Halloween 2012

This is a little late, but better late than never as they say! We had a fun Halloween in the new neighborhood! Adilyn and Kacy were Power Rangers...quite a change from my sweet little princesses on 2011 :) Because they were Power Rangers, I didn't feel right making Brooke a flower or ladybug so sometime girlie like that, so she got to be a SuperBaby! Thank goodness for the Internet because I couldn't find a yellow power ranger suit anywhere except for eBay, and Brooke's SuperBaby onesie came all the way from Australia! Anyway, the girls got ready, and I made a special Halloween dinner - mummy dogs and brains. The girls thought it was great. They could barely contain their excitement. Grandmother Henderson came over, and they were going crazy jumping and running around doing Power Ranger moves! Finally, it got dark and we started trick or treating. There were not many kids in the neighborhood, so the neighbors who were giving out candy were quite generous! The girls did great this year. They weren't nervous at all, and they always said thank you. We did see a couple creepy outfits, but they kept saying, "That is just a costume. It's not real." The Hrobars had an event at their TaeKwonDo gym, but they caught up with us eventually. We had a great time, and got tons of candy. Another successful Halloween!

Adilyn Update

I thought it was time to post some updates on my baby girls! Adilyn is of course not a baby, but she will always be my first baby girl. I am so proud of how well she is doing in school. I was so nervous about the transition to the new school! I was worried about her little nervousness and shyness as she got used to things in a new place, but she did absolutely fantastic! She has never once said that she didn't want to go to school. She never hesitated to get out of the car or get on the bus in the mornings, and I am so thankful. Those rough morning goodbyes were torture! There is a little girl named Skyler that lives a street down from us that rides the bus with her, so I think that helps a lot. It's so nice to have her jump on the bus every morning at the corner, which is just one house away! There was a fun run called the BoosterThon at her school for a fundraiser, and it was so nice to her in her element with her friends. She walked and ran (kinda) with a couple different little girls. It was really cute, too because she got to hold the flag for the national anthem. As Cory and I walked up to the crowd, we heard them talk about the national anthem, then we heard the announcer say, "I have a volunteer, Adilyn, could you come up to the stage?" My heart stopped, I thought, "There is NO way that she is going to sing?!?!" Luckily, no singing, just flag holding. She looked so proud. :) We met with her teacher last week, and she is doing fantastic. She is already reading at the level she is supposed to be at at the end of her Kindergarten year. Her writing is where it needs to be, and she is doing just fine socially. What else could we ask for?

Kacy Update

Kacy is hilarious, as always. She is a fantastic story-teller. Sometimes her stories are true, sometimes they are false. She is becoming quite the little liar, and she always makes up stories about things that happen to her. She likes to say that whatever happens to Adilyn happens to her. Like, "I have a Skyler in my class to like Addy." "My teachers told me to bring apples to school like Addy." I try to tell her to not tell stories, but she insists that everything she says is true.
Her leg has gotten better, but she still has a little limp. Every time she sees anyone like Dana or Sonja, she has to show them how "good she can walk." She also told Sonja the other day that she can jump, run, and do lots of cool tricks, too. Walking is pretty good, but I can still notice a little limp. I hope that she will get over that pretty soon because I would for her to have any issues with her development. I hate to overreact about stuff, but I also worry that sometimes I will ignore something that is actually serious. Still, it hasn't been that long since the cast came off. I guess I will just keep an eye on it and hope that it goes away.
She has been freaking out about me touching her when my hands are wet. Of course, anytime that I do dishes or wash my hands I never have time to fully dry them. When I touch her with them, she completely freaks out and gets so upset. It's so strange, but to avoid unwanted drama, I am trying to dry my hands a little better these days :)
Her stuttering has gotten much better, and she still says funny things all the time. Here are some of my favorites - "When Daddy is on his cone falls, I be berry, berry quiet." For some reason, she always calls phone calls, "cone falls". The other day, she was playing in the garage, and I had to go inside for something. When I left I said, "I'll be right inside if you need anything." She said, "Don't worry, Mommy, I will be a good little monkey." I asked her why she said that, and she told me that what the guy who wears that hat always tells George (in Curious George). She hates getting her hair dried, and anytime I have the hair dryer on she always screams, "Don't put it in fast gear, Mommy. Use slow gear!" Adilyn supposedly hit her when they were fighting one day. She came out and said, "Adilyn just hit me, you need to come in here and really yell at her!"
I love my little Kacy. She always keeps me on my toes, and she always keeps me laughing. I am so glad I have this extra time to hang out with her!

Brooke Update

Wow, Brooke is 7 months old. I can't believe how the time has gone. She is by far the happiest of our babies, but now she is officially the worst sleeper. I thought Adilyn was crazy to be waking up at 6 months, but now Brooke, at 7 months, is still waking up at least twice a night! I know without a doubt it has to do with how chaotic our life was for the last two months, and I know that because she never got into a good sleeper routine while we were moving and living with others that she just hasn't adjusted yet. But, knowing all that doesn't make the sleepless nights any easier! I know that it will all work out, and that she will eventually sleep. I just don't know what to do in the meantime. I never really believed in the the "sleep training" methods because I think kids will sleep when they sleep, but I am about to try anything. She usually wakes up between 12am and 1am to eat, then she will wake up again around 5am. I tried not to feed her at night, and I had Cory go upstairs and hold her, but it didn't really work. Oh well, we will get it all worked out, eventually, and hoping sooner rather than later. I would love, love, love to get a full night sleep one of these days. :) Unfortunately, her sleep habits don't get much better during the day either. She doesn't nap very well, and she usually only sleeps in the car or when I am feeding her. Yikes! We have to get this girl on a schedule!
Brooke is also learning to move around really well! She can sit up on her own pretty well. She just figured out how to get herself sitting when she is laying down on her belly. She can get on her hands and knees and rock back and forth, but she can't quite get coordinated enough to move to crawl. I can tell she will be moving soon, for sure! She can definitely roll and twist to get where she wants to go!
She loves to be right in the center of all the action. If Adilyn and Kacy are running around being crazy, she just stares at them and thinks they are hilarious! Even though she likes to be where the action is, she also is a pretty good independent player. She will sit in the middle of a bunch of toys and just play around with everything.
The girl is still a noisemaker! She will sit in the car and just squeal and talk and makes all kinds of noise. Brooke is always moving her hands. I remember Kacy moving her feet all the time, and I think Adilyn always kicked her legs. Brooke is always moving her hands around like she has "jazz hands" :)
I started feeding her solids about a month ago, and she is doing pretty good with all the new foods. She pretty much ate everything that I gave her at first, now I guess she has realized that she doesn't like certain foods. Anytime I give her something that she doesn't like she will literally gag on it. I thought it was the consistency at first, but then I realized it was just with carrots and peas. Another drama queen on our hands?!?

The girl loves to swing!!!

Pumpkins, Baby!

I think this is the first year that we haven't gone to Dewberry Farms or Halter Farm pumpkin patch. There was just too much going on, and the pictures that I always dream of never seem to happen at the patch! :) We got some pumpkins at the grocery store, and we had the Hrobars over for a carving party. We all a had a great time hanging out and carving some amazing pumpkin designs!

Pictures From The Homeless Period

We had such a great time staying at Ryan's and the Hrobar's house, and although it was a difficult time in some ways, our friends made it so much better! Both places were so stress-free and fun. I feel so lucky that the last month went as well as it did. :)
Here are some pictures that capture the memories and the fun of what will forever be known as "The Henderson Homeless Period."

 We LOVED the park by Ryan's house!

 We went to a fall festival with the Hrobars one Saturday afternoon.

 Painting in Ryan's backyard!

 Cory took all 3 kids to school every morning, and they always played with that goofy bear. They named him, Pandy. Cory said every morning they were super silly the entire way to school!

 Trampoline fun, every single day!!!

 After Kacy's broken leg, she stayed off the trampoline and stuck to digging the hole to nowhere.

 Nightly bedtime stories were probably my favorite part. They would always argue about who got to lay is who's bed! Uh oh! 

A packed dinner table.

 The Armadillos on the way to school! That just makes my heart happy :)

New House!!!!

Yay! Everything went great with the closing on the new house last Friday. The Hrobars came over to an empty house on Friday night to run around and eat dinner. The kids had a great time running and yelling and running and yelling some more! They played tag, poison person tag, and wrestled in the empty playroom. We ate pizza on the floor and in camping chairs in the kitchen. When Mason was done, he said, "Um, may I be excused from the floor?" :) It was great to have everyone together that very first night because it made me look so forward to all the fun that we are going to have in this house! Although it was fun to have everyone hear, it was also crazy noisy. The kids were getting super crazy after dinner, so Dana took the boys home. The girls stayed with me and watched a show while Shane and Cory made another run with the trailer. Saturday was a long, long, long day! We woke up and started moving and unloading and unpacking. Luckily we had help from Carl in the morning and Shane for the majority of the day. Cory made 4 trips to storage, and he kept coming back with more and more stuff! Brooke took an amazingly long nap, and I unpacked the majority of the kitchen. I was so proud of the work that I had done, and then Cory came back with about 10 more kitchen boxes...so disheartening! It went really well, though, and the two indoor storage units were cleared by the end of the day. Dana and the boys came over in the late afternoon, and the kids played and went swimming. It was pretty chilly, but they had fun in the pool for about 30 minutes. Saturday was our first night to stay at our new house, and it went great! The girls slept great in their own rooms, and it felt just like home. Just like home with boxes and junk piled up everywhere! :) 

It's been 5 days, and things are moving pretty slowly. I was doing great until Tuesday, then I just kind of got bored with unpacking and organizing. It will all get done, and I already have the more important rooms done. The kitchen, master bathroom, upstairs bathroom, laundry room, and girls' rooms are unpacked and organized. There are piles and piles of boxes in the study, and the game room is an absolute mess; but the important places are at least unpacked. I am having a hard time because I want to decorate and do the fun things, but the hard things are still not done! I just can't believe how much stuff we have. I am still throwing things away because if I start to unpack them and I didn't really remember them or care about it, it's going in the trash! 

 Everyone was checking things out.

 The big sisters, ready for a chilly swim!

 Trying out the diving board!

One of our dinners among the boxes with the Hrobars! At least we had a table this time :)

 Brooke, the backwards scooter, got herself perfectly wedged between two boxes!

This was one of the boxes that Adilyn helped me label :)

I am so happy to finally be in a house of our own. The house that will be our home for the next however many years! I love that the girls are just as comfortable here as they are anywhere. I just can't wait to be all settled, decorated, and done!