Monday, March 31, 2014

Paint Play

One day last week it was pretty windy and cool outside, so we spent the morning inside. Arabelle and Bo have been asking to paint in the tub ever since we did it in the winter, so they were excited for the chance!

They both went right at it and it took about 2 minutes for Bo to start painting himself instead of the shower wall. :)

He did this, then said he was the Hulk:


So I decided to help him along and make him look a little more like Hulk!

He pretty much yelled/growled the rest of the time. haha!



 Mae was a quiet observer:




Surprisingly, they had it cleaned up in about 5 minutes with a tub of bubble bath. 

Thursday, March 27, 2014

Busy Baby

Mae has been a busy girl these last few days! She was taking several steps last week, but today she walked a lot, probably more than she crawled!

Cool baby enjoying the sunshine earlier this week:

She stays right in the middle of it all!



I can't believe how fast she has gone from an itty bitty baby to a walking girl! 




Saturday, March 22, 2014

Mae is 10 months old!

Mae is 10 months old! This is way too close to a year old. :(

  • Mae is still on the same schedule as last month. She's waking up between 6:30 and 7:00, napping around 9 for 1.5 hours and again around 1:30-2 for another 1.5 hours. Occasionally she'll have a short nap and will just go to bed a little early. Bedtime is around 7-7:30. 
  • Mae is night weaned! Yay!!!! She will sometime still wake up and cry a little (or a lot....ugh!), but doesn't need to eat. Other times she sleeps the whole night without a peep.

  • She's still nursing 4x/day. Morning, after her two naps, and at bedtime.
  • Mae is such a great eater! Some of her favorites are diced grapes, cheese, and chili. She eats nearly anything offered to her. She has 3 meals and usually a small afternoon snack. 
  • She has also learned a new 'trick'. She likes to drop her food off the tray on purpose, usually only when she's finished eating. We're nipping that one in the bud right now. ;)
  • Still no teeth for Mae!



  • Mae is a walker! She's been taking a couple of steps for a couple of weeks, but the last few days, she's been walking a lot. It's so strange to look over and see her walking, unprompted!
  • She still LOVES hanging around Arabelle and Bo. 




  •  Mae's hair is really coming in, especially in the back. It's pretty dark! 


  • Mae still hasn't said "mama", but is a pro at saying "bye bye". :)
  • Mae loves to give kisses, especially to baby dolls! 
  • I've taught her to play the 'go night night game' that I've taught all my babies. I say "go night night" and she lays her head down, then I say "wake up!" and she pops her head up grinning. It's a good game because when I lay her down for naps or bedtime, I can say "go night night" and she knows to lay her head down. :)
  • Mae loves to play in the tunnel with Arabelle and Bo. Here's her in action:

Happy 10 months baby Mae! 




Friday, March 21, 2014

She can RUN!

Arabelle discovered a snake Wednesday afternoon, down by the dirt pile that they play on. She had gone to something up with dirt and I was videoing Mae, then you'll see what happens in the background here....


I felt bad for her, but she was in total freak out mode. I stopped videoing, because she was HYSTERICAL!! I went down and she was right.


I did't know what kind it was, besides NOT a rattlesnake. (Don't worry, I've done my research now and I know that the venomous snakes have 'fat heads' and the non venomous ones have skinny heads) Jared called one of his friends at the Police Dept. and he came and took a look at told me it was a rat snake. 

In the few minutes that we waited, I put all 3 kids on the trampoline and made Arabelle and Bo SIT, so they didn't bounce Mae's little head off. If I would have been brave enough, I would have chopped his head off, regardless of what kind of snake he was. I only like dead snakes. Once I tried to kill a snake and I barely hit it with the hoe before I dropped it and ran away. haha! 

We are on FULL ALERT for snakes now! And we all know that Arabelle can run pretty FAST with those long legs! 

*I showed Arabelle the video on Thursday morning and she thought it was hilarious and said it was okay for me to share the video. :)

Thursday, March 20, 2014

Jekyll Island Sea Turtle Center

Tuesday, we went to the Jekyll Island Sea Turtle Center for a field trip with our homeschool group. It was really fun!

Oddly enough, this week, our book was A House for Hermit Crab by Eric Carle and our science is to discuss animals that live in a shell. Sunday afternoon we read a couple of books from the library about sea turtles and learned all about them. Monday Arabelle did a sea turtle craft, so by Tuesday, we were ready to SEE the sea turtles!

Of course, they make you walk into the gift shop. Bo thought this little key chain with a floating sea turtle was the coolest thing there (no, we didn't buy it). 


Mae loved all the stuffed turtles.

First our group went into the are where they rehab the injured/sick turtles. The talked to us about each turtle and we learned a lot!


Then we went inside to the other are with more info about sea turtles, other sea creatures, and a few land turtles. They had this little aquarium with a hermit crab, sea anemones, coral, barnacles, and a shrimp. Bo loved watching the shrimp crawl and swim around. He stood there a good while laughing at the shrimp! He told me he was going to eat it. :)


Arabelle played this game where you try to help the turtle cross the road. Most of hers got flattened by the cars. haha!

This showed how the turtles hatch out of their eggs and make their way out. Bo was impressed by this, I guess.

The weather forecast said it was going to be 60 at lunch time and cloudy. I figured that would be a little cool, but okay for a picnic and some fun on the beach. Well, turns out it was 49 degrees and WINDY. So, we ate our picnic lunch in the car and played on the beach for about 15 minutes. We were a bit disappointed, but too cold to worry much about it!







It wasn't a bad drive and Mae did really well in the car. She napped on the way there and back and was thoroughly entertained when she was awake. 



We were all really glad that Jared came with us! 



Wednesday, March 19, 2014

Bubble Gum

Bo LOVES bubble gum. Any kind of gum, actually. Our deal is he gets 2 pieces a day, unless he happens to procure some bubble tape (sometimes Arabelle will buy him some) then he can keep up with it and have however much he wants. Sunday, Sambo bought him a roll of it, so he practiced blowing a bubble on Monday.

He gave me the tiniest piece ever and wanted me to show him how. Here's how it went:


Tuesday morning he had about 1/4 of it left and it was gone soon after. Funny boy. :)


Monday, March 17, 2014

Almost Spring

We are loving these bits of Spring weather and looking forward to Spring being here later this week!

I still can't believe we have enough kids to fill the swing set up. :)

I'm so glad Mae is content to stroll along while Arabelle and Bo ride bikes. 



As you can tell, we all love being outside! 


Sunday, March 16, 2014

Splish Splash, Mae's Taking a Bath!

Mae LOVES bath time these days! She plays with her rubber duck and a cup and has the best time. She will splash on demand and look for her duck when I ask her where it is. 

I just know she's going to love the pool this summer! 



Not sure what this look was about!

This is her signature grin these days. :)


Oooh, those teeth are about to pop through!

Friday, March 14, 2014

Arabelle Reads

I made a short video of Arabelle reading the end of one of her primer books. She does get carried away and start guessing/making up the story instead of reading at one point. ;)


Wednesday afternoon, I wrote some sight words on the driveway with chalk and Arabelle was running to the word I called out. Mae thought it was SO funny and was giggling away:

So proud of my girl! 

Tuesday, March 11, 2014

March Birthdays

We celebrated Grandma and Papaw's birthdays last weekend! Friday we headed to Pineview, then Saturday we surprised Grandma at Cracker Barrel for lunch and had cake for snack before we came home Saturday afternoon.




Mae tried her first lemon. :)
 And Bo ate a little tub of butter off his finger.
 Arabelle didn't want to have her picture made:
 Arabelle likes to take her 'wallet' anywhere she goes in case she sees something she wants to buy. She spent a little of her money at the Cracker Barrel store and bought some Fun Dip.

Arabelle made Grandma a Birthday 'book'.




We enjoyed celebrating two of our favorite people!