Channing is 4 months!!

Chan-Chan is our little doll baby.  She is such a sweet, low maintenance baby.  She is 14 lbs of pure baby love.  Her eyes are still a mystery.  They really have brown in the center but have a ring of gray blue around the edges.  Not sure if they will stay that way or continue to change.  She has very little hair but looks like dark blonde is coming in. 

 

She is definitely mama's girl but has her regular witching hour right when I am making dinner.  She will scream and scream until I basically I stop whatever I am doing, feed her and put her to bed.  She will sleep from about 6:00 or 7:00 to 11:00 or 12:00 and then it is hit or miss the rest of the night.  The kids wake her up at 6:00 a.m.  So I get about 5-6 hours of sleep right now....no wonder I can be grumpy during the day!!!

 

The older kids adore her.  Hadleigh wants to adore her but really has no patience for holding her or actually helping.  She does call Channing my Sissy.

 

 

In my opinion, Channy-boo looks a lot like her OLDEST sister. 

 

and maybe a little like her bruder without the chubba-lubba....hee, hee

 

But not really anything like my Haddy-Waddy.  Hadleigh definitely had her own look. 

 

Rocco is 6!!!

Oh this boy!  This boy has my whole heart!  On January 15th, Rocco turned 6!!  I cannot believe he is 6.  He has conquered kindergarten with charm and obedience.  He has a love of learning and a desire to please his teacher.  He ALWAYS has a smile on his face.  ALWAYS!!

 

 

Or sometimes he looks like this.  He is his father's son.  He thinks he is a professional comedian.  He is always willing to be silly or crazy to get a laugh!!

 

The kid has no teeth.  He has lost four on the bottom and three on the top.  He only has two that have come in the bottom.  That does not stop him from his basic vegan diet of green beans and raspberries and all other berries.

 

He loves this look.  OH EM GEE he rocks this look.  My sweet boy can be a stinker.  He really can only tolerate getting his own way every single time so we regularly have some serious power struggles.  He usually wins. 

 

This winter, he has been playing basketball.  The first game he was ten times worse than a deer in headlights.  He came off the court at the end of the game and said "Mom, I do not know how to play basketball."  Way to go Mom and Dad - epic fail!!!!

 

But by the second game, he was doing a little better and realized you needed to dribble and learned that you needed to shoot the ball in the hoop.  He made a couple of baskets and he was feeling good!!

 

By the next game, he earned the medal for most improved and best listener. 

 

AND THEN he broke his collarbone.  He always keeps us on our toes.  He has kept the sling on for more days than I thought he would and then after about a week and a half, we can't get him to wear it and he seems to be on the mend.  He already returned to basketball and tomorrow he starts back at spring soccer. 

 

I cannot believe he will be done with kinder in a few short months.  It will be a very fun year for Rocco because he makes everything fun!!

Jillian is 8!!

I realize I am way, way, way behind.  Now that Channing is no longer a newborn and has her own opinion, this mothering of 4 has become harder.  That's the understatement of the year.  BUT tonight let me try and catch up on some things. 

 

My big girl turned 8 on Janurary 6th.  She is really morphing into a young lady before our eyes.  She has finally hit her stride with 2nd grade.  She struggled in the beginning with the upgrade in spelling homework and math homework but now is in a groove.  Her teacher sends monthly science challenges and she loves doing those. 

 

She is definitely the first born.  She is the little general and usually bosses everyone around.  She loves taking care of Channing.  She and Hadleigh will sometimes play together but Hadleigh can only take being bossed around so long.  Rocco can last a lot longer.  But in the car, Jillian and Rocco will fight on the way to school and on the way home EVERY.DAY.  Lovely!!

 

For her eighth birthday, she wanted her ears pierced and even though there were some unexpected tears, now she loves it!  She picked out a teal color and they go perfectly with her blue eyes.  She is (percentage-wise) the smallest in the house.  Little Minnie is only is the 20th percentile for weight and only average for height so Rocco weighs more than her and is almost as tall.  Hadleigh is only 10 pounds behind her.  But what she lacks in size, she completely makes up with her big personality.   

 

 

She can be silly sometimes.  She likes to hide behind doors and scare you.  She is definitely Daddy's Girl.  The rest of the crew is mine but Jillian has her Daddy in the palm of her hand.  He will do anything for that girl. 

She is still taking Ballet I.  She complains sometimes that her teacher Ms. Hayley is too strict.  But then she will have a substitute and suddenly, Ms. Hayley is not so bad.  This winter, I signed up Rocco for basketball and once Jillian saw it, she was very jealous and wanted to play too.  There is nothing this girl won't try.  She is pretty fearless.  She also expressed interest in taking tumbling so she can get ready to be a cheerleader.  We'll see! 

 

She has a serious appetite for reading.  She has started checking out some classics like The Phantom of the Opera and Hunchback of Notre Dame.  For Christmas, I ordered some old Babysitter Club Books that I used to read and she has liked those. 

 

I am so proud of this sweet girl.  She is loving, inquisitive, kind, helpful.  Her writing will blow you away.  She loves writing in school and will compose a pretty decent well thought out composition.  I cannot believe how quickly she is growing up.  It is thrilling and scary at the same time.  I love you Jillian Avery!!  I love watching you grow into such a beautiful and intelligent little lady. 

3 months old

Channing is 3 months old.  She started daycare on monday and the ladies love her.  She goes to Hadleigh s school and hadleigh s teachers let her stop by to check on HER baby. 

She is still very easy going baby.  Very tolerant to her brother and sisters.  She is a serious baby.  You have to work and perform to get her to smile. 

The olders fight to see who can sleep with Channing BUT usually they regret it as she does cry during the night LOUDLY for milk!!

Christmas Day

The kids were up early Christmas morning.  The kids have no mercy on Channing.  Every morning they wake that poor baby up. 

 

 

Mom and Dad were coming at 8:00 so we had to keep them upstairs until then.  It was DIFFICULT!!!  We were surprised that Bill, Summer and the boys showed up too.  Santa had already delivered their presents.  Here they are coming up the stairs....

 

Look who got a new bike!!!  She cannot figure out how to push the pedals but she LOVES that she can bring her baby doll.  Jillian wants a car seat for her doll on her bike.  They always want what they don't have. 

 

Rocco continues his obsession of being a teacher so of course, Santa brought a school set.

 

Jillian got the holiday Barbie from her birth year.

 

Santa knew that Hadleigh really wanted a Peppa Pig and boy did he deliver.  A whole set of Peppa Pig dolls and characters!!  (Santa had to work realllly hard to get this gift and had to special order it from China!!!)

 

Later we went over to Mom and Dad's for lunch.  My grandma had fallen the day before and broke her other hip so it was a small gathering.  But as always, Mom went above and beyond for the kids.  They got all kids of goodies.

 

These two....do everything together.  KK calls Hadleigh his sister.  Open presents together, get in trouble together, always together.

 

She got a new doll

 

Jillian got her first American Girl doll.  She wanted Isabelle with a horse. 

 

She got busy right away organizing the dolls clothes and accessories. 

 

We had such a fun Christmas vacation.  I am discovering with 4 little bodies that it is really hard to take pictures.  I love taking pictures.  I love recording our day to day but I need two free hands which I rarely have.  Poor Rocco.  I feel like I did not take many pics of him and forget Channing.  She was with us on Christmas.  Oh well.  I'll get better.  Two days left of vacation and then we will gear up for the month of birthdays!!! 

Christmas Eve

Christmas Eve, we did something different and went to the 2:30 service at church.  It was nice to go to that first.  The kids were UH-MA-ZING during the service which lasted way over an hour. 

 

 

We used the timer!!  Turned out pretty good!!

 

 

We always go to Bryan's parents for Christmas Eve.  Hadleigh wanted to be "in charge" of opening Channing's gifts.

 

Being patient.  waiting to open...

 

Not really being patient at all!!  He photo-bombed my tree picture!!

 

The hit of the night - robes!!!

 

The whole gang got jammies and robes!!!

My Dancing Sweethearts

Hadleigh-boo LOVES her dance class.  Every day she asks if it is dance day! 

 

 

It is a challenge to contain her curls in a bun!  Mommy has to work really hard to get her to stay still to put that hair up!  AND most of it just falls out as you can see!  Ha!  She loves the stretching songs!!

 

She is by far the tallest 3 year old in her class!  And the most vocal - she sings the songs constantly!

 

She performed the "Teddy Bear" Dance!  So proud of this little girl!!!

 

Next up was Jilly-poo.  This year, she is in the Ballet I class for ages 7-10.  The class was surprisingly VERY serious.  The ballet teacher was so serious and there was no nonsense during the class. 

 

 

She did great at the barre work and answered a lot of the teachers questions about ballet positions.

 

At the end of class, the girls performed a dance to the Nutcracker.  Jillian did great!

 

Both girls were measured for their recital costumes

 

 

Hadleigh is going to be a poodle.  It comes with cute puppy ears!  ha!

 

Jillian's costume is more elegant of course!