Happy Father's Day, James!

I've been thinking a lot lately about how interesting dating is, and how you try to ask questions and find out the things you need to know, but back then, I didn't really even know what I would need to know. Well, and even if the person you're dating CLAIMS they will clean up toddler puke and get up in the night, reality might just change their mind a little. So it's just hard to know when you're dating someone how they will be with day-to-day parenthood, because neither of you even know what you're in for. You just have to trust your faith and your gut and hope for the best, I guess. And boy did I get super lucky with James.

I knew in my heart when I was dating James that he would be a great husband and father. I had never seen him with kids, but I knew that he was sweet and caring, and that he wanted me to be happy in a way I had never seen before. A friend of ours at church said a few weeks ago that he had never seen any dad be as involved as James, and I totally agree. I am so lucky to have him as the father of our sweet kids. They ADORE him and I feel so blessed to have him around. Can I brag about him for a while, and all that he does? This will be a long post, but he does not get enough credit on this blog, or probably in our family....






*He will pick out the kids' clothes, get them dressed, and do their hair (even Kenley's).
*He ALWAYS takes Parker at church because he says he just wants to spend more time with him.
*He is willing to give the kids baths and do the bedtime routine after leaving this house before 5am and being on his feet all day.
*I have never seen him turn Kenley down when she wants to play, no matter how tired he is.


*Good parenting comes really naturally to him.
*He asks my opinion, listens, and respects what I have to say when we discuss raising our kids.



*He likes to peek at the kids every night before we go to bed, and he'll call me in to see something especially cute.
*We end each day lying in bed talking about how cute our kids are.
*James uncomplainingly gets up with the kids in the night, way more than his fair share. WAY more.


*He also gets up with them in the morning. I almost always get to sleep until 8 and I'm usually scared to ask when the kids got up (hours earlier).
*He is always supportive of having more kids, no matter how close together I think I want them. I never have to convince him or argue about timing.
*He really "gets" what it is for me to be a stay-at-home mom, and is always understanding and supportive, and never makes me feel guilty when things don't get done or I have negative feelings about it.
*He is diligent about keeping the kids safe. Luckily.




*He always comes up with ways that I can have time by myself, and continues to offer, even though I usually bite his head off for assuming that the simple task of mothering is making me crazy.
*Me: "I won't dress the kids in unisex clothes." James: "Okay." "I don't like nursing." "That's fine." "I want him to stay rear-facing in his carseat." "Sure." "She needs to wear party clothes to a party." "No problem." "No kids in bed with us." "That works." James gives input when he needs to, but lets me do my thing for the most part.
*He is so excited about the kids' milestones and accomplishments, and gets genuinely sad if he misses a "first."





*He is a shameless bragger about our kids. If you have any contact with my husband for any reason, you have seen pictures, the blog, and heard all about how wonderful, smart, and adorable they are. He is usually one of the only ones at work with kids, and he loves to bring them in, show them off, and talk about them incessantly.
*He has a really unique and special relationship with both kids.
*He never has time for himself, and if he does, he just wants to hang out with us.
*There is never a doubt in my mind that we are the most important thing in the whole world to him.

Whatever, Drama Girl

So I'm trying to be a sweet mommy and give hugs to my little girl, and she pulls back and snips, "Mommy! Stop making me CRABBY!" and then crosses her arms across her chest and completely turns her back to me. I should have been stern about that, but oh man, I was laughing so hard.

What?

I totally got this new dress at the GAP

My poor baby, always wishing she had a dress from the GAP. Finally just had to take matters into her own hands.




I wasn't going to post again tonight because I didn't want my last little post about Parker to be overlooked, but this was too funny. Tonight while I was slaving away over dinner, Kenley was playing by herself in the living room. She walks into the kitchen and goes, "Look what I did, Mommy!" And she had ripped into this GAP bag and torn out a neckhole and two armholes to make herself a little dress. Okay so I know these bags are not meant to be toys and all, but of course I had to grab my camera before making her throw it away.

By the way, I feel a little ghetto that in the second picture you can see that one of my children is dressed in only a diaper and my other one is dressed in a plastic bag. Oh well, at least I got some new shorts!

Getting so big

Our little Parker is getting to be such a big boy. I forgot how much they grow up after they turn one. He has a funny little vocabulary. His first word was uh-oh, followed by hello. Now he also says mama, vroom vroom, and thank you. He loves cars, balls, and phones, and pretty much will only read his books about trucks. Here he is on the rocking chair reading two of them. He loves it when we laugh at him, and we think he will be kind of the jokester of the family. Parker still has a very limited menu, the only healthy things he likes are yogurt, applesauce, bananas, bread, peanut butter, and dried fruit. Everything you put on his tray gets the "touch test" and if he doesn't like the way it feels, it is NOT going in his mouth. In Utah he got his first haircut, and it's still a little bit curly, which makes me really happy. He loves playing outside, especially in the little police car or with the water table. And he must be looking more and more like James, since I have people telling me that almost weekly now. We love our little Parker B.!

Looks what I did on Saturday

I'm telling you, I should have a Mountain Dew and a Dr. Pepper with my Taco Bell taco every day. Gave me a serious energy burst and I came home and cleaned out and organized my whole pantry, fridge, and freezer. My before and after pantry pics don't really do it justice because my pantry is super deep so it's the back half that gets crazy messy, but you get the idea. I hope you all still want to be my friends after seeing the before pics. :) Thanks to Brooke for her super-clean and organized pantry to give me the motivation I needed!

Pantry Before


Pantry After


Freezer Before


Freezer After (Don't mind the junk food. Those are totally fat-free, 100% organic Totino's pizzas and chicken nuggets, I'm pretty sure.)


Fridge Before


Fridge After

The week in pictures

Well, I'm changing my Texas post a little bit and doing a day-by-day instead. I did add a bunch of pictures and stories. But I always skip people's vacation posts, so I don't expect that very many of you will find this overly exhilarating, but oh well. You can also check out Brooke's blog for more if you just can't get enough!

TUESDAY
We get into Texas and explore the Combs' new house, eat delicious tacos (chicken, salsa, and brown sugar in a crock pot), and let the kids get to know each other.





WEDNESDAY
We take the kids to the Wiggles Play Center and then try to make them play in the baby pool in the backyard while Brooke and I BBQ hamburgers. But Parker and Nate just wanted to eat dirt, and the girls just wanted to be crabby and fight. Kenley just saw these pictures today and got all grouchy and said, "Carli was taking my shovel!" For dinner, Kenley, Carli, and Nate consumed an entire package of hot dogs. They didn't pass the touch test for Parker so he didn't partake.






THURSDAY
We take the kids to a nearby splash park, and all four of them love it. We entertain the thought of coming back every day, but we never do make it back.







FRIDAY
We go to a different splash park. The kids weren't as into this one, not quite sure why. Then that afternoon we got a babysitter and went and shopped ourselves to death, then had dinner with Brooke's mom and went on a drive trying to find her police officer brother out on his rounds. Random, I know.




SATURDAY
We went to Brooke's mom and dad's house for some smoked brisket and let the kids play in the pool. Well, let most of the kids play in the pool. Parker chilled out in the dirt. We also had the girls model some of their clothes and matching sunglasses we bought for them.








SUNDAY
We went to church. Their nursery was overjoyed to have our whiny, tired foursome, but even so we left after an hour. This was our only attempt to take a picture with everyone. Not so great. I do like this picture of the boys doing a pretend Sunday BBQ.




MONDAY
We take the kids to Going Bonkers playland, everyone loves it. That night Brooke and I walk around Ikea and then go get potholes (frozen custard with a mix-in and hot fudge poured down the middle). I start to get sad about leaving and contemplate moving to Frisco. I love these pictures of the girls in their matching pajamas because they were taken not even one minute apart, and the grils are mad and pouty with each other in the first, and laughing best friends in the second. This was totally how our whole trip went.




TUESDAY
We had to leave. :( Kenley got really sad as the plane was taking off because she said she missed Brooke. I did too.

Thanks to Brooke for hosting us on our awesome trip! We had a great time!

Big Fun in Texas

Well, we're having a great time with the Combs!

The kids are getting along great. Kenley and Carli have pretty much the same verbal skills, and their little conversations are so funny. "My carseat is bigger." "No, my carseat is bigger!" They occasionally fight over toys but are very sweet at sharing. They like to call each other "my friend" and are always very concerned about getting an extra whatever for their "friend."

The boys are also getting along well. They love to slap each other and play cars. Not much else to say there.

Before we left to come to Texas, I told Kenley that we'd be swimming, shopping, and eating lots of treats. Then she told me, "No, just one treat. No sick tummies." So whenever we'd talk about Texas she'd tell me, "We will swim, shop at the mall, and get sick on treats." And that pretty much sums up the trip so far. It's fabulous.

We have tons more cute pictures and lots more to tell, but that's it for tonight because I'm exhausted and something tells me early church will feel extra early tomorrow...

Thanks for the prayers!

Well, since I know you all have been waiting with bated breath to see how the trip went, I thought I'd do a quick update. The plane trip went GREAT, despite the potential to be awful. I realized the night before that I was going to be keeping Parker up until 2:30 with no nap, so I was super nervous. But first awesome thing is that they let my mom come through security and back to the gate with me, which was a HUGE help. Then we got on the plane and were able to take an extra seat for Parker. The kids played, ate snacks, and stayed happy all the way to Albuquerque. I even got to read some of my magazine I brought in a fit of optimism. Then once we got to Albuquerque, things started to take a turn for the worse, at least potentially. We lost our extra seat, but this super nice grandma lady sat by us and was so sweet, helpful, and patient. Then once the whole plane was loaded up and ready to leave, we found out we'd be delayed about 40 minutes due to weather in Dallas. Fantastic. I almost started to cry because I did NOT need this with one kid on my lap and one about to need a nap. But guess what? I look over and Parker is ASLEEP!!!! If you know my kid, you know this is nothing short of a miracle. Parker doesn't sleep in public anymore, period. The last few times we were able to get him to sleep were a huge effort, and LOTS of screaming before he gave in. He just fell asleep sitting there in his carseat on the tarmac! So 40 minutes passed and they announced we were ready to go. I put the DVD player away, get Kenley on my lap, and then they announce that George Bush is leaving Albuquerque and the airport is shut down for at least 45 minutes. Argh. Seriously. But Kenley was pretty good, and then once we were finally leaving, KENLEY fell asleep during takeoff! That's right, my girl who no longer naps. So the two of them slept pretty much all the way to Dallas as I said thank-you prayers into the dog harness that Kenley had refused to take off that was smushed in my face. Oh, and finished my Real Simple magazine. Nice, huh? The trip went better than my best hopes.

So we're in Dallas with four kids under the age of three. Kenley and Carli are three days apart, both turn three in September. Parker just turned one and Nate is about to, so you can imagine the craziness. Lunch today was a giant production. We are going through massive amounts of food and dishes. I think I'm going to have to get more organized before having any more kids. :) So I've gotten tons of cute pictures that I'll post later!

Well, we're off!

Tomorrow morning I leave for Texas by myself with my two little ones. If you could offer up some prayers in my behalf I would greatly appreciate it, I'm getting REALLY nervous about Parker. Any tips for traveling with a very mobile one-year-old whose only use for toys is to throw them? Awesome.

Also, do you think it's time for me to go back on Weight Watchers to lose these last 10 pounds? Because Kenley does. The other day she told me that I looked like I had a gorilla in my tummy. Thanks, babe. That's sweet.