not so bad afterall

maybe half day kindergarten isn't such a bad gig after all. 

who knew?!

the chase sketch.

dear chase,

personality.

that's what i say when people ask me what you're like.

and lots of it.

you twist your tongue over upside down.

all the time.

everywhere and anywhere.

i remember sitting in 7th grade science class and learning that it's genetic to be able to do that.

i can't do it.

dad can.

there ya go;)

you love to sit in your robe after a bath.

you love to be cuddled up in a blanket with your "B".

you love to sit on my lap and be read to.

you love to let me sing you songs before bed,

and always give me a kiss and big "squish" before i put you in your crib.

sometimes when you say goodbye to people or want to send a kiss from a few feet away,

you suck in the sides of your lips,

and make a big kiss sound with your mouth.

it is one of my favorite things you do.

you are always smiling.

you are a happy happy guy.

you run like a flopping fish.

you trip over your feet a lot because of this.

i have a really good impersonation of it.

it makes dad laugh really hard.

you love max like a girlfriend.

you love to go down slides with her at the park,

sitting in her lap with her hands around your neck.

you let her dress you up in all of her princess dresses.

sometimes it's her idea,

and sometimes you bring them to her to put on you,

and then you hand her one to put on for herself.

you want to be just like brennan and do everything he does.

you know how to fight back and defend yourself.

you hit and throw.

and your face gets really mad.

mostly when we tell you no.

but you're so so cute when you do it.

then i put you in time out.

and you're still really cute in time out.

there was never a cuter screaming 2 year old in time out.

you LOVE cars.

trucks.

trains.

crashing sounds,

roaring sounds,

elephant sounds,

bears,

tigers,

giraffes.

you love every animal.

and babies.

you are so so soft and sweet with babies.

i never knew a little boy could be so soft and sweet with babies.

you love to pat them softly,

give them a tender look with your baby blue eyes,

and a soft hug from the side.

it makes me melt.

you call kids that are your age "baby" and cuddle them like you are SO much older than them.

you love to color with markers.

you are really possessive.

especially with markers and cars.

but really i think you are just so used to having people take things from you all of the time that you just like to guard things with your life on the chance that someone might be trying to take away what's yours.

third child:)

you love the movie CARS.

we can't even say the word unless we are completely ready and prepared to put it on because it's like opening the flood gates.

no turning back.

when you get really excited you run in place,

make a sound that gets higher and higher pitched as you suck in air,

but not in a loud way,

just in really really adorable excited with every passing second way.

like no boy has ever been excited for something ever as you are right at that minute.

it is the funniest thing to watch.

and it always makes everyone around you burst with joy.

you hate hats.

HATE.

but you like wearing hoods.

there is a difference.

you love wearing sweatshirts.

especially brennan's.

you make me roll up the sleeves,

and then refuse to take them off.

you know when you're cold,

and will come up to me and say "wooooo" and do arm actions for cold to tell me you want a coat on.

you do things like a 5 year old.

you will not sit in any kind of a booster seat or high chair.

not for the last 6 months.

i like not having to have one strapped to my kitchen chair.

you will sit in time out in the corner and not get up.

you will scream and cry, but you won't get up.

then when time out is done you will say "saw-wee",

give me a hug, and kiss, and be on your way.

you will stop doing naughty things if i threaten you with time out 99% of the time.

i can bribe you with anything sweet.

especially with whipped cream.

you understand that if this happens then this will happen.

which makes reasoning with you soooo much easier than max and brennan ever were at this age.

bless you.

you love to cuddle.

you are my cuddliest baby.

i could hold you wrapped around my body like a monkey all day every day for the rest of my life.

i love it when you wrap your arms and legs around me like a monkey because when you're hooked onto me like that i don't even have to hold you because you are so strong LIKE A MONKEY that you don't need me to even hold on.

i love it when you sit on my lap and cuddle into my bare neck.

and breathe on me.

i love your red hair and blue eyes.

people will stop in their tracks at the store to come up and compliment me on your hair.

it is the most beautiful strawberry red hair.

when it's greasy or wet it is a much darker red.

i love to put gel in your hair on sundays and comb it to one side.

you look like such a little gentlemen.

in the sun it looks more blonde.

it's magician hair.

always changing color on us.

you love your boots.

you ask to wear them, and call them "boo's".

you have so many words.

more than 50 that you use all by yourself.

you are a parrot with everything else you hear.

brennan and max love to tell you to say millions and millions of words.

you say it back to them right away,

and then they laugh at you,

and you say it again.

their favorite words to tell you to say are poop, poopy, pee,

you know, great stuff like that.

you love to make them laugh.

which is why i think all 3rd children might just be trained to be comedians from birth order alone.

your dad was a third child.

point made.

you speak in sentences as of the last month.

even strangers can understand what you are saying.

you say funny things.

very mater of a fact.

you love to play pretend with max and brennan.

brennan likes it when you play dead for him in the ninja game.

max likes you to twirl like ballerinas with her.

you do it all with them,

with no regard for gender specificity.

so cultured you are;)

it makes me smile.

you love to hold hands with max in the car.

one time you held hands with her all the way to the zoo.

milk is your favorite drink.

you would drink a gallon of milk a day if we let you.

not exaggerating.

you would rather drink milk than eat food.

you went on a hunger strike for almost a month last month because you only wanted milk "mil-mil"!

then you couldn't poop for 5 days,

and then you did,

and i finally decided i'd better not let you have that much milk anymore.

you get really mad,

scream and cry by the fridge,

begging for your milk,

and it is so so so cute.

you drink your milk like you have been walking through the sahara desert, 

fasting for 40 days and 40 nights every time you drink it.

every time.

panting for air after each long set of gulps.

like there was no man thirstier than you on the entire planet.

it's hysterical.

you are happy all of the time.

except when you're hungry.

then you cry for no apparent reason,

and i can't figure out why you're crying because nothing really bothers you,

and then all of a sudden i realize it's because you're hungry,

give you food,

and you act like some kind of animal that hasn't eaten in months.

you despise being rushed.

you have been this way since the day we brought you home from the hospital.

too bad you're the third child and you're life is usually rushed.

you laugh when people laugh.

you cry at sad parts in movies.

like when we took you to frozen on brennan's birthday and anna froze,

your eyes teared up with a pool of tears,

and then a glistening tear fell down your face.

you have the best facial expressions.

you love to play with the big kids.

you are obsessed with lightening "ma-keen" and "made" {mater},

and anything planes and trains {"too-too"}.

you love to push cars around the coffee table,

and smash and crash things out of your way.

you will play cars for HOURS all by yourself.

you say hi when people walk by you in the grocery store,

you love to talk on the phone,

and always say "bye" clear as night and day.

you love to sleep.

when i put you in your bed you roll onto your side with your "B" {blue dog binky}, 

barney, and a blankie, and go right to sleep.

you take a 3 hour nap every day,

and sleep almost 12 hours every night.

sometimes i wonder if you're not really asleep in there,

that maybe you're just so happy to lay there and suck on your binky in your own peace and quiet,

but most of the time when i check on you,

you are still totally passed out and asleep.

sometimes you are awake and laying on your back staring up at the cowboys and horsies on your curtains enjoying your binky though;)

you aren't trying to climb out of your crib yet.

see previous binky peace and quiet comments.

i can take you anywhere and i know you will be good.

i never worry about taking you anywhere.

you play at the park like a big kid with max and brennan like you are the same age as them,

and will swing in the baby swing for an hour if i let you.

you say "cheese" for pictures, and it reminds me of how max did that when she was 2.

it's so cute.

you know what's going on.

you just know what's up almost all of the time.

and it always surprises me how much you are "with it."

you ask for kleenexes.

wipe up when you drip milk out of your cereal bowl.

and ask to have your hands and face wiped off when they are sticky.

you are tall.

you love it when your dad comes home from work.

you whip around the corner and all but launch yourself down the little stairs to get to him before anyone else.

you cry and sob every day when he leaves for work,

and ask for him when i get you out of your crib on the mornings when he's already left.

you love to shoot cade's star war's guns.

susie gave you the white one that lights up because after two hours of shooting it out front,

it was just obvious that you were meant for it and it was meant for you.

sometimes i find you hiding in the coat closet with it just shooting it in the dark so you can see the blue and orange lights better in there.

you love to sleep in my closet.

when grandpa ryan comes to stay with us you run a little faster to hurry into your bed because you just love sleeping in the dark of our closet so very much.

you make growling sounds, and laugh at yourself,

and light up any sad day that anyone in our family is having.

it's a gift.

one of your special gifts you were born with.

that's what i believe.

you call me "momeee" and hold out the "e" sound at the end so long.

i don't ever get tired of hearing you say it.

you are my only baby that calls me that.

you love a bath.

10 hours in the bath would still not be a long enough bath for you.

you hate to be left out.

you always want to be included.

third child:)

you love to push trucks

watch trucks

tractors

the garbage truck in the mornings

the mail truck in the afternoon

any kind of truck

you don't discriminate against any truck.

you love to wrestle with brennan.

he body slams you,

you cry,

but you don't want to stop.

you're tough.

you love tee-vee.

anything on it you love.

pbs nightly news

kid movies

main title screen on dvds that aren't even playing.

just stick you in front of the glowing tube and it's like you're a mosquito headed to the light.

if you hear the word treat, cookie, cake, anything sweet you come runnin'.

you open your mouth really big and say "ah-ahhh" and point with your finger just to make sure we know you're interested in having whatever we have in your mouth.

your favorite word is "NO".

sometimes you will say "no" even when you mean yes just because it's always you're first response to everything.

it's super super funny.

even when it's not.

brennan says his favorite thing about you is that you do whatever he does.

max's favorite thing to do with you is hug you and go outside with you.

my favorite thing to do with you is kiss your lips and hug your chubby body, and have you lay your head on my shoulder with a blanket snuggled up around you, and play cars with you.

daddy's favorite thing to do with you is play with you and tickle you, and listen to you laugh.

we love you

LOVE YOU

LOVE YOU

chaser man!!!!

and then i got about 30 pictures of him smiling in his birthday crown.

yesssssss.

i know i'm a genius. i know:)

i just kept giving him whipped cream shots between every three pictures.

win.

{note: birthdays after day light SAVIN time=still light outside. who knew?}

tonight i realized that this is it.

it doesn't get any better than this!

loads of cousins and grandparents and aunts and uncles stuffing my house full on my kid's birthdays.

better than any themed party.

just faces that i love all around and a store bought over priced decorated cake from harmon's.

and cookies.

cause sometimes i also make cookies.

or just this one time.

whichever.

{p.s. these were STUPID GOOD.}

...

and in 5 years when everyone's off on missions,

getting married,

moving away,

and so on and so forth

parties won't be like this anymore.

and then i got sad.

but for tonight,

i just want to pretend that nights like these are going to last forever.

because forever is the only amount of time that would do these kind of nights justice.

rich in family and sweets.

doesn't get any better.

ok, cars and trucks are great too.

especially when you're 2 and a boy.

happy birthday baby man.

i love you forever.

mom

the baby man's BIRTHday.

dear chase,

you came out blue.

purple blue.

with red hair.

i remember you didn't cry,

and i kept asking if everything was ok,

and dr. nielson said everything was ok,

but it just started to freak me out the longer you went without crying.

because none of my other babies had ever gone this long without crying.

not even makenzie maxine.

but dr. nielson just kept telling me that everything was going to be fine,

and eventually after some good sucks from the good old fashioned O2 tank,

you really were fine.

and then there you were,

with your bright red hair all cleaned up,

and in a blue and white striped cap,

with pink chubby gooshy skin,

in my arms.

and i just couldn't get over that i had another 9lb baby. 

more than a 9lb baby.

AGAIN!

and dad and i just sat there staring at you,

and i remember i telling him i thought you looked like you had a good sense of humor.

and was it even possible to think that a 10 minute old baby could look like they had a good sense of humor?

but you did.

you just did.

and you do.

you really really do.

have a really good sense of humor.

and i could see it in your face.

from the very first minutes you were in my arms

when you were born.

i fed you,

we all cooed over you.

grandma and grandpa sandie held you.

they snuck up to the hospital first.

and got to marvel over you all to themselves.

then after about an hour of that dad wheeled you off to your bath,

and they wheeled me off to our other room.

grandma and grandpa gibson were there,

and grandma carol was there.

and grandma and grandpa sandie walked up there too.

there was never a hall so full of grandparents 

in love 

with a chubby red headed comedian baby ever!

you were the chubbiest,

fattest, cuddliest little baby man.

i loved just holding you in front of me,

and staring at you with all of your chub a chubs.

and putting my hands through your bright red hair.

we told all of the nurses how my grandpa and sean's grandma and bunches of both of our cousins all have red hair,

and i'm still not sure why i was so surprised to get a red head.

i should have expected all 3 of you to be red heads.

and when i would put my hands through your hair,

it would get all greasy,

and that would make it even more red.

you wanted to sleep more than you wanted to eat.

typical boy newborn.

at least with my experience.

but you never really cried.

and you were happy to BE.

our go with the flow baby man.

i love chase ray!

HAPPY HAPPIEST BIRTHDAY!!!!!

love,

mom

"throw away the coloring books!!!" -that art teacher in college

"throw away the coloring books! 

throw away the coloring books!!!"

that's what my children's art teacher in college at chico state came in screaming at us 

the very first day of class, before he even told us his name and his favorite color.

i've never forgotten that teacher.

and it was always my favorite class.

she started giving them eyelashes this week.

and brennan has been working on his mater and mcqueen.

very exciting around here.

THE BIG TIME

of creativity through art:)

#sleepyheadmater

above: what my table looks like all day, 

every day, between breakfast, lunch, and dinner.

and i love it:)

i've been working on my zebra and giraffe.

we have been talking a lot about their spots and stripes.

i can't wait to see what they come up with this week!

...

"Find joy in your children. Don't over-schedule them or yourself. You may not be able to take them on exotic vacations. It doesn't matter. When the day dawns bright and sunny, take an excursion to the canyon or the park. When it's cloudy and wet, read a book together or make something good to eat. Give them time to explore and learn about the feel of grass and the wiggliness of worms."

-Marjorie Pay Hinckley

...

amen.

it's just not max's year with bathrooms {is there really a hyphen in bandAid???}

while standing in a hot shower with conditioner in my hair 

and massaging proactive face wash onto my face,

i all of a sudden heard the sound of glass breaking on tile....

let it be the pink

let it be the pink

let it be THE pink!

because the pink is practically see through anyway,

and the sparkles in the pink polish might just blend in with the travertine if i'm lucky.

that's what i was thinking as i was franctically washing out the conditioner from my hair,

holding my breath, hoping it wasn't the red.

it 

was 

the 

red.

i have never washed conditioner out of my hair so fast in my life.

i told max to not move.

lots of times i think.

she said sorry,

and asked when we could go buy more.

i just kept wiping up OPI deer valley spice one cotton swab at a time.

with an entire bottle of acetone.

naked, with a towel wrapped up on top of my head.

true story.

during which time max informed me i had "baby boobs."

and went on to explain to me that there are big flowers and then there are little flowers,

and all of them are just different.

memories:)

of course,

in all non life threatening moments of my life 

you can always count on me to take a picture of the crime scene.

even when i'm naked with a towel wrapped up on my head.

i have no shame.

this is what happens when you spend all of your day 

around tiny humans that don't really notice nudity at all.

more than 24 hours later my house still smells like acetone,

even though i had sean promptly take the bag out to the curb the minute he walked in the door from Saturday morning at the clinic.

it took me 3 hours to dry my hair from the time i got into the shower,

until the time i cleaned up all of the red polish.

which basically means i got it wet in the sink about 17 times during the process to re-wet the hair that kept drying along the way.

i felt like a hamster on a wheel.

lots of runnin' but gettin' nowhere fast.

i blame the nail polish.

it all started going bad with the nail polish.

the kids fought,

brennan pulled max's hair,

or was it the other way around?

chase wanted the marker max had.

chase ate the marker max had.

brennan growled at max.

chase looked at max.

AAAAAAAND THEEEEEEEEEEEENNNNNNNNNNN,

chase stepped on a piece of glass i missed.

while i was trying to dry my hair for the 15th time with no luck.

which i didn't realize at first because the blower was so loud i couldn't hear him.

the thing just flowed like a little faucet on the bottom of his little chubby foot,

so i snapped a pic to send to all of the grandparents, close family friends, and 2nd cousins once removed,

just so everyone could be a part of my inability to dry my hair on saturday morning,

and so he wouldn't track blood spots all over the carpet in the house.

embrace the chaos.

that's what i just kept telling myself.

at which point i thought,

we're gonna need a bandaid folks.

and a band-aid might get my hair dry!

not the band-aid itself.

you know what i mean.

which most people would be excited for.

i mean, i'm always excited for band-aids.

because every mom knows there's nothing more exciting than having some real live blood 

on a real live kid to constitute the need for an actual bandaid!

a real live reason for a real live bandaid!

max and brennan were literally clapping, jumping, and cheering for him they were so excited.

band-aid!!!!!!!!

so we thought we'd try to lure him with the mcqueen band-aids.

MATER EVEN!!!

but deep down we knew.

no can do.

the man would not be pawed at.

he ripped that mater off less than 2 minutes later,

and it only lasted that long because we held his ankle the entire time so he couldn't take it off.

he hates band-aides.

what kid hates band-aids?

CHASE.

chase hates band-aids.

i finally get into the phase of my mothering life 

where i hand out band-aids like bribes for candy,

and i have a baby that not only isn't woo'd by them,

but refuses to wear them.

oh the irony.

someone called you barf face.

want a band-aid?

your milk curdled in the 3 day old sippy you found under the couch and you drank it.

want a band-aid?

you found out christmas only comes once a year, not once a week.

want a band-aid?

your sister got hurt, and you feel badly for her.

want a band-aid?

don't want to do your homework?

how about if you wear a band-aid on your arm while you're doing it?!

really, this is how i do it now.

say i with me:

"baaaaaannnnnddddd-AIDs"

they aid you in all of your times of mothering needs:)

pick your favorite disney princess,

cars character,

tinker bell themed,

avengers,

sesame street,

muppets stick on band-aids!

we've got them all.

all for your choosing pleasure:)

to soothe anything that might upset you at any point of your day.

they are $5 per box.

totally worth the money and fighting childhood obesity one band-aid at a time.

or something.

except like i said,

chase is not woo'd.

maybe he'll learn to love pennies...

i've got a mason jar full of pennies.

i'm thinking we're going to need more than just acetone for this....

did i mention we just had the tile professionally cleaned and fixed?

yeah, well, we did.

it's just not max's year with bathrooms.