A Very Merry Christmas

Wow. What a year this has been!  It has been so very hard and so very wonderful.  This year's highlights include:

Michael turning 3
Michael getting potty trained
Matt finishing law school
Matt looking for a job
Jennie giving birth
Adelaide being born (three weeks prior to)
Matt taking (and passing) the Bar
Adelaide being extremely dairy-intolerant (and very cranky until)

Jennie learns to live without dairy
Matt finding the perfect job at Clearman Prebeg, LLC
Sarah turning 2
Jennie house hunting (with Michael, Sarah and Adelaide all in tow)
The whole family moving
Buying our first washing machine (Oh, happy day!!!) and first lawn mower
Kids loving the novelty of having a backyard (with their own dirt pile! . . .Thank goodness for the washing machine!)
Jennie putting up Christmas lights for the first time
Having Christmas in our own home for the first time

Having wonderful Family and Friends who love and support us continually, and whom we love so dearly!!!

Our lives are overflowing with blessings great and small. The Lord has led us down a rocky path these last few years, but we are finally beginning to see the blessings of taking the road less traveled.  But one of the greatest blessings remains constant --the love we feel from each of you.  We love you all, think of you often, and pray for your welfare and happiness.

Have a blessed and happy Christmas!

Love,
Matt, Jennie,
Michael, Sarah & Adelaide

Holi-daze

So it's been a while since I've had a chance to update the 'ol blog. Downloading and looking through all the pictures on my camera, I realized it's been two very full months. So following is a quick run-down of the holidays and other momentous occasions our family has enjoyed.

 Sarah's Birthday
We held Sarah's 2nd birthday party at the park close to our house. Lots of friends came to celebrate with us, but this little girl had eyes for only one "person" . . . 

 her "Thomas Cake."  She insisted on a Thomas-the-Tank-Engine cake for her birthday, and I had a lot of fun making it. Sadly, the day was warm enough that the frosting melted really fast, but it was cute while it lasted.

Sarah Compton and Sarah Turner: could have been twins?  A friend from BYU moved into our ward about a year ago and, oddly enough, has a daughter named Sarah.  Their birthdays are just a week apart and they even look similar: same height, same fair skin, same blue eyes, same strawberry-blond hair, etc.

Halloween

Of course, we made our annual Jack-o-lantern. This year, for some reason, Jack succumbed to black mold rather quickly and within a week turned into a black, mushy, grotesque mess.  Fitting for the holiday, perhaps, but still really disgusting. He didn't even make it to Halloween; we had to toss him early.

 For trick-or-treating, Sadie was a blue dragonfly. Michael wanted to be a fireman again, but in all the craziness of packing for our move, I couldn't find his costume. So, we whipped up a super-fast robot costume out of a yet-empty box, aluminum foil,  packing tape, and glow-bracelets.

 The Move
Sorry, no pictures of the action. It all happened so fast, I totally forgot to take pictures. With the help of my parents, brother, sister, and a neighbor who owns a moving company we got almost everything moved in one evening. Then, it was just a matter of unpacking, putting away, and cleaning. 

In all the commotion, Adelaide learned to find comfort in sucking her thumb.  Both Matt and I were thumb-suckers, so it had to happen to at least one of our children.  As soon as she started sucking her thumb, she started sleeping through the night. Hooray!

Michael is such a good boy. He is always eager to help with anything and everything. His favorite compliment is to be told that he is a "good worker."  The week we moved in, I bustling around trying to put things away. I had unloaded the dishwasher but hadn't had time to do the dishes. Suddenly, there was Michael in the kitchen doing the dishes for me. I was amazed.  Considering he is only 3 1/2, he did a really good job too!

Solid Food
Adelaide is now almost 5 months old, and I started her on baby food this month. This is a picture of her first experience; she sloppily, but happily, gobbled it down. She now eagerly anticipates her "solid" meal each day.

Matt, Esq.
Here is Matt getting sworn and becoming an official, fully fledged lawyer.

Matt's 33rd Birthday
Mmmmmm . . . Birthday ice cream.

Thanksgiving
We had a wonderful Thanksgiving with my everyone in both of our families. We spend several days with my folks. The whole family was there.  My mom put me in charge of keeping all the kids occupied, so I planned lots of different activities.  Here we are making Thanksgiving posters.

Here we are on a fossil hunt.


"Turkey Olympics" included funny face contests, relays,

 a ball fight,

and, everyone's favorite, a pie eating contest.

Hyrum was the victor and Kylie came in a close second. Cole made a good showing and certainly came out the messiest, thanks to Uncle Stephan.

 
 I think the kids' favorite thing to do was feed the animals.

Nana and Popie had lots of baby ducks and chickens to pet and cuddle.

 Aunt Alison has adopted one of the chickens and taught it to sit on her arm.

We also spent several day with Matt's family and enjoyed another Thanksgiving dinner at Grandma Lamm's house. (Sorry, I forgot my camera.) It was lovely to see everyone there.

Sadie got a few belated birthday presents, including this cute tutu. She loves everything pink, so it was a big hit.

Other Events of Note
One of Sadie's birthday presents was a "little pink  potty."  We're taking a very relaxed approach to potty training this time around.--She can use it when she wants . . .and when I have time to supervise . . . so it's not very often.  But here she is sooo proud after a big "success."

We've been having lots of fun fixing up the house. My parents gave us an old desk and shelf that needed repainting. I finally gave up waiting for some time without the kids around, so I got everything out, took a deep breath, and said they could help.  We had lots of fun and they didn't get nearly as messy as I thought they would. . . . The paint job isn't perfect, but there are more important things.

Last weekend, Matt bought our very first lawn mower. The whole family, minus Adelaide, got to help push the mower.

 The kids couldn't wait to decorate for Christmas, so everything is out and up.

I grew up in the country and we never bothered with Christmas lights. All my adult life, I've lived in apartments. So this was the first year I got to put up Christmas lights on the house.  It was actually really easy because the original owners, long ago, screwed in little hooks all around the eves. I thought it was brilliant.

On Top of the World

We have some exciting news. --Matt got a job working at a law firm here in Houston, Clearman Prebeg, and it's doing exactly the kind of work he wanted to do: IP litigation. He worked with two of the partners last summer as an intern, then they split off to form a new firm.  They hired Matt on contract basis a few weeks ago and liked his work so well, they made him an offer for a permanent position within a week and a half.  He loves the work and comes home super-excited about everything he's done that day. But it's so frustrating for me, because he's so excited about his work, and he can't tell anything about the cases he's working on. Oh, well. At least he's happy.

Also, we will be moving at the end of the month. Finally a house with a backyard and a washer and dryer of my very own! I'm not sure how long the link will be good for, but you can check out our house at http://search.har.com/engine/4421-De-Milo-Dr-Houston-TX-77092_HAR64364041.htm (We're renting, not buying it.)

The last few weeks, with Matt getting a job, and then a permanent position so quickly, and then finding the perfect house, have seemed miraculous to us. I feel like we've been mountain climbing for the last four years and we've finally reached the summit and are looking down on the beautiful valley below. Yes, we still have a long way to go, but right now, we can take a breather, enjoy the view, and marvel at God's goodness, power, and mercy in our lives.

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I've been so busy, I haven't had time to update the blog in a while. So here are some pics from the last month or so.

Family picture from the day of Adelaide's Blessing. We had a nice luncheon after church with Matt's family, my family, and several neighbors.

Aunt Lisa and Sadie.

Ahhhhh. Time to relax --for the kids and for me. This was one of the few times all three kids have fallen asleep at the same time, so I had a good 30 mins of peace and time to myself. I was so excited, I had to take a picture. . . . Of course I had to spend the whole time in the car with them, but it was still very pleasant.

"Mom, why do you keep looking into that little silver box?"

"No, I don't want to smile for the camera."

"All right, all right. How about a half-smile."

Grandma came to visit for a few days and we loved having her.

Finally a real smile!

We went to the beach several weeks ago, as a "last-hurrah" before Matt started working.

A few days before, someone sent me a YouTube video of the Tsunami in Japan. The kids were at my elbows watching it too, so I explained in simple terms what a tsunami was. When we went to the beach and Michael saw the waves, even though he has loved!!! the beach before, he went berserk. He threw a huge fit thinking that the waves were going to come up and wash us all away. It took a looooong time for him to calm down, but he eventually did. (The moral of this story is --Never let your kids watch YouTube!)

Feeding the gulls.

Michael and Sarah both hated the ocean as babies, but it didn't seem to phase Adelaide one bit.

Fun with Dad

Since Matt finished the Bar, he's been at home job searching part time and being a full-time Dad, nanny, au pair, mother's helper, or whatever you want to call it. I would have gone crazy by this time without his help. He is the best! And since this is his first real vacation in four years, we're taking full advantage of it and doing lots of fun things.

We've been to the Children's Museum and the Natural Science Museum. (The kids can't get enough of the dinosaurs.)

We had an indoor campout. No we didn't sleep in the tent, but the kids had fun getting ready for our "campout" by turning the lamps into trees and hiding stuffed "forest animals" around the living room. The big thrill was turning off all the lights, climbing into the tent with a flashlight and Dad telling camp fire stories. (Nothing scary.)

Playing with water is always a hit. Sadie especially enjoys her mini-pool.

Matt took Michael to NASA Space Station. What a perfect father-son outing!

They looked at all kinds of cool space things. Michael got to touch a real moon rock. And they rode two different flight simulators. That was the coolest!

With so much to see and do, our little space cadet was pretty spacey by the end of the day.

With Matt here to help take care of Adelaide, I try to use my "free" time to play with Michael and Sarah. Sadie is really into dress-up right now, and of course, I play along.

More fun with rockets . . . Matt bought an even bigger rocket and used the same size engine in the hopes it wouldn't fly as far this time. We fired it off in the middle of a huge, empty field

and, of course, it landed in a tree at the edge of the field.

It took quite a bit of time and help to get it out. It took a group of homeschool boys and some tools borrowed from the park maintenance crew to finally get it out.

Adelaide News:

Adelaide continues to grow at an astonishing rate. She's a lot more fussy than either Michael or Sarah were, but we're slowly learning how to make her more happy, or at least cope with the fussiness. Tonight we tried giving her camomile tea (Pediatrician and Grandma recommended) and it was the first time we'd even tried to give her a bottle. And it worked! She took the bottle with no problem and drank the whole thing! (Neither of my first two babies would take a bottle at all, so this was pretty amazing to me.) She settled down a little, eventually fell asleep, and woke up happy. Wow!

She will only sleep during the day if you're holding on your shoulder. She sleeps in her bassinet just fine at night, but if you lay her down any other time of day, she immediately wakes up. It'd be fine if I didn't have two other kids in need of attention too . . .

She learned to smile this week, but I haven't caught a picture of it yet. Previously, this was about as close to a happy face as we could get.

Michael News:

Michael has recently learned to do buttons. This is a shirt he buttoned all the way all by himself!

He is a great big-brother. He loves coloring and doing "crafts" (anything involving scissors and glue).

Sadie News:

Sadie is in love. Not with the boy next door. Not with a favorite stuffed animal. Not even with Mom or Dad. She is totally head over heels in love with "Thomas the Tank Engine." She idolizes anything that has to do with Thomas, and carries her little Thomas trains everywhere she goes. She checks out "Thomas" videos at the library every week and watches them every chance she gets. And when she can't watch the videos, she carries around the DVD case so it can be near her. We're not sure how this infatuation began, but I suppose it's just one of those things she'll grow out of, right?

Pretty in pink --her favorite color.

Sadie recently discovered how fun it is to stick things down your shirt--if you're wearing a onesie.