Concerts, Tractor Rides, Birthdays, and More!!!

Lots of things going on this past week!!!  Kaylee had her spring concert at school last night and she even had a speaking part.  She told the name of the song they were singing and what it was about.  She did a great job getting up in front of everyone!! It was fun watching her and her classmates having so much fun singing and doing the actions to the songs.

Dylan started wearing big boy underwear this week!!!!  He still wears a pull-up when sleeping, but when he's awake he's in underwear.  He's also discovered the great outdoors is a great bathroom too!  We're so excited that he seems to be getting the hang of it and has been doing so well.  Sticker charts seem to be working pretty well and once his chart is full, the big prize is a trip to Des Moines to see Sesame Street!  That's incentive enough for Dylan.

Ryan got to go on his first tractor ride and slept through most of it!!!  Dylan kept trying to "drive" the tractor and had a hard time understanding why Daddy wasn't touching the steering wheel (he's using another farmer's tractor that has auto steer!).  Kaylee hasn't gotten to go for a ride yet since she's been either at school, church, or tumbling when Grant has been in the field. But she did get to go sit in the tractor with Daddy and Dylan and she liked that.

Grant's birthday was Wednesday and the kids helped make and decorate a cake for him.  They had fun decorating the cake and singing "Happy Birthday".  Dylan's birthday is just a couple of weeks away so he was having fun blowing out the candles and pretending it was his birthday.

And the news with Ryan this week is that he slept through the night for the first time Wednesday night!!!  He went to sleep at 11:00pm and slept until 5:30 the next morning!  We were both shocked when we woke up and realized what time it was!!!  Most likely he's not ready to keep doing this, considering he usually gets up at least once if not twice a night, but it sure was nice to get some extra sleep!

Kaylee's kindergarten class.

Getting ready for her speaking part at the concert.

The kids spending some time in the tractor with their dad.

Fast asleep during his first ride with Daddy in the tractor.

Grant with the kids on his birthday!

Dylan loved helping Daddy open his presents.

We might have another thumb sucker at our house.  Ryan has been sucking on his hands a lot lately and keeps trying to get his fingers in his mouth.  We've been trying to get Dylan to break the habit and to just do it at nap time or bed time, but as you can tell that doesn't always work!

Ryan seems to like his crib.

After making Grant's cake, Dylan liked licking the batter.  He's also wearing the ears to Kaylee's cat costume.  For some reason that seems to be one of his favorite things to dress up!  Might have something to do with us going to the play Alice in Wonderland.  Ever since then he's been saying they're bunny ears.

All smiles wearing his ISU outfit from Grandma Gina and Pa Dennis.

Taking a nap in our room.  He looks pretty comfy!

Ryan hanging out during some tummy time!

Growing and Changing

Recently, Kaylee decided she wanted to get her hair cut.  She's told us that before, but then changed her mind once we got to the salon.  This time she was ready for a change and did get it cut, so I wanted to post some new pictures.

Ryan is getting bigger and changing all the time.  He recently had his two month check up and weighed 13 lbs. 6 oz. and was 23 1/2 inches long.  So he is in the 80th percentile for weight, and 75th percentile for height. He's still a happy baby and has a huge smile!

Dylan is now paying more attention to Ryan and talking to him more often, probably because Ryan is now awake for longer periods of time.  He likes to hold Ryan, but it usually only lasts for a minute or less, and then he wants to do something different.  I've put a few pictures of the boys together on here too.  

Kaylee's hair before getting it cut.

Kaylee's new hair cut.

Ryan - 10 weeks old (4/17/09)

Brayden, Kaylee, Dylan, and Ryan at Grammie and Pa's house.

Dylan and Ryan hanging out together.

This is one of Kaylee's favorite shirts that she got shortly after Ryan was born.

Happy Easter!

Over the weekend the kids got to go on three Easter egg hunts, dye some Easter eggs, and spend lots of time with their cousins.  The kids really enjoyed looking for eggs, and Dylan was all about the chocolate!  After the hunts were over, he'd sit down and immediately pull something out of his basket, and then shove it in his mouth before someone would tell him he couldn't have it.  Kaylee had so much fun looking for eggs that when the Easter egg hunt was over she wanted to hide more eggs for Dylan and Brayden to find.  It was a fun weekend for all of us!

Our Family

Ryan's First Easter

Dylan (almost 3 yrs.), Ryan (2 months), Kaylee (5 1/2 yrs.), and

Brayden (2 1/2 yrs.)

Celebrating Easter at my Mom and Dad's house.

Back:  Lori, Travis, Grant, Michelle, and Ryan

Front:  Brayden, Bob, Kaylee, Elaine, and Dylan

Ryan - 9 weeks old

Dylan looks for eggs at the Easter egg hunt in the Williams park.

Kaylee looking for eggs.

Kaylee and Dylan after the Easter egg hunt in Williams. Notice the chocolate bunny in Dylan's hand!

Kaylee with her basket full of eggs!

One of our Easter egg hunts was at Grant's Grandma Oskvig's house.  Here is a picture of all the kids that got to look for eggs.  Kendall and Ryan were too little this year, but next year they will be able to join all the fun!  (Brent, Kaylee, Savanna, Livia, Colin, and Dylan)

What a Busy Week!!!

What a busy week we've had!!!  We've had lots of things going on and have TONS of pictures to share.  I was going to make a separate post for each of the kids, but then decided it was easier for me to just put all of the pictures on together (even though there are SO many!!!).  So here are the pictures we have to share and I will put a description under each picture, or group of pictures, telling what was going on.

Daddy and Mommy got to go to school with Kaylee on Friday for Donuts for Dads and Muffins for Moms.  When we got there, Kaylee showed us some of the stuff they've been working on at school.  She had a writing journal with the stories she had written throughout the year and then one booklet for mom and one for dad.  In those booklets she told what our favorite colors are, our favorite foods, etc.  My favorite part was where they had to tell how tall we are and how much we weigh.  She thought Mommy only weighed 14 pounds and was 55 inches tall!!!  That made me smile.  I heard one other mom say her son thought she weighed 5 pounds, so it was pretty cute.  The kids also sang songs for us, one about how their moms are the best, and another about their dads being the best.  The funniest one was about a soup that dad makes and it uses all of these animal parts in it and you could tell the kids had a lot of fun singing it because there were lots of smiles and giggles!

Some of the kids in Kaylee's class:  Kyle, Leigha, Faith, Lexi, Kaylee, Cassie, Ethan, Tasha, and Haley.

Wearing her cheerleading outfit.

Our baby is now 2 months old!  He is smiling all the time and we love it!!!  He's got such cute dimples and he always makes us smile.  Lately, we've been working on getting him to go to sleep on his own and he's getting a lot better.  We've been putting him in his crib while he's still awake and giving him his pacifier, and that seems to be working pretty well.  Some times when he loses his pacifier, we've seen him trying to get his fingers or his whole fist in his mouth so he can suck on that.  I have a feeling we could have another thumb sucker!!!

Taking a nap on the couch.

Ryan is starting to wear off some of the hair on the back of his head.

Here Ryan is taking his first bath in the big tub.  Kaylee and Dylan were already in the tub for their bath and since Ryan needed one too, we decided to put him in there with the other two.  We told Kaylee and Dylan that they needed to calm down a little so they wouldn't scare Ryan, but Ryan doesn't look like he's so sure about taking a bath with them!

 
Playing dress up again!  This time Dylan was the doctor, but Kaylee thought he should still put on a couple of necklaces too.  His favorite thing to wear is this pink hat, he absolutely loves running around with it on.  He also has a fireman's helmet on over top of the pink hat.  He said he was a firefighter!

And here are a few pictures of the boys in some of their Iowa State stuff.  The hat we got from our doctor at the hospital when Dylan was born, so we thought we should take a picture of Ryan wearing it too before he outgrows it.  

Our handsome boys!  I was telling Dylan the other day that I have two handsome boys, him and Ryan.  He told me that Daddy was a handsome boy too, and I told him that he was absolutely right!  

Easter Outfits

Over the weekend we took some pictures of the kids together wearing their Easter outfits.  I wanted to get some cards made for our families to send out to them for Easter and this is one of the pictures we took of all three of them together.  They actually did pretty good and it didn't take that long to get a nice picture of all of them!

Ryan was 7 weeks old on Friday and the picture above shows him with one of his huge smiles.  We love his big grins because then we get to see his adorable dimples!!!  Below is a picture of him during some tummy time.  He actually kind of likes being on his tummy (something Kaylee and Dylan both hated!!!).  He's getting really strong and can lift his head completely off the ground and hold it there for short periods of time.  He also likes lying on his tummy because then he can find his hands easier and he likes to suck on them.

Kaylee has been reading to her brothers a lot lately.  We had conferences at school last week and her kindergarten teacher told us that she's doing really well in reading!  We're glad she enjoys reading so much and her brothers like having their big sister read to them.

We have been trying to encourage Dylan to use the potty, and for a short time we were having some success.  For about a week and a half, he was using the potty at least once a day (sometimes more).  We even bought him some big boy underwear, but lately he's decided he's not interested in using the potty.  So, we still ask if he wants to use it, but if not, no big deal.  It will happen in time.  (Although, I have to say it will be nice when we just have ONE in diapers!!!)  He recently got some new rain boots and he's been wearing them around the house constantly!  We thought this was kind of a funny picture of him in just his underwear and his Lightning McQueen boots!