Bringing up Baby Brang!: I Know I Can Do This Mom!

This girl loves to dance and sing!

We took the kids to the Grand Rapids Public Museum to check out the Whale exhibit!

Laney is peeking out from a life size model of a heart of a whale!

Carson loved watching the chunks of ice going down the river.

And he loved looking at all the rocks and crystals too!

We had to hit up the carousel of course!

And yes Evie just had to ride too! The security lady running the carousel insisted that she could tell Evie wanted to ride after watching Carson and Laney having so much fun.

This is what we do while Mom cooks dinner now! It keeps her attention for just long enough!

And this...oh this...this is Carson's masterpiece of a fort that he worked on for 2 full days during our "snow days" that occurred without any snow at all. Those, along with the end of the quarter and the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday had this mom losing her mind! Carson had no school, no plans, no snow to play in outside....ahhhhhh!!!! He used every blanket and pillow from every part of our house. Even empty tubs and boxes he found in the back room. I couldn't even get the whole thing in the photo. Of course Laney only had one small section she was allowed to go in. He spent 2 days building and changing it but never really actually played in it. Yep, that's typical Carson. Thank God we have a basement for this stuff! He did end up cleaning it all up which practically took another whole day.

Her favorite spot!

Family homemade pizza making for dinner!

Thumbs up from Laney! The kids have discovered the rock wall at the YMCA. There are two. The orange one is the harder of the two. Laney made it right up the purple one on the first try and then about 3/4 of the way of the orange one. She begged us to go back the next day and bam, she made it up the orange wall! She kept giving me a thumbs up saying, "I know I can do this Mom!!!" over and over until she did. I hope she stays this positive and determined all her life.

That's Carson ringing the bell at the top. Way to go Buddy! He actually made it to the top on his first try but was too nervous to let go with one hand to ring the bell. But then the second night he got brave and rung that bell.

Laney is on the orange wall and Carson is on the purple.

Chuckie Cheese school fundraiser night! Not my favorite place but wow do the kids ever love it! I had Everson in the baby carrier while we chased these two around for an hour and man did my neck hurt after that. She's getting too big to be carried! Tear, tear. Carson actually ended up hitting the equivalent of the "jackpot" at the casino on the Pirate Wheel. He got 100 tickets at once! I wish so bad I could have been prepared to video tape his reaction. He had 5 or 6 kids standing around him cheering and flipping out along with him. So cute.

Laney got sick, again...and once again nurse Carson to the rescue! I went out for a run and when I got back he had two lists of things that Laney had requested from her place of quarantine upstairs. If you look close it says things like, "water, applesauce, kleenex, gatorade, grapes etc.". He also had gotten everything she requested ready on the kitchen table. I didn't approve of all her requests but he did take her up her dolls and some gatorade. He holds his breath when he's upstairs so as not to get sick. He came up with that himself and I just die laughing every time I hear him gasp for air!

Everson is pretty proud of herself now that she is crawling! She can't wait to get over to Lexi to grab at her. Lexi usually ends up wailing and running away but it's so fun to watch. Her favorite thing to go after is Lexi's dog bone and when she gets it she screams and holds it up like she's taunting her.

Along with all this crawling and pulling herself up onto everything comes lots of bumps to the head! I remember this well with Laney and it is so hard to watch. You have to let them climb but you just know the fall is coming! You can see her big red bump above her eye below from hitting Carson's bed frame while she was trying to pull up on his bed. So sad ugh.

Evie says, "Put me in coach!". She watched some of Carson's indoor soccer game and she was again pretty proud of herself standing there like a big girl! This girl is on the move!