Our Colorado Adventure Begins Tomorrow

Our 16 hour (for adults who don't stop much, it will likely be 22 hours at least for us!!) journey to the cabin begins tomorrow. Many would call a trip to the mountains a vacation, but we aren't ready to label this trip as such! And don't worry we aren't driving straight through, we might be brave, but we aren't stupid:) The girls might cry half the way up there and Landon and Liam might ask 'when will we be there?' 76 times and Kevin and I might just curl up in ball and shake back and forth when we get to stopping points.....but we can't miss out on an opportunity to go to the mountains!!!! I am actually very excited, not so much about the car rides, but for the parts in between. Fishing, hiking, four-wheelers, seeing family, hearing the river......yes it's going to be fun.

So I will take many pictures and might even post before we get home......?!?!? Say a prayer for us to have safe AND pleasant travel!

Some 5 month pics of the girls!

Miss Klaire.

Kallie loves her tongue lately. She sticks it out and touches it!! She is a goof ball.

I didn't have many pictures of Kallie and Klaire in the last album I uploaded, so here are several! They are doing great. They have been loving squash this last week. Sweet potatoes are up next. I surrendered to the homemade baby food. It tastes better and is cheaper. Why I decided to do this at this point in my crazy life.....I don't know. But they love it, wish I would have done it for the boys....I thought I was too busy. Funny I know.

http://picasaweb.google.com/laurastaples3/TheGirls5Months?authkey=Gv1sRgCMbJ1PyZor3EbQ#

Where to begin?

May where did that go...June humm...will it be July tomorrow? Our babies are 5 months old......can you believe that!?!? They might be small, but these girls can move. They are little wiggle worms....rolling and inching their way around. And talkers too. They have been so funny this week, they have been jabbering with such excitement and VOLUME! We may have a couple extroverts on our hands:) They are really getting into their toys and rice cereal too. In fact, I think we may introduce some veggies in the next week. They are sleeping from about 10:00ish to 6:00ish...pretty good we think! We have to go in a couple times at night to re-adjust them and pat them, but that's it. They take a great morning nap and then the two afternoons naps are rather sketchy.....the first is usually less than 30 minutes and the second is only an hour an half. So we are going to be cutting out that little cat nap very soon!!! It's just hard to entertain both of them from 10:00 to 3:30 with out a break!

The boys are doing well. Landon is growing an inch a week....his legs are getting SO long! Liam's vocabulary rocks! He is using some crazy big words all thanks to his super big brother! Landon has gone up to the elementary that he will be attending twice to meet the teachers and turn in some art work for a special tile project. I wish I had taken a picture of his drawing....I will when we get it back! T-ball is over. It was a lot of fun, but Kevin was playing softball at the same time...so it was draining me.

Kevin's parents spent the last third of the month with us. Kevin and his dad, along with some help from Collin and our friend John, built a deck! We LOVE LOVE LOVE it. We are out there all the time now. The boys think it is awesome, they think they should get a popsickle out on the deck twice a day too!! We...humm....maybe I should say me.....have big plans for landscaping around the deck...but we are not doing to our yard until next spring. One step at a time. I wish I could snap my fingers and have the house painted and decorated and the yard landscaped...but I guess that wouldn't be any fun. So speaking of decorating......I know you have been waiting for the big reveal of the pink paradise. I think I am done for now in the nursery.....I would still like a shabby chic mirror...but I now Kevin is ready for me to focus my efforts into finishing the living room!

Let me tell you about our washer and dryer drama this week! At one point we were the proud owners of 3 washers and 3 dryers this week. Yep, six units. So the washer and dryer set that Kevin and I got (used for cheap) when we got married has been good to us. But we have had to fix the dryer twice in the last year...so this week when it starting to bite the dust again, we said ENOUGH! So craigslist here we go. I weeded through all the ads all week, made lots of calls, sent plenty of emails, hit many dead ends, but then finally....the 'ONE' showed up. Less than five miles down the road, a newer matching set, for a great price, we go and pick it up, the family is so wonderful, we talk about hanging out some time, we get it home and hummm....what is this hose for Laura? I have no idea Kevin. Then it hits him. Gas dryer. We are all electric. Oh joy. So I guess we don't need underwear for tomorrow. Just kidding...:)

Anyway, we decided to keep the washer since we got a super deal on it and hunt for the matching ELECTRIC dryer (and if we didn't find the match, then we would mismatch again). Which by the way, the ad said that the gas one was electric...we just failed to check! After more searching I found the matching electric...hallelujah...oh but of course these folks don't want to split the set (even though they don't match!...ahhh). So fine, will buy your set too, and then sell your washer and the gas dryer as a set and our washer and dryer too. Kevin got the new ones hooked up today after a little more drama (thought we were going to have to wait three more days for some special screw to come in, but we luckily found one) and I have NEVER been more excited about doing laundry in my whole life!!!!!!!! And I can fit all most twice as much in this machines.....hooray!!

That and take care of our 12 kids is about all I did this week:) Oh and did I mention our vaccum went out the week before (and it is less than two years old). Our house functions on survival mood with out everything pooping out on us....this week I think we limped along! Mom, I need you back in Texas to do our laundry!!!!

I had too many pictures to post, so please just follow this link to a picasa album. There are two videos...one of Landon playing t-ball and one of the girls eating cereal. Enjoy! Oh and I'm updating the boys quotes with some new favorites....I feel bad that Liam, Kallie, and Klaire's quote list will never be as long as Landon's because I just had ONE talker to keep up with!!!

http://picasaweb.google.com/laurastaples3/May200903?authkey=Gv1sRgCPGd2c2ziayQLA#

I know. I know. I need to post!

Posting is overwhelming me right now because I have so much that I want to post about and not enough time, so bare with me! I hope to have a super long post with many pictures very soon!!!!

No chance of being 'tom-boys'!?!

We like a little bling around here....hope you enjoy the video clip at the end. We are finishing up the nursery this week so stay tuned for the unveiling of Kallie and Klaire's pink paradise.

Landon Landon Landon

I just can't believe Landon is five! He is so grown up for his age, but I still can't swallow that number very well! Landon has been planning his birthday party since December...right after every major holiday passes he asks when the next one is. I remember feeling like my birthday would never come....when I would give him the count down, he acted as if his birthday would never be here until we got within about 15 days:) So what does a kid like Landon want for his birthday...well he had some very specific requests. First, he wanted party hats, it's just not a party with out those. Then we had to have a very exciting cake....it was going to be a rocket until Aunt DeeDee found a Wall-e cake pan. And for those of you who don't know about Wall-e...well it was movie about a little robot and his journey with another robot Eva...and to tell you the truth I have never watched the whole thing with them! But robots are big around here, so not only did Landon get a robot cake but he got a real robot too. He also wanted the cake flavors to be lemon and coconut....can you tell I let him help me cook??? And he has noticed that for the adult birthdays we celebrate with my family we make a special meal just for that person. So he decided that he wanted....you'll get a kick out of this....fried chicken, mashed potatoes, corn, and PEAS! He thinks he really likes peas but he has only had them in stuff not by themselves. So with much persuasion I talked him into green beans and rolls instead of peas:) Landon also wanted to go somewhere special to celebrate the big day, so we went to the zoo. My mom says it was like the Staples zoo went to the zoo:) Yes, we were a handful and thankfully we had several other people there to help us! We had a full visit at the zoo. First of all Landon had pink eye...but he couldn't have cared less. The girls did the exact opposite of what I thought they would do on a warm day being pushed in a stroller....they stayed awake almost the whole time and were very hungry. We were often pushing an empty stroller and feeding babies bottles while we walked, we made a changing table out of the stroller for the poopy diapers they blessed us with while at the zoo. And Liam flipped over backwards off a picnic bench which damped his spirits for the rest of the day until we rented a stroller for him and got him an icecream cone. But Landon soaked up the whole day in classic Landon style! He literally ran from exhibit to exhibit, asked a few thousand questions, and scoped out everything he could. Oh and I forgot to mention, we UNknowingly went on TWIN day. It was crazy the amount of twins that were there and how much attention the girls got. One twin mom told me that I should get a shirt made that says, "Yes, they are twins. Yes, they are girls. Yes, they are identical. Yes, they keep me busy!!" I do enjoy showing the girls off, but I don't like it when random people touch them.....it's like hello I am the hand washing nazi...what germs do you have going on!!!


So when he woke up on his birthday (4/24) he asked me when will I be five. I thought hummm..don't recall telling him that there is a specific time....but then again this is Landon:) So I said well at 2:04.....four twenty four two thousand and four, born at two o' four....crazy! So he watched the clock all day and when it was 2:04 he turned and said, "But this can't be! I don't feel any different!" So then came a lengthy explanation and many questions....one of which was..."So what can I do that is different now that I am five...ya know mom....like backwards soumersaults, jumping to the ceiling, running super fast....?" It was so cute. And still everything is about being five now. The other day I asked him if he would through away a diaper and he replied, "I don't think five years do that mom."



Yesterday Landon wrote and illustrated a 16 page book. It is titled, yes he titled it and put his name on the cover like a real author, 'The Playground Fun!'. It is about a day at the playground and it starts off saying, 'Some one was watching a duck swim in the pool.' Yes he wrote 10 word sentence and spelled the whole second half of the sentence perfectly with out help. Then each page has a character doing a park activity and he narrated it with little tit bits like...whee...and whoo. He did the whole thing on his own and was so proud of it. Kevin and I were just blown away. I mean he spells and draws every day, but this was over the top! I sure hope his kindergarten teacher can keep him busy...


Anyway, Landon is our big five year old now and we are enjoying watching him be a terrific big brother, make new discoveries, and learn learn learn!

The birthday boy!

Wall-e cupcakes thanks to my sister.

Wall-e cake thanks to my sister!!

This will get the ladies' attention:)

Klaire.

And I just had to add this. We are all convinced that Minnie wishes she were a baby, so the joke around here is that we have triplets. We decided to make her dream a reality. She was not happy with us.

Easter outfits a week late!

All the kids were sick with a little cold virus last weekend (yes that has been fun) so we did our own Easter day last Sunday and didn't go to church. I was VERY bummed that the girls got sick, (seeing kids sick is always hard, but especially little babies) thankfully they didn't get it very bad and are mostly over it now.

So the kids wore their new outfits today and they were so precious. Kevin was calling Liam Mr. G.Q. And on a side note, I have some new quotes from the boys and I really do plan on updating their quotes soon! I've been a wee bit busy:)

Landon will be five on Friday and it's making this mommy a little sad. Five just sounds so old and I know kindergarten is just a few months away. You would think that having two babies to hold would make it easier for me to watch Landon and Liam grow and change, but I think it is actually making it worse because when I look at the girls I am constantly reminded of what the boys were like when they were that age. And it seems like just yesterday that I was holding them and so I know what can happen when you blink. I guess since we are so busy too, our internal clocks seem to be running at double time and it is intensifying my desire to want to slow everything down. I am starting to notice that I am talk about time rushing by so much lately...and well I guess it's just on my mind a LOT! Forgive me if I sound like a broken record!

Well, there are really so many things that I want to post about and describe......I wish I had more time to REALLY REALLY describe what all is going on in our lives...but for now I think I am going to have to settle with giving the highlights!

Drum roll please............................................................................................................................................

.........................................................................................................................................

We are going to have swarms of girls after these two stud muffins some day:)

Classic Liam face. He is just as funny as Landon.

I just want to bottle them up and keep them this way forever.

Kallie was saying, "Go Mavericks!"

Kallie showing off her adorable grin.

Klaire says, "Kallie give me some space and please stop showing off your bloomers."

"Oh Kallie...you are just wearing me out."

Kallie is the one upside down. And Klaire is getting a double chin...oink oink:)

"Okay Kallie, that's it, you just don't mess with my headband."

"Yippee mom picked Kallie up and just took a picture of me!"