4 months old today

17 pounds, 6 ounces
25 1/2 inches long

My baby keeps getting bigger!

our weekend

Nathan told the boys on Thursday night that he was going to take them camping the next day.  In the morning the boys were busy and didn't want us to know what they were doing.  It turns out they were packing their suitcase.  When they showed us they were so proud and so thrilled!!!  The suitcase was filled with everything they needed.  A change of clothes, a swimsuit, a small Ziploc bag filled with snacks, and marshmallows, chocolate and graham crackers to make smores.  And the best part was the logs each in a gallon Ziploc bag so they didn't get their clothes dirty.  :)  It was adorable.

 

When they arrived at Mill Creek State Park...it was completely full.  So they changed up the plans and ended up in a campground "in the middle of nowhere".  The boys all found that having an outhouse and nothing else around was quite peaceful. 

I enjoyed a quiet evening on Friday and a quiet morning on Saturday with my littlest son.  I needed that!  I've been feeling like I'm constantly behind and I hate that feeling.  It made me realize just how busy our house is with 3 boys.  But don't get me wrong, I was excited when they came back home on Saturday afternoon.  :)  Then we went to Sioux Falls to celebrate Claire's 9th birthday and Emma's 13th birthday.  The boys had fun playing with their cousins.  It was a fun party.

This morning during the worship service I would have liked to say that I was challenged by the message...instead I was challenged by my children.  I couldn't really listen because my boys kept whispering to me, messing with each other, telling me they were hungry, etc, etc.  After many conversations, our expectations should be quite clear and I'm hoping that next week will be better.  With the addition of Mason, and Levi now being too old to go to Little Treasures during the service, we've gone from having 1 to 3 kids in church with us!  It's an adjustment for all of us.

This afternoon Dorian and Levi were pretending to be police officers.  They were using a round rock as their cell phone and a flat rock as their iPod and they were heading over to Subway to get sandwiches.  :)

This evening I took out the exersaucer to see if Mason would enjoy it.  I honestly didn't think that he was old enough yet, but I was wrong.  He loved it!  Isn't he adorable?!!

my super heros :)

So my last post was about our weekend in Wisconsin and I forgot to mention that on the way there, I saw 2 little teeth in Mason's mouth!!!  I thought he was too young for that.  They haven't yet poked through...and I'm alright with that.  He's already growing up too fast.  :)

Oh, and we also celebrated our anniversary last week.  9 years!  How could I have forgotten.  Well maybe it was because it was quite similar to any other day.  It's pretty pathetic when you find yourself catching up on emails and working on updating the finances, each at your own computer...on your anniversary.  But we did actually go out for lunch together since that's when the sitter could come over.  :) 

The boys and I went to see Dan Wardell (who is famous to the boys since he is on Iowa Public Television on occasion) at the library.  He was a super hero and had an entertaining show that he did for the kids.  When Dorian came home he was full of ideas!  He wanted to make goggles out of egg cartons, swords and spikey shields out of cardboard, and play in our closet with the free flashlights that they handed out.  Don't they look cute!

 Friday was our Fun-Day!  We went to Okoboji for the day as a family.

 And we rented a BOAT!!!  It was our first ride of the summer...therefore, Mason's first boat ride.  :)

Saturday was our work day.  Nathan was super excited to use a chain saw to cut down our dead birch tree.

 And Levi was excited to help.

Dorian and I got all creative.  I used some of the birch wood to decorate with.  Dorian started making a nest out of the twigs, which led to then making a bird house out of scrap wood from the garage.  We decided to let him try hammering nails (since he kept begging) and assumed that he wouldn't be able to do it.  We were wrong.  I'm impressed with his carpentry skills.  And then we found Dorian making this teepee which I thought was pretty cool!

On Sunday afternoon Mason skyped with Grandpa and Grandma Tintle.  :)  He will see them in person in 9 days!

 Dorian discovered a new way that he could hold Mason.  I think they are both quite happy.  :)

On Tuesday we went to the Sioux Center Fair.  We really weren't expecting much, but instead we were quite impressed.  The boys really loved the petting zoo!

 Levi chose to have a pony ride and Dorian chose to go on the bouncy inflatables.

 A double-headed horse.  :)

Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday was BBX (Backyard Bible eXplore).  I signed up to welcome families and to check the kids in and then I stayed to help as needed.  The boys had many friends there so we all had a great time!

 Breakfast time with Super-Baby.  :) 

 

Here is the progress so far on the bird house!  Annika was helping Dorian last night.  Dorian is really having a lot of fun with this project!

Funny line from this morning:  Levi told me that he was telling me something in hand language.  :)

I love all of my little super heroes. 

Weekend in Wisconsin



After driving for 10 hours in the car on the 4th of July, we were excited to arrive at our hotel safely.  As quickly as the boys could, they went with Grandpa down to the pool!  Then we joined the rest of the Bolkema's for a shower and rehearsal dinner in anticipation of my cousin Julia's wedding.  After waking up at 3:30 that morning, we had to pass on watching fireworks and instead we were all sleeping by 8:00.

On Friday we spent the morning swimming at the pool in our hotel.  Then we enjoyed a beautiful wedding and a fun reception.  Levi and Eden had some great dance moves!

Peter is a math guy so they had math problems on each table and when they were solved correctly Peter and Julia had to kiss.  Well, since my dear husband is also a math guy, our table had much more difficult problems to solve.  Peter and Julia had fun correcting our paper!

Dorian loves his littlest brother.  :)

The boys were excited to dance. 

Levi was watching the older kids and trying to learn all of the moves!  :)

On Saturday morning, we had 2 sleepy boys in our hotel room.

Mid-morning we joined everyone for a day at the beach.  The weather was absolutely perfect!  Dorian and Levi were so busy playing in the sand that I hardly heard from them.  They enjoyed playing with Caleb, Megan, Willem, Sydney, Logan, Aniah, and Eden most of the time.

Mason hung out mostly with me under the beach umbrella.  He needs another year or two before he can enjoy the beach as much as his older brothers.  :)

We drove home on Sunday. 
Mason has spent some time the last couple of days in his Bumbo seat!  It makes him look so much older to be sitting up!

Last week in a conversation that we were having Levi said, "You know why I want to be a police officer?"  Why?  "Because I like donuts."  I thought it was pretty funny.  But after how excited he was tonight about buying and selling glasses of ice tea/lemonade to our family and neighbors...Nathan and I think that he would make a pretty good salesman.  It's fun to dream.  :)

lovin' my boys

As of June 23, Mason is 3 months old!

Celebrating his milestones:

Gives us lots of smiles, some giggles, and is fun to interact with.  He loves to coo and have "conversations" with us!

Gaining a lot of strength in his legs.  We've been surprised to find him not exactly how we laid him down as he can move himself around a little.

Gaining a lot of weight.  We just moved up to size 3 diapers, and 6-9 month clothes fit him the best!

Just discovered his hands and started batting at toys.

 

I wanted to remember how we wrapped Mason each night in his dino swaddle blanket.  So precious!  And this is what his hair looked like before his haircut.  Yes...he has had his first haircut already.  I wasn't brave enough to do it myself and while I was nervous when it was being cut off, I love how it looks. 

A few days ago Dorian and Levi were playing so nicely together outside.  I thought it was so cute to find that they had a table full of "ingredients" to make pizza with.

They were even willing to pose with their pizza creations when they were done because they were so proud of them!  :)  Lovin' these boys!