Week 3: All I Need is a Soccer Ball!

This week's post is all about...ME!

Not really, just the first picture. I have officially become a minivan mom! I used to bash the minivan, saying "I will not drive a minivan. I will be an SUV mom." Well, I guess that when I was saying that, I never thought that I would be the mom of twins. I thought that surely I would have a few years to buffer the time between car and minivan, hopefully using a Honda Pilot type small SUV to be the go between. But after much discussion(on my part) and number crunching (on Aaron's part), we decided that we really did need a new car, and found a pretty good deal on this minivan. We were cramming all 5 of us into my car, which took quite a bit of effort and creativity but soon realized that wasn't going to work for very long! We talked about getting a smaller SUV but I just felt that we would want the extra space that a van offered-especially if we have any more kids (although that is not really a discussion that we have right now)!The van is a 2005 Nissan Quest. The whole console area looks kind of "spaceship-ish." Emma calls it (the console/dash area) church. I guess it does kind of look like a podium. She will stand in front of the gear shifter and pretend that it is a microphone. The van is her new favorite place to play!

And as you can see, I put up a full body picture of myself. At my two week appointment with my doctor, I discovered that I lost 41 pounds! That put me somewhere between 5 and 7 pounds over my pre-pregnancy weight. (I weighed today and am actually under my pre-pregnancy weight!) Go me! I am a little confused because it took me forever to lose the weight with Emma, but it is just falling off this time around. I was all geared up for months of rigorous exercise and strict diet, but I am not having to do anything (thank goodness)! Hopefully it will last at least long enough for me to get my Lifetime membership with Weight Watchers...

And now for the update on the boys:

The boys had their doctor's appointment on Monday and both had a tremendous weight gain again! William gained 14 1/2 ounces and is up to 6 pounds 8 1/2 ounces, and Jonathan gained 13.5 ounces and weighs 6 pounds 10 1/2 ounces! The doctor told us that they want babies to gain 1 ounce per day, but they will accept as little as 1/2 ounce of weight gain a day. But my boys gained 2 ounces each day last week! We are so proud! Actually, I am pretty excited about it. They are starting to fill out a bit more in their faces and their bodies. It is comforting to watch them grow!

A neighbor stopped by on her walk one evening to visit and see the boys. While she was holding Jonathan, he found his thumb and started sucking it. This was a first for him and he hasn't done it since.

When I first saw this picture of Jonathan (while loading it on to my computer) I realized that I am going to have to go back through all my pictures and label which kid is in the picture. I can tell the boys apart when they are next to each other, I can tell them apart when I am holding one (or when Aaron brings one in and says "Which one is this?"), but in some of the pictures we have taken, it is harder for me to tell who is who. So here is one of them together. Like I said, it is hard for me to tell them apart sometimes. I put them in their little long sleeved tees, which I think look more like straight jackets, or they could pass for a chef's jacket. Anyway, just to confuse you all (and myself in the process) that is Jonathan on the left and William on the right. We usually put them the other way around-in their birth order. Emma and William had a little play time one day during the week and got all tired out. (Not really, I had just finished feeding William and sat him in the Boppy for a minute, and Emma wanted to get in hers. She covered them both in her Pooh Bear blanket-I was a little surprised that she would share.) Here they are taking a nap together. (Again, not really, Emma just pretended to be asleep for the picture.) This is Emma in her latest get up. Since it has been so hot lately, she insists on wearing her sunglasses everywhere she goes. For some reason, she thinks that the sunglasses act as some kind of "cooling off" method. She is also sporting her gardening gloves, and completes her pink spring ensemble with her church shoes-which, if you look closely, are on the wrong feet! Here is Emma before church last Sunday. She looked so sweet in this picture that I just had to post it. She is wearing a white linen dress and a pink sweater. When she came home from church, there was crayon all over her dress and sweater. She put crayons in her pocket which left marks all over the pockets. Luckily it washed out. I would have been sad if it didn't. I really like that dress!

Here is the true face of Emma. She is so funny! This is her before church today. She can be so silly sometimes!

Oh, and Aaron wants me to point out the difference in the bushes behind Emma. Last Sunday they were all wild and jungle like, and today they are all nice and shapely. Aaron spent most of the day in the yard yesterday, trying to tame all of our overgrown bushes and mowing. I love how green everything is here, but the yard work can really get away from you if you let it! (Or if it rains every Saturday, you don't do yard work on Sundays, and then don't get home from work until after dark every day during the week.) I guess that I could assist in the lawn mowing, but I kind of have a lot going on in the house! One last picture to leave you with this week. Aaron took Emma out to take pictures before church so I could finish getting ready. This one is so cute and so sweet. I will have to make it my desktop picture on my computer so that whenever she is being more than I can deal with, I can look at it and remember how sweet she can be!

That is it for this week. I realized that this blog (especially in the last few weeks) is serving as my journal. Since I am too busy to write in one, hopefully I can be descriptive enough here to serve my journal purpose. Hope you all have a good week!