This girl...

Her personality has really been coming out lately. As you can see she can get carried away while feeding herself. I have to say she has gotten a lot better since this picture was taken about a month ago.

She does the cutest thing where she cuts her eyes at you instead of turning to look at you. She does it to be funny and I die laughing every time. Please notice that she is holding her fork while shoving spaghetti in her mouth with her hand.

We had her 15 month appt. last week. I was a month behind but we got it done. She was a whopping 27lbs (94th percentile) and 33inches (off the chart). I can't say I'd be disappointed if she just happened to love playing volleyball:)

Our Newest Addition

Praise God for this gift He has given us in His perfect timing! I'm 12 weeks and 1 day pregnant with our 3rd baby. Due to arrive September 7th (or a week or so before if we continue our trend). Even as I write this it is surreal. We are amazed and so grateful for this sweet surprise.

This profile picture was taken today. The baby is about 3.5 inches long (not including the curled up little legs) and was even trying to do some flips already. We are going to let this little one's gender remain a surprise until arrival day. We have all we need for a boy or girl so we thought it would be great to add another element of surprise. Which means we need a boy and girl name, which will be hard since Demetrius and I have different tastes in names.

A few fun facts. We left Mobile pregnant and we will return pregnant. This is my 4th pregnancy since May of 2006 (that's just over 3.5 years). I have been pregnant nearly half of our almost 5 year marriage. Our kids will be 3yrs 3mths (jayden), 22mths (journey) and newborn!

Kids are Funny

This kid is hilarious. Those are his new undies on his head (and on his bottom). If he saw this picture he would say "I cheese-in." I agree. By the way, he is totally potty training himself.

Ok, a few funny stories..

Me: Journey you are so pretty. Jayden isn't Journey so pretty?

Jayden: Yeah, and I'm cool.

I was putting a bow in Journey's hair a few days ago....

Jayden: I want one.

Me: Girls wear bows.

Jayden: Oh yeah, boys wear....guitars and and and play basketball.

I was teaching Jayden the difference between curly and straight hair. We had gone through all of the curly and straight haired friends we have then I asked...

Me: what about daddy?

Jayden: Um. Daddy just has his head.

Such a Big Boy!

Jayden just loves life. He is easily excited and just about anything can bring a big smile to his face. His imagination is amazing. He loves to sing, dance and rock out on his guitar. Last week sometime we were all laying quietly in our bed and he sincerely asked me, "mom, wanna talk?" So of course I said "sure jayden, what do you want to talk about." He proceeded to tell me all about a drawing I made for him the previous day. Random and sweet!

In December we tried the BabyWise potty training method and although it set the stage for some good stuff he totally DID NOT GET IT! He consumed lots of treats and peed on the floor several times. It was fun but we definitely decided not to push it! So last week he randomly told me he needed to pee pee in the potty. Sure enough he did it! And, he's been doing it since. After just 1 week he is really catching on. He stayed dry ALL day today. Even during his nap! We cannot take any credit at all for his progress. He literally is potty training himself. Praise God for that one! Can i get a high five! Oh, and any advice on how to eliminate the treats would be appreciated. He gets 2 skittles for pee pee and 3 for poo poo. Just a side note about his continued quirkiness...he always wants one "brown" (purple) skittle and one orange. And, he has to make sure they both have a "S" on them before he will eat them:)

P.S. Did you notice how dark his hair is underneath all the blonde stuff? The cool guy part down the middle was the beginning stage of combing through his hair...of course he LOVES to do this...probably one of his least favorite things to do.

Umm...are you 2 or what? I swear he looks like a four year old and acts older sometimes. he is quite happy with his dinosaur rain boots, can ya tell?

Desperate Times...Desperate Measures.

Journey's has officially been sleeping in the laundry room for about 2 weeks now. Jayden is suddenly scared to go to sleep at night so to give Journey some peace as she drifts into dreamland, we made the move. The twins are just helping her get acquainted with her new "room." Don't judge me:)

Ok, if anyone out there has any insight on the suddenly terrified to go to bed ordeal...please pass on some advice to your girl. It is getting better but it's still a battle and it's just plain sad.

yummy!

Eating markers. Journey eats EVERYTHING...paper, stickers, gum wrappers, hair bands, diaper cream...so far no bugs that I know of. Doesn't she look proud of her "artwork."

Devastated that I wouldn't let her continue sucking all the ink out of the marker. She doesn't care about much but when she decides she wants something in particular and can't have it...she has a meltdown (oops hope she didn't get that from me:)

Tear stains meets marker stains. I think she's gonna make it.

Conversations Part II

Scenario A: I was putting Jayden's jacket on and accidentally knocked his book off his lap.

Jayden: Mommy, you say "excuse me book."

Me: Oh...well I'm sorry. Excuse me book I need to put Jayden's jacket on.

Jayden: Thank you mommy.

Scenario B: Demetrius had just finished making coffee in his new French Press he got for Christmas and he was sitting down in the living room with his cup of coffee. Jayden, with much confusion and a little sarcasm says...

"Mommy, where's your coffee?"

Apparently if daddy is drinking coffee then mommy is drinking coffee. This kid likes things to be the SAME way all the time. Funny.

Scenario C: We are driving home from a birthday party and we are a few minutes down the road when Jayden very seriously says...

Jayden: "Daddy PUT on your SEATBELT."

Demetrius: Ok Jayden thanks for reminding me.

Christmas with GG, Auntie and Uncle Brian

D's family came in a few days after Christmas so we got to do it all over again! (Thanks for taking the crazy long trip down here and for staying and enjoying the kids!) Again, not many pictures of everyone but we did capture the kids with their favorites. Journey got another stroller. She (and all of the other kiddos in our house) LOVE to push just about anything in the baby strollers.

Um...i could get used to this!

Jayden got a big boy bike from Demetrius' family. We thought for sure it would be a year before he could ride it. But, much to our surprise he asked to get on it a few days ago and rode it down the sidewalk to our neighbors house.

Christmas with the Kelloggs

Pop and Journey Girl....my parents, grandmother and sister came for Christmas Eve, Christmas and a few extra days. It was great having them and we are so thankful they came all the way down here to be with us.

Jayden with his Pop...this boy loves some Pop! For some crazy reason we didn't get any pictures of mom, nanny or my sister Angie. Sad.

Jayden with his first best friend Lapo. He is our neighbor and they play together A LOT! We have even been asked if they are twins by a random passer-by. Here they are on Christmas day...just doing what they do-riding their matching tricycles.

Doing their signature dance.

The Merry Christmas Post

Daddy and his girl on Christmas Day.

She was a little unsure about all the picture taking but she did love opening presents.

Rock star Jayden with his new acoustic guitar.

Priceless look on his face when he saw his guitar under the Christmas tree.

Journey's favorite...a purse (really a diaper caddy). She stuffs it full and carries it around like a little mama.

CHEESE!

"Munch" (aka Lunch)

Gabbie...just being sweet Gabbie.

Jocelyn feeding her babies lunch.

I posted these of Jayden and Journey to give props to IKEA for the super cool functional bibs. $2.99 for a pack of two. My kids won't ever wear bibs (and Jayden doesn't need one he just didn't want to be left out :) BUT Journey thinks it's a shirt so she doesn't try to rip it off. Oh, and we got a French Press coffee maker at IKEA for $9.99!!!

My New Favorite Passage...words to live by.

"If you do away with the yoke of oppression, with the pointing finger and malicious talk, and if you spend yourselves on behalf of the hungry and satisfy the needs of the oppressed, then your light will rise in the darkness, and your night will become like the noonday. The Lord will guide you always; he will satisfy your needs in a sun-scorched land and will strengthen your frame. You will be like a well-watered garden, like a spring whose waters never fail. Your people will rebuild the ancient ruins and will raise up the age-old foundations; you will be called Repairer of Broken Walls, Restorer of Streets with Dwellings."

Arkansas?

Here are some pictures from my girls trip to Arkansas. I went with my 3 best friends from college and Portia's best friend from high school (Tiana, who is now officially my friend too).

We went to the botanical gardens for some amazing Christmas lights. They also had a chapel that was glass and wood beams only. The walls were glass...talk about beautiful!

Ah...to be together again. It's always so good to be with these sweet friends.

Portia and I at the airport in Little Rock. Waiting for Julia to arrive.

We stayed at Rachel's family's condo in Hot Springs. She is sporting her two little puppies in that bag. They travel with her everywhere and no one even knows they're there. They are such good puppies.

Our view from the condo.

The bath houses make Hot Springs famous. We spent about 3 hours in the "healing" waters of the QuaPaw Baths. There were four pools of HOT spring water and basically people just come and hang out in their swimsuits and enjoy the natural warmth of the waters. We felt amazing when we left there!

The average water temp of the springs is 140F. All over the city you will see steam rising out of random places. Overall, it was a great trip. But, I won't be leaving my hubby and kids behind next time. After 2 days I was more than ready for them to join us.

I've been waiting for this...

My favorite things people blog about are conversations with their kids. I've been in Hot Springs, Arkansas all last week (post on that later) but Demetrius had an awesome convo with Jayden that I thought was share-worthy. Demetrius was laying in our bed....

Jayden: Daddy I need milk.

Demetrius: Ok go get me your cup.

Jayden: Ok daddy I got my cup. Hop up, I need milk.

Demetrius: Ok Jayden, wait a minute.

Jayden: Hop up Daddy. Milk.

Demetrius: Ok

As Jayden leads Demetrius into the kitchen he turns around and says...

Jayden: Thank you Daddy. Thanks for obeying.