Emily and Ben

Emily is the best big sister in the world. She loves her little baby brother Benjamin so much. Despite the fact that he is 21 pounds and she is not quite 35 pounds, she packs him around the house (even down the stairs which she is not supposed to do). The other morning I was in the shower and she decided to get Ben out of the crib. So she climbed into his crib, lifted him over the rail, and handed him to Sam (who is not strong enough to carry him around). Sam then laid him down on the floor. Then Emily picks him up and carries him to my bathroom. I was out of the shower by now and she brings him in. I, in a somewhat calm voice, ask how they got Ben out of the crib (there was no crying as far as I could tell). Emily calmly tells me how and says, "And we didn't even drop him once!"
Ben loves Emily and he smiles and gets excited when she comes home from school. He is very tolerant of what she does to him and is happy to be included in all the fun. Here is Emily dressing Ben in her dress up clothes. He was quite adorable and he even left the headband on for awhile (then he chewed it.)
Emily is a great helper with Ben. One morning I woke up to Emily, Sam, and Ben all in Ben's crib. Emily was getting Ben dressed. She had changed his diaper and was putting on his clothes. It was so wonderful to wake up to three kids all dressed and ready for the day!
Thanks Emily for all your help! You are a great girl and I appreciate how much you help me. You even do it with a smile!

Sam and Friends

Sam is a shy boy and is very happy staying at home with me. He doesn't have a huge need to be with friends but he does have two best buddies. Here are a few pictures I couldn't resist posting.

Here is Sam with his #1 best friend, Mason. Sam and Mason have played with each other since they were little. Emily and Mason's older sister, Sarah, are best friends and we spend a lot of time with their family. Even though Sam is about 9 months older than Mason, from the picture you can tell he is much shorter. Sam and Mason love to play with each other. They get so excited to go to each other's houses to play. Here they are dressed up as firemen, ready to go outside and put out some fires! (This picture was taken in November when the weather was still nice.) Here is Sam with his other buddy, Blake. Blake's mom, Hillary, is my visiting teacher and we have become friends. Blake is a fun boy who loves to dress up. Since he has no sisters at home, Emily's dress up is exciting and new to him. I couldn't resist snapping a picture of these two little guys all dressed up as queens and princesses (it was their idea-Emily wasn't even home). Don't worry within a few minutes they were sword fighting and playing with trains and cars.P.S. Blake is only 1 1/2 months older than Sam but much, much taller. My Sammy is a short, little guy.

Ben in Time Out

Somehow, Ben ended up in the time out corner. I'm not sure if he had help getting there (i.e. Emily or Sam). But he was was too cute sitting in the corner, eating a slipper, to not take a picture. So here is my cute baby. Excuse the slobber and runny nose, just look at those chubby arms. He definitely has not done anything that would send him to time out-he's just too adorable and sweet natured!

Emily and "Nancy"

Brad and I have this little "debate." I love the name Nancy. I would love to have another little girl and name her Nancy. Brad absolutely does not like the name. We were joking about it the other day. Emily was listening and she came up with a solution. So let me introduce you...

...This is Nancy. Emily spent about an hour and a half creating Nancy. She traced her own feet and hands for Nancy's feet and hands. She colored the entire body. She made a dress for her and decorated it with flowers and colored it yellow (her favorite color). She gave her hair and included a bow that doubles as a handle to hold her.

For about three days, we had to include Nancy is most family activities; bed time stories, dinner time, etc. She is now hanging on our art board as an honorary family member.

Will I ever get a "real" Nancy. Who knows...I'm still hoping.

Snow Sam

Sam went outside this morning to shovel snow. I thought he meant the driveway.
Silly me.

First Big Snow of the Season

On Saturday we had our first big snow of the season. My unofficial report is that we had about 4 inches of snow and ice. I say snow and ice because the snow at times felt like little ice balls which stung your face as it fell from the sky. It also plastered our front window with ice which gave it a frosted look.

Later, the snow started to melt but then froze which made everything very icy. It was very pretty though. Our mailbox, roof, and house were covered with ice which glistened in the sun. Once it stopped snowing, we started to shovel. It was difficult to shovel the snow because of the ice layer on top. We had to break the ice with either the shovel or in some cases a heavy, metal ice scrapper before we could get to the snow to shovel it out of the way.
The kids had a great time playing outside. They bundled up and played for quite awhile (and Brad thought I was crazy to buy snow pants:-). They thought it was really neat because they could walk on top of the snow and not leave footprints (because of the ice). Emily and Anders, the boy across the street, slid down the sidewalk with sleds. Everything was so slippery, they had a blast.

Eventually, we all got too cold and tired of being outside. So we went inside and had hot chocolate with candy canes. Oh, it is beginning to feel a lot like Christmas!

200 Days

Today is a milestone in our lives. Brad only has 200 more days left in his residency (not that he's counting down or anything ;)

We can't believe it. Our long journey is almost over-5 years of graduate school, 4 years of medical school and almost 4 years of residency.

Two hundred days seems like nothing.