Saturday with Mommy

On Saturday the boys at I went to my Aunt Linda's pool. They really had a great time splashing in the water and hanging out in their floaty. Here we are at the pool - Sam looks funny :)

Afterwards we went to my Aunt Linda's house and had BBQ and the boys played with all the cool toys she had their for her grandsons. They played with a drum for the 1st time, which they loved! They figured out right away that the sticks were to hit it with and it made noise. Aunt Linda also gave them some cute cowboy hats.
Matt played in a golf tournament all day with his friends so the boys missed Dada.

Sunday our friends Pooky and Mooky (Matt and Melissa) and their daughter Anooky (Anna) came over for dinner! It was great to hang out with them!

Last night was our big Bachelor finale watching party. We had a very yummy dinner:
-Tracy's lemon chicken
- my favorite green bean side dish
- yummy pasta
- salad
- peanut butter brownies and ice cream
- wine

I can't believe Ali didn't pick Chris. Whatever, Roberto!

First Royals game....oh, brother!

For all you Saturday Night Live watchers out there if you've ever seen the Aunt Linda character on the news segment of the show you know what I mean by "oh, brother!!". The dream of taking our kids to their first baseball game didn't quite come true for Matt and me. I'm happy we did it but it probably won't happen again for a long time.

I don't know if I've ever written about this but Sam is very scared of just about everything. He cries when there are loud noises and when the Minnesota Twins get 6 runs in the first inning and we are sitting by Twins fans, there is a lot of cheering and loud noise. He screamed bloody murder everytime people would cheer! I ended up having to take him to the very top seats of the stadium where no one else was sitting and hold him there for the rest of the game. He eventually had a grand ole time up there with just him and mommy. Matt is a great husband :) and him and Ben came to sit with me too. We went to the game with Matt's entire family so I felt really bad we were secluding ourselves like that - but it's better than having a screaming Sam the entire time. Ben was pretty good until the end when he started getting sleepy. We didn't leave the game until 8:30pm, which is an hour past their bedtime.

We do have high hopes for fun filled games at the "K" in the future....just not the immediate future with the boys!

Grandma and Grandpa with all the grand kids (notice Sam's face...the fun has already begun and we weren't even inside yet!)

Our little family all dressed in our best Royals gear:
Us in our seats:
All the cousins:
Aunt Allison and Ben:
The boys hanging out in their seats. Ben is having soooo much fun!

Sam at the top of the stadium. One and only smile of the game!
The 4 of us at the top of the stadium before the boys got too cranky. We had a good 1/2 hour in there when things were smooth sailing!
Like father, like son:

8 months and Happy Birthday Grandma!!

Yesterday the boys turned 8 months old and it was also my mom's b-day! We had a little party for her and she got to spend the day with the boys, which I think means it was a wonderful birthday......

Here are some pics of my big 8 month olds:

They were obsessed with the sign so they would look at the camera until it was put in front of them
Hmmmm, let me take a look at that a little closer:
Only half way decent one I could get- they were being total cranky butts:

Here is the birthday girl with her grandsons ( love Sams face here):
She was holding Ben when Matt was feeding him ice cream and got it all over her shirt so she had to change and wear one of Matt's. Here are the twins:
My dad was running Sam towards Ben and both boys were cracking up at this game:

Yesterday Matt went to the Manchester United game at the newly renovated Arrowhead Stadium. As I was putting the boys to bed Sam pulled himself up and was kneeling in his crib - really shaking the rails of the cribs. He had been doing it the last couple of days but yesterday he was rocking back and forth so hard he almost flipped over the side of the cribs!! I set up a pack and play and put Sam to bed in that. When Matt got home he moved the springs to the lower level (all this around 11pm last night!) I had to wake Ben up and hold him while this was going on because it would have been way too much noise in the room. Anyway, I"m so happy we did this last night because when I just put them down for their morning nap I go in to check on them and see this!:
He was having so much fun walking around his crib like that he wouldn't go to sleep. And, when he let go of the side he feel straight backwards. Not bending his legs or trying to catch himself just straight back like a stiff board. He didn't get hurt and I was cracking up!

So, to recap their 7th month of life...

Ben:
- loves his hands and holding things. He moves his little hands all around when he is not holding stuff and when he is he sometimes does it too so he can see how the toy moves
- poor guy had a rough month with ear infections. 3 in the last month and 30 days on antibiotics. Ugh, that kills me!
- laughs a ton to himself and has a new cackle type laugh
- gained 1 lbs in 2 weeks!
- can sit perfectly and is rocking back and forth on his knees getting ready to crawl

Sam:
- talking quite a bit. Is now not only saying dada but also mama and baba...and sometimes babble that actually sounds like complete words
- pulling himself up to standing
- crawling/dragging himself around
- one crazy mo-fo! That boys does NOT stop moving - EVER!!

Both guys:
- they have been swimming quite a bit. They like it but not love it anymore. Sam has taken to not liking a bath, which I'm wondering if it has to do with the excessive swimming.
- eating well. Trying new foods. We gave them puffs. They didn't really like it and Sam acted like he was choking on one so I pulled him out of his highchair only to realize the puff was still on his tongue - he was just being dramatic.
- drinking out of sipping cups- even though they still won't hold it
- sometimes holding their bottles. They are capable - just lazy sometimes!
- Today they cried when I turned the TV from the cartoons Matt had on for their. I'm going to break this habit ASAP!

They are changing so much I can't wait to see what this next month brings!!

Happy Birthday again, Mom! Love you!!

See ya...

New camera

As I said in a previous post we got a new camera. I think it takes pretty good pictures- definitely better than our last that took 50% blurry pics. Here are some new pics of the boys posing for us:

Sam

"No I don't want my picture taken"

"what part of "no" don't you understand?"

"I'm going to take that darn thing away from you, Mom!!"

"I'm outta here!"

"Ok, I"m back"

"You can take a picture of me!!" (Make this picture big so you can get a good look at that mug on Ben - it cracks me up!)

Side note - I returned the awful sleepers to JcPenny Outlet yesterday. At first they were trying to say that they didn't carry them there so I had to whip out the pictures of Ben on the blog so they could see what they looked like on an actual baby and not just on the hanger. They called the manager over and she remembered carrying them so they gave me my money back. Actually, they gave me a gift card.....so here we go again!

Sweet lil face

So, the 10 cent sleeper I ordered never came and I have been anxiously awaiting it's arrival! I looked on our Ebay account last night and it's coming from China! This is getting worse and worse.

The boys new favorite thing to do is play on the ground with all their toys. They sit up and play and fall over and then roll around all over the place. They don't like their jumperoos or exersaucers very much anymore. I'm hoping that changes because that is a lot of equipment to use for only a couple of months - I know, I know that's typical baby gear for you! Anyway, once in awhile when I am on the couch and the boys are on the floor I feel like someone is staring at me and I look down and see this:


Let's see, what else is new....we got a new camera so hopefully the pictures on here will be clearer. A lot of these are taken by my phone so that's why they are so grainy.

The boys have started riding in teh front of the shopping cart. i put down one of those shopping cart covers and it helps cushion an falls into the metal they have because they are still a little unsteady in it. They love it and think they are so cool. Yesterday I had Sam in a cart and he found the only spot of metal not covered by the cart cover to chew on.

Today was Ben's last day of antibiotics for his ear infection. Please say a prayer that they stay away. He is grabbing his ears still so I'm hoping that is just a baby thing and not that the fluid is still there.

Congrats to Pooky on finding out she is having a boy! Can't wait to see all these little boys running around!

Bff's

This is one of my favorite if not my favorite picture I've taken of the boys to date. They had just eaten and were in really good moods and just having fun with each other and with me.

I love my boys so much!

Play date anyone??

Anyone up for doing something tomorrow (Tuesday)? I don't have anything going on all day and would love to get out of the house!

Here is a pic of our sweet little dog, Maggie. I thought this was a great pic of her!

Swimming Sam

Here is a pic that my sister-in-law took of Sam and his Uncle Bryan on the 4th! Sam does this thing where he sticks his tongue out a little to the side when he smiles sometimes and this pic captures it perfectly:

First toofisis

My little Ben got his first tooth almost a month ago now on June 15th. He got his 2nd tooth about 2 weeks later. And, those suckers are sharp! Here is a pic of my big boy and his teeth:

Ear infection update

We had our doc appt today and she saw a little bit of fluid behind both his ears. She hopes that because they had him on Amoxicilin the 1st time and Augmentin, which has Amoxicilin in it, the 2nd time that it was just immune to the 2nd round. She did not give us the tubes talk yet, which I was happy about. She said she also felt swollen lymph nodes that made her think maybe it was a virus too. He puts everything you can imagine in his mouth so that's definitely possible!

Ben was 19 lbs (gain 1 pound in 2 weeks!)
Sam was 18 lbs 11oz

All looked good with both boys except the ear things with my poor little Ben.

Beware of cheap sleepers!

I found two matching sleepers at JC Penny Outlet a couple months ago. Knowing that the boys were in need of 6-9 month sleepers I gladly purchased them for the sale price of $3.99. I bought them because, if you know me, I love a bargain and also because they were very light weight and great for the summer!

Big mistake!

After putting them on the boys we quickly realized that these sleepers would disenegrate if we happened to take the babies out in the rain while wearing them! I didn't even notice at first but there are only about 4 snaps on the entire outfit and lots of gaping holes where there should be snaps. Matt and I refer to them as the gaping hole sleepers, actually.

Here is Ben modeling the atrocious article of clothing:

Full body shot. He looks like one of those "Before" picture people who are never smiling or look good in the "before' pics:


Here is a close up of the gaping holes. Notice the bulging diaper. Seriously, you really aren't going to put any snaps around the crotch area?!

Here is one of the legs of the sleeper that used to be sewn together. However, the first time the boys wore it the 2 loose stitches that were holding it together busted. And, no, his extra thigh roll pictured did not have anything to do with it!:

You would have thought I learned my lesson but nooooooo......I just purchased another sleeper off Ebay for 10 cents! I trid to purchase another one a few days ago but my 2 cent bid lost out to a 7 cent big. The shipping is $4 so I"m hopeful :) Stay tuned.....

And Pooky, you will not be getting these sleepers if you have a boy! They are going directly in the trash- I'm too embarrased to pass them down!

4th of July festivities!

We had a really busy weekend with a bunch of 4th of July activities/parties/etc.

On Saturday we went to the Lenexa Parade, which we hadn't been to in 5 years since we took our old dog, Desi, and she pooped all over the place. After that we went to Matt's parents house for a cookout. Directly from there we went to Matt's friends Terry's house for a pool party. The boys really are troopers for letting us tote them around everywhere and sleeping on the fly in there pack and plays and eating their big boy food on our laps.

Sunday we went to a pool party/cook out at my Aunt Marlene and Uncle Randy's. Aunt Jamie was there so the boys got some QT with her.

Here is Sam checking out Aunt Jamie:
Sam: "Hey! I remember you!!!"

Ben: "What about me?!"

After we left that party we went to Matt's sister's house for another BBQ/pool party. Ben had gotten up at 2am that morning very cranky and wouldn't go back to bed. As the day progressed he started to get a temp and was pretty lethargic. Aunt Tracy is a doctor so we had her look in his ear...sure enough he has another ear infection!! I am SO sad :( It's his 3rd in less than a month :( :( (double sad face!). I feel so bad for my little guy.

The ear infection did not hold him down because both boys had a great time swimming in the pool and when Sam went to sleep Ben stayed awake and ate ice cream for the first time:


"Not to shabby!"


And he got to watch fireworks! You could see the display perfectly from Tracy and Bryan's house!

We thought he would be scared of the loud noise but he loved the bright lights. And, after Dr. Aunt Tracy gave him Motrin he was as happy as could be:

Now, Aunt Lauren before you say I'm favoring Ben with the pics remember...Sam was a good boy and asleep at 9:30pm at night when these pics were all taken!

Hope everyone had a safe and fun 4th!

2 Boys!!

One year ago today we found out that we were having 2 baby boys! We were taking guesses on what they were going to be and most people said 2 girls or boy/girl. From the moment we found out we were having twins I said they were going to be 2 boys and I was right!

Me, Matt, Jamie, my mom and Jamie's two sons were at the big ultrasound. It was exciting for everyone to hear what they were. It was the first day that Jamie told her 2 little boys that she was pregnant but the babies were cousins Jill and Matt's- boy was that a lot to take in!

That day we knew we would have a "Ben" because that has always been my favorite boy name but we didn't know what the other baby would be named. We picked the name Sam about a week later.....and then almost changed it to Luke right before they were born....and then decided on Sam for sure about 3 minutes after Sam was actually born.

I love to think about the time leading it up to the boys birth - such great memories!!

Here are the ultrasound pics from that day:

Sam:

Ben (you can see his little butt to the left of the picture. It looks like he is sleeping on his tummy with his butt in the air - just like he likes to do now!)

What a big boy!

Ben helped me feed him his bottle during 2 feedings yesterday. He basically took it from me and held it for himself until most of the bottle was gone. He had a little trouble tipping it enough to get the entire bottle though.