Why I haven’t been blogging:

I have gotten a bit behind on my blog.  In addition to the usual busy life of work, kids, housework, etc., I somehow had the crazy idea to make Landon and Davis’s costumes this year.  Although it was a lot of work, I actually enjoyed it.  The best part was seeing Landon and Davis wear them almost every day last week and run around the house yelling “Super Landon” and “Super Davis.”

  

The back with their capes, and the superheroes flying through the air.

Although I didn’t make one for James, he looked quite cute in the tiger costume Becky let us borrow:

For Halloween Eve, we all went to a Halloween party at our church.  It was a lot of fun, and they had someone there taking pictures of everyone dressed up.  Here is the Malan family all dressed up for Halloween:

More fall festivities to come!

We’re Going to the Zoo, Zoo, Zoo

Last Thursday, my sister-in-law Stacey and my mom drove up to visit for the weekend.  On Friday, we decided to make a trip to the zoo.   We all got in free with our membership, so it was definitely worth it!

Here we are with all of our gear!  And here’s a picture of us on the tractor in the farm area.

   

Mom held up all of the kids to see the elephants, and James got tired of his stroller and decided he liked the Bjorn better where he could see the animals better.

James may have been tired of the stroller, but Kallie and Davis both wanted a ride at the same time.  They did pretty good like this until Davis decided he’d had too many hugs from Kallie. 

                                         

Cute baby Ethan enjoying the zoo in his stroller!

 

 

Kallie was so cute and pointed out the zebras to Ethan!  We had a nice lunch on the grass at the zoo, and a picture of all of us minus mom in front of the zoo sign as we left.

 

After the zoo, my mom braved watching all five kids at once while Stacey and I made a trip to Ikea.  When we got home, James was asleep in his swing, and Stacey shot these cute pictures of him when he woke up.

Kallie had fun sitting right in front of the swing and watching baby James too.  She was very cute with him!  Uncle Jake arrived late Friday night, and Saturday morning he turned on a football game and the boys joined him to watch.  (They are wearing their capes I made them for their Halloween costumes . . . hopefully I’ll finish the rest of the costumes to post on here by the end of the week!)

     

A squirt bottle, an ironing board, and a smile

Yesterday, I had this squirt bottle out after doing some ironing, and Landon and Davis wanted to go play with it in the backyard.  They were out there forever, squirting the dirt.  Who knew a squirt bottle could be so entertaining.

Meanwhile, every day, while Landon is at Kindergarten, Davis does pretty good at finding ways to entertain himself.  Besides listening to Little Einsteins classical music while running up and down the hall, he pretty much always does something with cars.  Here are a few pictures of him yesterday racing cards down the ironing board, and a short video too.

   

And finally, here are a few pictures of James.  He likes to sit like this on the boppy and watch Davis run all over the place! 

 

Uno

Last night, we had fun playing a game of Uno.  Davis decided that this was the best way to hold his Uno cards. 

He got bored of that and then tried the upside down approach:

Landon was a little more focused, thank goodness. We may have never finished the game if we had been playing with two monkeys!

First Giggles

I finally took a minute and captures James's new laugh on the camera. He has been laughing like this for a few weeks now, and he always seems to do it best for Shane!

First Love

When driving home from the library yesterday, Landon told me:

“Mom, when I’m bigger and big enough that I’m going to get married, I am going to marry Emma.”

Emma is a girl at Landon’s school that we have heard a lot about.  I guess now I know why.  :)

And for good measure, here’s a picture of him at the Lake Oswego Farmer’s market last weekend, enjoying a nice juicy peach.

Potty Training by the numbers

8 - Days Davis has been wearing his Lightning McQueen underwear

60 –Minutes it took for him to pee in the first pair of underwear

4 - Number of pairs of underwear he wore the first day

3 - Amount of times I’ve done a quick batch of underwear wash so he’d have a clean pair for the next day

0 – Number of minutes before we were supposed to leave for church when Davis, fully dressed to the shoes and already getting in the car announced, “Mom, me poopy.”  By some miracle, I got him inside, clothes off, underwear in the garbage can (didn’t want to deal with it), wiped down, pants (and diaper) back on, shoes tied, and back in the car to arrive at church on time.

1 – Number of nights Davis fortunately stayed dry since Shane forgot to put his diaper on before bed

39.99 – Dollars saved per month by potty training Davis

15+ Number of times per day I hear Davis answer me “No mom, me not,” when I ask him if he has to go potty.

5- Number of fingers dirty with poop when Davis first went poop in the potty and realized where his poop came from.

1 – Number of disgusted dads when he had to clean up the 5 poopy fingers (I was conveniently feeding James at that moment)

5 – Number of times he announced to me today “Mom, me haffa go potty!,” and we had an accident-free day!!!  Hopefully more to come!