swimming with their clothes on...

Mark had a fundraising event for American Humanics, an orgainzation that he is in for school, this week. They called it the "Duck Dash" - people bought tickets to have a duck race down the UNI waterslide in hopes it would come in first place. The ducks that came in first won a prize... Fun idea and I thought Isaiah would like to watch...so we went.

Crazy thing is both my mom and dad's ducks won out of like 295 ducks! (too bad Isaiah and Levi's didn't win:)).

Mark got to be one of the people tossing the ducks down at the top, he let Isaiah go up with him, he was a good helper! If you look really closely you can see them at the very top of the slide!

After the 12 rounds of ducks racing down the slide, Isaiah really wanted to get in the water--because Mark is such a good daddy, he said okay...and they got in! I didn't even think to bring swiming trunks for Isaiah so they both were in their clothes!

Isaiah (and Mark) had so much fun! He really didn't want to get out...I think we'll have to go swimming some time soon at that pool...I think there is even a family day that families can go for free! You know I'll post pictures if we do!

no fear.

Hooray for warm weather!

We've been able to play outside several days this last week and it has been wonderful! We even made it to the park multiple times!! It has been so fun and so scary (for me!)! Isaiah has absolutely no fear! He is so excited and curious about everything that he just goes for it! Take a look at my brave little boy:

he made it to the top of this VERY TALL ladder many times!

"I did it!" is what he'd say when he got to the top.King of the mountain!
I tried to get him to say it, but he didn't get it so he moved on. :)I turned away from Isaiah for no more than 30 seconds to check on the other little ones and look what he did!best buddies.

Levi's really changing!

The past few weeks have been huge weeks for Levi! He's learned to do several big things!

I shared some pictures a few weeks ago of him using a toy to pull himself up to his knees. Once he figured that out he was so curious to do more! Last Wednesday he figured out how to pull himself up to his feet! If you leave him sitting somewhere he will find something to pull himself up with and stand with the support for a long time! He loves to look around and be part of the action!
For at least a month or two he has reached for things when he was sitting up. If there was a toy a little ways out from him, he would reach to get it sometimes even getting to his hands and knees...Now he will get on his hands and knees and scoot towards it. It started that he would just scoot backwards, but in these last few days he will CRAWL forward! He will pick up his knees and go! We've watched him go as far as several feet away. He is an explorer!
He's also picked up on mimicking what someone else is doing. A week or so ago, Mark was playing with him and got him to follow his lead in raising his hands above his head. And yesterday I got him to clap with me! He's been clapping for a little while now, but more just slapping his hands together and not really meaning to. But check out this video, he was totally clapping!


He is really growing and changing!!

OH and on Saturday he had two little teeth pop up--his front bottom two teeth. They are just barely there, but they are coming!!

what's on your shirt?

Now that the weather is warmer again and Isaiah can wear short sleeves, I pulled out the 3T tote full of clothes that I have for Isaiah (a friend from work has so wonderfully (and cheaply) sold me her sons' clothes and Aunt Brittany is so nice about handing us down Dakota's clothes he out grows --Thank you Brittany!! so I have lots of clothes in the basement). He's been pretty excited to wear several "new" shirts... well, really, I've been pretty excited that he gets to wear different clothes, truthfully I don't think he really cares one way or the other :)

The other day he wore a new Thomas shirt...I asked Isaiah, "who's on your shirt?" He looked down and of course knew Thomas and he also knew Percy, but he didn't know James...so I told him the red train was James...he got so excited and screamed, "LEVI JAMES!!" He was so amazed that Levi was on his shirt! :)

When we got to Laura's house, I asked him who was on his shirt again and he said, "Thomas, Percy and LEVI JAMES!!" It was too cute!! He loves his little brother so much! He is proud to say, "that's my brother," when he is with him. I'll have to post some brothers pictures soon.

Easter 2009

So I said I'd post some pictures of our new house, but I'll do that another time...because we had such a nice Easter weekend that I want to post about... it was great having fun plans, a break from packing, unpacking, cleaning, etc!

Our celebrations started at my parents' house on Saturday, my sister's family came for an Easter lunch...my grandma Carol and Aunt Sharon were planning to come, but weren't able to make it :( We had a nice day with them, my mom made a YUMMY lunch with ham, scalloped corn, green bean casserole, wild rice, and much more!! and then we got to open our Easter baskets--the Easter bunny went all the way to Hawaii to get our gifts this year!! :)

Isaiah decided he wanted to eat his lunch in the highchair ... did I ever mention that the high chair at my parents' house is the same high chair that MY DAD sat in when he was a little boy?

The baby cousins playing together...Levi always has to touch her!

That evening Shannon and Anna came over and we dyed Easter eggs...
Isaiah would pick up an egg and drop it into the mug of dye as quickly as he could...several eggs ended up cracked... oh well! it was cute

Anna had fun for a few minutes (she's only 1 1/2) and then was done...but she sure wanted to stir the egg for those few minutes!

Easter morning we woke up and the Easter bunny had been to our house!! He hid 21 eggs for us to find (even though I was pretty sure there were only 20 hidden!!) Isaiah was sooo funny finding them...he'd see one, point and run...

Look at that tired face!

Isaiah and daddy opening up the eggs, putting them in a line, and counting them! The eggs were filled with go-go bites, bug bites crackers, and coins.

The Easter bunny also left Hi-Ho-Cherry-O, Candyland, and a FisherPrice Gumball Machine toy for the boys! We had just enough time to play one round of Hi-Ho-Cherry-O before it was time to get ready for church.

Look at my baby boy--8 months old on Easter Sunday.

After church we went over to my parents for lunch and a family picture...And then we were off to Kammy's Easter Egg Hunt! Kammy had 200+ eggs hidden at a local park for the special little ones in her life and she invited Isaiah to participate!! There were 6-7 kids running around finding her hidden eggs...Isaiah LOVED it...he found 50 eggs!
Before the hunt, Levi experienced his first ride on a swing! He smiled and giggled...
Next we were off to Mark's Step-mom's side of the family Easter gathering... she always has a huge turnout for her holiday parties (50+ people). Isaiah always has fun because there are lots of kids to play with...including his cousin Dakota--those two always have so much fun.
Around 3:30 Isaiah was TIRED and so we headed home and look what happened...
Because it was so late, he didn't get to sleep too long...I got him up and we went for a walk and then played outside...
Look what's in our new backyard!
Tonight we ended our Easter celebration by opening a package that came in the mail from Grandma and Great-Grandma in Florida!
What a FUN FILLED Easter!!!

And the best part is--He is Risen!
(which is what Isaiah yelled when we walked into Jayda's house today!)

moving pictures...

So...I didn't post anything (except the one slip about the realtors coming) on my blog about our house being for sale or our planning to move. I guess I didn't really want to post anything until I knew it was for sure, and it went so fast that we really didn't know it was for sure until it was happening! The story goes...

Mark and I decided it was time to move the beginning of February--we needed a new neighborhood that was safer for our family...We worked hard to get our house ready in just a few weeks, thankfully we didn't have too much to do, mainly cleaning and de-cluttering. On Tuesday February 24 we had our realtor come over and we signed papers to put our house up for sale. We didn't expect too much action as the media has made it sound like a horrible time to sell and we had our house on the market about a year and a half earlier and had NO success in the 5 or 6 months we had it listed. On Wednesday February 25 we scheduled two showings for our house the following day, and on Thursday February 26 we had 3 groups of people come look at it and by that evening we had two offers on our house!! We accepted the second offer and our house was sold--36 hours after it went on the market! The offer we accepted was OVER our asking price! It couldn't be better, right? (they didn't even ask for closing fees or our applicances!)

So, we quickly began looking for houses hoping to find the perfect one, we went through at least 15 different houses looking for the perfect one (and we were pretty particular about the ones we actually wanted to see)...we felt a little pressured to find something as our closing date was set for April 3, just six weeks after we put our house on the market! On Sunday March 8, Mark went through a few open houses and found our house! He called me and said, "I could make an offer on this one without you even seeing it and I know you'll love it!" I was working that day and the owners of the house were just getting home from a vacation so I wasn't able to go see it that day. The next day we went to see it and we made an offer on the spot! Things went well, and 3 weeks later we moved in!!

I just can't believe how perfectly it all worked out and how everything fell into place for us! God is good!!

Because of all the hoops that had to be jumped through for this to be final (our buyer was taking out an FHA mortgage loan), we didn't really know if it was going to go through or not until the very end of March. For this reason, we didn't start packing until days before the move... so this made things interesting for us ... and crazy on Friday April 3-moving day... Thankfully we have a wonderful family who helped us make it through...and I think Mark and I agree that we will never do this again, or a least not for a long time! I caught Mark saying a few times, "I'd rather go back to Iraq for two years than do that day (moving day) over again!"

Here is Mark and Jay (my sister's husband) with the super huge u-haul.
Mark, Jay and Mark's dad with the hardest thing we had to move-our hutch!
My sister, we ran out of boxes so she started filling up garbage bags. :)
Liahna (my niece) helping--keeping our liquor box safe-haha
My mom helping--she was on baby duty all weekend long!
Mark's step-mom, Cindy, helped move so much stuff and pack up the vehicles, I didn't get a good picture of that, but here she is playing with the kids so I could keep going!
My dad helping move more big stuff inside the new house!
Our big helper Isaiah! He looked so cute trying to move stuff inside for us--I could tell he thought he was being so helpful!
What a crazy move! It was so much work, but we got it done fast and we had very little break (a small window in the hutch and one drawer!) I'd say it was a success!

Thanks again everyone for your help! Check back, I'll post pictures of the new house next!

moved.

wow. we are moved! talk about work, let's just say I don't plan to ever move again!! YUCK. but it's over and we LOVE our new house!! You'll have to come see it!

I've got pictures to share, but I really don't know where the cord is to connect my camera to the computer, and the laptop is upstairs and so is the camera, and I'm downstairs...and yes, too lazy to go upstairs! :) So I'll just share a short version of our move and post some pictures another day, okay?!

So things started on Thursday, we managed to get early possession of our house late Thursday afternoon, we had to go take a look and be excited about it before the work began! Later that night, my mom took Isaiah and Levi for us while we went to move somethings and paint...The only room we really wanted to paint right away was Levi's because it was pink...so my "job-share partner" as we often refer to each other--when I'd have to say that we are now good friends (right Laura?)--came over to help...we managed to get his room painted by 1:15AM!! and it looks great!! Thank you mom and dad for keeping Isaiah over night so we could get it finished, and thank you Laura for all your help!

Friday morning we closed on the new house (we closed on our old one the Friday before, but got to live in it for a week--somehow it saved our buyer money?)...after the closing the real work began...let me just say, WE HAVE WAY TOO MUCH STUFF!! But with so much help from our families--my mom and dad, my sister, her husband and daughter, and Mark's dad and step-mom (THANK YOU!!!!!!!!!)--we managed to get everything moved by around 4pm Friday...

Poor Isaiah was sick through it all, so thankfully my mom agreed to keep him overnight again on Friday--thanks again mom and dad!! and on Saturday he woke up from his nap with a temperature of 105.4 degrees! YIKES. But he's all better now--happy as can be, and wild as ever!

And now we just unpack and unpack and unpack...it's been fun... ha ha!