20 Months...

Elliott Joe,

You are 20 months old! Just 4 shy months away from turning TWO and I can hardly believe it! You are still SO VERY MUCH my baby and I don't see that changing anytime soon! You are the definition of a momma's boy and I love it. At 20 months old ...

You are strong willed and hold your own against your brothers! You ay be the youngest babe right now but you won't let that slow you down and you won't let them boss you! You are full of sass and spunk and stink!

You love to snuggle and sleep with daddy and I. Every night I nurse you down to sleep around 7:45 and then put you in your own bed {still in a crib...}. You sleep in there until anytime between 11:00 and 4:30 and then you are in bed with us. We just started this a few weeks ago, up until then you were with us full time, and you aren't really a fan. If you could have it your way you would  just sleep with us always! You aren't the best sleeper still. You wake a lot to nurse in the night, but that's my fault. I haven't worked on weaning you of that yet and it's okay. We have all summer to work on getting you to sleep through the night! You play with your belly button to sooth yourself when falling asleep.

You are a pretty good eater! Not too picky yet, but there are some things you just don't care for. You like fruit, eggs, yogurt, all meat and fruit snacks. Oh my gosh, the fruit snacks. You would eat them all day long if we let you. You have a HUGE sweet tooth and ask for candy all day long by pointing to the jar we keep the treats in a grunting and squealing. You love the frosting off the cake and whenever you eat cookies you have to have one in each hand. You also get so mad if I break your cookie or donut in half because you really don't need all that sugar... but man oh man, you want it all and you have no problem letting me know how NOT okay that is! You still nurse anywhere from 3 to 6 times a day.

You really have no interest in toys, but you will play with trucks and airplanes and such if your brothers are. But, they don't hold your interest for long. You would rather be pulling out things you shouldn't have from the kitchen drawers or coloring on the walls or playing with the dog food and water. You LOVE to be outside and will declare "OUTSIDE!" at all hours of the day. I am so thankful it's finally get nice enough out where we will be able to be outside A LOT. It's about time... we had a long winter, buddy!

You are FUNNY. You make the most hilarious faces and goofy dances and you close your eyes and shake your head when you are embarrassed or just trying to be funny. You do this a lot when you are eating and it cracks me up. You will still bust out dancing when we sing the "Elliott Joe!" song. Whenever we ask "who wants to...." You always raise your hand and yell "meeeeeee!"

You are so happy, always. I mean, laughing, giggling, being goofy, smiling and just HAPPY. It's contagious. Just this past weekend I was watching you just sitting there laughing and giggling at something totally random and it hit me: you are happy to your core. My happy souled little babe. I hope that happiness never leaves you.

You have just recently started throwing epic meltdowns when you don't get your way or are overly tired. Man oh man, I wasn't ready for these from you yet... my baby! But, all we can do right now is secretly laugh at you when you throw them because it's actually pretty hilarious. You are quite the drama king! ha ha! At 20 months old you would still be happy if I held you all day long and you aren't a fan of sharing me with your brothers if you feel like you need me RIGHT THAT MOMENT {which is often!}.

You have a lot of words and I just love hearing your sweet voice. Everyday you surprise us with more and more and just within the last few weeks you have been saying so much. The other day I turned on the Tigers game and you said "baseball game!" clear as day. You will repeat anything we say and can talk in sentences. You talk pretty clearly and it's really easy to understand what you say. You always say my name like "momma?" as if you have a question mark at the end and I love it. You also LOVE to chant "DADDA!" and declare every time you see him in the house, in bed or when he comes home at night!

You adore your brothers. You love playing with them, and watching them and following them around. You do a great job keeping up with them and I can't wait to continue to watch your relationship grow.

You are smooshy, and snuggly, and sweet, and spunky, and loving, and funny, and cute cute cute. Every single day I love you more than the last and I love watching your personality come out. you are my baby, baby, baby.  You are our muffin.

I love you so much, Elliott Joseph.

Happy 20 months sweet boy.

Love, Momma

Kindergarten Round Up ...

Last week on Monday, May 12th, Porter had kindergarten Round-up! I truly can't believe we are already here. How is it possible that my sweet first tiny newborn baby is already old enough for THIS?! I swear he was just born.

They aren't kidding when they say it flies by.

I help run round-up each year. I am the first one the families see when they walk in and while the kiddos tour the rooms I sit with the parents and ask them a few questions about their child. Nick was bringing Porter to his appt and I knew that as soon as I saw them walk in the door I was going to be an emotional wreck... and I was right! Seeing my little boy walk through the doors with his daddy just about did {both Nick and I!} me in.

He was so excited for this day, we talked about it for weeks, but once he was here he was a little hesitant and shy. He ran up and hugged me right away and then the three of us walked into the room together. I helped him find his name tag and then sent him on his way with Kristy {one of the kinder teachers}. Kristy told me later he was teary when I walked away and kept tugging at his eyes so he wouldn't cry. Oh, my sweet sensitive boy.

He got his eyes and ears checked, toured the rooms, got to play with the toys, plant a sunflower seed and eat a snack. Within a few minutes of doing this he was his happy, outgoing, self. After they left Nick and him went out for a special lunch, just the two of them.

It was such a sweet and fun start to his school career. I can't wait to have him in my building next year and get to love on him whenever I want.

3 Years Old ...

Weston Andrew,



My sweetest Wes you are THREE YEARS OLD! I can't even believe it! I can remember this birthday so well with Porter that it's so hard for me to get my mind around the fact that we are already here with you! But, you were more than ready to turn three and you counted down to your birthday for WEEKS before. It was so exciting and so fun to watch you so excited and so much looking forward to your big day. This was the first time you really understood what a birthday was and the excitement around it. Now we talk daily about whose birthday is coming next and you are just so excited to celebrate all the people you love.



At age three you love airplanes and trains and cars and all things BOY in that aspect. You love to play with your brothers and you and Porter could play those things for hours together. You two really do play so well together but you also love to tease Porter and press his buttons and man can you get him going! Ha! You are the perfect little brother, doing exactly what you are suppose to do! You love to watch movies, be outside - you would be outside for hours and hours if we let you, sing and dance, and be silly. You are really, truly so funny. It's just who you are and I can't wait to see this come out more and more as you get older. You also know that you are funny and that is one of the best parts!



You are a pretty good eater and will eat pretty much anything. You love hamburgers, sandwiches, mac cheese {as you call it}, pancakes and waffles, fruit snacks,  apples and all things sweet! You have a major sweet tooth, just like your momma and you will take up any chance you can to sneak a treat. Frosting is your favorite and you will often just eat that and leave the cake.



You are still soft and pudgy and I love every inch of you. You are so snuggly and cuddly and you love to just sit and snuggle with daddy and I. You are the master staller at bed time and often will try and use snuggling and "just wanting to watch the ball game" with us. You also ask for a drink 100 times and tell me you have to go to the bathroom, and since we are just newly potty trained this is something that you know will work...ha! You're a smart boy!



You are so sweet, and loving and a natural caregiver. You love to take care of and love on Elliott, even if he is almost as big as you, and the babies as your school. Ms. Gwen recently described you using all those words. She just can't get over how sweet and cute you are. You are so loved and adored by everybody who knows you, Weston Andrew. You are so much all of those things... and you are also stubborn, strong willed, bossy and demanding! You have no problem using your voice and expressing how you are feeling about things. You won't back down when your mind is made up and will battle it out with us staying strong the whole time! It can make for challenging times right now but these are all characteristics that I know will make you are great person in the long run... just about teaching you how to use them all in the right way!



Recently we have spent some time traveling and in hotels and you are a FISH... you love to swim and do it all on your own, not letting us help you at all {with the help of your life jacket, of course}. It has been so much fun watching you do this, Daddy and I just couldn't believe how you took off, totally fearless! And you really are fearless {which sometimes terrifies your momma!}. I can't wait to swim with you all summer, it's going to be so fun watching all three of you take it all in!



Weston Andrew, I have said it from the time you were born and it's still true today... life will never be boring with you in it! You are such a fun, funny and bright light in our lives and we love you so much. You are my sweetest middlest baby and I love you, love you, love you.



Happy three BIG years, my bundle bee.

I love you.

Love, Momma

30 years 30 goals ...

I turn 30 in a week. ONE WEEK. I know, I know. It's no big deal, but really, it kind of is. The decade of my 20's was a HUGE one, a WONDERFUL one {college graduation, buying houses, building houses, getting engaged, married, having THREE sweet babies... and the list goes on}. How will the 30's live up to that?

Funny thing, is I know they will. I am about to enter the season of strictly focusing on raising my family, and I am so excited.

I have been slowly working on 30 goals that I want to make and meet for myself in the next 10 years... some long term, some short term, and some in between. One of them is to be back to blogging. Not for anyone but ourselves, for myself. I know no one reads this anymore and  I am more than fine with that. But, I miss documenting our every days and all the exciting things. I do a great job keeping it up on IG and I print those books so I have the pictures.

But I miss the words.

These sweet babes are my entire life. We have so much exciting things coming up, and so many fun things that just happened {birthdays, purchasing Shugarts, kindergarten round-p} and I just don't want to miss a thing.

Goal: 2 times a week.

Here's to goal number one to a better me come 30 ...

One Year ...

Elliott Joseph,

Today is September 17^th and you are ONE YEAR OLD. One year. Something about this birthday is so beautifully bittersweet. It’s hard to wrap my mind around the fact that it has already been one year, when I can truly remember your birth so fresh in my mind, but yet I can’t really remember life without you in it. I have been an emotional mess as I relive the day you born and reminisce this last year. But, none of these emotions surprise me. I knew this was all coming. With you being the third baby I knew exactly how fast this would go. I knew exactly how fast this year would fly by, how fast you would grow. I knew I was going to simply blink and be right here, writing you this letter.

And, here we are.

This last year has been nothing short of wonderful. My heart has never felt more full. I have loved watching you grow and the complete chaos that comes with raising three young boys, three and under. There was never a dull moment and you never missed a beat. You love the craziness that surrounds you and laugh and squeal and dive right into the fun whenever you get a chance. You LOVE your older brothers and explode with delight every time they walk into the room, or you see them for the first time in the morning. And, the feeling is mutual my little buddy. Porter and Weston fight over whose baby you are, daily, and every day when I pick them up from school they come running to me and say “Let’s go home and see baby!”

You have such a funny personality. You know when and how to be funny, already! You will run and start to do something you know you aren’t suppose to do and then turn right around and bend over and start belly laughing at me. You just crack yourself up! You also can hold you own against your brothers like you wouldn’t believe. You will NOT let them take toys from you, or do anything that you think isn’t okay. You yell and scream and fight back. And, you bite. Man… do you bite. We are working on that one, buddy.

You are a pretty good eater. You will eat anything except for things in liquid form. Yogurt, applesauce, etc isn’t something you care for. But, it doesn’t worry me. You will eat anything else and you are still nursing 5 or more times a day, so I know you are getting what you need!

You are finally napping without being held {only took 12 months… ha!} and take two naps a day, usually about 1 to 1.5 hours each. You are such an easy, go with the flow baby, that a lot of your naps are spent in the car while we are running errands. Such is the life of the third baby. You are, however, not the best sleeper at night. You still sleep with Dadda and I and you wake up anywhere from once to 5 times a night to nurse. This is MOSTLY my fault as I haven’t even tried to wean you of nighttime nursing. Honestly, I am not too worried about it right now. I sleep, you sleep, that’s all that matters in the long run.

You started walking just after ten months and now you are RUNNING. ALL OVER THE PLACE! It’s so fun watching you discover the world standing up right. You will put your hands up and come running at me smiling for me to pick you up. My most favorite thing. You are, most defiantly, a momma’s boy!

You are huge. At your one year well check you weighed in at 26 lbs and long. You are wearing size four diapers and size 18 to 24 month clothing. You are wearing all the clothes that Weston just wore this past spring. Dadda and I laugh all the time at just how big you are. Sweet, cutie boy.

You can say momma, dada, uh-oh, duck, see and dog and you pretty much will repeat any word that we ask you to say. You won’t continue to say them on your own after that but you WILL try and say them when we ask. You talk and babble pretty much non-stop, just like your brothers. You will not be silenced by your brothers and you make sure we all hear you, all the time!

You do such a good job of playing. Playing with your brothers, and playing alone. You actually really love toys which is just do weird because your brothers really had no interest in things like that at this age. You make the growling noise for your animals when you are playing {and you seriously growl ALL THE TIME anyways, just for fun. I seriously love it} and you vroom vroom your little cars around. You are obsessed with this one little pan that we cook with and you come into the kitchen, open the cupboards and get it out every day, all day long, and carry it around.

You are snuggly, smooshy and my baby. You are my baby. No matter how big. No matter how many people tell me in the course of a day that you look so big, or don’t look like a baby anymore, you are. You are my baby and when I hold you, you fold perfectly into my arms. Just like you have from day one.

Elliott Joseph, 12 months ago you came into our lives fast and furious. And you haven’t slowed down yet. I love you so much sweet baby boy. So much.

Happy One Year.

Love, Momma

rocking you to sleep on your first birthday. I haven's missed one single night of rocking you to sleep since you were born.

10 Months ...

Elliott Joe, 

This week you turned 10 months old! So hard to believe in just two months we will be celebrating your first year of life! And what an incredibly happy first year it has been! You are such a joy. It's hard to even put into words how much our little family adores you. 

You are always happy. Always. You wake up in the morning with the biggest smile on your face and you smile as I'm nursing you to sleep at night. You love to laugh and you do this funny little giggle all the time. Cracks us up! You love to dance and no matter what you are doing you will stop dead in your tracks and bust out a move when I start to sing to you. It's pretty stinkin' cute. 

You just recently learned how to wave and it's amazingly cute. You open & close your little fingers and just kind of state at your hand in amazement of what it's doing. You LOVE your brothers & they just love you right back. So much so that all day long I'm reminding them to not constantly be touching, kissing & smooshing you! You are defiantly the baby of the family right now & adored by all! 

You will eat anything! It's pretty wonderful. You eat three meals a day, of whatever we are eating, and nurse 4 to 6 times a day. You are a BIG boy! You love bananas, gram crackers, waffles, cheese,  and fruit. You never ate baby food! You wouldn't have it so we just skipped right over that! You still nurse every three to four hours. 

You usually go to bed between 8:30 and 9:00 and have been sleeping through the night most nights until any where from 4 to 6. Once you wake up I nurse you right back down & you'll sleep until 7:30 or so. Not bad baby boy! You're still in bed with us too, and will be for a while longer! 

You aren't really interested in any toys but you do love to follow your brothers around and try and steal their toys. You torment Weston just like he does to Porter! Every day I thank God for the gift you three are to each other. Nothing more amazing then watching your relationships unfold. 

You are a momma's boy through & through! The only time you aren't happy is when you can't see me or I can't hold you RIGHT then! 

You have 6 teeth! 3 on top & three on the bottom. You can stand all alone & take steps in between furniture. You'll be walking in no time! You say "momma" and "dadda" clear as day and call us those names when you see us, or want us to hold you, feed you, etc. You growl all the time like a little bear and it car kid is up. One of my very favorite things! 

You are in 18 & 18 to 24 month clothing. Size 4 diaper and my guess is you weight about 25 lbs. Like I said, big boy!

Elliott Joe, you are our light. I feel so honored to be your momma and watch you grow. This 10 months has flown, and it's so bittersweet, but I wouldn't change a thing. Life is good sweet boy, so good. And you and your brothers are the reason why. 

Happy ten months sweet baby. I love you. More than you'll ever know. 

Love, Momma 

Crickets ...

I'm not sure if anyone even checks in on us via blog anymore, except maybe my grandma {hi grandma!}, but I really want to get back on board on my little space here so that I can keep documenting my sweet boys growing up. In this format. 

We are having an amazing summer. The boys are all at such fun ages and it's been a blast.