone was anytime after 10:30. Luckily he slept in most mornings until 8:00, which is pretty late for him! He also did a good job of taking good naps in the afternoon, which was very necessary! He was begging to go "night night" most afternoons because he was so ready for a nap. He was having way too much fun at night to go to bed and of course didn't even get tired at all until very late at night!

Day 1 (Wed. Dec. 22nd)
Left NP around 1:00 to travel to Paul's parents farm. We weren't scheduled to leave until the next night but because of a possible snow storm we decided to leave early and beat it. FYI: the big storm never really happened, but it was still nice to be there early and start the celebrating! We arrived around 6:00 in time for supper with the whole family and a night of playing games and cards.

Day 2 (Thurs. Dec. 23rd)
Had breakfat at McDonald's in West Point with Uncle Mike in the morning. Went to play at Great-Grandma Betty's & Great-Grandpa Ken's during the morning. The boys LOVE playing in their basement. They have so many fun toys and a big space for them to run around. And Gma Betty loves having them too!
After playing, we made another trip to West Point for lunch at the truck stop, one of Gpa Ron's favorite places, for Godfather's pizza. Came home for naps and then hung out at home that night playing more games.

Day 3 (Fri. Dec. 24th)
Hung out at home in the morning and prepared for Paul's immediate family's Christmas celebration at noon. We ate lunch and then opened presents in the afternoon! The 3 boys (Grady, Isaac, Luke) were so excited to open presents! I got a really cute video of them running around in a circle in front of the tree yelling "Present time!" However, once the present opening started they didn't really care as much for it and kept having to be redirected back to the present opening. They got lots of awesome stuff though!
That night we all went to Christmas Eve mass at 5:00 in Wisner and then headed to Gma Betty's & Gpa Ken's for the Guenther family Christmas that night.

Day 4 (Sat. Dec. 25th)
Santa came! Grady woke up to some cool new things from Santa! A McDonald's drive-thru play set with lots of accessories and a stocking full of goodies!
We slept in because of our late night celebrating the night before and then got ready to head to the Hagedorn family Christmas at noon that day in West Point. (Paul's mom's side of the family.) We left a little early from this Christmas becuase we were heading to Lincoln and Grady was VERY ready for a nap! During present opening he kept coming up to me and whining "I night night!" "I night night!". He fell asleep on Paul's lap during presents, which is VERY not like him. We can't ever get him to even sit on our laps for more than 2 seconds so he must have been a tired little boy from all of the partying we had been doing!
So, we left for Lincoln and had a nice supper at my Aunt Shari's house with some family who was there. Most importantly, baby Noah (my cousin Heather's baby), who is about 4 months old. This was the first time we got to see him in person so it was a fun night!

Day 5 (Sun. Dec. 26th)
We went to church that morning and then headed over to my Aunt Lori & Uncle Scott's for the Luehring family Christmas (my mom's side of the family). We had a brunch at 10:00 and then of course presents afterwards, and games with the cousins! Gradyn got to play with Madison at this Christmas, which was fun to see him interact with a girl and how different it is from playing with boys all the time.
*Side-note* - During church that morning Grady took a run towards the front of the church and Paul had to chase him all the way to the front and to the side seating that he took off towards. It was quite hilarious, and embarrassing all at the same time! Everyone was laughing and we got quite a few comments about it on the way the car afterwards. That is why we DO NOT allow him to think he can get out of the pew during church. He takes off and doesn't want to come back. He has been so much better about church lately, so we are hoping this was a 1 time fluke!
After the Luehring Christmas we left to go back to Pender and got to hang out with some of Mike's friends who were visiting. We went to eat pizza at Welsh's Pizzeria in Pender and then back to the farm to play some games with them.

Day 6 (Mon. Dec. 27th)
Cassie & I took the boys to Norfolk during the mornning for a little shopping and lunch.
I think we just hung out at the house playing cards and games that night but all of the days are starting to run together so I can't remember for sure! :)

Day 7 (Tues. Dec. 28th)
We took Grady outside in the morning to ride around on the Mule and see the cows. He also got to ride in the tractor with Daddy for a LONG time because Mike & Ben got stuck so they went to pull them out! He LOVES the tractor rides and seeing the cows and Gpa on the farm!
That night Paul, Andy, Cassie, Mike, & I went to Sioux City to a movie and dinner at Texas Roadhouse. It was awesome! Cassie and I even got to squeeze in some shopping at our favorite store, Gap Outlet! :)

Day 8 (Wed. Dec. 29th)
I think we just hung out in the morning and played. We went to Paul's cousin Ben's holiday tournament basketball game in the afternoon. West Point Central Catholic played Homer in Bancroft. Grady did pretty well at the game! I was sweating by halftime from keeping him busy, but he stayed seated with us, which was my worry! It was nice he had his cousins and Gpa to also entertain him.
We then went with a LOT of the Hagedorn family to eat at The Hideaway! Our local fave!

Day 9 (Thurs. Dec. 30th)
Isaac & Luke came to hang out with us for the morning! The 3 boys got to take a bath together for the 2nd time of the week, which they love! We then all went outside to "play" on the farm, which means tractor rides, riding on the mule, and watching the guys work. They love it! It was about 50 degrees so all of the snow was melting and it was a MESS on the farm that day, but we tried to stay out of it the best we could.
We then got to go to the truck stop for lunch again for more Godfather's pizza!
That night most of the family went to Ben's final holiday tourney game while Paul, Grady, and I went in to Pender to hang out with our friends Ryan & Deenna and see their twin babies Oliver and Olive, who are 9 months old. It was fun to see Grady play with the twins because it was a nice change of pace from all of the fighting he does with Isaac & Luke! He was SO NICE to the twins and made sure they always had a toy to play with! Much different than fighting over every toy with his cousins.... :)
We got home in time to see the Husker Bowl game (yuck...).

Day 10 (Fri. Dec. 31st)
This is when we wanted to leave to come back home to NP but decided we better not due to bad weather. We hung out/took naps in the morning on the farm and then went to Beemer to eat lunch at the Hay Barn at noon. This was our laziest day! More naps and hanging out in the afternoon!
Gma Betty & Gpa Ken watched all 3 boys that night so Andy, Cassie, Paul, and I could go out with some of Andy & Cassie's friends to eat and celebrate the New Year! We ate at the Hideaway again, which was awesome! We made it back home in time to see the ball drop and say Happy New Year and then were asleep in bed by 12:15. :) Grady also rung in the New Year and saw the ball drop for the first time! :)

Day 11 (Sat. Jan 1st)
We packed up and drove home and got back around 4:00. Spent the night unpacking, doing laundry, and re-organizing. I already have lots of project planned for us to do this month to get the baby's room ready and figure out where we can store lots and lots and lots of "stuff". Wish us luck! :)

It was an awesome vacation away to hang out and see lots of family! We got to do so many fun things and mostly just hang out with Isaac & Luke, which is good for the 3 boys! They love/hate each other so much! haha! Mostly love, except when someone is taking their toy away!