Sniper, Stroller and Sundays

Eli has recently taken an interest in guns despite my rigorous efforts to uninterest him in guns. One day I sniped a picture of him sniping what I hope was just birds with a gun-shaped stick.

In one of the least smooth transitions I've made on the blog, let's hop from sniping to my sweet baby's first day at church!

He was a complete angel the whole time. Slept all through Sacrament Meeting. Was loud and gurgly in Sunday School -- giving Jeff an excuse to go sit on the comfy couches with him in the hall. And then was a perfect little peanut in combined Priesthood/Relief Society. He didn't even need to be fed! He was a peach and everyone was anxious to finally see our little preemie that we've kept locked up for so long.

The secret to my sanity in the summer is walks to the park. I have been dying wondering how the heck I was going to maintain my sanity with three bums and a stroller with only two seats. After discovering there was in fact such a thing as a triple stroller, I began my hunt for a second-hand triple stroller.

I eventually found a steal of a deal in Provo and I made my brother pick it up for me. When he dropped it off at my parents' house he said, "You're assault vehicle is at mom's." When I got behind the wheels of our new ride, I began to agree with him that "assault vehicle" was the best description of the beast that is our new summer transportation. 

I think it will take a little time to break us all into our new wheels. We're feeling a little skeptical about the stroller bus.

Jeff went out of town one weekend so I went to my parents' house for help managing the rascals. My mom and I went to a pretty park in Salt Lake for an excursion one afternoon.

My mom's been enjoying soaking up as much of newborn-sized Lincoln as she can.

Lincoln has remained newborn size going on three months now. I don't think he's broken 9 pounds yet.

Eli scraped his face at the park and it bubbled up into a nasty road rash. Even with his scrape, he and Madison look adorable for their unintended matchy matchy moment.

One day I took the boys to a park. A few other kids came while we were there and asked Eli and Carson their names. Eli and Carson responded, "Bumblebee and Optimus Prime." They're beginning to live in a complete Rescue Bot alternate reality. And I'm beginning to wonder at what point I should be concerned about their obsession.

Becky finally got some time to snuggle the Lincoln-meister. I loved his little hand dangling out from under the blanket.

My mom helped me put the kids to bed and made it look like a cakewalk all the while.

Lincoln has started acting like the 6-week old I've been craving. He's becoming more structured in his routine, he's becoming more interactive with smiles and coos, and he's an overall happier baby. Yay!

I keep having the urge to capture Lincoln's tininess, but I haven't had a good measurement tool to gauge his size. One day I put my hand up to his head and finally felt like I had found a good lasting measurement to show how itty bitty his head is.

He is turning into the sweetest little smiley boy. I get so excited every time we can weasel a grin out of him.

Along with the six-week cuteness has come the six-week difficulty sleeping. We're out of the pleasant newborn-who-will-sleep-wherever-and-whenever stage and he's become a little more temperamental with his slumber. He went through a little phase where he kept waking up either 10 or 20 minutes after I put him down and it was driving me completely batty!

My friend gave me the book, "Secrets of the Baby Whisperer" several weeks ago which came in handy when Lincoln's sleep issues emerged. I've used the sleep advice in the book and so far it's helped get Lincoln used to falling asleep on his own and consequently stay asleep for longer than 10 minutes at a time! Lifesaver! I highly recommend the book.

Not in the book is my tip to shove a blanket behind the binky to get it to stay in place. There's nothing more annoying than a dozing baby who gets startled awake after losing his binky!

We did our first city Easter Egg Hunt this year. Eli was psyched!

Right after the Easter Egg Hunt we went to my parents' house for General Conference Weekend.

The kids kept busy for part of conference by raiding all my parents' board games.

Lincoln kept busy by being lulled to sleep by the speakers' soothing voices.

I bribed the kids with homemade ice cream to pose for an adorable picture.

My dad seized an opportunity to bond with Lincoln after I unintentionally neglected his cries upon waking up from his afternoon nap. I'm used to three-year old screaming to get my attention, so I'm still not used to sifting through the noise for Lincoln's muffled cries in a house full of busy kids.

G&G Thomas with their newest grandchild who only got that title for a few weeks before his newer cousin stole the spotlight from him.

Carson and Grandpa having a stare-down. Probably because Carson repeatedly ran into him or ran by him and punched his legs or banged his head into their wall. Carson is the definition of bull in a china shop. And sometimes the only way to tame the bull is to give him a good stare-down.

Also, we're going to Disneyland again! We spent Sunday working on inputting our signatures into the computer for one of our t-shirt designs. You didn't expect us to go to Disney again and NOT have matching t-shirts, did you?!?

Upon realizing we had yet to snap a cute family picture with our newest family member, I made the family trudge out back to get my dream shot. Eli -- for the first time in his life -- was concerned about getting muddy which resulted in him walking through the grass like this:

And it was all for this shot. With a screamy Lincoln. An awkward Sarah. A crabby Eli. And a creepy Carson. Oddly, Jeff, who was the least excited about this picture, turned out the cutest. Go figure.