The Last Few Weeks

Here's what has been going on at our house the last few weeks (in no particular order):

-- I had a great Mother's Day! The girls made me flowers out of tissue paper and sprayed them with body spray so that the paper smelled nice. Andy got me a video camera that is the size of a cell phone. I have 8 hours of storage on it so that fact along with the size means I will be able to take a lot more video of the kids. I was super excited about it since they are growing so fast. I also received several homemade cards and pictures from the girls.

-- Luke is 5 months old now. He has been sitting/standing in the exersaucer for short periods of time. He also uses a bumbo type chair with a tray of toys around it which has been helping strengthen his muscles. He can "tripod" when trying to sit, but still topples over after a minute or two. This picture is a little blurry because he doesn't sit still while in the exersaucer. As you can see, he really likes it! I plan on getting him a Jumperoo in the next couple of days.

-- Yesterday, the pool opened for the summer. The girls were so excited! Emily and Eliana had a half day of school so we met some friends there right after lunch. It was Luke's first time to a pool. He usually loves splashing in the bathtub so I thought he would enjoy it. The water was cold though so he wasn't happy about it. I ended up holding him on the side of the pool for most of the time. Emily and Eliana spent most of their time in the deep end and sliding down the slides. Sarah practiced floating on her back. She hates getting water in her ears in the bathtub so I noticed that she had them covered up while trying to swim.

-- Eliana lost another tooth. She has now lost three teeth in the past couple of weeks.

-- We have implemented a new rule at our house. No screen time during the week. They get 2 hours on Friday, 3 hours on Saturday, and 2 hours on Sunday. We had been contemplating no screen time during the week for a while now. Emily and Eliana watch at least 4 hours of TV a week at school. I recently read an article in my PARENTS magazine where Michelle Obama was interviewed. She mentioned that not only were her daughters not allowed to have screen time during the week, but that the weekend hours were restricted as well. We hadn't thought about the weekend restrictions, but figured it was a good idea. We told the girls that the president's daughters have the same rule with the same restrictions and they didn't fuss as much as we thought they would. I will probably make exceptions as I do need a break when it's raining outside, but we will see how it goes. In an effort to find more things to do as a group, I bought a couple of puzzles. The girls and I completed this 750 piece puzzle a couple of days ago. They already have plans to start another one soon.

-- The last day of school was today. Emily had an Honors Program that we attended. She received three medals: one for Perfect Attendence, one for Principal's List (all A's) all year, and one for having 238 Accelerated Reading Points. All the students in the district take a test on Reading, Math, and Language at the beginning of the school year, after Christmas Break, and at the end of the school year. Emily scored the highest in all three subjects in the entire school!

Eliana didn't have a program this year, but she showed us her two medals when she got home. One was for Principal's List (all A's) all year and one was for reading 450 Accelerated Reading books, the most books read in the entire school!

We are so proud of both of them!! To celebrate the end of the year and all of their achievements, we took them out to lunch at The Crepe Maker. It was a gorgeous day so we ate outside on the patio. It was yummy!

Starting Again

Ok, I know, I have not kept up with this blog as I have done in the past. I rarely have time to get on the computer these days. School will be out in a couple of weeks. I am determined to start writing again once summer vacation arrives. I will try to post a couple of times before then to update everyone on what has been going on in our household since the last time I was on here. I also promise to start reading the blogs that I am following. I have thought about everyone the last few weeks and wondered what was happening in their lives. I realized that this blog helps me remember when the girls had various activities and lost their first teeth. I hope to continue this so that as my memory continues to fade, I will be able to look back at past posts and remember what happened.

Celebrities :)

A couple of weeks ago, Emily won 4th place in the Scrabble Tournament that was all 3rd graders for the Spotlight program in the county. Andy and I got to be there to see her play and receive her medal. We were very proud of her!



Eliana found her name in a Clubhouse, Jr. magazine story. She was super excited because she rarely sees her name anywhere. Click on the picture to enlarge the article.



Sarah saw me posting this and asked me to put a picture of her and Luke on here:

Declaration of Peace

Emily and Eliana came to me with a document that was handwritten:



In case you can't see the pencil, it reads:

I, resident of the Hamilton's humble home, pledge to forever more be nice to my sweet sister. I will not fight with her unless it is absolutely necessary.

Sincerely,

Emily Hamilton
Eliana Hamilton


I wonder what they deem as "absolutely necessary". I haven't heard any arguing for the last couple of days so maybe it's working. I hope that it continues!

Love Is In The Air

Eliana got her first love note today. The boy gave it to her in a sealed envelope with a heart drawn on the back.



She said that the boy came and asked her what she had done with the note. She told him that she was going to take it home to show me. He went back to his desk and came back later asking what her answer was. She told him no. He said ok and went back to his desk again.

When she got home, we talked to her about how it had taken a lot of courage for him to give her that note and that it was important to not hurt his feelings even though she didn't like him the same way. So, she changed her answer to "yes" and wrote "as a friend" underneath. I'm just sorry that she won't be able to give it to him until Tuesday because they are out of school on Monday. I hope the poor kid isn't too distraught over the holiday weekend! I just can't believe we are already dealing with love notes from boys!

Night = Party Time?

I am still having issues with Luke at night. He has a couple of good nights in a row where he actually wakes up to eat 3 or 4 times a night, but then goes right back to sleep. I don't mind those nights at all.

Unfortunately, he still has nights where he is up most of the night. He will fall asleep, but as soon as I lay him down, he will wake right back up again. He is fussy and spends most of his time crying if he is not trying to eat nonstop. Last night was no different and I ended up giving him a bath at 12:30 a.m. thinking that the "Calming Lavendar" body wash might have been the reason that we had such a good night the night before. Apparently, Luke had different ideas. He wasn't fussy after his bath, but he was wide awake. He spent a good 30 minutes just looking around and listening to me talk to him.

Here's a picture that I took at 1:30 a.m. today:



I think he finally went to sleep (and stayed asleep) between 2:00 and 2:30 a.m. I'm not really sure of the exact time because I never looked at the clock after 2:00 a.m.
This late night party resulted in him sleeping most of the day. Here's a picture that I took at 1:30 p.m. today:



Hopefully, tonight will be another good night and I can figure out how to help him have more good nights. Any suggestions would be appreciated!!

Baby Announcement

We have a BOY!! Luke James was born on December 17, 2011 at 12:18 p.m. He weighed 8 lb, 9 oz, and was 21 3/4 inches long. He was born on Eliana's 7th birthday. I'm sorry that I have been missing from the blog the last couple of weeks. Luke likes to stay awake most of the night and sleep all day. I'm thankful that Andy has been able to be home to help me with the girls because I have been exhausted! Now that the new year is here, I am trying to get back into some kind of a routine. I hope that I will be able to post regularly again. With four kids, our family is now complete and we recently got family pictures taken.















The girls are really excited to have a brother! Sarah wants to help out all of the time. She is constantly giving him kisses and hugs. It is really sweet!