Halloween

We had a great Halloween! Jonah was supposed to be a football player but at the last minute he adamantly announced he wanted to be an elephant. So, he wore the elephant hat from Emma's dance recital. We had a great night!

October

Emma's birthday lunch - look at those smiles!

Our big four year old

Jonah has gone through a ridiculous phase with shredding library books. Here is one of his beloved Thomas library books that he tore into many, many pieces. It cost us $18 to replace. I was NOT happy and he is no longer allowed to have Thomas books from the library. He did very sweetly apologize to the librarian and gave her the money for the book.

Jonah and I made muffins while Emma was at school. We made pumpkin muffins that he could have and he was so very excited.

He was especially excited to eat the batter.

Emma at her four year check up...so sad. She ended up having another double ear infection. I had no clue. That sent us down a path visiting the ENT and we are monitoring her ears for now.

At 4 years old Emma is 44 inches (98th percentile) and 45 pounds (95th percentile)

Enjoying a bubble bath

Beach time in October

Tea Party with Mommy

This kid LOVES football

Jonah colors at least an hour a day. His face is so precious when he is concentrating. I love our conversations while he is coloring and I am in the kitchen. So cute!

We took a day trip to Columbia and went to the zoo. The kids could not have been more excited or enjoyed it any more. We topped off the day with a trip to Red Robin which was amazing! It was Jacob's first restaurant experience and all three kids were just perfect.

This face is ridiculous! He was so excited to get some new clothes from Sam and find a steelers sweat suit inside!

The kids were sliding down the steps and giggling. They were not giggling when the rug burns started to burn. It was not a fun evening after this.

Emma was teaching dance class at the barre with Jonah

All ready for dance class. Jonah can do various ballet moves with nice form. This was the first time he was dressed like this and it was just hilarious.

Jonah

Jonah and his Puppy

Gosh, this kid melts my heart! I just want to kiss and hug him!!!

So funny

He is LOVING the football season. He can tell you a large number of players and positions for the Steelers. So much fun!

Emms Kate's Fourth Birthday

Happy Birthday, Emma Kate!

The boys celebrating with birthday hats...Jacob is not too sure about that.

 To celebrate Emma Kate's birthday we started the day by going to the doctor for a strep test! She did not have strep, but she had a double ear infection (and Jacob had one too). After the throat culture, through tears, Emma Kate said, "This is NOT a fun way to spend my birthday". Sweet girl! After that we had a good day celebrating even though she did not get to go to school. We had a special lunch at Sonic and she was even allowed to get a slushie for her drink! That night we had spaghetti and meatballs per Emma Kate's request. She enjoyed the day and the constant stream of presents. I can honestly say that each and every present she received was just perfect! She was so thankful for the gifts and was genuinely touched by everyone's thoughtfulness.

Emma Kate at 4 Years Old...

• prefers to be called Emma Kate (she gently reminds us when we forget)
• LOVES preschool
• dances everywhere and is obsessed with Angelina Ballerina and dance class. She is often found teaching dance in her studio, aka her bedroom. She has really improved a lot in the past year.
• very interested in drawing and writing. She has exploded with her writing and each day brings a new skill in her drawing. It is exciting to see that skill develop.
• Everywhere she goes she has a baby with her. EVERYWHERE. She loves each and every baby and stuffed animal in our house. She feeds them and talks to them and teaches them to crawl and talk and bounces them when they cry. Each morning on the way to school I get a very detailed list of directions for how to care for her baby that day and when I pick her up I am asked for a specific report of what happened while she was gone, including how long naps were and how much the baby ate. 
• She adores her brothers and loves to play with them
• is becoming fashion conscious and has an opinion about her outfits and always is eager to change if she doesn't match or looks "silly"
• loves going to the pool and beach. She is just about to move beyond floaties.
• she eats a ton...she is a bottomless pit but continues to be a great eater and loves all fruits and vegetables.
• she is most definitely a rule follower and experiences such freedom within boundaries. 
• She is painfully sensitive and thoughtful. She loves and cares for others. She gave me one of her babies for my birthday. So thoughtful and very sweet since she loves them so much.
• Emma Kate is very sensitive to noise (how does she survive in our house?!) and smells. We are working to help her learn to overcome these sensitivities as they come.
• She is so extroverted and adores talking to whoever will interact with her
• has stopped sucking her thumb!!! She made the decision to stop and that was pretty much it. We did have lots of conversations about that and we did find that she is still sucking it in the middle of the night when she is asleep, but she has broken the habit during the day and at bedtime. Along with that, Ducky stays in her room now and she has even given one to Jacob. She is very concerned that she does not want her teeth to look funny.
• loves Jesus and sings about Him all day and asks great questions trying to better understand who God is.
• she is so helpful and nurturing and the boys essentially have a second mommy...whether they like it or not!

 We could not be more blessed by Emma Kate! She is a precious girl that keeps us laughing and wanting to pull our hair out! Here are a few pictures of Emma through the past four years.

One Week

One Year

Two Years

Three Years

Four Years

Emma Starts School

 Emma Kate (that is what she wants to be called now) started preschool this month. She goes Monday, Wednesday, and Friday from 9-1 and could not love it any more. For the first week she just repeated over and over, "I love school, I love school". Her teachers just laughed at how much she told them she loved school. There are 11 kids in her class and she is the oldest and tallest. She has made friends with a girl named Kate who turns 4 next month. They are in the same Sunday school class and really enjoy playing together - what an answer to prayer. She was just devastated when she missed school on her birthday because she was sick. She was worried the police would come get her because her teachers wouldn't know where she was (not sure where that came from). We are just so thankful that she is enjoying it and blessed that the Lord is affirming our decision to put her in this school and wait until now to do that.

Off to her class. We were not able to get a picture with her teachers that morning but she just danced right into the room and started following directions.

Outside school before the big day!

She is getting so big!

September

It has been a long time since I have made my way to the computer to post. August into September was quite busy and the past two and a half weeks have been a revolving chain of illness. Here are a few updates and random thoughts I want to hang on to.

At the end of August we had the chance to see the Reitanos again. Mike and I even got to go out alone with Josh and Paige on a date. It was SO much fun!

Grammy and Poppa came on September 1st. We had a great visit and went to the beach and pool and downtown. They were so helpful and such a blessing to us. (of course no pictures...surprise!)

Jonah has been pretending his puppies are baby kitty cats. He tells us they are squealing and has us snuggle them. He nurtures and cares for them so sweetly. Recently I have let them watch the cartoon Martha Speaks and one puppy became Martha and the other Skits. He is such a sweet, sweet boy!

Jonah has started stuttering. While it is mostly a non issue he does have times where it is very frustrating for him. He got stuck at breakfast the other day and finally slammed his head against the chair out of frustration and through tears yelled, "I can't say it". It broke our hearts.

Both kids LOVE their new classes for church. Jonah walks right in and waves to me. It is such a blessing. Now if only I could feel that way... :)

Emma started school - another post to follow

Jonah has been going through a daddy phase and he cries for daddy all day long. Sweet and frustrating at the same time.

Fall is officially here and we are still in full summer weather. The overnight low dipped to 60 and everyone was complaining the next day about how cold it was. I say bring on the 50s and jeans and sweatshirts. Fall is my absolute favorite time of year and also the time I am most homesick. I miss the activities and weather of Cincinnati this time of year but we will again enjoy the Pumpkin farm here and start to look for some new traditions involving shorts and swimming and enjoying flowers and green trees for a few more months. Nothing bad about that...just different.

I know there is more I wanted to share but I am so distracted and overwhelmed with these three sweet babies that I forget just about everything. Just yesterday I closed the garage door before I closed the door to the van and it got caught and made an awful screeching noise and left a pretty good scratch on the door. I was so frustrated but life goes on...our life is full of noise and commotion but is so fun and our kids are such an amazing blessing. It is such a gift to watch them grow and see God's creativity come out as they develop their interests and personality. So fun!

I walked into Emma's room and found her wearing this...the shirt is 18 months. She was "riding" on her pillow pet and it was a riot. She has quite an imagination and loves to dress up.

This picture just does not do any justice to the flooding, but we had unbelievable rain at the end of August. It caused amazing flooding in the city. In one 90 minute window our part of the city got 6.7 inches. It was crazy. We had two days of this rain and it caused a lot of problems.

Bath time escaped the tub a little too much and leaked through to the living room ceiling...ugh!

Emma fell asleep at the top of the steps in her doorway one night as we were battling with her to go to bed. It was just hilarious to come up the steps and see that she fell asleep while making her stand.

For my birthday Jonah got to have a mini Thomas cake like his birthday (since he couldn't eat our cake).

This is the balloon Emma Kate picked out for me for my birthday. Very special!

Football season is here and we are excited!

Emma Kate started back to dance classes. Aren't these tights just special?! I am working on finding places to say yes and I said yes to these and did not shed a tear when they tore the first week of class.

Surprise! Jonah got sick again. He started a virus in our house and then a cold which has cycled through all of us and caused double ear infections for Emma Kate and Jacob. The past two and a half weeks have been full of sickness.

On this morning Jonah was asking for toast with jam. I looked over and he was trying to eat the middle of the toast and had the entire thing plastered against his face.

The cake Emma Kate and Grammy made for my birthday!

Getting big!

Love his smiles!

Jonah has really started building with his blocks. He now builds Sodor (the island Thomas the train lives on). This was complete with football guys. His creativity is coming out and is so much fun.

Pretty good picture of them together

Our only family picture with all of us. Not too bad

Excited for the first Steelers game of the season

The tower at great waterton

Enjoying play time together now that they miss each other during the mornings.

Proud of their creation

The tunnel to Misty Island

They created this all by themselves. They built sheds for their trains. I love that they did this all on their own!

He loves playing with Jonah's blocks and will sit and play with those and watch his brother and sister build for a long time.