A few years down the road...

Hey! Fast Forward about 4 years from the last post and here we are! I haven't even had a second thought about this blog. We now have 3 girls under 5 years old and are busy with them. :) Brian has been working 2 jobs for about 3 years, but recently (as in less than a week ago) quit job #2. So... now he is trying to use that time to take more photos and do more things dealing with that. He is great at what he does at Ancestry.com (where he still works full time), but he really loves photography and anything to do with it. So we're putting our faith in the Lord that he can make something work with this new change. :) I'm still at home with our kids. It gets so overwhelming and frustrating somedays, but I'm a "Mommy-In-Progress" so I'm trying not to yell and lose patience so much (which is honestly the hardest thing I think I've ever had to do). I'm bad at it, but every day is a new day and I just keep trying again every day. I still do graphic design jobs on the side, but it gets really hard to take care of kids, house, cub scouts and everything else and not go crazy with adding more to that list. Sooo... I am not actively trying to get more clients at the moment (though projects still seem to find me often enough). :) Our oldest is 4 1/2, and she is ready to go to kindergarten NOW. However, her birthday isn't until November, so she'll have to wait another year. To help her pass the time and be more confident in kindergarten, she's participating in the Upstart program that does school online for 15 min./day, 5 days/week. We're also about to start her in the neighborhood Joy School so she'll have some friends and be better about social interaction when she starts kindergarten. This means that I will also be teaching every other month or so at our house. Not sure how that will go, but we will see I guess. :) #2 kid just turned 3 and is in love with being 3. :) Anything that has 3 in it was made especially with her in mind (How did they know?). She's a fun, sweet little thing and helps lighten the mood. She also has a super dramatic side that keeps us up to our eyeballs in crocodile tears at the moment. She wants to be big just like her older sister and she wants to be a mom when she grows up. She can't wait until she can be a mom. :) She's much less pragmatic and logical than our oldest. They get along, but they always want to do and play with the same things, so many arguments and fights ensue. #3 is 11 months now and I can't believe how fast the time has flown by since she was born. She's a curious, curious girl and seems to get into even more trouble than her older sisters did at this age. She's just learning to walk (has walked across the room a few times), but still prefers crawling because it's faster and easier to make a quick get away. She love her blanket and bottles. She is a big girl. :) She was born weighing 11 lb. 10 oz. and 22" long. She has remained in the 90% in height and weight for her whole life so far. A little different than her sisters, who usually sit in the 25% to 50% areas. It's a blessing that she is as big as she is. Her sister love the heck out of her. They can't stand not hugging, kissing and touching her. She's fairly patient with them, but it's not her favorite thing by any means. :) She and her older sister both were born with cleft lips and have had to have surgery at 3 months old. There are many more surgeries to come, but we were lucky and they only had cleft lips and not palates (which they were both thought to have looking at ultrasounds). Well. I've successfully used up time that I should have been doing something more productive with, so I will have to try to update this again soon (at least sooner than last time).