Easter Morning

We had a fun Easter morning. I really enjoyed finding them each of the kids a little present that I knew they would enjoy. Annabelle was thrilled with a pink rimmed fedora and Asa, who is currently in love with Mickey Mouse got a new stuffed animal. 

 I just love Annabelle's bed head!

 Of course Kai wasn't left out, but he didn't care too much about the glowing sea horse in his basket.

After church I noticed that Annabelle has just grown leaps and bounds since she wore this pink dress to David and Clara's wedding a year ago {Happy Anniversary you two!} . It's almost as if she's sprouted new legs ;)

New Lens = Instant Gratification

Mike's other birthday present came in the mail yesterday, a new lens. The kids and I were in the backyard when he came home with it and was ready to try it out. I can't believe the amazing shots he got of the kids who were just standing on the porch. The technique he used is called "high key".

My beautiful girl! 

In case you didn't know, this boy stole my heart.

And my baby. I just can't get enough of this chubby, happy little guy.

 For any of you curious photographers, this is how Mike described his process: "I had the kids standing in the shade, in front of a wall that was in the sunlight. I used the pup up flash, which limits the shutter speed to 1/180 of a second. This makes the sunlit was go to bright with, which makes for some fun images in the style called high key."

Yeah, I married a photographer stud.

Train Museum Photo Shoot

I think after Mike took the picture of Kai in my grandma's suitcase I really fell in love with old fashioned, sepia toned photos again. So to mark Kai's almost 2 month {and because Asa really loves trains}, we took a trip to the train museum for a little sibling photo shoot.

Annabelle is such a cooperative model and such a cutie {I don't care if you think I am biased}, so I have a lot of favorites of her.

Kai was pretty cooperative as well, even if this one is a little precarious. Don't you just love that sweater? 

Asa, just driving the train, no big deal

 The walking rails is a remake of an old favorite {check out #20}, 

I can't decide if I like the color or the sepia more.

Saturday Morning

We had a perfect, slow Saturday morning this last weekend. With no one in town and no where to be it felt like our first truly lazy wake up since Kai was born. Annabelle and Asa joined us in our room to snuggle up with the baby. They all looked so darling in their pajamas and with their bed head I grabbed the camera and got a few priceless photos of the kids adoring their sweet little brother.

Sometimes Asa is gentle, but we have to keep a close eye on him because sometimes he is not!

Can't you just hear her giggle?

It is moments like these that I am can't believe how blessed I am.

Three, Two, One

{Three}

Sherwood baby number three is doing well. We got to take a little peek last week for my 20 week ultrasound and HE is growing a moving and all that just like he is supposed to. I am already fond of him as this has been a super easy pregnancy. I haven't been sick or anything like that. On some days I get really really tired. But that is the easiest symptom to remedy: take a nap. Or take a coma (a coma is one of those naps when you sleep so hard and drool and wake up disoriented). It seems that when I need a coma so does Asa. Perfect!

Unlike my pregnancies with Annabelle and Asa I haven't hit the 'eat gummis every single day' phase. I still like sweet things, but mostly just in moderation. I have noticed that I am more emotional. Yeah, that was unexpected. I fought back tears for the first 10 minutes of the 4th of July parade this year. I find myself feeling shoved to the side when I haven't been. At unexpected moments of slight difficulty I will suddenly become overwhelmed. It is a bit ridiculous, which is what I try to keep in mind. I just take my good friend's advice and tell myself "I'm just going through a stage right now".

Sometimes while in this stage I make lapses in nutritional judgement. Let's just say that is what happened the night I decided that we were going to have peach crepes with real whipping cream, powdered sugar and chocolate drizzled on top for dinner.

Back to our little number three. He is already fairly active. So far his little jabs and kicks have been fairly amusing. Asa loves to fall asleep laying on my chest/belly. Unknown to Asa, his little brother notices and makes sure to thump Asa several times to let him know that he is being squished.

This week at my appointment he was so active it took my RNC about 4 minutes to get his heart rate because every time she'd get him for a second he would move before she could get enough beats to get the rate. She exclaimed several times that he was a really active baby.

{Two}

This boy is my love. He is a real rascal but then he turns right around and has me wrapped around his finger again. He'll empty the recycling, climb up on the table, sneakily drop his dinner on the floor, turn the power strip for the computer off, try to get his hands in the toilet (or the 'yuck' as he calls it), throw toys down the stairs or imitate his sister when she is crying BUT most often when I scold him he'll give me a cheesy grin with a scrunched up nose so that I have to quickly turn away so that he won't see my smile. He'll snuggle up to me and bring me a book to read him. He'll remember to sign instead of grunt.

He has been picking up signs so quickly now. For a lot of them he does his own little variation but for now he is using: dog, cat, hat, telephone, book, fish, bird, eat, drink, please, thank you, help, more, again, snowman, flower, baby, and this week I have been trying to get him to say 'love'. He also shakes his head or nods to answer yes and no questions. We love being able to communicate! Of course there are always break downs (like last night when he didn't understand why I wouldn't let him eat the baby powder) but overall signing makes life so much easier.

Mike says it is time to cut his hair again. He is probably right, but if he gets really sweaty and it is humid out then he'll get curls like in this picture from the zoo.

{One}

Miss Annabelle has been in school for about a month now. Here in Arizona they start school a lot earlier in the year and most of the schools only offer full day kindergarten. I know - aren't you supposed to ease into it? For the mother's sake?

She likes going. There are ups and downs as far as having a stricter bed time or getting up in the morning goes but she is always happy about it on the way there. I was a little worried the first week because she told me "Mom, did you know that learning isn't fun?" Seriously, who let that one slip?

Since Asa and I miss her all day she is a bit of a celebrity in the afternoons. We sit and eat a snack with her, read books or play if she feels like it. Some days I think she is just ready for down time and she'll disappear into her room or watch a show.

She let slip last week that a boy at school was giving her kisses. I tried not to act too shocked so that she wouldn't get embarrassed and not tell me WHY he was kissing her. She explained that she had won candy three days in a row and that he got so excited for her that he just started kissing her cheeks and arms. Mike encouraged her to cover her face next time!

Monsoon

So we finally got some real rain for the summer, it started off with hail for a few minute and then it rained for little while after. It cooled the weather off from 105 to 80 which was a welcome change of pace and let us get outside for a little fun. nothing beats jumping in puddles after a good storm. Annabelle and Asa had a great time, Asa was amazed at the water falling from the sky and loved playing in it. Annabelle enjoyed getting wet and even helped Asa have some fun.

- mike

First Hair Cuts

That's right, our kids are growing up! (Sniff, sniff)

Annabelle and Asa got their first haircuts together a couple of weeks ago. Annabelle's hair had never been cut and for the last 2 years or so it seemed that it didn't really get longer, just bigger.Here is her before shot:

I felt a little torn about trimming Asa's hair because it needed a little more length so that we could see whether or not it was going to be curly. But . . . the shagginess around the edges was just looking messy, so I went for it. Here is his before shot:

Annabelle was nervous that she would FEEL her hair being cut. Afterwards she exclaimed, "That didn't hurt at all!" Too cute.

Her hair turned out a little shorter than I was anticipating, but I got the eternally tangled ends off and over all it looks healthier, we might just have to wait a while to get it back into a pony tail. But most importantly - She likes it :)

Asa's haircut went a lot smoother than I anticipated. He loved standing up looking through the chair at a very helpful Sister. She kept him happy and distracted while I trimmed up around his ears and neck.

I didn't take any off the top, just the sides and back. But here is his final result:

I don't know that I'll always cut my kid's hair, but it was fun this time. They put up with me and at this age they can't point out any of the flaws!

Favorite Videos from March

These kids are hilarious. I wish I had more moments like these on video. Enjoy!

March in a Minute

Yes, I realize that it is, uh, May. But for my sake I'd like to do a little catching up. It seems to be the theme for my blogging thus far this year. March is one of the most beautiful months in Arizona. I love the sunny warm (or as many here refer to it as, cool) weather. Great for hiking, play dates at the park, visiting the zoo and all of that.

Needless to say we spent a lot of time outside. The citrus fruit is also in season, which means many friends are looking to dump their excess fruit. I love making homemade lemonade and I think we perfected it this year and added puree strawberries.

In March Asa sped up his crawling and mastered going up the stairs. I have a gate at the top of the stairs but can't bring myself to get one for the bottom . . . seriously, can you imagine, having a baby on one hip, an armful of something else and trying to negotiate a gate, climb the stairs, negotiate another gate and then have to do it all again on the way down? Safety First? How about 2nd? I do put an ottoman at the bottom of the stairs to block him when I can't keep and eye on him. Teething, drooling and waving made up most of Asa's month. Take a look at those teeth in there, this kid's smile cracks me up!

Annabelle enjoyed her first field trip in April. Her preschool class went to a fire station. She talked about it for weeks and initially didn't want me to go with her, but a few days before said it would be alright if I came along after all. I might have embarrassed her with all the picture taking . . . she survived. Since the field trip and Safety Week at school, she has been more focused on safety. She asks WHEN our house will burn down, she notices wether or not bike riders are wearing their helmets, if firemen will come to our house, if girls can be firemen, when she'll be old enough to bathe Asa without me . . . I'm glad she has taken over as safety officer for me. I have to admit issues of safety don't cross my mind as often as they do Anna's.

A highlight for us in March is celebrating Mike's birthday. I had to steal this picture off of our friend Tacy's blog as she managed to remember to take a picture! Tacy and Mike share a birthday, exactly. Well I don't know what time they were born, but I love them both and so we got together and celebrated. Oh, and they both love cheesecake, so it works out perfectly. Later in the week they packed up and moved to Utah. It was a fun night, but a bitter sweet farewell as we'll miss them, but I know they'll enjoy being closer to family.

Mike got a new macro lens for his birthday and has been a mad man macro photographer ever since. He usually shares his favorite shots with his fellow Sherwood photographers on the family photography site, if you want to see what Mike's world looks like in macro take a peek through the archives.

Other March happenings deserve a post all of their own. I think the time is up on 'March in a Minute' but I couldn't help but post this last picture of Asa - - with all the crawling and disinterest in eating as of late he doesn't have quite this much chub anymore. Oh yeah, and I think this is evidence that he'll get some curl to his hair.