things to remember...

 A B E L

i hope i never forget...

the way you sort things + line things up + organize things just so... you've always done this.

Teaching you to play go fish.

When you asked me if you'd be a daddy when you grew up + said you wanted to marry me.

when you asked me where dad was + i told you Las Vegas, and you responded with, "is he lost? is it a lost place?"

the little boy that is coming out in you... your new language where you really just speak/rap gibberish + experiment with consonants.

when you told me the other night while brushing your teeth, in a suddenly concerned tone, "mommy i can't say shit" --i held back laughter... ummm yes abel that's right, you can't.

Spoiling dinner by eating the "cotton candy" clouds in the sunset, on the porch with you and Lucy + Isla.

the way you call dessert "uh-zert" + typically ask for it after every meal.

how you love people + how your sweet + naive, childlike spirit loves and accepts even the ones who i struggle to, no questions asked

speaking of questions, it's more like 85 billion questions asked, always... about everything... most times twice.

you're so special abel. you'll be 4 soon + i can't believe you've been ours so long. you're the best helper, best little companion, you take care of your sisters, still give the best morning hugs + are all around just my favorite little boy in the history of little boys. i'm so proud of you.

L U C Y 

i hope i never forget... the way you say, "are you kidding me?" how you always ask for hot chocolate because abel is having some, but how you don't really like hot chocolate- you like chocolate milk, and basically wait until your hot chocolate is cold to drink it. I love when you say you wanna be "nex by ____ (insert you, daddy, Abel or babe.)" i hope i never forget your voice. FOREVER. serious hopes for a never changing voice from you my girl! That you ARE the party. Your hysterical + wild + fun nature. Your ummms, your dance class tights, the way you bring your hands to cover your bursting smile when something surprises you or makes you laugh a lot. Your hand gestures in general  + the way you tell stories. The way you always want to do what Abel is doing, and how sweet + loving you are with "babe" -Isla. I'm thankful for how you love me + still need me so much, how you always want me to hold you + snuggle you... I have to remind myself sometimes of how special this is, because in the moment it can feel like I don't have enough hands + be overwhelming because I'm feeding isla or catering to needs of your siblings, but it's so special + I know one day you won't. You're more beautiful than ever + i'm so lucky to be your mom. 

I S L A

i hope i never forget...

Your warm, soft cheeks after you nurse, your gruff little voice, the buried face in my shoulder when you flirt with daddy, the tummy that just won't quit + your precious hands(I've swooned over them since the day you were born). The way you looove the bath, crunchy paper + how I love the sweet blonde fuzz that adorns your perfectly shaped head. I hope I never forget the saving grace you've been, nearly every day of your life. Sometimes 3 kids feels like 30 kids + when the mood is just right (& by that I absolutely mean when it's not just right- like AT ALL) YOU my sweet one are my exhale. 

things to remember...

isla has been with us for three months now, and my big kids seem big... three months really isn't that long, but pictures don't lie + they all look a million years older. i just love them, big or small. i try and make a note anytime they do or say something especially cute so that i can at some point write it here and remember it when three months from now or three years or thirty, they are doing something totally different. so, now felt like a good time to catch up on the past three months + also share these sweet photos in our favorite L'ovedbaby jammies!

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sweet isla jane... feels like she's been a part of us forever. i know her face + love every bit of her. i love to kiss the sweet spot behind her ear, the space between her eyes, or the spot between her nose and mouth. basically if i could kiss her whole face at once i would. she is the happiest, chattiest, easiest, prize baby ever + the perfect third child. she flirts with me in the mirror + when she nurses, and i spend soooo much time that i "should" be using for the continuous pile of laundry that keeps showing up on our couch, playing with her instead... i couldn't be happier about that. 

the other day, abel introduced himself and arrow to our neighbor as, "i'm captain jake + my matey is minnie."

mornings with lucy 

when we went to the drive in, abel gave me his red sour patch kids, even though he told everyone else it was his favorite color and they could have a different one.

chatting with isla 

lucys hand gestures + head tilting + generally everything about her delivery of conversation... bottle it up + play it back on repeat.

i hope abel never stops saying adventure "adbenture" or calling making smores around a fire "camping" 

please let me never forget the time lucy told me that "harlow ate it" when she finished her marshmallow and wanted another. 

when every conversation with abel during the months of july, august and september starts with him saying, "let's talk about Halloween" -- my child 

lucy's baby talk voice, "awwww baby booo" or the time she told me isla was hungry and to "feed her yours boobs"

"i sure can!"

they're sweet little bodies curled up in my lap

on the 4th of july, i gave abel a penny for the fountain and he kissed it before tossing it in. fairly certain that my postpartum emotions and i cried tears over that preciousness. 

when my stomach growled and lucy told me my tummy burped

"I'm building frosty for Lucy, he's a jolly happy soul" -- abel

abel + lucy's pirate faces, forever

"let's make a baby train and go to target! sometimes auntie comes with us!"--abel

...and by sometimes he means every time.

**all jammies are l'ovedbaby brand! 100% organic goodness, awesome colorways + such great people behind it! thanks for making our morning scene that much sweeter!**

things to remember, again.

i hope i never ever forget...

the time abel came running into my room exclaiming, "mom! mom! hiwawee!!" and grabbing my hand to pull me into the other room... to where i'd find lucy naked at the piano with a pile of poo right beside her, and he says, "she pooped! right there on the bench!".... a reminder that i allowed the naked run around between diaper changes to last one minute too long.

the time harvey stunk up the kids room + i told him to leave, and abel picks up his red guitar, follows him to the hall + begins singing, "harvey, please don't fart in our facessss, please don't fart in my faaace."

every little thing lucy says ever.

my kids obsesssssssionnnn with band-aids

my text conversation with chris on giving up sugar, or not giving it up ;)

the time i changed lucy's diaper, then just sent her on her way in her bloomers, then asked why there was a random diaper on the couch... "must have just grabbed an extra by mistake"... then realized what i had done, wow.

the time abel asked to have an apple with honey like his uncle josh, but to top it with sprinkles :)

lucy singing chris happy birthday

how excited the kids are to do "their jobs" which is letting the dogs out when we get home, abel opens the kennel, lucy opens the dog door... dream team.

the time arrow was petting harlow's belly + noticed her nipples and exclaimed, "look at all those teeters!!" -- crying laughing now just re-thinking about it!

picking flowers (dandelions) + putting them in a cup, every single day

when abel tells lucy not to cry, he is going to protect her (whenever talk of being babysat comes up)

abel putting the kibosh on the easter bunny. "no! himma bite me! himma stay at him easter bunny house!" (he later came around to the idea... still pretty undecided on santa)

the smell of chris' cologne in the bathroom long after he's left for work

hearing their conversations + watching them play together

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aaaand a little update on my sweet kiddos with more things I hope to never forget!

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A  B  E  L

abel talks alllllll the time now. like every minute of every car ride, and most of the other minutes throughout the day. this can obviously be exhausting, because it's often a lot of questions, and often times my answers don't suffice for him, leading to repeated questions, but it is mostly so good to me and i try to take the teaching moments and make the most of them, and hear where his little heart and thoughts are at. it also makes me think just MAYBE it could bring an end to our passy days (praying that one up hard). it's CRAZY to hear how his brain is working + always full + jumbled + moving fast... i let chris know that this is how the inside of my head sounds + he suddenly understood me so much more. 

whenever we finish something or leave from somewhere, he always tells me had fun doing said thing or place.

he told me he was going to grow up soon today... i wanted to cry + told him nope not happening, and so he started smiling and flexing his arms muscles at me like it was happening right there before my eyes, and then we laughed about it.

a few of my favorite things abel regularly says right now are:

"look at my face." -- (if you ain't lookin', you ain't listenin')

"really super"-- he will tell me that the baby is going to be really super tiny, or he will tell me he wants to snuggle really super tight & then wrap both of his arms around my neck REALLY SUPER TIGHT, nothing better. 

hippos.

he is big on letting us know things we shouldn't say, he usually tells us in a whisper. some times he's confused... like the time I said something was "so sick" + was reprimanded for it, most of the time he's right... "mom, don't say dang it"... and I never noticed how often I said things were stupid (so embarrassing). we mostly just try to play it safe now and stick to "aww coconuts!" (from jake) -- if our kids aren't little mirrors right?!

speaking of the whisper, it's the cutest + funniest thing ever. soooo much is meant to be whispered these days + he typically speaks slowly, and lays his hand on his cheek when he does it, obviously thinking he's doing the hand beside the mouth/whispering gesture.

EVERY time i wear a dress, which is most days now since the whole being done with pants thing I mentioned in one of my recent posts, he tells me, "mommy i love your pretty dress" + then i love him more than i thought i could, because how sweet + thoughtful + observant, and also what mom or pregnant woman doesn't need to hear that on the regular?!

he loves pumpkin seeds, smoothies, his hair flat, his paw patrol shirt (that's a serious choosing my battles moment when he asks to continuously wear it + i agree to him wearing it under something new... i think our max has only got to be like 5 days so we're good). he would eat cookies all day every day, knows my starbucks order, likes kiwi because of the crunchy seeds, says "absolutely!" in the cutest + most enthusiastic way possible, and farts around at bedtime + nap time like it's his most important job in life.

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L  U  C  Y

lucy says any + everything, such a difference from abel at this age. there is literally nothing she won't say, we laugh and look at each other regularly throughout the day because it's so crazy to hear so much from such a tiny little person. I'm thankful that she has abel ahead of her, because he's literally the sweetest child I've ever known + says wonderful things that I love to hear her repeat, like:

"me face" -- same rules apply to looking at her face when she wants to tell you something. she also uses this incorrectly, like in the car when I'm driving + she will ask me to look at her and I do and she follows it up with... nothing. 

she calls abel "abes" + like her brother, only requests "the water song" every minute of every car ride ever -- heart be still.

"jesus love me tooooooo!"

she currently has the most hysterical face going right now, where she puckers her lips and tilts her head down, looking up at you from underneath those thick, dark lashes... it's her deciding face + her sass face + it's the best ever. 

whenever she's hungry, she says "me, someping" + lately she gets the silliest hand/point thing going, and will point to everything around us, telling us what it is, while pointing + doing little knee dips. she is SUCH A HAM and knows it. i really don't know where she gets it, but it keeps us laughing always.

this morning before getting out of bed, she touched my hair + told me "hair flat, i like it!" -- NOT a bad way to wake up. 

she is obsessed with abel, and will randomly wake + ask in the middle of the night where he is + what he's doing. since we are currently in a phase of everyyyyyy one ending up in our bed during the night (your vision of me + chris on opposite islands + my growing belly hovering off the edge of the bed is correct here), he's typically right next to her + so i'm able to show her + then she just rolls over and goes back to sleep. so sweet that she loves + cares about him so much. 

i woke up at 4:30 monday to say goodbye to chris as he left for a work trip, and instead of going back to sleep to you know, prepare myself for a half week of single parenting, i decided to stay up googling the transition to three kids + work on this post here... while i lay there, lucy rolled into my side + i stopped and listened to her breathing... what a gift. 

lucy loves fruit + veggies, chocolate chips, abel, doing everything herself... EVERYTHING + ALWAYS, snuggling up next to my belly to go to sleep, flowers in her hair, her daddy, the on the farm book, me, + wants a paw patrol shirt like abel.

as i finish this post, it's the end of what was a very hard day. i failed too many times + wish i would have done better as a mom. even at the end of days like today though, those two kids are everything. they drive me insane + i love them intensely all in the same 3 minutes. i know that one day i will miss even the hard days, i will miss their sweet breath next to me at 4am, and i will miss the chaos that is life right now. so i'm letting go of today, because tomorrow is new + with it comes more grace.

i hope i never forget these things. (more things HERE)

things to remember

I hope I never ever in all my life, forget the little things. the little things that my children say and do, the way chris laughs, or toddler hands on my neck... 

the little scenes from every day life that I tuck away into my imaginary jar that can hold all of the sweet memories and never let even one of them go forgotten. 

...I haven't actually found a jar or enough room in my head to remember all of the moments that make me terribly happy, but this space thankfully can hold some of it for me.

I hope I never forget...

that most mornings for the past three years, have looked like some variety of this photo above.

intruder mickey... the night Abel left his blue mickey behind at my moms and didn't notice until we crawled into his bed. chris ran to the store to get inconsolable him another (enter red mickey) and returned to him having already fallen asleep. he layed the new Mickey in bed with him. when Abel woke in the early morning to come to our room, I heard him from across the hall and saw him as he exited his room (ALWAYS ALWAYS shutting the door behind him). he stood there studying this new intruder Mickey for a good 2 minutes before making his way into our room + crawling into bed to fall asleep... didn't say a word to me about it until morning. 

the phase of Abel bringing whatever blanket he was covered up with in his bed AND any lovies he had to our room when he'd make his way there... and running back if he ever forgot one. 

lucy squeezing my neck before bed and then saying, head... nose... chin... cheek... o'er one... lips... and kissing each mentioned spot so sweetly.

the way lucy always asks "tome?!" (come) if you tell her you are going to go somewhere

abel shouting, "go daddy! go broncos! touchdown!" at chris's soccer game

the way my kids laugh at bathroom humor (i don't know why) or when I hear them "reading" on their own... "sleep sleep poop" giggles and then turn the page and repeat

Lucy's 18 month old love of shoes. yours, mine, abels... if there's a shoe around she's gonna wear it

hearing their little conversations from the other room... 

abel: "you like daddy?" 

lucy: "uh huh!" 

abel: him really nice to you? 

lucy: "uh huh!"

when abel walks around singing "o come to the altar, the father's open wide!" or "god is so big and so mighty, there is *mumble mumble* can't do, for YOU! and points, or when he asks me to play his "water song" (grace like a wave-elevation worship) on repeat all day every day since the album came out.

lucy's grin or her 1.5 year old voice or the way she sings frozen's "summerrrrr" + the sparkle in her eyes...

abel's morning snuggles + how the smell of maple syrup triggers memories of a tinier him who always managed to have some somewhere, making him smell as snack worthy as he looked and acted.

I hope I never forget these versions of them, and next years versions of them, and last years, and on and on.