Updates on all of us, including our newest member

I will start off by saying that we did not have our baby yet. That would be scary early, we still have 2 1/2 months to go. But we do have a little elf that joined our family December 1st. His name is Joey. I had never heard of all these "Elf on the Shelf" things but luckily my sister, Steph, is a lot cooler than me. She sent our family one in November since they have us for Christmas and I am SO glad she did. The kids LOVE Joey. It is the last thing Tyler talks about before he goes to bed at night, and the first thing he and Brynlee look for when they wake up. Seriously, I think they're way more excited about Joey every day than Santa coming haha. But it's been a lot of fun for them to find him in a new spot every morning. Thankfully we haven't forgotten to move him yet, and Kenny is much more creative at finding a funny spot for him then I am. But it's a fun new tradition.

Madison: I cannot believe how quickly she picked up on walking, and really well. She just walks around the house like the other kids now and it's so cute to watch her. Her climbing abilities have also improved, thanks to her frequent practicing. She keeps me on my toes, that's for sure. Church is pretty difficult with her, and I'm already couting down the months till nursery. She thinks she's one of the big kids and just tries to do everything her big brother and sister do. She gets really, really mad if you don't let her try and do everything they do. She has also figured out how to pull the elastics and clips out of her hair, so she often looks like an orphan child because she never leaves anything in for very long.

Brynlee: She's still sort of like Dr. Jekyl and Mr. Hyde. Totally sweet and perfect angel child one minute, and will turn on you in a second. She occassionally resorts to "baby talk" and acting a lot younger than she is, which worries me for this baby coming. She's very needy about being hugged, held and loved a lot. Sometimes I think I'm going to hire someone to just sit here and hold whatever child needs it so I can get something done, or not have them fighting over my lap. It's even more awkward with my ever-growing belly. But we sure love Bryn and she loves to sing and talk in the cutest little voice. She pretends to read books all the time and always begins each page with "One day..." Bryn's very good about cleaning and picking things up when she's done playing, if it's something that's obvious or an intentional game, if that makes sense. Like she carries a lot of little knick knacks around and leaves stuff out all over the house, but if it's something we get out like a bin of legos, or the play-doh, or a game, etc. she is very good about picking up after herself. Everybody loves her curly hair, and I often get asked how I do the ringlets when she has pigtails or something. She's just a natural babe :).

Tyler: He loves going to Joy School two days a week, and always has such a fun time playing with friends. There's a girl in his primary class, and joy school with him named Julia, and they always say they're going to marry each other. I've tried to get him to stop talking about it so much. It was funny and cute at first, but then I think it was starting to get a little overboard for 4 year olds. But they are good friends. He is such a good big brother and really helps me out a lot. He thinks he is hilarious and tries to make up "funny jokes" all the time, and we try to give him our best laughs :). He's in the "silly" phase of childhood, but he's still pretty well behaved. We still do preschool at home each day with our own Sonlight curriculum, and mostly he just soaks up all the books. He can't get enough of reading books, and I don't mind a bit. He's actually getting pretty good at reading on his own and sounding out words.

Me: I am doing fine. Tired a lot, but fine. I hate wearing maternity pants more than anything else in the whole world (random sidenote). I was looking at some home videos from back when it was me and Ty and Bryn, and I was missing the old me. I used to be not nearly so chubby, a lot more energetic and fun. Now I feel like I can't keep up with anything, or I just don't even want to try, and I'm tired. I have a lot of dreams of me running, or being back in highschool playing basketball, and then I wake up with leg cramps, or because I have to pee again. So I'm really looking forward to not being pregnant anymore, which is too bad because I still have 11 weeks to go. I'm still trying to be patient with waiting to hear on where we're moving; some days I do better than others.

Kenny: Seems to handle everything much better than I do, and I'm grateful for his strength in that regard. He works out every day during lunch, they have a nice gym in the same building as his work so that's a good outlet for him. I feel bad making his shorter than everyone else's, but he really hasn't changed, haha.

So that's us in a nutshell. I don't have a single picture to put on here, but we'll get to that this week, hopefully.