Summer recap and Fall happenings!

*Be prepared for lots of rambling and lots of pictures!

I cannot believe its been so long since I've posted! Looks like I took the summer (& then some!) off, so I really wanted to update my little blog and do a quick recap!

Life with four kiddos is BUSY. We are constantly going, going, going.

We had a really great summer...Grant has therapy 3 mornings a week (2 speech sessions and 1 hour of OT), so as you can imagine, the driving back and forth as well as the therapy time itself takes up a lot of time. Almost every Monday of summer break I took the kids to the library and they picked out a few books to read while we were in the waiting room. And of course we have our weekly Target trip and a grocery store/errands morning too.We usually spent most of our afternoons swimming at my parents pool and trying to beat the heat!

4th of July!

In July we had our family vacation at Great Wolf Lodge in Charlotte. We wanted to stay somewhere closeish to home (aka little travel with a baby!) & we wanted something that would work for our WHOLE family, and Great Wolf Lodge was PERFECT. Its an indoor water park resort that has areas for the whole family. I spent most of my time in the kiddie area with Grant and Clara while Kane and the boys hit up all the water slides. It was surprisingly relaxing for me-Grant had a blast playing in the baby/toddler area and since it only goes to 1.5 foot deep, he could navigate the whole area without me having to follow him around. Clara and I sat in the zero depth area and she splashed away! Kane and the boys would always swing by & come check on us every 45min-hour and I would go on a few rides with the boys then too. The best part was that our hotel room was just down the hallway from the entrance to the water park so I could go back to the room with the babies whenever I needed! That was great for when Clara would get cranky and needed a nap & Grant needed a snack or something. We would leave and go out to dinner every night, & then return for late night fun at the resort arcade and bowling area. The last day there, we left that afternoon and stayed at a different hotel in Charlotte so that we could take the boys to visit a few landmarks. We went to the Carolina Panthers Stadium & we toured the Billy Graham library (which was so cool!! so much history there!). We had SUCH a good week & made so many wonderful memories with the kids...we are already planning to go back again when we can!!

After being home for ONE day from our vacation, me and Kane turned around and went back to Charlotte for Kane's annual meeting with corporate. He spent the morning and early afternoon in a meeting, and I had a glorious day shopping and eating lunch BY MYSELF, which never ever EVER happens. I missed the kids like crazy (esp Clara since it was the first time I had ever left her), but it was so needed. I really needed that little break. Once Kane got out of his meeting, we went back to the hotel for a few hours and then headed to a cookout at the president of the company's home on Lake Norman.

The first week of August brought the start of football for Carson! Harp decided not to play this year (he would rather play on the playground with the other kids), & that has taken up a huge chunk of time. He has improved SO much since the start of the season, so its nice to see the hard work pay off!

The end of August means back to school time! Our summer felt like it went by SO fast, but even so, the boys were ready to go back and to see their friends. They both love school SO much, and we all enjoy the routine school brings! Carson started 3rd grade this year and Harp's in 2nd! They both have amazing teachers this year and I am SO excited about that!

Our Clara girl is growing so fast! She is just two months away from her first birthday and my heart can hardly stand it. Her (big) personality is really starting to show! She is such a friendly baby with a streak of sassy with a little drama thrown in. ;) I'm told it a girl thing, ha! She started crawling right after our trip to Great Wolf (I could tell she wanted to while we were vacationing...she almost took off a few times in the hotel room), and shortly after that she started pulling to a stand & now shes cruising around the furniture! She loves to clap and her favorite song is "If you're happy and you know it." She can wave (at herself, ha!) and can say "hi" and "dada." She loves to dance and follow her brothers around (mainly Grant), and her newest favorite thing to do as of late is pull all the books off the bookshelf in her room. I can't even express how much joy she has brought to our family!

8 months: 

9 months:

I wanted to jot this down for future purposes, but Grant is doing SO wonderful lately. He is really developing and his hard work in both speech and OT is finally starting to pay off. He still has a way to go, of course, but I just wanted to mention how excited I am for him. We spent the summer working on preschool stuff & he mastered identifying all of the alphabet, & identifying shapes (he already knew colors & numbers for a long time now ;). In OT he is working on pre-writing skills & using scissors, which has been trickier for him-he has fine motor delays (VERY likely due to his poor eyesight). It has been a long, long road with lots of tears and prayers. My personal goal for him and my main hope and prayer is that we can get him caught up to where he needs to be by the start of kindergarten. We have so much ground to cover, but I really think it can be done!

Well thats all for now! Hope to start blogging again more regularly! :) Check back in a few days for pictures of my girl at 10 months!

The Fog is Clearing

I have 4 kids now. 

Some days I can't even wrap my brain around that. FOUR. We've been a family of six for almost 6 months now (how are we already halfway through Clara's first year?!), and the fog is finally clearing. We are in our groove, our new normal. I'm feeling more and more like myself. 

I hate that I haven't kept up with our little family journal so I'm going to post a bunch of pictures with random captions to catch up on whats been going on over the last several months!

Here goes:

I took this of the kiddos back in March. I wanted a picture of them all together. Holy Cow. I felt like I had wrestled a bear trying to get a picture of all them looking at me, but I managed to snag one. (secret: Carson's eyes were actually closed in this one, so I had to photoshop his eyes.) 

Heres another group pic: I think this was before my mom's birthday dinner at the end of March!

A few pictures from Easter Weekend!

A flood of Clara pictures: aka guilt because I haven't blogged her little life like I did with the boys! ;)

Sweet girl at 5 months!

Dimples

Harp showing off his artwork that was on display at our local Spring Festival! He was super proud (and we were, too!) 

So...I just realized I submitted this post before finishing this post sometime last week...maybe the fog hasn't cleared as much as I had thought, ha!

Continuing...

I can't forget to mention how much progress Grant has made! I decided to get him evaluated for Occupation Therapy right after his 3rd birthday. He definitely qualified for services, so he goes for 1 hour every week. I really think it has been wonderful for him! Apart of OT is feeding therapy and ever since he started, he has been eating SOO much better. I also requested around his 3rd birthday for an extra speech therapy session which was obviously approved. So he goes to speech 2x a week now (once at the office and once at home). After the summer I am going to push for both sessions being at the office...I really think it benefits him SO much more than the sessions at home. Anyways, enough rambling with that!

 Grant always uses 2-4 word phrases now...that doesn't seem like a big deal, but it is HUGE for him. He was evaluated for speech during our annual craniofacial appointment back in March, and the speech pathologist there thinks he has a touch of Apraxia of Speech (which, thanks to my "Medical License" in google, I had already gathered he had, ha!). Anyways, for Grant that means his brain is not being able to put a sentence together, despite being able to say each individual word correctly. For example, if you ask him to say "I love going outside!" he can say each of those words individually "i" "love" "going" "outside" however, when you tell him to say it as a sentence, "I love going" ends up becoming jumbled gibberish and he'll end with "outside". Its confusing and complicated,  but it suits Grant because NOTHING with him is ever easy! :)

Potty training....is not going. We're on a break until schools out for the boys. He understands the concept, he knows what he is suppose to do, he can say the words, recognize when he urinates, stay dry for long periods of time. It is not a battle of the wills, it is 100 percent a sensory issue. I have a game plan in place but honestly its more of a Clara issue at this point-I need her to be a little older so I can devote the time and effort to potty train Grant.

Last but not least...we went back for a repeat hearing test on Friday...they weren't able to get the results (which is very frustrating because I told them on the phone they wouldn't be able to...not getting into that right now, though...), so we are going back for a sedated hearing test next. We will know definitely if there is or is not hearing loss.

 

Carson and Harper are doing so good, as always :) Excelling in school, enjoying their childhood to the fullest extent. Carson is playing tackle football this fall which I'm nervous about, and Harp decided not to and wants to take hip hop dance classes...we are signing him up for summer classes which will be so much fun to watch! :)

They sat on our front steps and waited all week for the ice cream truck to come by...he finally came by while they were outside and were just SO excited!



Well that is definitely all for now...longest post for me in a while and it only took a week to type up, ha! 

Grant is THREE!

Grant Joseph is THREE years old today!!!

That seriously blows.my.mind. I feel like I was JUST documenting his first year of life! 

Here is just a quick peek at what Grant is like at 3 years old!

-Grant still LOVES Barney and Elmo. He sings and dances along every day! He really likes to watch short Sesame Street Songs on youtube...his current faves are Pentatonix Sings to Five and the 3 Primary Colors song.

-Grant loves pretty much all breakfast foods (just don't mix his cereal and milk together-hysterical tantrum will ensue!). He's currently stuck in a chicken nugget and milk routine for lunch that I'm trying to break, and dinner is definitely a toss up.

-Grant can count to 20 (well, with a couple of extra 13's thrown in there, ha!). He can count actual objects up to about 10, he can sort colors and some objects into like groups, he can identify his numbers up to 5,  he can say his ABCs, but we haven't really gotten to identifying them yet! I'm pretty sure he knows his colors, but likes to blurt out any color he can think of before I even point to something, so it's hard to quiz him :) *I'm documenting this so I can look back to see his progress. Grant has come SO far in the last year and still has a way to go to get caught up, but I am SO SO proud of him!

-Grant is still working hard in speech! He's about to start going twice a week and I really think it's going to be good for him. He started putting words together and can identify more objects than I can count...our next step is really working towards answering us when we ask him questions and then speaking more spontaneously (instead of just when he wants something).

-Grant LOVES music. He can memorize just about any song effortlessly...his guilty pleasure is Taylor Swift, haha!

-Grant's favorite place in the world to be is outdoors. He loves to run freely and jump on the trampoline any chance he gets.

-His favorite books are Goodnight Moon and Brown Bear.

-His favorite songs are Baby Bumblebee and Bingo.

-Grant absolutely LOVES Carson and Harper. He follows them around and does and says anything they do. He goes to their room while they are at school and plays with their light sabers and gets into all the stuff he normally isn't allowed to touch ;)

-Speaking of which, Grant spends most of his waking hours teasing the boys ANY which way he can. While they are doing their homework, he runs in, snatches their homework sheet and then runs for his life, lol! He especially loves to take Carson's legos. He dives into a fetal position with Carson's treasures tucked tightly into his chest. SO funny. Well, to me...they don't think it is, ha!

-Grant is literally the most stubborn child/human being I have ever met in my life. He is like a grumpy old man trapped in a 3 yo's body. He doesn't like change. He doesn't like new stuff (all of his old stuff works just fine!). His stubbornness has really gotten into the way of his developmental growth. When his speech therapist is trying to get him to say/do/look at something, Grant will look at the ceiling and sing his ABC's at the top of his lungs. Or close his eyes tight and name any and every family member he can think of. And when he's tired of that, he'll pretend to be interested in what she's pointing at long enough to grab said object and chunk it across the room, always with a big smile on his face. Sigh. It is both hilarious and frustrating at the same time. SUCH a little stinker.

-Sweet boy still loves his Barney stuffed animal. He sleeps with him tucked in his arm every night and carries him around quite a bit during the day.

-His current favorite thing to do is to make a loud farting noise and then say, "EWWW Mama!" Or Daddy, or "Artin" or "Arper" or whoever may be around. :)

Grant absolutely adores Clara. He smothers her with kisses and hugs alllll day long (bless her heart, ha!). He watches carefully when I change her diaper and makes sure I always put "pow-per" on her. He calls her Twara and I secretly hope he always calls her that.

************

We had a small party at our home yesterday. He LOVED when we sang Happy Birthday to him and he actually was somewhat interested in his presents (which was big surprise!) Here are some pics:

Singing Happy Birthday...I have a video I'll upload later!

Waiting patiently to open presents :)

He kept hugging all of his new clothes, haha!

He was NOT in a picture taking mood!

Happy THIRD Birthday Grant!!! We love you SO much sweet boy-words cannot even express!!!

Clara at 2 months!

I'm a little behind, but Clara Amelia is 2 months old now! She is so little (especially compared to my boys at this age!). She weighed in at 10lbs 2oz  and was 21in long...I think she is going to be petite! Clara has dark blue/grey eyes and a cute dimple in her right cheek. She is such a sweet baby, although definitely on the fussier side. She has a LOT of gas issues that we are still working through. She smiles so big and coos so sweetly when you talk to her. She's holding her head up pretty good and hates tummy time (typical Trocheman baby!) She loves her brothers and they are absolutely head-over-heels in love with her! They are all so good to her and love to hold her and kiss her. Grant has really come around and walks by her all day long and says, "HI TWARA!" Here are a few pictures of our sweet girl:

All for now!