It's warming up!!

I looked at the weather forecast for this week and we're supposed to be up to 45 degrees!! That sounds SO warm. I am hoping that it will be enough to really start melting some more of this snow. I am anxious to see green grass again. The kids have been playing outside a lot - sledding and playing on the swingset. They're anxious for some nice weather though.

I was driving by the barracks the other day and saw a soldier out in shorts and a T-shirt, barbecuing - and it was 22 degrees out :) It's just funny what you consider warm after a while. I don't think I've put my coat on in a month - I usually just wear a sweatshirt. I'm expecting to see the Native Alaskans pulling out their summer clothes next week :)

We'll be finished with schoolwork by mid-May (before the baby comes) and then we're planning on taking the summer off until September. After having made it through a winter, we will definitely appreciate this summer more than we did last! The kids will be outside all day long :)

Happy Easter!!

The Easter Bunny visited our house last night. The kids were up early for their Easter egg hunt and then they headed downstairs to find what goodies he left in their baskets. We're expecting a major sugar high today :)

Thank you Aunt Annie

Here is Nick opening his birthday present from Aunt Andrea. Then saying "Thank You"

Do it again Dad!

The kids playing outside

The girls have been enjoying going outside in 30 minutes spurts throughout the day. They've been sledding in the front yard. Hopefully the snow will be gone soon and then they can start playing in the grass!! We are all looking forward to some warm weather and a green backyard.

Happy Birthday Nick :)

Here is a video of Nick :)

Happy 2nd Birthday Nick!!

It's hard to believe that Nick is now 2 years old. His birthday is actually tomorrow (Easter) but we decided that the kids would have enough candy tomorrow and so we did his cake and presents today :)

Here he is reclining in the high chair after chowing on some chocolate cake.

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He doesn't want to set down his Lego Thomas the Tank Engine train. He's been carrying it around the house all day long.

Baby names

We still don't know what we're having. I haven't been lucky enough to get another ultrasound done. I'm 31 weeks along now and it looks like we're probably just going have to wait the 9 weeks to find out what we're having. In the meantime, we still have to come up with baby names!! We don't have anything chosen for sure yet - and now it's starting to get close. We've all been having fun looking through the baby name books and trying to find the perfect name.

Here are some of the names on our list so far (some of them added by the kids):

Girls:
Victoria Grace (Tori for short)
Victoria Rose
Margaret (Maggie for short)
Genevieve
Chloe (Andy loves this name but I think it's too short)
Christmas Rose (Lexie's suggestion)

Boys:
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (this is what Kate insists we need to call him)
Gunnar
Nathaniel
Gabriel
Thornton (we will most likely use this as the middle name)
Barnaby (Ellie's crazy suggestion)

So, we don't have a very long list yet. Considering we already have Elizabeth, Katherine, Alexandrea, and Nicholas, I'm thinking we should go with another long or royal name :) I'm leaning towards Victoria Grace of Victoria Rose for a girl and either Nathaniel Thornton or Gunnar Thornton for a boy. I'm sure we'll add to the list in the next couple of weeks and then hopefully we'll be able to narrow it down to one girl and one boy name. I would hate the baby to leave the hospital without a name!!

Yesterday

Yesterday I was brave and took all 4 kids to dentist appointments at the same time. They did SO well!! Ellie, Kate, and Lexie all went back by themselves and did perfect. Then I took Nick back and he opened his mouth right up for the dentist. No one had any cavities!! Hooray!!

We also had 2 very interesting incidents yesterday. First of all, Nick decided that he didn't want to make a mess in his pants (that's gross right?) so he took off his clothes and diaper and left me a big present on the playroom floor. Thanks Nick! Yes, I am ready for him to be potty trained :)

Then, Lexie stuck a piece of chewed up bubble gum up her nose - way up her nose. Luckily, she is a good nose-blower and was able to shoot it out her nose without me having to dig. Had it been Kate, I'm not sure what we would have done. She can't blow her nose for anything :)

I also took Lexie to her yoga class and Ellie to ballet and Highland dance. She is getting so graceful and precise in her dance movements. It's really neat to watch.

Hopefully today will be less eventful and we can get some more schoolwork done!

Buster troubles

Ok, so when I was thinking of getting a dog last summer, why on earth didn't anyone stop me?? I love Buster to death - he truly is a great dog. He doesn't have accidents in the house, he's great with the kids, and he doesn't bark or get into too many things. But at the end of the day, he's still a large dog. I am now in the middle of trying to convince the kids that we need to find him a better home. Of course, this is their first pet ever (besides a fish - does that really count?) and he's our only pet. Telling them that we should get rid of him is breaking their little hearts. The truth is though that with Andy leaving in the fall, I think I'm going to have my hands full enough with the 5 kids. I'm trying to think this through logically and make a decision here within the next couple of weeks on what to do....

The Pros to Keeping Buster:

1. the kids love him

2. he's a really good dog

3. it might be nice to have a dog in the house while Andy is gone (although he doesn't really bark when people come, so that might not be much of a help after all)

The Cons to Keeping Buster:

1. He has scratched all of our wood floors (although I guess he's already done that and it probably won't get any worse than it already is)

2. He has to be constantly inside (and I have found that I am definitely an OUTSIDE dog person) It annoys me to no end that he won't just go outside and hang out. He does his business and then he is scratching at the door again wanting to come in.

3. He likes to run away. we have had to go searching for him a number of times - and I have even had to pay a ticket when animal control found him.

4. He leaves huge amounts of doggie doo-doo in the backyard -and I have kids that want to play back there. With Andy gone, the job of cleaning it up will be left to me.

5. We can't give him the amount of exercise he needs. I am not going to be physically capable of taking him for walks around the neighborhood with 5 kids. Can you imagine that??

6. I can't leave the house for more than 6 hours at a time, because he has to be put in the kennel while we're gone. This can be really frustrating to me, because I don't like having to drive home specifically just to let him out. With another car seat in the car, I won't be able to take him for rides in our vehicle either (and he loves to go for rides).

7. The amount of dog hair in our house absolutely DISGUSTS me!! Like I said before, I guess I'm an outdoor dog person. I vacuum the floors every day and yet there is still hair everywhere! The thought of a new baby learning to crawl and being covered in dog hair is really gross to me. If I didn't have so many kids laying/playing on the floor this might not bug me so much, but they tend to do gymnastics, watch movies etc. on the floor.

8. Recently, he has been inhaling his dog food and water and then throwing it up. I had to clean it off of 8 stairs last week. Can I say YUCK loud enough?? I have enough bodily fluids to clean up without his to add to it :)

I really wish we lived somewhere where he could roam around more (and would relieve us the duty of keeping the yard so clean and taking him for walks.) I just don't want to break the kids hearts. I wish I had decided against a dog last summer. He was just so cute and the kids were so excited about him. Like I said, he's a great dog and I'm sure we'll be able to find him a good home - maybe where someone can take him for rides in their car and take him hunting (he catches birds mid-air).

So, looking at the list obviously the cons outweigh the pros. But, do the kids feelings count for more than all of my frustrations?? The kids are going to be heartbroken if we do end up finding him a new home :(

Snowman update

Update on our poor snowman - his head fell off today :)

Nick the Escape Artist

What to do with Nick. Where do I begin? We try to spend our mornings getting schoolwork done - which means I'd like him to play quietly in the playroom or sit in his high chair and color etc. That had been working in the past, but no more. He now climbs right over the baby gate in the playroom (which really worries me because we havet he exact same gate on the stairs). I also can't confine him in the high chair anymore - he easily climbs out and down onto the floor. We went out and bought a new high chair this weekend (one with a 5 point harness). The other we were using was a wooden one with one strap across the lap. I figured we needed a new one for the baby anyway. This high chair also has wheels and can be rolled around. They just keep coming up with new things every year, don't they? Here is a picture of Nick in the new high chair. I just don't know what I'm going to do with another little one in my arms when I'm trying to deal with him - and schoolwork. It should be interesting :)

Homeschool Club

The kids and I are part of a Homeschool Club here in North Pole. They meet twice a month - once for a field trip and once for a "club" day. This past Friday, we had Theater Club and all of the kids broke into their different age groups and got to do skits for everyone. Lexie's group did "No more monkeys jumping on the bed", Kate did 2 - "Caps for Sale" and "The Three Little Pigs" and Ellie did a skit where she was an adventurer (or maybe a miner?) who had fallen and needed medical attention. The other kids dragged her around and she had to be "worked on" They all did such a great job! Here are some pictures from their afternoon of fun :)

Morphing Snowman

After a number of days near 40 degrees, our poor snowman has melted into this very strange looking being. He has lost everything but his carrot nose - and he is soon to lose his entire head :) Of course it has cooled down and has been snowing again, so he may have another transformation coming! (Yes this is the same snowman we made in November that I posted a picture of in November and January)

Our Trip to Delta Junction

We've been cooped up for months, unable to leave town. Andy had a Friday off and the weather has been in the low 40s (which seems incredibly warm to us now) so we decided to take a drive out of town and head down to Delta Junction (south of us). Well, there isn't much there :) We took the kids to eat at a little diner. They just loved it, because there was a toy train circling around near the ceiling. It kept Nick busy (he's definitely into all modes of transportation right now - especially trains and helicopters!) This first picture is of Quartz Lake (on the way back). Notice that there is a truck parked ON the lake next to the ice fishing hut. I for one wouldn't want to be the one to test that out :) Here is Lexie making another one of her weird "my picture is being taken" faces.

This is the Alaska Pipeline - crossing one of the rivers. The kids thought it looked like a very strange bridge.

Here are the girls in front of the "Knotty Shop". We stopped there on the way back to get some lollipops and souvenirs (it's only about 20 minutes from our house). The front of the building is decorated in knotty burlwood and here are the animals of wood out front :)

Here is Kate, busy listening to her MP3 player on the way.

Poor Nick, Part 2

Ok, so Nick is having a really rough week. His toenail fell out today while he was playing in the playroom. We couldn't find it either. I'm just waiting for someone to bring it to me and say "Mom, what is this?" It looks really gross too - like there is a hole on the top of his toe. I'm hoping that it grows in quickly.
His toe hurts, something is chewing up his guts, and he has a really bad diaper rash (he's SCREAMING when I change him). I'm hoping that he starts feeling better soon - although I have to say that he's taking it all pretty well.