ice skating

Well, things have been pretty busy here at NTBI...we have had lots of homework but we are still loving it!  Lots of homework means lots of very late nights for us...we try to never do homework from suppertime up until our kids are in bed (usually 8:30-9 or so).  So we definitely are glad that we have good family time with our kids in the evenings, but it just means that we go to bed really late!  So all that to say...that's why I haven't been blogging much:)

So anyway, a couple of weekends ago, the Campus Life department here planned an ice skating night.  It was so much fun!  Originally, Nathan was just going  to take Kaine to it, but then Aaron and Jill told me that I should take Halle, too, and they would watch our 2 littlest.  Thanks, A and J!  I am glad Halle and I could go, too.

We drove there with Alisha and her baby Sophie (Alisha's hubby Ben had to work that night, so she came with us):                        

                                     

Kaine and Nathan were excited to skate...

And I got to hang out, holding Alisha's baby Sophie...

And of course, hanging out with my sweet Halle!  Halle wasn't interested in skating, so we just watched.  I was fine with that, because it had been years since I have been ice skating!

Kaine loved it!  He has been getting pretty good at rollerblading, so he seemed to do pretty well on ice skates, too.  It really helped that they had these "walker"-type things:

He tried it a couple of times without the walker, but he didn't like that as much.

Halle was content to just sit with me and watch...

Or eat candy:)

FINALLY, Nathan talked Halle into just trying it a couple times around, in her boots.  She was very unsure, but she was brave!

It was soooo cute!  Nathan held her up like this so she was like Superman, going around the ice rink.  It was adorable:)  She liked it so much that she then wanted to go and get ice skates on!  Which meant that I couldn't justify just watching anymore, so I got some skates, too.  (I was glad I did, then...it was fun!)

Kaine ended up skating by himself, toward the end of the night.  He was so cute!

What a fun night!  Thanks again to Aaron and Jill for watching Layla and Daisy!!  And speaking of Daisy, if anyone is curious how she is doing (see last post)...she is doing much better!  Her teeth are in, and she is now getting used to eating a lot of baby food.  She decided she was done nursing for good, so I just try to mix in powdered formula with the baby food.  She still won't drink much of anything, but oh well:)  She will get there!  Looking on the bright side...at least she was easy to wean!  It's not always that easy, I can attest to that...and I am not stressing over it anymore:)

Have a good night!!

Oh, Daisy...

She is a cute little thing, isn't she? 

Well, Daisy is now 10 months old, and she very randomly decided this past week that she is DONE nursing.  What??  This might not be such a bad problem, except that she will NOT take a bottle and she will NOT drink out of a sippy cup, either!  Needless to say, she is stressing me out a bit this week!

But I can't totally blame the poor little girl...this past week she has gotten 6 new teeth!!  So there has been a lot going on in Daisy's poor little mouth, and that might have something to do with why she wanted to stop nursing.  Who knows?  All I know is, these past few days I have been trying really hard to figure out how to get formula into her (without the bottle or cup, of course, which makes it tricky!!) and how to get any fluids into her...it hasn't been easy, but she is doing okay!  If anyone has any tips for me, do tell, please!!  I have been mixing formula with baby cereal and then mixing in 1 or 2 jars of baby food.  She likes that pretty well, but I just can't get her to drink anything.  But I think she will learn the sippy cup soon (hopefully!!) if we keep working with her.

                                   
Ahhh, Daisy.  She is a sweetie:)  Doesn't her face in this picture crack you up?  She is so funny! 

weekend with my parents...

We were so blessed this past weekend to have my parents come up to visit!!  We always love having them come...they are so incredibly helpful and generous to us (and to Aaron and Jill)!  They do a great job of making the trip pretty often, and we are so thankful that we still live close enough for them to do this! 

So our weekend was pretty busy!  On Saturday night dad and mom took us all out to eat for Aaron's birthday (which was actually over a month ago).  We went to a really cool restaurant and it was lots of fun:)

Halle and Grandma Jan...these two are pretty close:)

Kaine wanted to take a picture of Aaron and Jill...

Me and my sweet little Daisy:)  Sadly, she was in the beginning stages of sickness this night:(

We sat Layla and Ivy next to each other.  They are really becoming friends!  It is really cute to see.  They thought it was fun to sit in their high chairs next to each other!

Layla likes to be a mommy to Ivy sometimes, too:)

So sweet!!!!!

We had some good food...

And Kaine loved the restaurant because it had an arcade!

So that was a fun evening:)  My parents were planning to go to Detroit church with us the next day, but this little girl was not doing so well:(  I stayed home with her and she was doing so bad that I even took her to the doctor that morning.  I really suspected she had an ear infection, but it turned out to be just a virus.  (and actually, a couple days after this, we found out she actually had Roseola...which is a common thing for babies to get.  She had a high fever for a couple of days and then the fever went away and she broke out in a rash.  Which is the exact definition of Roseola!  Kaine and Layla had it when they were babies, too).  But I am happy to report that she is all better now!

So that night (Sunday) my parents GRACIOUSLY and BRAVELY watched all 6 kiddos so that Nathan and I and Aaron and Jill could go on dates for Valentine's Day!!  Thanks, dad and mom!  That was so nice of you guys!  Nathan and I went to Red Lobster, which was so good.  Not so sure about our waiter, though...(haha, just kidding...our waiter was actually a fellow married student.  And he really did a great job:) ).

After we got back from our dates, we celebrated my dad's birthday, which is coming up on February 24...

I am so in love with this little guy...isn't he so adorable???  What a sweetheart, too:)

My dad and Kaine...they spend so much time together!  Dad, you are such a good grandpa!



Thanks for everything this weekend, Dad and Mom!!  We loved spending the weekend with you guys and we appreciate ALL that you did (and continue to do!) for us...you are amazing parents!

Bible verses...

Something that is really important to us is teaching our kids Bible memory.  (Don't get any ideas now that I am great at memorizing...I am not!  I definitely do not prioritize this like I should.  Nathan does much better than me at this! ).  But anyway...

We want our kids to learn this, for sure.  So we have come up with a great way to do this that works really well for our family.  Every day at lunch and supper, we recite it with them (whatever portion they are working on at the time).  And sometimes we recite portions that they have done in the past, so they won't forget them.  So after a couple of weeks, they usually have it down pretty well.  Kaine usually memorizes it first, but Halle is really great at it, too!  And once they can say it to us by themselves with hardly any help, we reward them!  Nathan and I really get the good end of the deal, too...we practice Scripture memory every day with our kids, and then we get in on the reward, too!! 

First, we take them to one of our favorite places...

We love McDonald's!!  Especially in the winter...it is a great place (although very germ-infested, I'm sure) for them to play when it is too cold to play outside.  And for me...I love their french fries!!

So we take them to McDonald's and let them get a Happy Meal...

Although Layla and Daisy are too young to memorize, we bring them, too:)

Just a sidenote...last night when we were there, Daisy tried 2 new foods!  French fries and chocolate milk!!  Yes, I know this is terrible for her.  Poor fourth child:(  But don't worry too much...she only had 1 french fry and just a little bit of chocolate milk from the end of the straw.  She loved both of them, by the way.

The playplace is always fun for our kids, but last night there were a LOT of hyper, very LOUD kids there...so we didn't stay very long:)

Then, as the second part of their reward, we go to their new FAVORITE store...

We told them they could pick anything they wanted in the WHOLE STORE!  They were in awe!  It is so easy to please little kids:)  Someday they will realize that this only costs us $2!  (And don't worry...sometimes we let them get a nicer prize, but we can't do that too often!)

It was such a fun night!  I am so proud of Kaine and Halle...they really do a great job memorizing their verses.  If anyone is curious, a few of the ones that they have done in the past few months are:  Psalm 1, Psalm 100, Psalm 63:1-8, The Lord's Prayer, and the one they just accomplished...the Beatitudes.  Kaine also knows Matt. 7:24-27 and also Eph. 6:10-18.  Here I recorded Kaine doing the Beatitudes and Halle wanted to do the Lord's Prayer.  

Good job to Kaine and Halle!  We are so glad they are memorizing so that they have God's Word hidden in their hearts...that will be so valuable in the years to come. 

it was worth a try...

So, you all know from my last post what a great helper Halle is, right??  Well, she still is...and I thought of something I could teach her that would be super helpful to me!  I thought it would be great if I could teach her to change diapers!  Have you ever heard of an almost-4-year-old who can change diapers?  Yeah, me neither...I guess I should have known:)  I don't think Layla was as excited about my idea. 

Oh well...I guess I will just keep changing them:)

my little helper:)

Four kids can be kind of busy at times, but God has blessed me with the best little helper!  Halle absolutely loves her little sister and is always so willing to entertain Daisy or get me anything I need.  She really loves to help and I appreciate it so much!  She is growing up so fast.  I know she will be such a good mommy someday!  



Also...

We are now into our Sophomore semester here at New Tribes Bible Institute.  We are really loving our classes and our times together as a family here.  We truly thank God for this opportunity!  For anyone interested, check out my sister Jill's blog here to see a great summary of our classes and things we are learning.  Nathan and I are taking pretty much the exact same classes as Aaron and Jill, so I thought I would save some time and you can just hop on over to her blog:) 

(Hope you don't mind, sis!)