Henry's Birthday Party: Cars 2, Cupcakes, and Dinosaur Bones?

Here are some pictures of Henry's really fun 3rd birthday at Delco Park. 

I like this picture because you can see Lily's long swirl of hair in the back blowing in the wind. 

Xander got Henry some monster trucks...shocking I know. 

We had a bad storm come through the area a few days before and it uprooted quite a few pine trees at the park. You can kind of see one in the background of this picture. After the party was over the boys were digging in the dirt and they uncovered a tree root. They started yelling that they had found a dinosaur bone! They spend quite some time digging out the exposed "dinosaur bone". The next day when I asked Xander what he liked best about Henry's party he said, "hum...the cupcakes and finding the dinosaur bone".

Lily and Amelia also had a simply delightful time too. 

Water Lily, Small Miracles, and the Weekend

I love the weekends! It means that Jason is home from work and we can actually get stuff done. I love getting stuff done!

Friday night we went out to eat with Jason's parents and then went to their house for some swimming and a campfire. It was Lily's first time in the pool and she loved it! I wasn't sure if she would since the water was chillier than a bath tub. She loved to pat and splash the water. Xander would even put his head down near her so she could splash him.

 Jason's parents recently took one end of their raised bed planters and turned it into a sandbox for Xander. Xander could dig in dirt all day long. He loves this articulated dump truck. 

 Gramps adding some more new sand. 

 I love campfires. I had two s'mores. I could have eaten at least 5, so I consider 2 using self-control. 

 Saturday a small, but glorious miracle occurred in the Edem household. Lily woke up at 7:00. I nursed her and she actually went right back to sleep, so I did too. Xander came into our room at 8:30 and snuggled with me and he went back to sleep. He woke up again at nine, but I turned on Thomas on PBS and he watched that in our bed and when it was over went to his room and read books. Jason and I both got to stay in bed until 9:50 when Lily woke up. Even though it wasn't the best sleep ever (for me at least, Jason was sound asleep the whole time), it was so nice to be able to just lay there. I can't even tell you the last time this happened. Although the rest was needed, it also made me feel behind schedule when we finally got up and got going.

Saturday afternoon we all headed to Menards "to save big money". Jason was all excited it was Lily's first time there, so I took a picture. We got some shelves for the garage and two more pieces of Easy Tracks to hang stuff on the wall. Jason was able to put it all up.

  Jason also assembled a small table I bought at IKEA last weekend for our guest bedroom. Now Erin has a place to put her phone and chargers when she comes to stay with us! 

Sunday night we headed to the Schuler's for a cook-out. The older kids had fun playing pretend in the basement. They were pretending to be firefighters.  Brinley also loves to play with the babies of the bunch. She does such a great job. I am pretty sure she is one of Lily's favorites. 

 Amelia is tall her for age and Lily is on the shorter end, so they are about the same height! 

Crazy Fun 4th of July!

We knew our fourth of July weekend was going to be crazy and fun. Jason's parents hosted a Harrington Family Reunion at their house. At one point there were 22 adults and 13 kids all sleeping at Jason's parents house. I also knew that our fun pack weekend would be exhausting. It would have been exhausting pre-kids let alone with two little ones out of their element. Lily also decided throw us an extra curve ball by running high fever and sending us to urgent care (don't worry she was fine...just really grumpy all weekend).

So here is the run down of events: 

Thursday:

Tour of a Sawmill in Wilmington (We are so dorky!)

Brinley's 5th Birthday Party at Miamisburg Pool

Friday: 

Spent all Day at the Creation Museum in Kentucky

Arrived Home to Discover Lily at a Fever of 102.9...yikes

Saturday: 

Headed off to Canoeing

(after canoeing Jason and I took Lily to urgent care)

Sunday: 

Lily's Baby Dedication at Church 

(You know she is not our first baby because she was still not feeling great, but I thought "hey we can stand up there for a few minutes, so we are proceeding as planned")

Monday:

4th of July Picnic at Cruz's with awesome slip and slide

(Jason left Xander in the dust!)

Headed straight to the Comers to finish off the weekend with fireworks from their front yard. 

Whew! I am tired just writing the summary. It was a lot of driving, dragging kids around, wrangling kid stuff to and from places, and work in general. Why is even fun work with kids?  It was all worth it though in the end. Oh and if are concerned about Lily she is fine. After the nice urgent care dr. looked her over, she concluded that it was either a virus or her teeth and they really couldn't do anything differently than we were already doing. Wouldn't you know it but her two bottom teeth are pushing their way up. I think Lily owes us 50 bucks...we will just put it on her tab.  

Xander Meets the Dentist

Xander went to the dentist for the first time shortly after his 3rd birthday. I prepared him as much as I could. I had a teeth cleaning the week before his appointment and I took him with so he could watch. Dee, my hygienist, was so good and showed him the tools and talked him while she worked on my teeth. He even got to meet Miss Leah, his hygienist, for next week too.  I still wasn't sure if he was going to want them to use any noise making tools in his mouth. I love everyone at our dentist office and they told me that unless I had concerns they never pushed kids to do anything at their first visit.   He was a champ though. It was one of those moments where he was so mature about everything and I was just so proud. (I am going to let all the nice people at the dentist think he is that way all the time.) 

 Listening to Miss Leah explain what is going to happen,

 Miss Leah counting his teeth. He even let her clean and polish them with the electric brush. 

 Look at those sparkling teeth! 

 Dr. Holzinger coming in for the final check. 

 All done and looking great! 

Thank you Dr. Holzinger's and Dr. Seller's office for a wonderful first trip to the dentist. A big thank you to the wonderful hygienist, Miss Leah. If you decide to quit this job you would make a great preschool teacher! 

Happy Birthday Henry!

There are not many people who can say they have been friends since they day they were born, but Xander and Henry can. Henry I have enjoyed watching you grow these past three years along with Xander. Even though you boys have your own personalities they seem to complement each other nicely. I love watching you guys play together with your crazy banter that I assume is normal for three year olds. I have also enjoyed (kinda) your weird boy humor that is seemingly emerging. I can't say that I really understand it, but your dads don't seem too worried about it.  My prayer for both of you is that you grow up to men of integrity who love the Lord (and selfishly your wonderful moms too). I hope that each of you will be a positive influence in each other's lives. 

Happy 3rd Birthday Henry!  

 Xander and I visiting Henry on the day he was born! 

 One of the few pictures where Xander is noticeable larger than Henry. 

 Their first easter egg hunt. 

Xander's 1st birthday party.

                                                           Just last week

Xander and the Potty

I can't honestly say I had officially begun to potty train Xander. We knew we were going to be traveling over Labor Day weekend, so I knew I didn't really want to start until we were going to be home. Xander seems to have the type of personality were he at least has to think the idea to under take a larger project is partially his idea and lets face it I really needed him to be on board with this one. A few months ago I decided to begin what I lovingly call the "brainwashing" portion of his potty training. I headed to the library to collect any and all books and DVDs they had on making using the potty seem like the best idea ever (which by the way are painful for any adult to watch). We read the books and tried to watch one of the DVDs everyday (brainwashing). We bought a little potty that he liked to sit on, but not use. Than on Monday night while Jason was watching football and I was in the other room on the computer Xander emerged from the bathroom, diaper-less and pant-less, proclaiming he "put his pee pee in the potty". Jason, who was kind of suppose to be the one watching him, says he became increasingly nervous as to what he would find in the bathroom (because if there was pee all over my walls I probably won't have been happy). Nevertheless Xander had apparently made it to the potty, taken off his clothes, and peed all in the potty all by himself!

It's A Girl!!!!

I was in complete shock when the ultra sound lady told us. Jason says I asked her recheck 4x (I didn't realize it was so many at the time.) We are very excited though. Xander is looking forward to "giving the baby rides in my dump truck". I am sure she will love it. :)