The last of January...

This big girl is doing awesome with her potty training!  In fact I'd say 'she's trained'!  The only time she is ever in a diaper/pull-up is at night.  And I pretty much just do that because I have them.  In the month she's been wearing underwears she's only waken up in the morning 2, maybe 3, times wet.  If she does need to go at night she wakes up and yells from her crib that she needs to go potty, that wakes Brynn up, and Brynn comes downstairs and gets me in time for me to get up and get Kate to the potty.  She's only had one "accident".  And that was at playgroup last week and it was really my fault.  She told me she needed to go.  But we were at a park that was out in the middle of no where.  I had this lengthy discussion in my head on what to do - my last two potty trainers have been boys and I would have just taken them over to a tree and had them go, but I knew I couldn't do that with Kate, so I tried to remember what I would have had Brynn do, could/would she just squat for me??, I contemplated if I could get to the car and drive somewhere quick enough, etc etc etc... and while I was thinking she gave up on me and had to go.  I deserved that.  Anyway, she did/does great!  And I also put on my big girl panties and finally tossed the bottles that have been taking up room in our cupboard...  Go me!

Dylan doesn't want to nap anymore.  But once or twice a week he still needs to and he falls asleep basically right away when I make him go to his room.  And even some times when I let him just read books or watch a show he'll still fall asleep...

Tyler has decided the easiest way for him to get the dishwasher unloaded is just to open up every cupboard in the kitchen and have at it...

He also made this really cute kitty mask at school for Kate and was so excited to give it to her... and she loved it...

Kates become a little bit of TV head lately.  Her favorite thing to do right now is watch a "show on mommy's bed".  She asks to do it all the time and thinks its her special place... 

...notice how she has two shows going on in that picture :{ One on the TV and one on the iPad??!!?  Who are her parents???!?

Brynn and Tyler did excellent on their report cards so we took them to Krispy Kreme since they give the kids a free donut for every A on their report card...

 ...of course Tyler just wanted to stare at the donut machine instead of actually eat his donut :)
And he was such a big helper in putting together some new garage shelves...

 More of our wildlife pictures...

...besides our bears and alligators and controlled forest burns, we also have lots of dear.  And they like to just take walks down the road like its no big deal :) I think its great.

 We went to the Panama City Mall for the first time since playgroup was there.  They had this fun little play area...

Plus just a video I took...

And that's about all the excitement we had in January!  Now on to February... 

Our first Sandman!

Last Saturday we got together with a bunch of our church friends/neighbors to spend an afternoon enjoying the weather and some good company.  We had a yummy BBQ and rented a bouncy house for the kids.  We had a great time chatting, eating, and running around playing.  Kate and several of her little girlfriends (okay and Dylan too) were in heaven playing tea party with water!

Then this past Saturday we finally had some downtime and got to just hang out on the beach again - its been too long since we've been able to and we really enjoyed/missed it.  It also gave me a chance to try out my new beach wagon I got for Christmas.  Ohhhh, and we even made our first snow... I mean sandman on the beach :)

For this beach trip I packed mostly sand toys and sports stuff and left the water toys at home.  I knew it was a beautiful day but figured the water was still probably a tad bit chilly compared to what we are used to.  But of course it didn't phase the kids at all.  They went right into the water and were asking for their goggles, boogie boards, snorkels, etc.  Oops!



Yep, we are enjoying our first "winter" here and don't feel like we are missing out on anything!...

Since Christmas...

... (other than potty training) we've been busy playing with all our new presents.  We are loving the Kinect.  It makes for some great family fun.  Even Kate can play - she loves Fruit Ninja!
And the boys got Squishy Baff in their stockings - a magical potion that, when added to your bath water, turns it into a slimy goo.  So fun right?!  They loved it.  But Kate wasn't about to get in... she enjoyed it from outside the bath...

Here Kate is riding her new bike...

 ...and apparently Dylan loves riding her bike just as much (actually probably more) than she does.  In hindsight I probably should have gotten a more gender neutral colored bike :{ Oh well.  Dylan doesn't seem to mind.  He also loves giving her rides - she stands/squats on the back - its very cute.  A few more comments on that picture - yes, that is a big hole in my front yard.  No, I do not care.  It is very entertaining for the kids.  We actually have a few of them.  And yes, that is a snow scraper he is using to dig.  While we have numerous shovels its fun to mix things up every now and then.  We obviously aren't going to be needing it for our cars any time soon so why not.  We originally were using it as a "walking stick" of sorts for Tyler to use while learning to use his new roller blades.  But it has since had many other uses.  Who knew?!

The kids were very good about sitting down to write their thank you notes this year!!  And when I told them we were all done Tyler was very concerned that he had not made one for Dylan who gave him his "Optimus Prime with the guns on the shoulder"... and he insisted that he wasn't done until he did that :) Made me so happy and proud.

One of my biggest pet peeves right now is when I ask one of them to do something and their response is, "WHY DO I HAVE TO DO EVERYTHING!!!"... I'm sorry what???!?!?!  Who has to do everything?!!!?  They actually have to do very little around here.  Sooo... I decided my kids need to be more helpful and have more responsibilities around the house.  Consequently we are going to start working harder to learn to love to work and get jobs done together!  Teamwork here we come.

The boys have realized their favorite job is to dust/scrub everything in the house down with wipes :[  Whatever, its a good job for them and they get a lot of things cleaned that I would never get to.  Its worth every penny that they use in wipes :) 

 Uh, just a few random pictures...

While we were less than thrilled about the weather over Christmas, of course once everyone left the weather went back to the 70's.  It has been absolutely gorgeous here!!!!  Everyone is outside enjoying it.... children and wildlife included.

We found this turtle while taking a stroll one day and Kate loved him...

Even Harlow our alligator has reappeared and is sunbathing on a regular basis again!...

And we spent this past Saturday morning enjoying some time at the park and getting in some exercise at the same time...

For Christmas I had gotten Brynn a craft set to do with her friend Emma that she has over for regular play dates.  We were so excited this past week for her to come and do it.  Sadly, it was a cheap set and nothing working out right in it.  So sad :(  But she came home from school one day and announced that one of her friends had made a pretty duct tape flower pencil.  So we looked up the How To video online and watched it.  The next morning I woke up and Brynn (who of course had been up bright and early - who knows at what time) had went ahead and made one all by herself!  I was so proud of her craftiness!!!!