Annabel::7 Months

Now time is really flyin'! #4 is closer to 1 years old than to the day she was born. Life feels very full with all 4 and I sometimes wish I had more time to just enjoy Annabel. I fail to even appreciate what a good baby she really is because life around us is utter chaos. She deals with it well!

Her brothers entertain her to no end, and take care of her for that matter. I rarely get her up from her naps or get toys for her to play with or scooch her away from what ever she's managed to reach. They are great brothers.

Annabel is just about crawling. By far my earliest mover. I swear the boys were nowhere near crawling until 9 months. I always blamed it on chubbiness, but now I think it was because they were back sleepers and she is so much stronger on her tummy because that is how she sleeps. I tried to make Easton a tummy sleeper but he would have none of it! So she is mobile now! Her crawl is very unorganized still, but she will get places and she can even get herself back up to sitting which is handy.
She just started solids, but isn't real coordinated with that either. She likes it a lot, but her tongue has no idea what to do with that food. She manages to eat it, but it's messy, and hilarious!

She's a gem.

And, yes, that is a huge basket of laundry in the corner. Just keepin' it real.

 

 

In the Orchard

There is an awesome (neglected) orchard on our property. I have dreams of taking care of it so that it really produces its potential but I think it may just stay a dream. It would be such a huge task. These trees need pruning and the whole orchard needs mowing, and who knows what other kind of tree care and spraying would need to be done to make this orchard what it was meant to be.
Nevertheless there is still plenty of yumminess to be had. There are lots of different kinds of apple trees out there right now. At least 3 different kinds of plums. There are grapes coming on and lots of cherry trees that never really did produce anything. And the peaches have been the biggest surprise. They are huge and so tasty. I didn't know peaches could do this well on this side of the mountains. Maybe it was just a good summer.

Brendan is my orchard/picking partner. He loves fruit the most and he and I think it is great fun to explore the orchard and see what kind of treasures we can find. Everyone else either is climbing or somewhere else playing.

 

 

 

 

Play Hard Crash Hard

WARNING: there are some pictures below that some people may not want to see.....just so ya know!

It's been 6 days since it happened. Our worst crash of the summer. It was Brendan again. This is the third significant face injury he's had this summer.

We were all inside, everyone except Brendan, when he came in crying (which he never does. If you hear Brendan crying from an injury you know instantly something bad happened). I was in the kitchen and heard him but didn't see him. I heard Rand say, "What happened, Bud?" and I came around the corner and saw him. Blood everywhere. We ran to the sink and he kept saying, "Did my tooth come out? Did my tooth come out?" He spit blood in the sink and and I looked in his mouth. To my horror, his permanent tooth (they are only about half grown in) was dangling out of its normal place. We finally got out of him what in the world happened. He was skateboarding but not with his feet. He was running down the sidewalk, pushing the skateboard with his hands. The skateboard hit a crack and stopped. His face was only inches from the ground and that is what happened.

We were all panicking inside but trying hard to keep it together. Rand nearly threw up and we instantly called the dentist and left to get him looked at. Brendan was really concerned about his tooth and his whole mouth was really banged up (and his nose and shoulder and eye and cheek) he even had gravel in his teeth. Everything started swelling. Poor kid. He was really embarrassed for anyone to see him and really didn't want to have a fake tooth.

The dentist was great. He asked what Brendan's teeth used to look like and we told him that it used to be even with the one next to it. So he just gentle put pressure on Brendan's gums and pushed the tooth back up and into place. To keep it there they bonded it with a flexible wire to his other tooth. He gave us a couple weeks to go home and heal and we shall see if the nerve and blood supply was permanently damaged. So far, after about a week, the tooth still looks alive!

I had to get Brendan's permission to share the story and he approved the pictures, although with hesitation. He is here proof reading over my shoulder. I assured him that years from now we will want to read back over this blog and remember what happened. And he wanted me to be sure to write, "Thank you God for dentists!" Amen to that!

WARNING::: PICTURES COMING. NOT EVERYONE IS GOING TO WANT TO SEE THIS!

 

This is day 1 after we got home from the dentist. Oh this makes me sad. And he's even trying to smile. This hardly captures how swollen his cheek and mouth were.

 

Day 2. Still swollen and getting colorful.

 

 

His Papa brought him flowers. That's a skateboard and band aids in there!

 

Day 3. Covered in vitamin e oil.

As of today, Day 6, he is looking better. Most of the scabs are off, but that new skin is NOT the same color as his summer tanned face. We will see the dentist in a week for a follow up about his tooth. He is still having trouble eating from the gash in his lower lip that has turned into 4 canker sores and he obviously can't bite anything with his front teeth.

These boys of mine, they play hard....and they crash hard too.

Sweet Sleep

Infants and toddlers alike....They never looked so sweet as when they were sleeping.

Artisan Bread

I've been really on a bread kick. Sad thing is, I'm not even eating it (well I'm trying not to). But, I have a whole houseful who are! When Rachel was here, I was making my weekly 2 loaves of bread (the same ones she makes too) and I was asking her if she has ever been able to make a really crusty artisan style french bread. She said nope and that was that.

Well a couple days ago she sent me a text and said she found a recipe and it was easier than easy and I have to try it. And I did and it was perfect and I may never buy artisan french bread again!

This recipe came from The Merlin Menu. It was seriously so easy. It just required a little thinking ahead (like the night before) but was simple to throw together in the middle of cleaning up dinner and then making pancakes the next day! I followed the recipe exactly this time, but am definitely going to try making a whole grain version, and an herb version, and a garlic version, and....?

Mixed the ingredients (4 total) in a bowl the night before.

This is what it looked like in the morning.

Scooped it out onto a floured bread board and formed a ball (no kneading)

After letting it rise for an hour on parchment paper I plopped it into a preheated dutch oven.

Put the lid on and baked for 20 mins, then removed the lid for the last 15 and this is what came out!

Fall is coming. You are going to want some of this with your first bowl of soup!

It turned out so perfect!

Stunt Kites and Body Boards

Back to the beach!

Brendan got a Body Board for his birthday, so of course, we had to go back to the beach this weekend! We still haven't managed a sunny day, but it's warm enough. My mom came with (and some other friends, too) and my mom brought all the kites she could find in her garage. There was a time she and my brother, Willie, were into kites and bought several really cool stunt kites. They are fun! And for the thrill seekers, like Willie, and apparently Brendan, a regular kite just won't do. Brendan got the hang of it fast and spent a lot of time figuring out how to make that kite do tricks. There's some power behind that kite and the wind and I was sure Wyatt would have gotten drug down the beach with it! Gonna have to fatten Wyatt up a bit before he gets the reigns by himself!

Brendan::9 Years

Brendan is so fun to watch grow up. He is passionate and brave. He is very much like his dad, personality wise. He is logical and oh so literal and he corrects me on my grammar when I am trying to make a point....which is maddening! He is smart and determined and very helpful.

He is still very much into dogs. He loves dogs and he knows more about them than I thought any little boy could! His favorite dog is a Husky. As fate would have it, University of Washington, in Seattle, happens to have a Husky for its mascot, so it isn't that hard to find some Husky stuff for a kids birthday. He said to me tonight, "I am so thankful for all my dog stuff I got for my birthday." I love how easy it is to please kids this age.

For his birthday yesterday he had a few of his buddies over for a camp out. We had pizza and ice cream cake and then a campfire and sleeping in the tent. All 5 boys slept all night in the tent without an adult and believe it or not, no one came into the house until 6:30 the next morning. That's being 9 for ya! We had family over for dinner tonight and he got a blackberry pie (from me) AND a cheesecake (from Nana). He's one lucky kid! I think this was the first birthday without regular cake.

I thought about fixing up this picture, but I love how the berries in his teeth and the berry juice on his lip tells its own story!

I just love Easton in this picture. :)

Check out this t-shirt. My mom found it somewhere random and could not NOT get it for him. I told him it would make a good night-shirt. After his party he changed into pjs and I asked where his husky shirt was. He said he hung it up because he wants it to stay nice. HAHAHA

The best brothers

Ocean Shores

To beat the heat wave last weekend we headed to the beach for the day on Sunday. It's always guaranteed to be at least 10 degrees cooler. That's not always a good thing around here, but this particular weekend it was...at least for me. No A/C in houses (most people anyway) around these parts!

We went to Ocean Shores this time. Our main reason was because you can drive onto the beach there. With all the gear we drag out there with us I was willing to put up with cars on the beach for the ease of access to our towels and coolers and tents and buckets and the copious other things that must go with us! It's really hard dragging a double stroller loaded with 2 children and all that other stuff through a sandy trail and over a dune down to the beach where we usually go. I love that we live close enough to hop in the car and go for the day....or half a day. The scenery changes so fast, and so does the weather! We left upper 80's (on it's way to upper 90's) and sun and drove right into maybe 70 and cloudy. The marine layer never did lift while we were there (in fact, we have yet to have a sunny day at the beach this summer, but we are going to keep trying) but it was warmer than the last few times and the boys were in and out of the cold ocean all day! Easton stayed in the sand. Annabel stayed in the pop-up shelter.

Baseball on the beach, of course.

It's  a great way to warm up.

Can't slide real well in sand. :)

It's not every day horses come tromping through the middle of your baseball game!

Annabel::6 Months

I'm always falling behind on these birthday posts. I had to get this one up because we have another birthday kid TOMORROW! We still haven't had the little girl's 6 month appointment yet, so I have no interesting facts like how incredibly chubby she is, but you can tell from the pictures!

Annabel has moved into her own bed, at least for naps and the first part of the night. She is too mobile to be trusted in a big bed by herself so now she is contained!

She is sitting up great and playing with toys and putting her own binki back in her mouth. Growing up! She is still just nursing but has had a taste of rice ceral and oatmeal and even a banana. She seems to like food, but doesn't know exactly what to do with it. We shall wait until the spoon and swallowing solids isn't such a strange thing.

She had her first cold and you will see she wasn't quite so smiley in these pictures. It has disrupted the broken sleep we were getting even more and she has lived in the ergo on my back while I do basically everything.

6 months. It feels like we survived something. :)