The Enforcer

Garrett is in a "stage" right now. I sent him to timeout during breakfast...yeah early start.

The rule is still quietly on the rug, that he's not even close to sitting on, behind him. I won't start the timer till they are sitting there and NOT making any noise. Garrett was rolling and squirming all over the floor and not even close to quiet. He kept whining that I hadn't started his timer yet. Next thing I see is Lincoln sitting on top of him...at least was being still...finally. Lincoln is the "husky" version of our kids and might out grow both of those big boys. I'll teach him young to be my Enforcer and then I can say, "Don't make me send Lincoln in..."

His 4 minute timeout took almost 45 minutes to get finished.

After timeout we require them to say, "I'm sorry for _______." If they don't remember why they were sitting there we remind them and send them back for another 2 minutes. Sometimes just getting them to remember takes forever.

In an effort to avoid an additional 2 minutes Garrett now has a list he apologizes for a loooong list of things every time he gets out. Today it went something like this, "I'm sorry for being mean aaannnddd being rough with Lynneah aaannnddd talking rude aaannnddd not sitting to eat aaannnddd saying bad words aaannnddd not sitting in timeout right?" Each time he'd say something his tone would go up a little like he was checking to see if he was at least on the right track of remembering why he'd been sent to the rug.

Thanks for the help Linkers.

Tried Again

I tried again. I think it turned out a little better. The house was ROASTING hot in an attempt keep her warm, but she still got a little cold and didn't want to smile. She doesn't look quite as annoyed, that's an improvement.

I'll take what I can get and declare her adorable!

My Little Stocking Stuffer

I've always thought little babies in stockings were so cute. This Christmas was my chance. None of our stocking were wide enough to slip a baby in, but Brianna had this pretty one that did work.

Lynneah is a long scrawny little girl, skinny enough to fit and eventually squirm all the way in.





Doesn't she looked thrilled with it? I thought I'd caught one with her smiling, but it was blurry. :-( She was having nothing to do with curling her arms up in a cute little pose. Those arms are out in every one. sigh...I tried.


I might have to beg Brianna to borrow it again so I can try to get a little better shot...unless she or my mom caught a good one.

Silent Night...

HA!

NOT a Chance!

Keep Dreamin'!

Not if I have anything to do with it...

It's beginning to look a lot like...

Christmas??

Or something like that.

Currently, Stephen, the big boys and several of the neighbor kids are having a large water fight. They're equipped with water balloons, guns and hoses. All of them are soaking wet. I heard Stephen on the roof a bit ago and have the house surrounded by water blasting kids.

Saddest part is they came to the door asking if I could come out and see something. Fortunately I was nursing at the time so Stephen grabbed his mega water gun (that was taken off the market due to injuries it caused) and went out.

Gotta love Christmas in the desert!

My sympathies to all the sufferers of snowy places. Snow is something I like to look at for about 5 minutes and then I'm done.

{;-D

I've Been Told...

There needs to be a new picture of Lynneah...not screaming her head off...posted here. Well, she did a whole lot of that screaming her head off, anytime she wasn't attached, for a while. I most definitely wouldn't recommend a two week maternity leave to anyone. It makes that time you're trying to get life + one figured out REALLY complicated. I've been tired somethin' fierce! The boys have been yelled at a lot; I was just flat out too tired to deal with the sassy little mouths, and total disregard for all the rules. Oh, and don't forget the new full contact wrestling/fighting moves they have. One more week and Christmas...er..."Winter" Break starts. It'll be a long couple weeks with all of them home all day *but* I won't have to worry about getting them up at a certain time, badgering them to get dressed so the can eat, have the morning fight about brushing teeth or have to get myself ready for work.Yes, they will still brush their teeth I just won't need it done by 7:10 am, and yes, I'll be looking pretty great in all my hag glory. Hopefully I can get lots more pictures of Lynneah at that point too. For now this will have to do.

I can never get pictures to embed where I want them too. I swear one of these days I'm gonna get smarter than this darn computer and and then we'll see who's laughing.

Anyway, the above picture was taken the morning I woke up to my alarm rather than already being up with her when it went off. I was SUPER excited. She slept from 10:00 pm till 6:15 am...IN HER OWN BED. We've had several days of real chunks of sleep at night. I hope she's not just teasing me. She's got allergies on top of acid reflux (very common in kids with diaphragmatic hernias) and wouldn't sleep, especially laying flat. So on nights Stephen was on shift she slept in the bouncy seat next to me. It kept her elevated and let me just bounce her back to sleep when she woke without getting out of bed. Poor guy spent 2 nights "camping" on the floor when he was home because I was so proud of my new set up and didn't want to give it up. After 2 nights he squeezed back in bed with the bouncy seat between us. I found the perfect pillow to help elevate the mattress in her cradle and she'll sleep in it now. The bed is ours again!