{another visitor}

we have been so spoiled to have not one but two grandma's come help out.  gramma rabe came out for 10 days which made the boys extremely happy.  they did a lot of snuggle time watching movies.

we stared at this little guy all day.

even though this picture is blurry, ike gave us his fist little smirk.  i love this boy so much!

gramma played with the crazies for hours and hours.  they went from the trains to the car garage and back and forth.  she was a good sport.  luke was always asking, "gramma, do you want to go upstairs and play trains with me?"  how can you resist him?

they gave gramma lots of kisses and loves.

ike was even able to sneak in some gramma time.  

and then nolan came around to tackle his brother and gramma.

my nolan is such a loving kid.  he loves to snuggle.  i hope he stays like that forever!

we tried to get a good picture of the boys with gramma but not everyone was looking at the camera at once.  so we took a bunch.

thank you so much ann for coming out and helping us adjust to having a new little one.  it was so much fun to have you.  we did quite a bit while she was here.  jake and i were able to go on 2 dates!!!  what?  we haven't done that in years.  we went out to dinner 2 times as a family.  the boys did great.  and we had many good talks with ann.  sure glad we have such amazing parents.  

hopefully the next time our family sees us will be in ut!  cross your fingers that it can happen.  ike will be 6 months old if it happens.  i guess we'll need to do a ton of skyping. 

{the crazies}

after my mom left us we had a week by ourselves and we had a great time.  nolan and luke are in to dress up (boys version) and nolan wanted ike to join in on the fun.  so ike became batman for a day.  i thought it was pretty funny and so did nolan when he came running to me to tell me that ike was batman.  

the crazies had their first bath together.  ike was a "bit" jaundice, nolan was oh so thrilled, and luke......well, he looks like a homeless child that never gets food.  funny thing is, we just took him to his 3 yr check up and he was in the 30% for weight.  normally he is in the 3%.  he is just one long and skinny kid.  what you can't tell from this picture is two seconds after we put ike in the tub he began pushing and out came a huge mess.  there was poop everywhere.  kind of gross.  but that's what boys are, right?

and then there was snuggle time with daddy.  jake has been on an easier rotation this month so ike and everyone else gets to benefit from it.  ike loves when he gets to relax with daddy.  i think this picture is too cute for words.  i really love my family.

{at home}

life has been so great with ike in our home.  i am trying to soak up every moment i have with this little man.  he is seriously so precious.  all of us can't get enough of him.  i would say nolan is still the one that is so concerned about ike.  i love seeing nolan take the role of big brother so well.

poor ike has been a bit jaundice and we have been going to the hospital everyday to get his heal pricked to see if his levels have gone down.  he peaked on day 5 and is SLOWLY going down.  if you can't tell his eyes are super yellow.  he looks so much better today.

we've been doing plenty of tummy time even with ike not loving it so much.

nolan has been the best at holding him.  he is asking all day long if he can hold his brother.

the boys helped grammy make some delicious heart sugar cookies.

they each took turns rolling out the dough.

not many cookies were made in the process because the boys were continually eating the dough.  i think they learned to do that from me.  i usually double the batch so that i can eat as i go.  

i think nolan is pretty studly.  i'm so amazed at how much he's grown.

lukie is such a cookie monster.  he was always grabbing the dough and eating it, even after we had cut the shapes.

this next picture might gross you out but we were laughing so hard about it.  nolan was really digging the cookie dough and decided to take matters in to his own hands by stuffing a huge amount of dough in his mouth.  he could barely chew.  we were laughing so hard, which made him start laughing and he couldn't handle it anymore so he decided to spit the whole wad out of his mouth.  pretty disgusting if you ask me.

and while we were dying over this.....ike was doing this....

such a sweet baby.  we love him so much!

the boys were so thoughtful because after we had baked the cookies they brought them over to ike to share with him.  they wanted their little brother to join in on the fun.  they brought the cookie sheets (already cooled) over to ike's side.  i love seeing how much my boys like their little brother.

we also added two knew members to our family.  yes, that's right.  we got our boys some lizards.  nolan named his frank (thanks haley for the name idea) and lukie named his jack.  they haven't stopped staring at them in their little habitat.  

jake was hard at work building the lizard's home.  i have to say he did a fabulous job!  don't you think?

here's a picture of jack.  i didn't get a great picture of frank.  he tends to hide in the leaves and sit there for hours at a time.

i can't believed i agreed to this.  but our boys were so excited to get a pet and i wasn't going to do anything big or crazy.  jake told the boys about when he was a kid what pets they had and the boys immediately wanted a lizard.  so now i have to mist the lizards twice a day and feed them crickets.  yes people, crickets.  we already had one of the crickets escape and is somewhere dying in our house.  the things we do for our kids to make them happy.  i'm sure we will do so much more.  

and we are very sad that grammy's stay with us is over.  she left us this morning and the boys have already been asking to play with her.  i can't tell you how much my mom helped us transition with this new baby.  she cleaned, cooked, played with the boys, cuddle ike, and took me shopping to buy me some fat pants.  she was such a great help to me.  i am so lucky to have her as my mom.  thanks mom!  love you and know that my boys love you too!

so that's what has been going on at our home this past week.  life is flying by and we love it all.  even the sleepless nights holding my little ikester.  i'm so in love with my family.