January Birthday Buddies

The boys have started doing this cute? thing where they shove their littlest brother into a bucket with a bunch of pillows/toys. I think it started as a nice attempt to imprison him so he couldn't ruin their Lego creations, but Jonah seems to have noticed their contraption makes a nice shelter, so everyone's happy. 

The boys have convinced him it's such a great game that now Jonah voluntarily imprisons himself and will sit perfectly content in a bucket for large periods of time. 

I turned 31! I used my birthday as an excuse to try all the things I've always wanted to try but never have. I took my first step inside a Trader Joe's and I sampled my first taste of Crumbl cookies. I also curled my hair to further convince you I was doing all sorts of things I don't normally do. 

Bada bing bada boom, next thing we knew we were celebrating this little guy turning FOUR! 

We spent the morning at the park. 

And then we enjoyed our weekly garbage man entertainment--making the morning a total birthday win. 

Once night hit, the bat wings came out. 

This Batman obsessed boy is finally on the road to being potty trained! Of all the tactics we tried to convince him it was cool to be potty trained, telling him Batman uses the potty was the thing that eventually spoke to his soul. We've had the most success we've ever had in the last month and it seems like he might stick with it after at least a year of potty training efforts. Woo-wee!

Lincoln has also been working on not sucking his thumb. We bought him "Batman gloves" (black winter gloves) that he wears, and due to them making him look like Batman, he hasn't taken them off since we gave them to him and he consequently hasn't sucked his thumb with the gloves on either. He's making big strides to be a big boy!

Lincoln is a firecracker. He loves to talk. He has a great vocabulary and speaks very well. He loves to be silly and he's always down to have a good time. He can get a little mischievous if you don't keep him busy, but he's starting to keep himself busy with trying to learn the alphabet and color and make his way towards pre-k activities.

These two have recently realized they can be friends. It is cute 10% of the time and trouble 90% of the time. If you ever hear both of them laughing, it's safe to assume they're smashing goldfish on the counter and then sliding their hand across the counter to send goldfish crumbs flying across the kitchen. 

We have tried out only doing screens on Friday and Saturday this school year with much success. Here's a weekend veg sesh in action. 

I thought this paper Carson brought home was cute.

It says, "Who! Who! What's that sownd? It's an owl! What owls eat: Owls eat fish, frogs, insects, mice. Some owls sleep during day. Owls live in woodlands. What owls look like: They have big round heads and they hav brown, gray, black and wihte fethers. I hope I get to see a real one!"

I loved the wording of the whole thing and check out that first grader's handwriting! He's such a darling student and I love everything he brings home from school.

With the church's new home-centered learning, we have enjoyed finding a system that works for us. The kids each teach a lesson one night during the week. We call those lessons "Night Light" because it's our little bit of light from Christ to end each night. Carson taught us about being "born again" in Christ and had us to a puzzle of a newborn baby (Jonah) to introduce the topic.

We had our traditional heart breadsticks for dinner on Valentine's Day. 

Complete with everyone's favorite--chocolate covered strawberries! My love language is food. 

We thought our backyard wouldn't be big enough for a trampoline so we left our old trampoline at my parents' house. Once we got to our house, we did some quick measuring and decided a trampoline could and would fit in our backyard. We got one that's a little smaller than our old one and surprised the boys with it. It's been just what we all needed to get rid of all that pent up energy!