September

Oh boy.  This is a photo dump for sure!  

My good friend, Carol Van Shaar, asked if she could practice taking photos on my baby.  Um...yes!  So when the adorable blessing dress that my sister Diana made arrived on my doorstep I called Carol up to arrange a photo shoot.  Nora is being blessed later in October but I wanted to be sure I had some pictures in case things get to hectic the day of, or you know, she grows out of the dress.  She is putting on the ounces after all!

And while taking pictures of Nora, Carol snapped a few of the boys too.

Love this Ben!  He is getting so big and truly is so funny.  I'll share some stories later in this post.

I love Nora's smiles.  She shares them freely with our family.  She is most smiley in the morning and I eat it up!

I can't get over how big these boys of mine are getting.  Stop it!  Isaac is full on school aged and looks it.  Ben is definitely more in the preschooler category.  It's killing me.  I really think Isaac has growth spurted these past few weeks.  His new church pants had to be loosened at the waist and are no longer too long.  We bought them less than a month ago.  He's growing like a weed.

Jacob took the boys to see the Angel Moroni placed on the Fort Collins temple.  I'm pretty sure this was late August and I stayed home to feed Nora.  Kinda sad I missed it but was grateful he took pictures.

Nora is getting so strong and loves to stand.  She also loves to talk with her brothers.  Isaac likes it too.  Ben likes it for about two seconds.  Also, that mess on the floor, kinda constantly there these days.  I can't keep up on it with a baby around.  It drives me a little bit crazy but I'm tyring not to let it.  Nora will get bigger and I'll have a little more time to clean someday, right?

We celebrated the first day of fall with some sugar cookies.

Nora watched in her chair.

The boys did the decorating.  I love the sprinkle loaded one of Isaac's.  It's what happens when you are in the middle of supervising cookie decorating and then the baby gets fussy and wants to eat.

The boys wanted to make sure Nora had plenty of entertainment.  They piled on the toys.  I love the plane by her face.  When I picked her up I found two or three more toys in the less obvious spaces.  She is so patient.

We drove up near the reservoir to see the harvest super blood moon.  It was fun.  But then the moon went behind the clouds and kids needed their beds so Jacob and I watched the eclipse from our home.  It was pretty cool.

The boys loved playing on this wooden fence.  That is until we got home and they realized they had slivers in their hands (Ben's arms and hands were covered with little slivers) and bums (Isaac had slivers in his pants.  I guess Ben was grateful for diapers at that moment.)

Nora looked so cute in this outfit.  It just seemed way too uncomfortable to keep on her for too long and I put her back in a cozy knit outfit after a few hours.  I guess I'm more about comfort than fashion.

We have had about 10 leaves fall and Isaac was dying to rake them.  Okay.  Go ahead.

Then they tried to rake them out of the tree.

And clearly there were enough to jump in!  He kills me.  I was laughing pretty hard at the pathetic little pile.  But they had a great time.

Oh my word, this is one of my favorite Ben faces.  Wide eyed excitement about life.

And after raking leaves you must build an imaginary fire with the wood you've been collecting all summer.

He was so proud of the fire construction and hopes dad will let him help build the next real one that we make.  I also brought out some marshmallows so we could pretend to roast them on our pretend fire.  The kids thought it was awesome.

Guys, Nora is 2 months old tomorrow!  She is so chunky and adorable in every way.

She loves her hands!  Constantly sucking on them.

And one last blessing dress photo that got out of order.

Some stories that I want to remember:

I've taken to putting Nora in the baby chair while I make dinner and sometimes while we eat.  One night Isaac asked if she could sit close to his chair.  I said okay and put Nora near him.  He was the cutest most diligent little care taker all throughout the dinner hour.  It was absolutely adorable.  When she started to fuss he very instinctively put his foot on the rocker and gently rocked her to calm.  All while he continued to eat his dinner.  And if the rocking didn't work he would get out of his chair and bend down to put her pacifier in her mouth.  It made this mother heart happy.  

Isaac does want to be such a big helper most of the time.  I've let him pick Nora up when she is doing tummy time and crying and ever since then he wants to try picking her up all the time.  It makes me a little too nervous to let him do it all the time but sometimes if I'm near enough and watching closely I'll let him.  He does struggle getting her off the floor and it looks a little awkward but she never complains.  In fact, she LOVES Isaac.  He smiles for him and talks to him like crazy.

I also love the boys playing outside so independently.  They usually end up pretty dirty and I'm glad it's getting cooler so they are less inclined to turn on the hose, but they sure have fun out there.  And I sure get a lot done when they play outside.  The other day they were digging in the garden and I heard through the windows the yard debris bins being moved.  So I got up to check things out and saw that Isaac was pulling up the dead zucchini plant and throwing it appropriately away.  I was amazed.  I thanked him for being so helpful and told him he was welcome to pull up the tomato plants too.  And he did!  I love obedient and helpful moments like that.  And Ben was happy to help too.  He is generally happy to do whatever Isaac is doing.

Oh Ben...he is trying our patience a little with his whining and crying.  He was so mild as a 2 year old so I guess as he is now approaching 3 he feels it's time to exert his independence.  But he is also killing me with his cuteness too.  He still says the funniest things.  This was a conversation we had a few days ago:

Ben: Mom let's go somewhere.

Me; Where would you like to go?

B: Costco

M: What would we do there?

B: Eat samples.

M: That would be fun.  Nora is sleeping.

B: We can leave her here.

M: Is she old enough for that?

B: No.  Isaac can come home by himself and stay with her. (He was at preschool).

M: Is he old enough for that?

B: Yes! He's big!

M: He is big but not big enough to walk home from pre-school by himself and take care of Nora.

B: Oh.  (So matter of factly...so funny).