False Alarm....

They were runaways from the neighbor! After a day of convincing and lots of excitement.... sigh. The boys are handling it better than the mother.

Well, who expected this!

After an earthquake tremor during nap time and finding these under my porch, I can emphatically say it was not a normal Tuesday!




Meet Joy and Glory. Joy is the black one and Glory is the tail-less white one. Named and cherished by two toddlers and still being "considered" by the father. We'll see how this all works out! This contraption is my life saver. I didn't have it for the boys, but for my third I'm glad to have commandeered it! Eliza seems to be very social so she loves feeling like she is a part of things!

Sidewalk paint and Barber Shops

Looks like I can't find the time to post every time something happens.... so I am combining two. We finally got around to giving our boys their summer buzz cuts. I'm fully aware that most people do this in May, but we were a little busy then. So we headed out to the deck with the trimmers and the leaf blower. This what keeps the boys entertained. Once they are covered in clippings their Daddy blows them off. It's lots of squealing (yes even for boys) and running around with big smiles on their faces.



The second is a recommendation of a good friend from NYC.... sidewalk paint. I checked out a site online and found a recipe. The kids had a really good time. We will definitely be doing this again! Thanks Beth.

I actually like her!

For those of you who don't know me extensively as a mother.... that statement is a big deal. It took me about 9 months to say that about Sam. Knowing what I know now about my diet and how it affects her and knowing that it must have affected Sam in the same way, I wonder if I could have sped that process along by eliminating more foods while I nursed Sam. But nonetheless, it took quite a long time to pass from "I love my child" into the "I actually like my child." Babies are like puppies, in that they break the world down into two categories of people.... those who get the puppy in order to have a dog, and those who want a puppy but don't actually want the dog. I fall into the first category. I suffer through the pains of infancy in order to have another toddler. Go figure. Either way, the probability that this may be our last makes me pay more attention and try to take greater notice of Eliza and her phases. Either way, I have really been enjoying her lately. She has gone through some difficult and trying phases (and has even been called birth control by people who will remain unnamed), but has emerged into a smiley, opinionated little girl whom everyone in the family loves. I thought I would post some pictures of her smiley-ness.

Shamelessly Late

I have no excuses. Here are some pictures of our adventures over the past month..... of which include camping, a visit from the Linden's and the Jamieson's, a visit to Montgomery, and a visit to Nanna Sally and Papa's for Nanna's 60th.... man, I thought this was going to be a slow summer! Enjoy. Forgive me for not commentating. Just thought I should go ahead and put these up regardless of my lack of inspiration with words.

A Visit from the Jamieson's and the Linden's!

Camping at Hungry Mother State Park in VA

Oh... and I forgot.... a chubby little girl

A visit to Montgomery AL

The effects of a time change and lots of fun! Don't worry.... this is probably the only time he's done this in the past year!

Eliza.... waking and eating!

Well - because of the lack of sleep and an increased amount of chaos in my house (it's amazing how a crying baby in the background can make any routine task seem stressful) I have failed to post. If you are not tuned in to my life in other ways you may still think I'm worrying about my daughter's weight gain..... well not any more. All of the sudden (at about 4-5 weeks of age) she decided to chunk up. Now she is an amazing 12 pounds at 7 weeks (which is about 9 ounces larger than my oldest son was at 8 weeks!) and is in the 90 percentile for her uncorrected (not taking into account her being early) age. Well, in weight that is, as in height (in typical Breedlove fashion) she is only in the 50 percentile. Looks like we're going to have a chunker on our hands. Which is typical of our babies.

She has definitely woken up. I have gone through the painstaking science experiment of trying to figure out what makes her cry. She was having definite stomach pain so I have eliminated several things from my diet - dairy (sigh), caffeine (man, I'm loving this process), and peanut butter. It still seems like some days she spends the majority of the time crying, but I suppose that this is because she is just a baby. She is not quite old enough to "schedule" yet, but she is too old to sleep the day away. So we're left in no-man's land. She wants to be held all the time to fall asleep, then she wakes herself up after 15 minutes, and then she cries from being overtired. All that to say - my life looks very different now than it did 3 weeks ago, 2 months ago, or a year ago. I suppose we can always say that!

One thing has remained the same. The boys still adore her and Sam still claims to have a baby in his tummy. Often at funny times. For example, they were all eating cookies for dessert at my mother's house and I had to settle for synthetic crap.... candy corn. So Sam turns around and says he wants some. I explain that he had a cookie and that Eliza won't let momma eat a cookie or she'll cry. He explains to me that his baby in his tummy doesn't like cookies either (even though his is 4/5 gone) and it needs candy corn too (insert melt down). Sigh. Sam. Never a dull moment.