Jumping in

Claire loves to jump.  She jumps every chance she gets. Claire makes Max lie down and she jumps over him.  So far, no casualties.  She rolls up the large rug in her bedroom and gets a few last jumps in before bed.

So I captured her today in her jumping phase, so it can be remembered.



I also like the other little details of these pictures.  Like, the pink cowgirl boots she's obsessed with.  And the skinny jeans that aren't all that skinny on her tiny frame.  And the pink cupcake shirt she's wearing, which she wears all the time.  I'm pretty sure she loves it because of the cupcake and not because it says "Birthday Girl" on it.  She's not really an attention seeker.



JUMP!


Last Friday when we were driving to the zoo, we were listening to some song on KTIS (Christian radio).  Claire asked, "Mommy, what does 'faithful' mean?"  I thought for a few seconds and said, "It means that God is always with us".  She thoughtfully responded, "oh.....God is always with us....." There was a long pause and then Max blurted, "Mommy, what does 'OH MY GOSH' mean???" Buzzkill!

Claire's been stumping me lately with how to respond to her.  The other night she was lamenting that the owwie on her finger still wasn't better.

"Mommy, I prayed for God to heal my finger.  Why isn't He healing it?  Can He not hear me?", she asked me.

"God can ALWAYS hear you honey, but sometimes it just takes some time for our owwies to heal", I responded.

She thought for awhile and said, "Is he not healing me because he's too busy healing other kids?"

I swear she asks me these questions at the very end of the day, when only this question and the bedtime routine stands between me and watching Dancing with the Stars on my couch.

Speaking of jumping, tomorrow I'm jumping, figuratively speaking, into a new job with Target.  I'm back downtown Minneapolis, which, during all seasons other than winter, is actually a longer commute for me.  Last week was rough, with telling my team and saying goodbye to many friends I've known since I started my career in that area almost nine years ago.  I even cried, multiple times, in front of my team.  I might write a post on this goodbye and words that were shared with me later this week.

Have a good week!

Easter

Right now the kids are having rest time so I thought it was a good time to put my feet up and share pictures from our Easter.

We've had a great weekend.  I was off on Friday and went to the Zoo with Ami and crew and then to her house for lunch.  That evening, Mom and Brad watched the kids while Josh and I went to Good Friday service and then we had pizza with them before they went to the next Good Friday service themselves (it's so convenient that my mom lives just a few minutes from church!).  Yesterday was our nicest day of the spring yet and we had a full day.  Grocery shopping when Target opened at 8:00, Ethan's first birthday party, made a cake and birds nest desserts for today, long walk outside, nummy homemade dinner, and then egg coloring!

I love this sweet picture of me and my boy, even though it's not a great picture of me and it's out of focus.  My lovebug is so precious.  But he's turned into an awful nighttime sleeper!  I was talking to my sisters-in-law today about sleep training him.  Has anyone done "cry it out" with a 2 year old?  He's still in his crib and has never tried to get out.  I think he could honestly cry for hours, which would be difficult for me, Josh and Claire but maybe it would only take a night or two?  I'm at a loss for what to do.  Getting up with him multiple times a night (and for 20-30 minutes each time) is doing nothing for my case about adding another baby!



This morning we went to the 10AM church service (our church has many services.  Last Christmas Eve, we had 21,000 people attend!) and then went to Aunt Sue and Aunt Julie's house for lunch.

The five Docken cousins.  Omi watches all five of them, five days a week, for 10 hours a day! God bless her.


Adore him.


Three nice smiles out of four- I'll consider that success!


Auntie Bethanie organized a fun egg hunt- thanks Bethanie!


Claire, Brody, Everleigh, Mara, Maverick, Max and Briggs- love these kids!




My dad, Chris, Becky and Bailey were planning to come over for dinner tonight but my dad had the flu and a several-day debilitating migraine this week (at the same time!), so he can't come. :(  Instead, my Mom and Brad are going to come over along with Chris' family.

Happy Easter!   Easter changes everything!

2009 and 2010 Family Photobooks

The first year and a half of our childrens' lives, I just printed photos at Target and placed them in standard photobooks, sometimes with a caption.  I took so many pictures that we have like six photo albums from Claire's first year.  Not a very efficient use of bookshelf space!

In 2011, I started making my Shutterfly Family Photobook.  And I fell in love.  After creating books "real time" for 2011 and 2012, I really wanted to go back in time to create books for 2009 and 2010 but the task was daunting.

I finally bit the bullet and in the past two months, I have created both my 2009 book (101 pages) and my 2010 book (111 pages) and I am so thrilled!  I am so excited that I will have a series of these books for each year of their childhood (I'm hoping until they are 18!).  The hardest part for me was just getting started.  Once I did, I got into a rhythm (while watching Bachelor or American Idol) and it went pretty fast.

I am thankful that I was blogging those years because it made it a lot easier. However, if you haven't journaled your children/family, you can still document their life in retrospect.  A couple tips:

• The date the photo was taken is embedded into the picture's metadata.  Even just pasting photos from the same event together and marking the date is great photo-journalism. 
• While simply viewing pictures from 2009 and 2010, it was amazing how many emotions and memories flooded back to me, even without having anything blogged.  Much of my storytelling in these books came from my own memories that surfaced once I viewed the pictures, and not from my blog itself.  If you are having trouble remembering details around any event or stage in their lives, maybe your husband remembers!  
• Shutterfly frequently offers 50% off the size 12x12 photobook.  I ordered the 2009 book for just shy of $90. I haven't ordered my 2010 book yet.  I finished it last night and am hoping Shutterfly offers 50% off later this week (right now the 12x12 book is 30% off so I'm holding out).  This, to me, is money VERY well spent!  
• I like having "themes" that carry through my different books.  In 2012, I used photos for the front and back covers (versus the leather cover I used for my 2011 book) and I really liked it, so I did the same for my 2009 and 2010 books.  For 2009, 2010, and 2012, I also put a bible verse on the back cover that was especially meaningful for that year.  For my 2010 book, I used the same bible verse that was on Max's birth announcement, which is "God is able to do immeasurably more than all we can ask or imagine" Ephesians 3:20.  
• Spend time proof-reading your book!  Once my book is completely done, I go back in painstaking detail to re-read every single word in the book, to prevent typos or grammatical errors.  In the three books I have printed so far, I only have one error and it still drives me nuts!  But that's also my pet peeve (typos/grammatical errors in "published"/formal works).   

I'm hoping I may have inspired someone to consider journaling your family through family photobooks!  I hope you enjoy perusing my two latest books below.

2010 book

Click here to view this photo book larger

2009 book 

Click here to create your own Shutterfly photo book.

Click here to view this photo book larger

Shutterfly photo books offer a wide range of artful designs and embellishments to choose from.

Thoughts from the mind of Josh

It's been a long time since I've done "Thoughts from the mind of Josh".

One night this week he said:

"Max, when I put lotion on you [after bath], I feel like I don't even know you." 

(because he normally dries, applies lotion, and dresses Claire, and I do the same for Max, and she looks like half the size of him after bath).

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Yeah for Saturday!  Our day will be filled with the normal weekend chores.  Tonight I have a much-anticipated Ladies Night with my "Mom friends" (and all seven of us are going!).  We always get dinner together the third Monday of the month, but it's been three years since we had a Ladies Night on the weekend!

A big shout-out to my sister-in-law, Bethanie, who turns 30 years old today!  It's hard to believe I met her when she was just 18!  Bethanie, I have so enjoyed building a relationship with you the past 12 years and love traveling this journey of motherhood with you.  Hope you have a wonderful day (and wish Barry didn't have to work tonight!!).

Have a great weekend, all!

Friday funday (and a couple more)

I forgot a couple cute Max phrases that I want to document in my book.

One morning during my staycation, I asked Max to grab something off the floor and bring it to me.  He gave it to  me and said, "Here you go, Sweetie Pie".

Last Sunday we had dinner at Nana's house.  As Max was eating his dinner (and Nana was grabbing something in the kitchen), he looked around to find her, made eye contact, and on his own accord said, "Nana, thank you for making this!"

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This morning I brought the children to the Como.Zoo Conservatory for their first time.  It made us that much more anxious for spring.  When I told my Mom this morning that we were going, she decided to join us for awhile since she works only a couple miles away.



Stopping to smell the flowers.










This is a 13 foot long snake, that eats once a month or even every other month.  He eats large guinea pigs.



Claire stared him down.


Tonight we are going to Buca's for dinner with Heather, Sean, Bethanie, and Barry (Josh's sisters and their husbands).  Instead of buying each other birthday gifts, we go out together one night each year. My dad was supposed to babysit Claire and Max but he came down with a migraine this afternoon so Great Aunt Sue and Great Aunt Julie are coming to the rescue (thank you again Sue and Julie!!).  Excited for a fun evening! And tomorrow is always my favorite Saturday in March--- Moss Basket Days!

Have a great weekend!

Life with Claire at almost 4 and Max at 2 1/4

I love this series of photos.  Just a diaper box, baby, stethoscope, and two little loves.















Look at joy on Max's face.  Love.

I haven't been doing well with posting updates, stories and quotes from the children on the blog lately.  I do it so I can transfer them to my annual photo book and treasure them for years to come.  Recently I've been quickly jotting down stories or quotes on my phone, but since Claire has a tendency of 'accidentally' deleting all of the notes on my phone, I thought it was about time I blog about them.


On Feb 13th, Great Aunt Sue emailed me a story from the farm.  She said: When I was at the farm on Monday Claire was playing with a small bottle of lotion. She squirted some out and it splashed on me and on her. She walked over to the sink, grabbed a towel, looked back over her shoulder at me and said, "I assumed that was going to happen."

Bedtime routine.  We still do baths every other night (will change once they start wearing sunscreen again).  I read the kids one or two books in Max's room and then Claire leaves and turns his light out. I rock Max in his rocking chair for a couple minutes and sing a couple songs (tonight it was "rockabye" and "Away in a Manger", per his request).  Settle him into his crib and close the door all the way shut.  Then I go into Claire's room, rock her in her rocking chair, and talk about our days (again) and other random stuff.  Then I tuck her into bed and sing her three songs.  The three songs are typically "rockabye", "three blind mice" and "Mary had a baby boy".   Hugs, kisses, get her a kleenex, some more chapstick, then she tells me, "I love you, Mom, I love you, too, Goodnight, I love you.  Is the little light on?" (bathroom light).

Both kids focus intensely on picking the fuzz out of their toes when their socks are removed. When doing so, Max pulls his toes so far apart we worry they will rip.

On Feb 5th, Josh took Claire to gymnastics and just Max and I enjoyed having dinner together.  We had the following conversation:
Me: "Maxy, what did you do at the farm yesterday?"
Max: "I went on the tractor yesterday....  it was a big one... I went to Grandpa Don's house.... I had a cookie... a brown one.... Papa had a white one...."
It melted my heart to hear him recount a whole story.

That same night, Max bit me.  I was talking to Claire about how much it hurt (it really did). She said, "Dear God, thank you for making Mommy's owwie feel better. Amen".  This was her first prayer all on her own initiative.  Now, hardly a day goes by that she doesn't initiate prayer (or proclaim excitedly that God healed one of her owwies).  Last weekend, Claire and I saw a girl on crutches at Target.  I could tell Claire continued to think about it the entire time we were there.  Later, we were in the shoe aisle and she was hobbling around, trying to get a feel for how it would be to walk with crutches.  She said, "Mommy, can we pray for that girl?"  I said, "Sure, sweetheart".  She sat down in the shoe aisle, folded her hands and said, "Dear God, please make that girl's leg feel better.  I pray she has no more owwies.  Amen".

One evening I said to Claire, "what did you do today?"  She responded, "I was SO busy at work today.  I email, I called, I text".

Claire woke me up at 5:00AM.  I went into her room and asked, "What do you need?"  "I need to say I love you so much," she said.  Alright then, go back to bed.

In early January, Max was playing with his dinner food.  I said, "Max! Please don't do that.  That's gross."  He looked at me disgustingly (like he was shocked that I had called him out) and he said, "THAT not gross!  My DIAPER gross!".  We laughed so hard.

Other Claire-isms:

"Mom, do I have skinny jeans that are clean?"

"Oh, Mom!  You look SO cute! Do I have a shirt just like that?!"

Me: "Claire, we can't read a book tonight"
C: "Mommy, can we just lay in the chair and talk?"
C: "Mommy, what was your favorite thing today?  My favorite was coloring (curling) your hair".

At Baby.Gap, I was looking at a pair of flare jeans for Claire.  Claire said, "Mom, I only like skinnies".

Claire has a WICKED sense of smell.  This often leads to hysterical moments in our house.

Max is amazingly verbal, but says some things with the wrong sounds.  A couple cute examples:
"I want to watch a pantoon" (cartoon)
"Tan I please have a tookie?" (can I please have a cookie)

I love hearing just everyday sentences come out of Max's mouth.  At dinner last night he said, "Oranges are my favorite".  A couple days ago he said, "I will open the door so you can get out".

The  kids wake up REALLY early and it's killing us on the weekends.  They're consistently up between 5:30-6:00.  Actually, Max starts waking up around 5:00 and we continue going back into his room to quiet him down until we give up around 6:00.  Monday morning Max woke up at 5:00 and started shouting from his crib (through a closed door), "HEYY!!  HEY!!  You guys!! Somebody get me!!"

When it was cold a couple weeks ago and I was walking with the kids into Target, Max kept saying, "it's code!  It's code!  It's code!  Heat it up! Heat it up!"

Staycation week in review

Well it was wonderful and rejuvenating and good for my soul, and now it's come to an end.  I am incredibly grateful for the past 10 days. I feel refreshed, more organized, and obsessed with my children (I still kiss them hundreds of times a day, even as I'm walking them to time-out. #mixedmessages). I can't help but be sad tonight.

I had a big to-do list for the week and got almost everything crossed off.  I organized my linen closet, pantry, desk, extra bedroom, bathroom drawers, car, and hallway closet, and gave away 16 bags worth of stuff I don't need and in some cases, forgot I even had.

I saw my broham Chris and my niece Bailey 5 out of the 6 weekdays I was off.

This week was a great change of pace for me.  I would never presume that it's easier or more difficult to be a stay at home mother or a working mother because I think it's largely dependent upon each individual's specific circumstances. But I do know that it felt really good to do the laundry, pick up the house, clean, empty the dishwasher, run errands and make dinner while I was home during the day instead of having to cram all of that into the evenings and weekends.

Here's our week in review (if you follow me on IG, you've seen some of these pictures but not all of them!):

MONDAY

We have cleaning people come once per month and they arrived two hours earlier than I expected.  Thankfully my brother was around so we stopped at his house so I could put on my make-up, eat breakfast, and see my niece before we headed to the Minnesota. Zoo (oh and both Claire and I fell on the ice, which was fun too!)


We went to the zoo and met up with my best childhood friend Katie and her son Parker.  I think it was the busiest I have EVER seen the Zoo.  It was also sandbox weekend so we got cute buckets.  Fortunately, my kids wanted to get nowhere near the mass of children crammed into the massive sandbox, just as I expected!


We couldn't find an open table to eat our lunches so we went to Cul.vers instead.  Love any time I get to spend with Katie!!


He walks around with his hands in his coat pockets and it slays me.


After naps we made banana bread for the guests we were expecting the next day.


That evening I went out for drinks and dinner with Krista, Jody, Rachel and Melissa.  Love these girls!


TUESDAY 

On Tuesday morning Cindy, Jessica, James, Jude, Amy, Jane, my brother Chris and Bailey came over.  Cindy is my Godmother (and the Mom of the family I visited three times in Ukraine) and I have been friends with Jessica (Cindy's daughter) and Amy since I was four years old (well, Jessica since I was five because she is five years younger than me!).  We had a wonderful time catching up.  Cindy and her husband Paul will be spending the month of March in Moldova.  They will be there on behalf of HOPE International but Cindy is also feeling called to work on the cause of human trafficking, which is an enormous issue in Moldova.




That evening, Everleigh joined Claire at her gymnastics class because it was 'bring a friend' week! Those two are the sweetest together!


WEDNESDAY

We met my dad, Chris and Bailey for lunch on Wednesday.


That evening I made a full turkey and potatoes meal for my mom and Brad.  It was delicious.


The kids had a ton of fun playing "duck duck grey duck" and "I spy" with Nana and Grandpa Brad.  When they were leaving, Max looked up sweetly and said, "I love you Grandpa Brad".  All on his own initiative!  It was one of the most precious things ever.


THURSDAY

On Thursday we met my mom, Chris, and Bailey for lunch at Old Chicago (my mom was working from home that day).  The kids were so well-behaved that it was actually a relaxing meal!


Max is left-handed, which I find interesting.


After naps, we finger-painted and colored.

Look at that sweet tongue.


FRIDAY

We braved the snowy roads Friday morning to drive Daddy to his bus stop, so that he could take the train to the Mall of America to meet up with us after work.  A couple hours later, we braved the roads again to go to Melissa's house for a playdate with Carson and Kate.  Carson and Claire are only days apart but he's probably a foot taller!


After naps, the kids and I went to the Mall of America.  Is it sad that my two year old knows the names of different malls?  "Are we going to Burnsville Center or Mall of America, Mommy?", he asked me.


It just so happened that the Farmer family (Brad's daughter) arrived an hour later, to celebrate Cambrie's third birthday!!  Claire is very afraid of even walking into the amusement park in the mall because it's too loud and overwhelming.  Before that day, she wouldn't have even thought about going on the rides, but she mustered up a lot of courage and joined Cambrie on FOUR different rides!  I was so proud of her.

Here is Shayla and I with Cambrie and Claire.


Max wanted to join too and we all enjoyed the balloon ride.


On Sunday, Nana and Grandpa Brad babysat the children while Josh and I went to a class at church.  Then, they blessed us with her delicious lasagna.


MONDAY

Today was my last day. We had a good morning at home, playing, folding laundry, cleaning up, and playing some more, and then we met Chris, Bailey, and my Mom at Chipotle for lunch (my mom was working from home again and this is Chris' last week of full-time Daddy Daycare).

While we took this picture, Claire was saying "you can't take it yet, there's food in my mouth!  I have to chew it first!"  Haha, she's so polite.
.

After naps, we went to Sara's house to have a playdate with her, Rachael and Allison.  It turned into a happy hour!  So much fun.  The kids LOVE Sara's house because the kids are wonderful and their basement is like an amusement park, with an actual blow-up jumpy house, 15-foot or so long roller-coaster type thing, trampoline, etc.



I'd like to do another full week off sometime this summer, perhaps in August.  I love the extended time with my children.  It was blissful.