This is my attempt to cover all of what happened during the month of April, at least in a brief summary. Here goes nothing!
One of the last home improvement projects we did before listing our house was replacing the ceiling fan in the living room. This was a long overdue upgrade! The picture doesn’t really make it look that great, but this ceiling fan is so much better than what we had. The old white one was so dim that the whole room just seemed dark and dreary at night when it was on. It’s a shame we didn’t replace it years ago!
The girls have gotten into dressing up more over the last couple of months. Savannah is in that stage where she wants to do everything Brooklyn does. So now when Brooklyn gets out the dress-up clothes, Savannah wants to wear something too!
To celebrate Nathan’s birthday in early April, Caitlyn invited us to go to Build-A-Bear at the mall one morning to let the kids make stuffed animals. It was the first time Brooklyn and Savannah had ever been, and I hadn’t been since probably high school. We had a great time! Of course, you can’t tell it from Brooklyn’s expression. Nathan was cracking me up making silly faces every time I tried to take a picture :)
Savannah wasn’t too sure what to do, so I helped her pick out a bunny rabbit to make.
At first, Brooklyn wanted to choose a Chewbacca stuffed animal, but she knows nothing about Star Wars ;) So, I tried to direct her toward something different. She ended up going with a really cute striped tiger!
Brooklyn went first out of all the kids. It was fun to see how seriously she took the whole process. She followed all of the directions about rubbing the tiger’s heart on your head/heart, giving it a kiss, and making a wish :) The only thing she didn’t like was pushing the pedal to make the stuffing go into the tiger. I think it was too loud for her liking ;)
Savannah needed help when it was time to make her bunny, so I didn’t get any pictures of her during the process. She did good though!
This was the best picture I got of all the kids with their stuffed animals. Brooklyn picked out a purple and blue bathrobe for her tiger…haha! She decided to name him “Tigey” because that’s the name of Daniel Tiger’s stuffed tiger in the TV show. Savannah didn’t really care what her bunny wore, so I picked out an outfit I liked ;) We named the bunny Hoppy!
They also got bunny ears to wear since Easter was just around the corner :)
Savannah wanted to carry her bunny all by herself. It was funny to see her drag that box all the way to the food court after we checked out!
There she goes!
Getting a peek at the Easter bunny down on the first floor of the mall :)
We ate lunch at Chick-fil-a in the food court after leaving Build-A-Bear. It was such a fun morning!
The girls ate well and got ice cream after they were finished with their meals.
The kids wanted to stop and say hi to the Easter bunny before leaving the mall. Brooklyn was scared of Santa last Christmas, so I was shocked that she went right up to the Easter bunny, gave him a hug, and just stood there talking to him for several minutes.
Brooklyn and Nathan went right up and said hello. Gabriel went a few feet inside the gate. Savannah was nowhere to be seen. I think she was hiding by my leg…haha. Maybe one day! We had a great time celebrating Nathan’s birthday and appreciated the invite to be part of the fun! :)
Saturday, April 8th was our yard sale! Once we decided to try to sell our house and move, I’d been plotting to have a yard sale and try to get rid of some stuff we didn’t need or use anymore. It was my first time to host a yard sale at our house; I’d put some stuff in a yard sale at Britni’s house about 1.5 years ago, but never had one at our house. It was a good bit of work to set everything up, but I think it was worth it overall! Alisha, Cheryl, and Britni all put some stuff in the sale as well, so it was more than just our stuff. Alisha helped me the morning of, so we got to spend all morning outside enjoying the nice weather and chatting KID-FREE! Honestly, it was worth all the work just to spend a few hours outside in peace and quiet…haha. But, making some money didn’t hurt also! I sold a few things before and after the yard sale (an 8×10 rug and a Fossil watch), so I think I definitely made over $150 total from the sale.You just never know what people will buy! We sold all of our old nursing textbooks, a few engineering textbooks, a bunch of random odds and ends, an old computer monitor, etc. It was great! The best part is that we won’t have to pack that stuff up and move it now. It was a definite win-win!
Cici bought some bright yellow balloons for us to attach to some of our yard sale signs at the road, so the girls enjoyed playing with those after the sale was over!
We were surprised to find that several of Travis’s college textbooks are still worth a decent amount of money on Amazon, so you better believe we listed a bunch of them for sale that we didn’t sell in the yard sale. Within a couple of days, we had already sold 4 or 5! Who would’ve guessed we had a gold mine sitting in our attic 7 years after graduation :)
Sweet girl eating cereal for breakfast!
One day in early April, Travis was cutting the grass for the first time since the fall. The grass (weeds!) had gotten kind of tall, and he noticed some loose animal fur in the grass as he was mowing. He didn’t think much of it, so he mowed right over it. As he was coming back the other way, he saw something crawling away from that spot. It was a tiny baby bunny! He’d mowed right over the top of a bunny nest! Thankfully, all the bunnies were okay, and he was able to get the loose bunny back into the nest and cover the hole back up.
The bunnies were so small! We think there were at least 5 or 6 in the nest. Brooklyn and Savannah enjoyed looking at them when Travis showed us what happened. We checked on them a couple of times over the next week or two, and then one day they were gone! I guess they got big enough to leave the nest :)
On April 11th after music class, we walked to a nearby playground that was a couple of blocks away. Brooklyn has become good friends with a little girl in the class named Lizzie, and Lizzie had been begging her mom for us to all get together to play sometime. So, we decided to head to the playground for lunch and some fun after class that day. Another mom and her kids joined us too. The kids had a blast!
Brooklyn and Lizzie followed each other everywhere :)
The most fun activity of the day was putting bark and leaves down into the drain…haha. It’s amazing what little kids find to keep themselves entertained :)
They played hard and were worn out by the time we left!
Having fun at the playground by the library :)
Praying together before breakfast one day :)
Brooklyn rarely wants me to do anything to her hair these days, so pigtails are a rare but cute hairdo! :)
Brooklyn got some alphabet workbooks and dry erase markers for Christmas, but she hasn’t been interested in using them for anything other than just coloring until recently.
First time tracing her letters – she did a pretty good job!
On April 15th, we had pictures with our favorite photographer, Carla. She was doing mini sessions all day in Mooresville. We snagged an early morning slot, which worked out well since everyone was still in a good mood at that point in the day ;)
I already shared the pictures of Savannah in her 2 year blog post, so I won’t repeat all of them again. Love this one though!
Big sis Brooklyn!
I think this one is my favorite of B by herself…
She’s getting so big!
Favorite family pic!
Big sisters with the new baby :)
The next day was Easter! The Easter Bunny kept things pretty simple this year. Mostly candy and some new sippy cups :)
Matching dresses for Easter this year—thanks to Leah Carver for letting me buy several matching outfits her girls had outgrown :)
After lunch at Cici’s it was time to hunt Easter eggs! At first, Carter and Savannah took off following after Brooklyn, but that was a losing proposition. They never would have gotten any eggs that way, so we convinced them to go off in different directions :)
Mommy forgot to pack a belt…haha! Poor girl can hardly ever keep her pants up without one :)
Savannah caught on pretty quickly to what she was supposed to be doing. Sometimes she needed a little help finding the eggs, but she definitely did better than I thought she might!
Showing off all the loot inside the eggs!
We have a spot in our driveway that always collects water after a big rain. Makes for a tempting jumping area ;)
So much fun!
This month, Savannah finally learned how to drink out of a Munchkin 360 cup! We have now transitioned over to using those for milk and water pretty much all the time because they are better for your teeth than cups with hard spouts (according to the dentist).
Savannah has perfected her scowl for sure!
We get this look quite often ;)
Storytime at the library!
April 20th – Brooklyn claimed she wasn’t tired during nap time and basically destroyed her room while she was supposed to be sleeping or doing “quiet time”. At 4:30 PM, I sent her to her room to clean everything up before supper…
At 5 PM, I noticed things were too quiet in her room. Walked in to find her room exactly the same as it had been earlier. Lights on…
Child was sound asleep! Sometimes I don’t know whether to laugh or cry…this was one of those times :)
Uncle Travis with either Luke or Barrett…haha. Can’t remember which one for sure!
On April 23rd, we went out to eat for Emily Smith’s birthday after church that night. The kids got to sit at a table all by themselves!
In the spirit of decluttering and preparing to sell our house, I decided to get rid of the bookshelf in our breakfast area. It was given to us by Travis’s aunt and uncle, and it wasn’t something I planned on using in our next house. The wall that it had been on looked pretty bare after the bookshelf was gone, so we put up this vinyl word art in its place. I really liked how it turned out!
On April 26th, the girls went to the dentist! I was totally shocked when Savannah was willing to go first. She has always liked Dr. Curtis, which is pretty abnormal because she typically doesn’t like people she doesn’t know well. It was a quick and easy cleaning, and he said her teeth looked great! At that visit, she only had one more baby tooth left to come in (one of her 2 year molars), and it came in like the next week after that. So thankful to be done with new teeth for a while! :)
We had discussed Brooklyn getting her teeth cleaned with the “real” dental tools this visit (as opposed to just a toothbrush), but she wasn’t in favor of that idea :) It wasn’t worth the fight, so maybe next time she’ll be brave enough! Her teeth looked good also. Thankful for a quick and painless visit overall!
After we left the dentist, we headed to Creekwood Park for lunch and a playdate with Alisha, Britni, Emily, and their kiddos. It was a nice day to be outside, and the kids had fun!
We love this little playground!
Neat sight to see – the girls “reading” their Bibles side by side at the coffee table :)
One evening while Daddy was outside cutting the grass, the girls wanted to put on a “show” for me. Brooklyn requested that I pull a dining room chair into the living room to watch. They wore their dress up clothes, danced around the living room, and ate a picnic. It was a fun time for all until Savannah started eating Brooklyn’s pretend food instead of her own, and everyone started screaming and crying…haha. Real life :)
On April 29th, we officially had a 2 year old!
Savannah’s birthday party wasn’t until the following weekend on May 6th, so we had a low key day on her actual birthday. We ordered pizza for supper and ate it in the living room while watching the Peanuts movie on TV. After we were finished with the pizza, we paused the movie and were about to sing “happy birthday” to Savannah and eat brownies when the phone rang. It was a realtor wanting to bring someone to see our house in the next 10 minutes. Of course! So we put the movie and brownies on hold, cleaned up the house as fast as possible, went to Cici’s house for a while, and then came back home to eat dessert!
Happy birthday, Savannah!
She was very unsure about the lit candles and did not like it when Daddy held the brownie up closer for her to blow the candles out ;) Total opposite of her big sister, who at age 2 tried to put out the fire on her candles with her fingers!
Hard to believe our sweet girl is TWO!
This baby has been so neglected on the blog! The sad reality of being the third child I guess ;) This was taken at 14 weeks along on April 5th.
16 weeks (April 19th)
17 weeks (April 26th)
Quotes and Notes from April
- Feeling good overall during this pregnancy. I’ve had some trouble with headaches off and on…some seem to last for two or three days at a time before they go away completely. Other than that, can’t complain one bit! We had a sneak peek ultrasound done at 16 weeks to find out the gender and announced the news at Savannah’s birthday party on May 6th (pictures and details to come!). The girls got their own ultrasound pictures to take home with them that day (although we didn’t tell them the gender that day…it wouldn’t have stayed a surprise for long if we had!), and it was so sweet to see them carry around pictures of “Mommy’s baby”. Brooklyn even wanted to sleep with her picture in her bed at naptime :)
- 4/8/17 – Brooklyn has definitely corrected some of her mispronunciations (“gr”, “cr”) – she is now saying “grapes”, “crayons”, etc. correctly!
- 4/10/17 – After Brooklyn was being particularly sassy one night, Travis told her, “You’ve got spunk!” Brooklyn replied, “Is it in my ears???”, and Travis told her, “It oozes out of you everywhere…” Brooklyn (with her ears covered): “Is it still coming out???”
- 4/13/17 – We were at Alisha’s house one morning, and Carter had a toy that Brooklyn wanted to play with. She instructed him, “Carter, drop it. Drop! Drop! DROP!” Not sure dog commands work on your cousin, but nice try :)
- “Thank you for different kinds of skin.” – part of Brooklyn’s prayer one day
- 4/20/17 – first time that Savannah sat on the rug for the whole 30 minutes of story time at the library! Typically she will sit with Brooklyn for a few minutes and sit with Mommy part of the time too.
- Savannah caught us off guard by saying mayonnaise (“nah-naise!”) one day!
- 4/26/17 – our house was officially on the market! *This is the main reason why I’m just now getting around to blogging about April. Selling your house ain’t for the faint of heart!
