Little Mommy

Whoever said that girls act like girls and boys act like boys only when we train them to do so was wrong. Totally.



Since little Jeremiah arrived on the scene, Miss Joanna's favorite past time is seeing, holding, hugging, and kissing "her" baby. She is such the little mommy. She brings him diapers, bottles, and toys constantly, whether he wants them or not!



She loves to give him hugs and kisses. The boys, while loving in their own ways, were NEVER like this!


MY baby!!


Sweet kisses...



"Eye!"






Josiah gets in on the baby love as well--after all, Joanna can't get all the camera attention!

It's sweet to see Joanna and Josiah loving on their baby brother. One, it makes for adorable photo ops and two, it's about the only love going on here among the kids these days. Jon and Jordan seem to have some sort of battle going on that results in pretty constant bickering between them, Joseph grumps at all his brothers lately, and Josiah picks on Joanna every chance he gets. I'm SO hoping this is just "new baby adjustment" and that all will be back to normal soon. I'm thinking I might just have to make everyone hug everybody else multiple times a day, while reminding them that they need to LOVE each other (or else!!!) Think it'll work?

On an unrelated note, after posting about needing ideas to use up eggs yesterday, I got a suggestion to make French toast. (Thank you, Linda!) Not being one to do things the easy way, I made this recipe of homemade challah bread last night, since it makes utterly fabulous French toast. I'd never made it myself before. Probably not the best project to start at 8:30 p.m. (it takes about 3 hours with rising and cooking times) but it turned out quite nicely:



I used up 15 eggs--5 for the bread itself, and 10 making it into French toast. I think this will make the breakfast rotation, if I can make and freeze a bunch of the bread in advance. It was delish!


No pics of the final product--it got scarfed down as quickly as I could get slices off the griddle!

I have 2/3 of a loaf of challah left...I'm thinking it might make a tasty bread pudding!

Caught!!!

This is why I have a lock at the top of my pantry door:



(Obviously I don't always remember to lock it...)






Sneaky girl!

Kitty Love

Joanna loves anything she can cuddle. She is constantly dragging around some stuffed animal or another, or her little baby doll. She stops regularly to give her lovies sweet little kisses. (She puts her little mouth on their faces and says "Mwah!"--so cute!) She then brings them to all of us in turn and expects us to give them kisses as well. It's really adorable to watch her big brothers humor her by kissing her babies!!

She is especially thrilled to get to cuddle with one of the real kitties any chance she gets! It's a good thing we have a very tolerant cat. Isn't this just precious?



























(This last one is my fave!!)

The boys were never like this...they enjoy their (rather large) collection of stuffed animals as well, but are much more likely to divide them into armies and have battles with them! Yep, boys and girls are definitely different!

7 Months Old!

I can't believe we're over halfway to her first birthday! She is such a treasure!

4 Months Old!

Yes, it's time again for our monthly photo shoot! Joanna was much more agreeable this time around, although I couldn't get her to smile with the camera in front of my face. Of course, every time I moved the camera away and then spoke to her she would give me a huge grin!



Joanna is laughing now, and it is so precious to hear! She brings us so much joy--even her brothers are completely smitten with her and want to hold her, hug her, and play with her all the time.


She is starting to try to scoot a little bit when she gets on her tummy. She's been rolling over for a while now. Today I put her in the doorway bouncy seat and she seemed to enjoy it...she's growing so fast!


This last picture is actually from last Saturday, but I love her expression and just had to share it!


We love our precious little girl so much...she is such a blessing!

My Babies!

Three Months Old!

And time for more pictures!

I had her all dressed up in a cute new outfit, but Joanna decided to play the part of Princess Crankypants tonight and only stop screaming if Daddy was holding her. So what we have here is a small collection of shots either over Daddy's shoulder or being held up in the air. I guess she's saving up her smiles for next time! :)


















She has grown so much. I can't believe she's been here a whole quarter of a year already!