Last day of preschool!

Today ends a chapter in our lives as the boys go to their very last day of preschool. They have been attending a smaller preschool here in town which Carter found when he came to find us a house. (Remember... I didn't get to come on that trip because I was pregnant with Annabelle! Carter's mom came to help him... hooray for Gran!) I have mixed emotions about today. I am super excited for the boys to start Kindergarten in August, but am so sad to see this part of their lives end. We have been through the last day at a preschool before, but this one has a whole new meaning since it is truly their LAST day of preschool EVER. How did these boys grow up so fast??? They have made such great friends and none of them will be attending our kindergarten. We will try to stay in touch over the next few years, though. Here are some pictures from our day...

** standing on the front porch of their school
** with their sweet teacher, Miss Julia
** a few friends from school
** brotherly love before leaving the house
** the rice krispie treates they made (they say P + H... maybe I should have taken the picture before we put the saran wrap on!!!)

Swinging

Annabelle had fun swinging at the park while the boys played tee-ball yesterday. Precious!

How times change!

Carter and I had a minor flood in our basement last week. My heroic husband cleared all of the boxes and tubs out of our storage room before anything was damaged, but the repairman just came yesterday to fix the problem... so we have had a basement (a.k.a. the boys' room!) full of crap for over a week. It gave us a great excuse to go through some old boxes of stuff! We emptied over 6 large tubs and have a TON to give away... and I'm not finished yet. In going through our stuff, we found some interesting treasures.

*** A box full of beanie babies which makes Carter shake and convulse with memories of driving around from McDonald's to McDonald's when they had Teenie Beanie Baby toys with Happy Meals. His mom and I couldn't bear to miss out the entire collection... but we ate way too many chicken nuggets that summer.

*** Way too many boxes of artwork from Palmer & Harrison. I threw away a trash bag full of coloring pages and old valentines from preschool. (Don't worry, Gran, I kept a lot too!)

*** Carter's ZIT hat from Tech Drumline days... I think there was stuff growing inside it. Gross. Nasty. Ewwwww!!! He was ecstatic and started googling how to wash a baseball cap without ruining it.

*** Speaking of Carter's stuff... we found these two lovely items which I had to share. He and I laughed so hard when we found this t-shirt among his collection. My how times have changed!







And this collector's item also made us laugh... considering the events of the past few weeks. This was from the inagural game of the Big 12 (Tech vs. K State I think) which Carter attended with the band.

Father's Day Weekend

We had a great Father's Day Weekend!  Here are a few highlights...

Annabelle slept until 7:00 Sunday morning and started babbling "Mama" (oops... forgot to tell her it was Father's Day!)  She has also started grinding her teeth, now that she has enough to grind.  :)  It sounds awful.  Carter's wish was to watch the U.S. Open, so I tried to keep the kids occupied and away from him.  Palmer curled up on the chair next to him and fell asleep.

The boys had a birthday party to attend Saturday, so Annabelle and I had some girl time.  We read books...

And practiced standing up!

Friday was a super fun day as we went to the long awaited Toy Story 3 movie!  The boys dressed in costume (although neither one wanted to be Woody... they usually fight over him!)  I cried at least twice during the movie... it was great.  Can you tell how small the Buzz costume is on Harrison?  We have been counting down this day on our calendar for a very long time.  It was precious to see it with our Buzz and Woody fans... definitely a day to remember!

Tee-ball!

After a rain cancellation on Tuesday, the boys were excited to meet their new tee-ball teammates yesterday! Carter has gallantly volunteered to coach our team (the Phillies) and it was almost as much fun watching him as it was watching the kiddos! We have 10 kids on our team... a good mixture of boys and girls. Our first game is next Thursday. It was the hottest day we've had in Iowa City this year... of course. :) (upper 80's, Texas friends!!!! Ha!) Love it!

7 months old

Annabelle Joy is 7 months old... where does the time go?  Here are some things I want to remember about her at this age.

• her ear to ear grin
• how crazy she is about Palmer & Harrison
• her belly laugh when she plays Peek-A-Boo with Palmer
• how hard she arches her back
• her "vampire" teeth
• how soft her skin is
• what a great eater she is
• how content she is (most of the time!)
• how much she loves bathtime
• our precious "mom and me" time between 5:30 and 7:00 on my mornings to get up with her
• the smile on her face when she sees me
• her ability to sleep through the night (hallelujah!)
• watching her develop a very special relationship with her Daddy (some days I think she likes him more than me...)
• the sound she makes when I am preparing her food (she reminds me of how our cat, Roxie, used to act when we opened a can of tuna!)
• the sound she makes when you are bringing a bottle toward her mouth (Hurry, Mom... faster!)
• listening to everyone who sits behind us at church ooh and aah over how cute she is each Sunday
• her early love of jewelry (mine, that is)

Summer Haircuts!

Just call me the barber of Seville I mean, Iowa City.  I cut three heads of hair this morning!  Here are the before and after shots.

Carter...

Palmer... 

(I think he looks just like his cousin, Luke!)

Harrison... 

(I think he looks just like Uncle Jay here!)

And a gross picture of all the hair we cut!!!!!

Welcome, Summer!

Videos of AJ eating her first cereal

** Mimi / Gran -- you can't see these videos through FaceBook... you need to click on the blog to watch them!**

Annabelle is eating rice cereal! This is such a silly thing to take a video of... but I think almost every parent remembers the mushy white goo that dribbles down chins and onto an endless stream of bibs. It was amazing to me to watch how fast she caught on to "eating". In one week she went from this...

To this...

Harrison loves to feed her, too. He is such a big helper most of the time! Palmer is too, but Harrison is especially fond of his baby sister. He hugs and kisses her all the time. She is the first person he wants to see each morning and she grins from ear to ear each time he appears. He can make her smile and squeal already... I look forward to watching their sweet sibling relationship develop through the years.

Are you tired of cereal videos yet? Here is a final one of Harrison feeding her...

Easter 2010

We had a great Easter weekend. Gran found coordinated outfits for all three kiddos which got so many compliments at church! After a wonderful church service we came home to fix lunch for some friends. Carter fixed brisket and we all had a wonderful time! Here are a few pictures...

1. Palmer showing off one of his Buzz light years

2. Harrison hunting eggs in his rain boots... dressed himself :)

3. Pastor Denny with the kids during the children's sermon

4. The three kids plus mom... we sadly never got a picture of all five of us all dressed up

5. Annabelle's treat from the Easter Bunny

Annabelle has found her voice!

I tried to capture a video where you can really hear her "talking" to me... but this is the best I could get. There are about 3 places where she coos and it just melts me! Ignore my goofy comments... I was just trying to get her to talk. :) This video is mainly for our Texas family who don't get to see us often enough. This isn't a milestone or anything... just sharing the latest Annabelle cuteness!

My first day alone with all THREE!

Saturday was my first day to have all three kids by myself. I have had them for a few hours at a time before, but Carter was gone all day for Honor Band clinic and concert. I was nervous about how the day would go, but we had a blast. :) Annabelle had fun watching her brothers try to entertain her most of the day... she is really watching their every move these days. They love it when she smiles at them. The boys and I baked a cake and played games together, and they spent a lot of time in their room building a "fort" out of every single toy they own. I knew it would be a mess to clean up, but they were having so much fun and playing so sweetly together that I let them continue. (Carter wasn't so excited to see the mess when he came home, however!) I was feeding Annabelle on the couch and kept hearing footsteps coming up and down the stairs but never heard them say anything... and it turns out they were sneaking bites of cake! It was cooling on the counter before we iced it (which we never did by the way). I laughed so hard and immediately reached for the camera. Random picture, I know, but it was a funny memory. They also kept singing this song from school to the tune of "Do Your Ears Hang Low" that goes like this...

Can you bake a cake?

Can you cook a t-bone steak?

Can you make a chocolate malt?

Can you make an ice cream shake?

Can you boil a cup of water?

Do the dishes like you outta?

Can you bake a cake?

Snow video

I think I finally figured out how to transfer videos from my BlackBerry to my computer... wasn't nearly as intuitive as I thought!!! Here is one of Harrison shoveling snow in our driveway with Carter a few weeks ago. We have had a few more inches since this was taken (including today) and they are forecasting at least 5 inches more this week. :)

Catching up again!

As expected, my posting has totally slacked off. I am going to try to post a few pictures at a time to catch back up to when Annabelle was born... she is 11 weeks old now!!!!!

Carter's grandmother, our Amma, passed away last week. We flew home last Friday and came back on Wednesday. It was Harrison and Annabelle's first flights! (Palmer and I flew by ourselves before he turned 2 to Houston for a pediatric cardiology appointment at Texas Children's Hospital... he had no memory of this, so we pretended it was his first flight, too!)

Harrison took this picture of Mimi with Annabelle

Here are the boys about to get on the airplane... too cute!

Here are all five cousins... what fun they all have together!!!

Where does the time go?

As you can see by the date of my last blog post, things have been a little busy around our house! Miss Annabelle Joy Biggers joined our family on November 13th at 6:39 a.m. She weighed 6 pounds 6.7 oz and was 19 and 3/4 inches long. After 14 hours of labor she was born via c-section. The boys are absolutely crazy about her and could not understand why she and I had to stay in the hospital for 4 days. Here are a few pictures of our earliest days with her... and I hope to update more often. (Although with three kids now... time is more precious than ever!)

The classic c-section picture... upside down mom. :)

Proud brothers meet her for the first time!

Going home outfit... Carter wasn't a huge fan of the bow.

Right after her first bath at home

October is going by so fast!

A few pictures of our October...

1. A pregnant shot of me at 32 weeks (3 weeks ago)

2. The boys enjoying our first snow (no accumulation... but still exciting!)

3. The boys with Gran & Big Daddy at the homecoming football game... We beat Michigan!

4. Notice Palmer is asleep in Big Daddy's lap... sitting right in front of the band -- he can sleep through ANYTHING!

5. Mario and Luigi costumes... too funny. Palmer can't wait to wear it with the "mushtaf"

We have five weeks to go until the big due date! I'm hoping to make it that far. I can't believe that we're so close... or that we'll be a family of five soon!