Amelia-16 months

Little momma. In the past few weeks, you have taken a fancy to your baby dolls. At home, you have to sleep with two CPKs and my old plastic baby doll. Plus lovey. Last thing you talk about at night, first thing you talk about in the morning.

Millie Moo, you love to sing right now. "Eat, eat, eat...NANAS!" and "C (is for) Cookie!" and "row row row (your boat)". You are also starting to recite parts of books you like, and point out all the animals you know.

LouLou Lollipop, you are wild! You are climbing everywhere and into everything. You think you're interested in the potty, but mommy and daddy aren't ready for potty-training again after only a seven-month hiatus. You have twelve little teeth and your hair gets longer each day. You're a little sassy thing, but it's kind of fun watching you put your stamp on life. Except when you open ten unfrozen ice pops right before mommy has to go to the doctor. Cleaning the red out of the grout isn't going to be so fun. So take a good nap so I can get working on that, okay?

VBS 2009

Please note the 2009. Having participated this year, I'm sure I'm stuck with VBS until the Amelia is in middle school. For years I have volunteered to help, since I have a fairly flexible schedule, but I have never been needed. In late May, I got a phone call from the organizer, could I possibly teach the 3-4s class. Um, you know I'm a NICU nurse, right? You will have lots of help. Um, okay.

Flash forward to last Monday. It is Seth's first time being old enough to participate in VBS, and he is so excited to go. Amelia doesn't know she's got 15 hours of nursery time ahead of her. I have butterflies in my stomach, partly due to the fact that I'm teaching a bunch of preschoolers plus Elise is at the hospital in labor. The theme for VBS was Discovery Canyon, and it's a darn good thing I have a lot of Southwest books due to my parents' trips to Arizona. The little ones needed a lot of fillers! I had to dig deep to my YMCA days, but we made it through. Seth loved his class and always thought it was so neat that we had done the same things at different times. It was a good, but exhausting week. Hopefully next year it won't be immediately after party week! Or maybe I can be in charge of snack, haha.

meeting baby Brian

Of course we hightailed it down to South Carolina as soon as VBS was over Friday (more on that in another post). The drive was awful, but once we got settled at our hotel and Seth took a quick swim with his cousins, we were ready to go meet baby Brian. As you can see, he was a little jaundiced and had just won himself a biliblanket a couple hours earlier. Otherwise, he's doing fantastic and tolerated his handful of older cousins invading his territory very well. Saturday we went with the Johnstons to Whirling Waters, and had an awesome time playing at the waterpark. After nap, we headed back over to see the baby. Click on this picture. I caught a cute gassy smile! (See the bili blanket tubing. Seth got REALLY mad when I called Brian a glo-worm.)

The kids really, REALLY liked Brian. In the car this morning, Seth told me, "I sing Brian to sleep ever time I hold him." Which he did.

On our way out of town Sunday, we stopped by for one more quick visit. We got all the kids on the couch and took the first picture of all six grandkids together.

Amelia has become a little momma (more on that later, as well). If one of the adults was holding Brian, she wanted to be picked up so she could see. By Sunday morning, she would pat herself and say "my baby". We humored her and let her pretend to hold Brian.

He has a name!

Let me introduce Brian Scott Shelton, who finally chose to make his appearance yesterday around lunchtime (TWELVE days late). He and Elise are doing great, and I think Chad is doing okay as well. Grandma Sarah is splitting time between the newest grandbaby and the granddog. The rest of us are going down Friday afternoon to meet the newest member of the family! I can't wait to squeeze on him (which may or may not be before I inspect him, because that's what I do...)!

And yes, Seth was confused about the name for a minute or two, but now he's got the Uncle Bryan, cousin Ryan, and baby Brian thing all straight. Heck, he has a mom named Sara and a Grandma Sarah, and an Aunt Elise and an Auntie Lisa, you'd think he'd be used to it by now, ha!

Father's Day 2009

For the first time ever, we did not go to the zoo for Father's Day. Instead, we started our day with a bike ride and got progressively lazier as the day went on. I'm glad we didn't venture out, I don't think I had a day trip in me. Nathan tried to watch golf when the weather cooperated, and was thrilled to watch the US men's soccer team beat Egypt. Notice his new shirt from Old Navy: "Not now I'm watching the game..." This hardworking daddy enjoyed his lazy day (and somehow only had to play a couple hours of Seth's new games with him, ha!)

Seth @ 4

Four years ago Saturday, at 6:30 am, Nathan and I were getting up and getting ready to go to the hospital. This Saturday, at 6:30, Seth was the last person in the house to wake up. First on the agenda was a measurement in the basement: Seth was born at 8:55 am. By that point in time on Saturday, it was almost 90 degrees, and we were all outside watching Seth take his new bike for a spin:

I think it was around 11:30 when Seth was brought to my room and I was finally allowed to inspect him (because that is the first thing us NICU nurse moms do). This year, we were partying at Funigans by that time:

Seth wanted a Monsters vs. Aliens themed party. We found the shirt a few weeks ago at JCP, and I had to hide it last week so it would be clean for the party. Bryan sketched a Bob the Blob for me, and I traced his design onto the cake. I ordered all the party favors online, including these cool cardboard masks:

Most of Seth's best buddies were able to come, as well as his cousins, Marie, Eric, Lisa, Michael, Gram, & Pops. After the party he opened the rest of his presents at the house. Notice his little helper. Amelia was a very jealous sister most of the time on Saturday. I have photographic evidence for when she is older and tries to deny it.

Seth enjoyed every minute of his birthday and was very sad when he woke up Sunday and realized it was over. He quickly got over it when he realized he was still four. What a big boy!

rainy day hooligans!

We've still had a lot of rain around here. The natives are getting restless. I was cooking an early dinner before work Tuesday and Seth was coloring with his window markers before Nathan got home from work. I thought I was being slick by giving Amelia ColorWonder markers. Then I found her looking like this:

I thought she had somehow stolen one of Seth's, but then I saw this:

Busted, Seth!

another weekend at home

Yet another fun weekend spent in our own backyard! After a week of violent evening storms, the weather started to straighten up Friday, and we were able to go the pool that afternoon. Saturday morning our neighborhood swim team had a pancake breakfast. Of course we were one of the first ones there, and we had to play on the playground for a little bit while they dealt with a blown fuse.

After breakfast, we took two vehicles to Target to get our early birthday presents, bikes! Nathan took the bikes home, and I took the kids to Walmart, since Target no longer had the Spiderman helmet Seth wanted. Then we hit two bicycle shops on the way home looking for an infant helmet for Amelia. Our timing was perfect, my friend Pam had a bike trailer she wanted to get out of her garage. So I ran over to her house and picked up the kids' wheels. By then we were tired, so we decided to nap and go to the pool before we took our maiden voyage.

"What's wrong with Daddy?"

Our neighborhood is very hilly...I was proud of myself for making it up all of them. Nathan definitely felt the effects of the extra load behind him.

Sunday we went to church and the pool...another fun weekend at home for us!

ps--let party week begin!

It's a bird, it's a plane...

...it's SUPERSETH! (Or as Seth would say, "I'm just Seth in Superman sleep-jamas.") A couple weeks ago I bought these Underoos and I was in big trouble because it didn't come with a cape. Grandma Sarah saved the day and made him this awesome cape.

And his sidekick, tutu girl!

a late 15 month check-up

This afternoon we had Amelia's check-up, during naptime no less because the doctor rescheduled on me. No concerns, she's eating/sleeping/developing well. Today she weighed 21 lbs 8.6 oz (30th percentile), which is just a smidge more than Seth did at 15 months. She was 31.75 inches long (85th percentile).

Amelia's newest fascination is the toilet. She loves to flush and put things in the toilet, like her brother's underwear, things that are in the trash can, Gram's lighthouse figurine...if Seth and I could just remember to keep all the bathroom doors closed, it would be a lot easier!

She had her first haircut Saturday. I just trimmed her bangs, and now she looks like a little girl rather than a ragamuffin, even when she doesn't have a bow in.

donuts, a ballgame, and pool time

We woke up to horrendous rain Friday morning, and I frantically tried to think of things we could do, since a pool day seemed out of the question. An hour at the gym got us through the morning, and after nap we decided to....celebrate National Donut Day. We met Nathan at Krispy Kreme and picked out our free donuts. The kids finished theirs after we got back home.

We have kept our weekends free so we can go to SC to visit our new nephew whenever he is born. With nothing on the agenda for Saturday, we decided to go to Newton to see Evan and Ryan's last game. Here is Evan at bat...my pictures of Ryan were all blurry.

The cheering section...

Sunday morning we went to church and the grocery store, and made another trip to the pool (we went Saturday afternoon, too). Amelia thinks she can swim by herself. She likes to count "one, one, whee" and jump in.

Seth's new swim belt like the one he used at swim lessons came in this week. Seth is becoming a better swimmer every time we go to the pool. Check out what he decided to do yesterday:

early June celebrations

If you've been following our blog for awhile, you know we celebrate big for about a week in the middle of June every year. This June, we're starting early. On Tuesday, my cousin, Krista, gave birth to Liliana Lourain. I love that our girls share a middle name (after my maternal grandmother)! Fun fact: my grandpa's boat was called the SaraKrista (...maybe I shouldn't have brought that up, Lisa used to get so mad about it, but she wasn't born when Grandpa B bought the boat!) Also, our college friends, Stephanie and Nathan, welcomed their second son into the world on Tuesday (hence why I said it was a baby kind of day on FB!).

Wednesday we had our first adventure of Seth's summer break, a Durham Bulls game with Gram and Pops. The kids did really well at the game, we made it to the top of the eighth before we decided to leave. Luckily, I had packed an overnight bag, because Seth BEGGED to go back to their house. Seth met Wool-E Bull and had his shirt autographed. He wasn't scared of him at all. I hope that bodes well for our future Disney World trip. Wednesday was also Dad's 35th anniversary at IBM. Good enough reason to play hooky and go to a game with the grandkids!

Today is Elise and Chad's 4th anniversary, and one week until He-Who-Has-Not-Been-Named (my nickname for the baby, Elise is a big Harry Potter fan) is supposed to make his arrival. I have been giving Elise a hard time that he will come today and she will never get to celebrate her anniversary on the right day again, but my phone has been quiet, so he's running out of time if he wants to do that. It's perfectly okay for you to have your own day, little guy! We'll celebrate whenever you choose to get here!