Bradley lost his first tooth a few weeks ago!  We were on the playground at Chic-fil-a and he literally lost it!  I just noticed it was gone and said, “Hey!  Bradley!  Where’s your tooth?!”  He didn’t even know it had come out!  We wrote the tooth fairy a note explaining what had happened and left it under his pillow.  She accepted the note in place of a tooth and left B $2!  Bradley is finishing up pre-k and will be graduating in a few weeks!  Hard to believe!  He also mastered riding a two wheel bike with no training wheels!  He just got on and took off!  My little boy is growing up so fast.   He knows all his letters and sounds and is reading small words.  I knowwith just a little instruction next year in kindergarten he will no doubt be reading by Christmas.

Caleb has said good-bye to sippy cups and is now drinking from big boy cups!  It was a rough two days when I first took them away.  I think he went into withdrawals like a drug addict!  He screamed and cried for his “ippy” cup, but then something clicked and he picked up the big boy cup and started drinking, and has been fine ever since.  We’ve also started potty training, but it could be a long process.  For two days we tried very intensely and he was frustrated, and I thought I was losing my mind, so we backed off.  Now he sits on the potty if he wants to, and if he refuses, then that’s ok with me too.  It’s there whenever he’s ready, but NO stressing allowed for either of us!  He’s talking up a storm and parrot’s everything we say.  He’s still struggling with constipation, and we’ve gone back to soy milk (again).  I have a feeling we may be visiting the doctor again soon about that issue.  That complicates potty training as well. 

Chris ran a half iron man triathalon in April.  He was amazing!  We’re talking a I don’t know how long swim, followed by a 5o-some mile bike ride and then a half marathon!  That’s a 13 mile run!  He did it all in the rain too!  It was a nasty day, but he did it!!  Then in March he did an Olympic distance triathalon, which is actually shorter than a half iron man.  This man is amazing!  We plan on doing one together in July here in town.  Chris works so hard to support our family.  Most evenings and late nights he’s responding to hundreds of emails that he’s received during the day when he’s on the road.  He took a well needed and deserved vacation week two weeks ago and just chilled out.  He spent several nights playing video games with his friends till 5 in the morning, but good for him!  He deserved it.  He’s taking another vacation week off this month too!  And now me and the kids will be here all day to keep him company!  Chris is the proud new owner of another hand gun too.  Happy Father’s Day!  Early!!!! 

I’m enjoying my summer vacation so far, even though it’s been so busy and hectic.  I’m taking two graduate courses this term, and they’re really fast paced, so I have to work on that sort of stuff alot.  I’ll do my internship this fall and be DONE and have a master’s degree in December.  Yeah!  What will I do with myself in the evenings now?  Huh?  Relax?  Read a book for pleasure?  What’s that??  I’ll be teaching kindergarteners at church beginning this month too.  It should be pretty fun, I’ll have a class of 5-6 kindergarten girls that I’ll move up with as they move up through the grade levels.  The idea is to build a relationship with the same group of girls.  My birthday is tomorrow.  I’ll be 33, which logically I KNOW is still very young, but this is the first year that I’ve ever felt like I’m starting to get kinda old.  Turning 30 was fine, 31, 32, no problem, but this year, I’m thinking…gosh I’m closer to 35.  Still young.  Still young.  Still young.   I had an eye doctor’s appointment today which reminded me of my increase in years as well.  My one good eye (still bad mind you, but better than the really bad one) got even worse and requires an even higher prescription.  That’s what happens as you get older said the doc.  Great.  I’m very thankful for my vision, that is can be corrected with contacts and glasses, and that my eyes are healthy, but I hope my kids get Chris’s eyes.  He’s so stinkin’ lucky.  He has eyes like an eagle. 

Well, there you go, three months in a nutshell!  I’ll try to keep you updated more often.

Here’s Piper when she first arrived.

Caleb and me with Piper.  Caleb wasn’t thrilled about having his picture taken.  Bradley took this one btw!

We discovered that Piper really loves lettuce.

So sweet.

Piper chillin’ with an apple slice on Chris’s lap.

Piper’s new best friend.

After Bradley composed himself, he walked out of the room holding his arm out awkwardly apart from the rest of his body.  I asked him if he though ice cream might make him feel better and he said yes.    I had also bribed him before the shot that if he was very strong and brave I would take him to Toys R Us to buy him any toy that he would like.  So, after we left the doctor’s office we headed to Toys R Us, which was convienently right around the corner from the doctor’s office!  We had a nice time and browsed every square inch of the boys toy section.  Twice.  Bradley decided on an aircraft carrier. 

I was truely so proud of Bradley today.  I have heard stories of children his age who scream and shout and throw themselves on the floor out of terror when it comes to shots.  Bradley show so much courage in the face of his fear! 

Bradley with his new aircraft carrier, fully equipped with six fighter jets!

Bradley’s battle wounds 1 and 2.

Battle wound 3.

Lets go back to fairytale land, shall we?  Our New York City trip was fabulous!  Wonderful!!!  Stupendous!!!!  We had the best time together!  It was cold, but not too cold.  Here are some pictures!

Me, infront of Bloomingdales which was about 5 blocks from our hotel.

Chris, infront of Serendipity3, and us at our table.  Serendipity is known for their frozen hot chocolate, but I didn’t try it.  Is that a crime?  I did have their mocha late and it was pretty darn yummy though.

Me on 61st street somewhere around 3rd Ave.  The streets remind me of so many movie scenes I’ve seen.

The view from our hotel room.  28th floor!

The view down Park Ave. (I think?)

St. Patrick’s Cathedral.  We walked through during Sunday morning mass.  Whoa.  I’m so glad I’m not Catholic.  I don’t think I’d ever want to go to church.  But, it was an interesting experience.

Ice skating at Rockefeller Plaza!  Can you spot Chris and me?  Don’t spend too long looking, because we didn’t shell out the 48 bucks to skate!

Times Square.  Chris and I agreed that we would never ever ever ever want to be here on New Year’s Eve.

On the outskirts of Central Park.

Central Park

So beautiful.

Outside the theater before the show.

Me before the show.

“I am sorry you have come to know these feelings personally, but I can honestly say, several months out, that in a very, very strange way, I feel very blessed of God by my similar experience. Not everyone gets to have a perfect, holy child. Not every child gets to go from the comfort of his mother’s womb straight to the arms of a Savior. Not everyone gets to intimately understand the sacrifice the Lord made on our behalf, and the pain He felt when His son died. Not everyone gets to know that they have a child who has overcome death and the grave and is living eternally in the most perfect and wonderful place we could even try to imagine. We are blessed to be “not everyone.” We are blessed to have been given these gifts, a new ministry of comfort, and a chance to glorify our God despite the circumstances. I call my experience my “Job moment in time.” I am more than confident that your family will endure and emerge as Job did, and God will recieve all the glory. You’re already doing it. Isn’t it amazing what the Jesus in us is capable of? Way more than we every could have imagined.”

1.  Be healthy and try to lose 10 pounds.  I’ve been carrying around extra since Caleb and even more extra since my third pregnancy.

2.  Go to bed at a decent hour.  I know I’ll feel so much better if I do.  I’ve decided 10:00 is my bedtime.  Ok, 10:30 at the latest on a school night.  Last fall it was very common for Chris and me to go to bed at 11 or 12:00 and on a really late night 1:00 or later! 

3.  Get up on time and stop pushing snooze!  (This ties in with res. #2 above)  If I get up on time I can get ready in a peaceful calm environment without rushing around like a crazy woman to get to work on time. 

4.  Read my bible more.  (This ties in with res. #3 above).  I need to get my toosh out of bed on time to have my quiet time in the morning.

5.  Leave work on time.  Staying just a half hour late creates a domino affect on all the resolutions above.  When I stay late, I pick up the boys late, start dinner late, so we eat later, clean up and bed time comes later, so I end up staying up later too.  And then get up later the next morning, and so on.  You get the picture.  I usually stay because I’m in the middle of something that I want to finish, but I’ve decided I just have to make myself stop and leave!

Chris and I are eating healthier and making an effort to eat out less too.  I’m so proud of Chris!  He’s eating colorful vegetables and trying new things!  He will even eat onions (vidalia sweet only) now!  We’re having talapia later in the week, so I hope he likes that too!  We bought ourselves a George Forman grill and are really loving it!  Check out our dinner tonight. 

The grill is really nice and grills things really fast.  The only complaint I have about it is that it is awkward to clean.  Maybe I just don’t have the hang of it yet, but I seem to end of getting water all over the counter somehow.

Chris is also training for an ironman triathalon.  I don’t even know how long this thing is, but it’s huge.  Like a million mile bike and trillion mile run or something insane!  He’s working out in the morning before work and after work.  He’s nuts and slightly obsessed I think, but he’s dedicated and I’ll be there to cheer him on when he finishes!  To help with his training schedule I’m now taking the boys three days a week to school in the morning, which means I have to leave the house (with them ready to go) at 6:25.  I was not thrilled about it at first, but now I really love it!  I love spending that time with them in the morning (even though it’s very early morning!).  We eat breakfast together and have some nice moments getting dressed and ready for the day.  I used to eat with them everyday, but the last several months of the fall I started going to work and leaving  the house with all the boys sleeping.  They all got to sleep later and I didn’t have to wake up as early either.  It just became a habit (there’s that word again!), but I’m glad to be taking them a few mornings a week now.

It’s 10:02 pm, so I better get off to bed!  My college classes start on Monday, so I don’t know how frequently you’ll hear from me, but I’ll try to keep the blog updated!