BIG man!

Wednesday morning began as usual. Olivia woke up about 6:00 and came in bed with us...I try to fall back asleep (no luck). 6:15 Aidan wakes up. I let him grunt around for a few minutes in hopes that he'll fall back asleep (no luck). I walk into his room to get him and what do I find? Ready?

Aidan standing up in his NOT LOWERED crib, leaning his torso over the side! Oh, how I worked hard to hold back the expletives! I'm pretty sure I uttered something like "oh my goodness" because Olivia became concerned and has been talking about it ever since. :) We've been meaning to lower the crib this week anyway since he can now get from tummy to all fours to sitting, but it just hadn't happened yet. Now it has.

Doesn't he look tiny way down there? Little BIG man!

Oh, and by the way, if you haven't figured it out yet, he can now pull himself up all by himself...at 6 1/2 months. Yipes.

Family Pics

My lovely, lovely BFFOIKYA Bridgit came up to Ryan's folks place to take family pictures of all of us together while Aaron (Ryan's brother) is home from Sweden. It was so much fun to have her and we are STOKED to see the pics! Here's our little sweetie all ready for pics (Can you tell she has a jelly bean in her mouth? Gotta love bribes!):

Of course it wouldn't be the Thompson's without a jump in the lake to end our pictures! Here's the kiddos "decompressing" after having to be good and say "cheese" and "monkeys" a WHOLE LOT of times!

The adults and big kids jumped ALL the way in, but I don't have a shot of that! We'll get it from Bridgit soon enough! It was a great time!

More fun at the lake!

UPDATE: I don't know why the pics look so cruddy, they aren't on my computer!!

Up at the lake again last weekend--Here's some pics (now that it's Thursday!!):

Swimming "by myself!"
Aidan down by the lake

Riding in the rain...naked :)

Raegan & Morgan frolicking in the rain

Yeah....

Aidan's 1st time swimming (sadly, the best pic I got!)

:)

Pillow Talk

(No not what you are thinking...)

Olivia has been in bed for about 25 min....and has gotten up a few times. She's usually really good about staying in bed, but has decided she wanted some company tonight. I always try not to engage with her when she gets up and just put her back to bed...but how can you not when you are laughing? :)

(Envision me quietly picking her up and putting her back in bed)
Olivia: Mom, A ha.
Olivia: Mom, A ha.
Olivia: MOMMY, A HA!!!!!
Me: What?
Olivia: A HAIR!!! (Meaning: there's a hair in my mouth, get it out...she hates hair in her mouth)
Me: Okay (insert fingers in mouth, feeling around on tongue for hair)
Olivia: Mom, oo ha bu ey.
Me: What? (Take fingers OUT of mouth)
Olivia: Mom, you have blue eyes.

That's where she gave me the giggles and I had to give a cuddle before I put her back in bed...after I finally found the hair that is.

And then she said: Give me that hair, I think it's mine!

OH AND, Aidan crawled up 2 stairs at daycare today. I'm in for it...

May the best pic win...

I guess that's the best I'm gonna get today!

Dancing & Yoga

Here's the promised video! I know you've all been checking back hourly to see if it's up yet...so without further ado:

The Mark

If you can see in the picture from my post yesterday (look close!) my mom has a small beauty mark near the base of her neck. I don't notice it any more than I notice that my mom has a nose, nor do I think most people notice it, but I suppose you would call it a distinguishing feature. (side note: I always know when I have been watching too many crime shows when I think about what distinguishing feature of mine would help identify my body...sick...but if you must know what it is, I have a permanent retainer on the back of my top 2 front teeth...and if my teeth were missing, I have a birthmark just below my right calf...anyway, I digress...)
Olivia almost always notices Grammi's birthmark and has a funny little fascination with it. She often asks, "Can I touch your mark?" It always cracks us up!

The best part? When I showed Olivia the picture of Grammi & Grandpa "found", she said, "Oh look! There's Grammi's mark!" I guess that's how she knows it's really her! :)

I love her.

Updates

Aidan took bottles at daycare this week half formula, half breast milk. Like it was no big deal. :)

Also, I looked up Olivia's stats--she was only 3/4 lb. bigger than he was at 6 months so I'm really not stressing too much. I know, "they" say that boys are supposed to be bigger then girls, but I really dont' think that at 6 mos. it can make that much of a difference.

I think Aidan is getting a tooth--he's been a "tad" crabby the last few days and has bumpy gums on and off.

Olivia is going through an aggressive phase the last few days. She has these periodically, usually related to her teething as well... 2 year molars maybe?? I think she is also having a hard time dealing with Mr. Mobil taking her toys. :)

When I have more time (really, someday, will I??) I plan to post a funny video with Olivia dancing and Aidan doing yoga. It's good stuff. Check back for it. :)

Grammi and Grandpa are in Germany (coming back tomorrow) for a 10 day trip. Olivia has been missing them terribly and has been concerned about when they will come back. At least 3 times every day she asks if Grammi and Grandpa will take her to the zoo when they come home. A few days ago she was asking about them and I asked her if she missed them--she said "Yes, I lost them!" It was way adorable. So then Grammi and Grandpa sent her this picture in an email captioned "Grammi and Grandpa are found!"

Dontcha love Rog's expression? Me too. :)

2 year pics!

Take a looksie!

www.hinklephotography.com/client/olivia2years

P.S. this is my 3rd post today! Scroll on down!!

Our House

Ryan and I bought his parents house a few years ago when they were making the permanent move up to Grand Rapids. It was a big decision for us as is buying a house for everyone, but buying the family homestead also takes on a big responsiblity and obligation. It is a good deal for us though because it is close to work for Ryan and we have a smaller house on our property (that we lived in when we got married) for Ryan's brother to rent.

We have a HUMONGO yard, which I LOVE! It is so wonderful to be able to let Olivia outside and not have to worry about her running into the street. We do have a swamp, so of course we're careful about that, but I don't have to be within 10 feet of her playing outside all the time! I took these pictures a while ago (April-hence the raunchy grass in the pics--it's much greener now!) to do a post, and forgot about them! Here's a looksie at our house & yard!

Our House (and boiler & wood shed)
The garage, and turn around..we have a long cement driveway that will be perfect for bike riding!

Part of our massive yard!

More yard! And niether of these pics show our backyard! We love our space!

If she smells it...

Olivia has discovered her sense of smell, and she loves to talk about it!

Yesterday we were taking a walk and walked past the shop on our property which is rented by some friends of ours who do body work on cars. They were painting inside and you could smell the fumes as we were walking by. Olivia said: Pew! What's that smell! It stinks.

This morning I was changing Aidan's diaper (like usual!) and it was poopy (like usual lately b/c of his antibiotics!). Olivia is always curious about poopy diapers so I helped her up on the changing table so she could watch (weird, right? I can't wait to tease her about it when she's a teenager! And Aidan too...). As soon as I opened up his diaper she started gagging! Ohh, it cracked me up! She wanted to get down right away and said "Man Aiders, that was a big poop! P U stinks!!" The best part is the "stinks" because the way she says it sounds like "stanks".


Smells she likes: Tires (at the tire shop...me too!), cinnamon rolls, our house

Smells she dislikes: Dog food, paint, poop (me too!), and the soap at the carwash

Fatten him up!

We had Aidan's 6 month check today! I always look forward to these appointments for reassurance of how my kids are doing, to get some questions answered, and because I enjoy our doctor so much! Aidan's appointments have been a little stressful for me because of his size, but I'm trying not to be worried since our doc isn't worried.

Here's his stats:
Weight: 13 lb. 9 oz. 1st percentile
Height: 25 1/4" 8th percentile

Oh he is just so little!!! Dr. Larson's words: Because he is doing so well developmentally, I am not going to get excited about his weight. She was amazed at his ability to get on his hands and knees and how strong our little man is. She did say that she wants us to try to get as many calories in him as possible though. For this reason:

I made my first bottle of formula tonight. I have very mixed emotions about this: apprehension, guilt, hope. Aidan is a poor sleeper, waking up anywhere from 2-6x on an average night. (I feed him 2-3x during the night) We are going to try to give him a bottle after I breast feed him every night for 2 reasons: fattening him up & trying to help him sleep better. I also wanted to ask her about formula anyway because I just can't pump enough at work to keep my frozen supply up and I just don't have (don't make) time to pump other times. It's hard to find time when he eats all night still!! I want (don't really want, but feel stuck) him to have some formula so I can feel reassured he is getting enough to eat. He always seems satisfied, but we'll try anything! I exclusively breast-fed Olivia for a whole year, she never had formula and I wanted to do the same with Aidan. I know there is nothing wrong with formula and I hope no one who formula feeds takes offense to me feeling this way. I just wanted to do only breast milk for my little man!

Anyway, back to the bottle. He wouldn't even take a little taste!! He just refused. Do any of you have tips on how to introduce formula when you've been only breastfeeding?

Also, I'm researching high fat foods I can feed to him. I am going to include (more) avocado, and start egg whites, and ground flax seed. Do you know of anything?

Let's fatten this little man up!

Okay here goes:

In recalling my "not-me-Monday events", the first to come in mind would not be that for the past 2 days I have not been cleaning the spit up off of my carpet with just a wet wipe. No never! I always have time to grab the cleaning supplies or a carpet cleaner 10 times a day to clean up baby barf!

On Thursday night at the parade when Olivia consumed a ton of candy, I would never let Olivia take a few sucks off of each sucker and then put them away only to grab another. Nor would I let her take some more licks off of her sucker after it fell on the ground...Nope not me, never!

And I absolutely would never have a house full of clean laundry...I mean it's clean, but do you really think it's folded and put away?? Of course! I mean, I have all the time in the world, and LOVE to put away laundry! Don't you?

Splash Park

Okay, so like 3 weeks ago we went to the Splash Park in one of our neighboring towns. It was just a blast! Olivia has since been again with Grammy and, again, had a blast! It is perfect for toddlers because there really isn't any standing water so they can run around like mad (well, if you are brave like Olivia anyway).

Taking time for a lunch break
The Park

Nice boob Aider.

She L.O.V.E.S the water!

Waiting for the bucket to dump on her


And a funny--the other morning Olivia woke up, came in bed with me and said, "Mom, I care about cows and I care about school." Fantastic Olivia, fantastic...

And Aiders has ear infection #2 of the summer! He was up literally all night on Thursday night. I have (fortunately) never been up ALL night with either of my kids before and it was rough. We even went for a drive in the car at 3:30 in the morning to try to help (it did...till we came home). By the way, there were a ton of cars out--who is up that time of night anyway?? He's on antibiotics and feeling way better now! Thank goodness!

4th of July

We spent the weeked up at Ryan's parents house north of Grand Rapids with our family and a lot of Ryan's extended family. All in all we were 28 people! And that wasn't everyone!! It was a great time with lots of swimming, playing, relaxing, and EATING (I think I gained 10 lbs.). We were so busy I hardly had time to get any pics, but snapped a few!

Playing on the deck in the pack and play or "CONTAINMENT

Aider-baby-boy (as Olivia calls him)

Morgan & Aidan

6 months old!

I tried really hard to get a great picture of him sitting by himself, but alas, this was my best attempt. The good news: he's starting to sit by himself! He also pushes himself up on his hands and knees and rocks back and forth (I attempted to get a photo of this too, but alas...)

I can't believe my little man is 6 months old already! Do you realize that's half a year!!!!

A Day in the Life...

The title of my blog certainly captures the way I feel about our trip to Portland! First off, it was a GREAT trip! It was wonderful to see my brother-in-law, Aaron, become ordained in the Covenant Church, wonderful time with family, and beautiful sights to see in beautiful weather! We had a wonderful time! (Here comes the "but"...)

As those of you know who have small children, bringing them with on vacation doesn't REALLY qualify as vacation because the work doesn't end. Aidan did fantastic, for the most part. He was happy and enjoyed being carried and played with by all his family members. We were tremendously busy though, trying to pack in many sights in just a few days and spent a lot of time traveling in the car. Being overly busy combined with sleeping like CRAP made for an emotional little Aider-man at times! Let me just digress on the sleeping...

He basically woke up every hour all night, every night (except the last night when we got smart and put his pack and play in the bathroom to sleep, which made him sleep better like he woke up every 2 hours, but wouldn't you know I got a gut ache during the night and being that Aidan was in the bathroom couldn't use it, so I trodded down to the lobby bathroom in my pj's at 3 & 3:30 in the morning...a day in the life...and still only ended up with 2.5 hours sleep that night because we had to get up at 4 to go to the airport) (phew....) and I averaged about 3-5 hrs. sleep total. Oh, I don't think I have EVER been so tired in my life! Luckily, I got a great nights sleep last night at home, in my own bed! Oy, it's a good thing for support and fun times anyway!!

Tomorrow we are headed up to Ryan's parents cottage for the 4th, hopefully Aidan will sleep better up there!! (PLEASE!!!) Here's some pics from our trip!

Awww, our 6 year anniversary! Ryan bought me roses while we were there :)
In the Bjorn, how he spent most of the trip!

Jenelle & I on Mt. Hood

Cannon Beach (I know the picture makes it look warm, but it was only about 60 degrees; I stripped him down for the sake of the pic. We also went in the ocean...BRRRR!

Cannon Beach (The Goonies was filmed here--apparently...I have never seen this movie.

Lame-o, right?)

Multanomah Falls

Spike 1 & Spike 2 a.k.a. Uncle Aaron & Aidan