hello!

i know i never blog anymore, but it's because i'm busy protecting our baby from the 2 monkeys that live in our house...

i have so many pictures from the past few weeks/months to catch up on.  i know i'm going to regret how little i've written down from brecken's first 5 months of life, but spring is always so crazy around our house.  we finished our backyard project (the one that was on my new year's resolutions list LAST year), which has taken up every free moment of our day, so hopefully things will slow down now.  i'll get caught up on posting stuff later.  for now, here's a scene i walked into this weekend.  take heart in knowing that kennedy and blakely have welcomed brecken into their club...

i guess they decided she needed some "hair" too.  crazy kids!

already?

smith is a little boy in kennedy and blakely's class that kennedy talks about ALOT.  we found this in the garage.  oh boy...

corte de pelo

most people make this announcement when their kids are about one, but we don't do things by the book around here.  kennedy and blakely got their first haircut!!!  yes, they will be 5 in 3 months, but if you just started keeping up with our family, they were shiny bald when they were 1, then had about 3 hairs when they were 2, so we are very excited that this day has come.  we took them to a really cute place called sweet & sassy and they loved it!

what does a girl who loves hair do when her kids take 5 years to get it?  take 95 pictures (literally)!  here are a few...

 

(see the paparazzi in the mirror?)

and not to leave the little one out...brecken was asleep so we sat her in a corner for most of our time there, but we looked over and discovered that she had woken up and pushed her snuggle thing off of her and was peeking out.  i guess she didn't want to miss the action...

how we...

...entertain our baby:

...celebrate the 80's:

(note: i did NOT pick this outfit out, and my kids have no idea what the 80's or it's style entails, but they emerged from the closet with this on today and it seems they would fit in nicely)

...clean our floors:


(note: i do NOT make my kids clean my house. they like to play cinderella, and it works out great for all involved. i give them some safe cleaner and a rag and they go to town)

don't leave me with the baby!

it was 5 days of just the 4 of us girls, and we survived!  i hadn't gotten on to tell you that brett was leaving town because i'm always afraid for a stalker to know i'm home alone with the 3 kids.  i mean, supposedly you're not even supposed to post pictures online from your phone because GPS tracking devices can tell people where you live or something?!  i really hate that we have to think this way, but you just never know these days...

brett's favorite thing in the world is skiing (obviously, since he named our kid after it), and he and about 15 other guys have started an annual trip to keystone, colorado.  he desperately wants me to be adventurous and join him out west, and i love sitting inside and looking at the snow, but try as i may, i just can't ski.  i love the idea of it, and i think girls are so cool that can do it, but anytime i start getting up any speed at all, i fall on purpose so i don't go any faster.  our first (and last) trip was to park city 3 years ago, and i got to the top of the mountain and got stuck, so rode on his back half of the way down and then hopped on a snow mobile with a guy taking food to one of the restaurants for the rest of the way.  brett has adorned me with all the best ski gear and rugged accessories, so i look really cool, but riding on those long things is another story.  next time we go he's putting me in ski school, but i'll probably still be scared and just put on all my cool clothes and hold my poles long enough to take pictures to post on facebook to make people think i'm rugged, so i'm glad he has some guys that he can get his ski fix with each year.

our last five days without the man of the house (most of these pictures were taken with my phone, so not great quality)....

i took the 3 girls to my friend charissa's neighborhood club, where they have a character night each month.  this month woody from toy story came for a visit.  we all had dinner at the club and the kids colored and did crafts with woody.  they had so much fun meeting him, but blakely played it cool and acted like she was way beyond that when it was picture time so it's just kennedy and chloe in this one...

my sister-in-law and i took k and b to their first gym dogs meet and blakely had too much candy...

we celebrated brett's stepdad's birthday.  this is him with brett's mom, plus all of the grandchildren on this side, along with the 3 week old baby gary's nephew and his wife just adopted. she is PRECIOUS (and made brecken seem huge and old already)...

we made cookies for valentine's gifts...

...and did lots of other fun stuff that i didn't take pictures of....a few friends came over for a girls' night, i took brecken to meet my grandmother for the first time, went to lunch with my mom and coach; basically traveled all around and filled the time well.

brett promised me before he left that i would have treats so i would have something to look forward to each day of him being gone.  these were left to make the house happy...

i had cards stuck around the house with dates i could open them...

a "special messenger" left a sugo flatbread by the back door (sugo is quite possibly one of my favorite restaurants in the world, and they have a flatbread that is no longer on the menu that we order every time we go there.  it's pulled pork, arugula, and some sort of white balsamic glaze they pour over it with some sort of shaved cheese...manchego or something like that?  it's the best thing ever)....

he set up a mini scavenger hunt where i found little treats such as this (the wine, not the gun handbook)...

this came today as my valentine's gift.  has anyone heard of these?  supposedly they're the cool blanket among celebrities (but does every company claim that?), so maybe i'm behind.  i had been using some blankets someone gave k and b when they were babies, and now that they're older they've taken them back, so i needed one.  i love having a blanket that i snuggle with at home that i can also take with me for a piece of home when we travel.  brett surprised me with this one and it's my new obsession (the whole hour i've had it, but it will be my future obsession too).  it's their "cozy chic throw blanket," and it's the perfect size.  the tag is pretty funny so they may not have the best marketing department, but the blanket itself is amazing...

being a mom is hard work, but something about knowing you've got someone who appreciates what you do and doesn't take you for granted makes it feel so much easier.  i'm pretty sure my "someone" takes it a little over the top and does way more than he needs to (i.e. i'm spoiled), but i don't think i'll complain about it ;)

i just got back from kennedy and blakely's mother's sweetheart tea at school, but forgot to take pictures.  here's one from before they left to go to school this morning.  is it me or do they look really old?  they're kids now; not toddlers, and barely even preschoolers.  more on that later because it makes me really sad...

 

<3  happy valentine's day  <3

we're alive

well, i don't really know how to blog anymore (or maybe even write).  if anyone cares, our blog is not dead, and i don't have intentions of giving it up forever...just no time recently.  i've got a good 8 weeks to catch up on, and i don't remember a whole lot of it, but it hasn't been roses.  in a nutshell, kennedy and blakely had the flu so brecken and i had to leave home so she wouldn't get it and be put in the hospital, brett had the stomach flu, brecken was dropped and it fractured her skull, she screamed bloody murder for a few weeks before we realized she was allergic to me (i.e. milk) and had reflux, and we got snowed in for 3 years.  yes, there are many details to this list of why the first 6 weeks of brecken's life were rough, and many emotions that have gone along with these details, but i'll spare them.  i can be wordy anyway, and oftentimes my blog has turned into the debbie downer of the blog world, so we'll say we adore our new baby, but don't miss the first few weeks of her life.  fast forward to now...

 

one good thing about being through the ringer is it makes you appreciate when things are good.  so, atleast for now, things really are good.  brecken is 9 weeks old and she is at the precious stage of smiling and trying to talk and sleeping through the night a few nights a week (and she's more precious on those days ;)).  i love her, but she's not the best baby i've ever been around.  mine and brett's genes create some screamers (and none of them have hair).  just some random thoughts to catch you up on our life...

- her name: everyone wants to know your baby's name, and when i tell them, they always say "what?  brackett?  bricken?".  no.  brecken.  as in breckenridge.  colorado.  "was she conceived there?".  good grief.  so the story of her name.  there's not really a good one, and there's not great significance to it.  it was really brett's pick because i decided when i was pregnant that i was done having kids and that he wasn't going to get his boy after all, so he could atleast pick the name (and no, we're not committed to that decision, but you have to tell yourself that when you're pregnant).  he loves skiing, and breckenridge was the first place he skiied, so he mentioned the name after seeing it again on a neighborhood sign.  when i was a rho chi, there was a girl coming through rush named breckyn (and i'm sure someone out there will read this and know her, so you can tell her a random girl out there saw her name tag and named her kid after her).  i saw her and thought she was beautiful and saw her name and thought it was cute.  i never even met her but remembered that, so when brett mentioned the name, i agreed.  i wanted to name her emmaline, so that became the middle name.  k and b call her "breck-a-boo".

- speaking of k and b, they are the sweetest big sisters in the world.  they ADORE their new baby...never a minute of jealousy or wishing it was still just the 4 of us.  they live to hold her and help feed her and "pet" her.

- and speaking of names, i think brett and i may should have looked up the meaning of names before we named our kids.  we looked them up recently, and look at their lovely meanings...

blakely: dark meadow or pale meadow (fine, but weird)

kennedy: helmet head

brecken: freckled

by the way, they all 3 show up under boy names.

- christmas: i still haven't posted a christmas update or pictures, which means it will probably never happen.  it was not a good christmas, and that's blasphemous to say if in my heart i had celebrated what christmas was really meant to celebrate.  i most definitely did not spend it celebrating a baby who was born to bring us peace and joy.  the decorations and gifts and songs and food did not bring me life as i wished them to.  why was i surprised?  we still took pictures to look like we were one of those happy little families in matching pajamas by the sparkling fire looking down lovingly at our new baby sister (whose neck was breaking)...

 

-i still look a little pregnant.  blakely asked me yesterday when my tummy was going to stop being big.  i tried to go shopping today to find stuff to hide it, but brecken hates her car seat, so i had to carry her around the store.  i tried to hold a shirt up to me to see how long it was, but i hit her in the head with the wooden hanger and she screamed, so i gave up and left and decided it went away with twins so surely it would go away with one.

- my rear view mirror has a new view and i love it so much.  i hate the sounds back there because brecken screams and k and b complain about her screaming, but i know "this too shall pass", so i'm trying to soak up the views because i know it won't be this way forever...

- these 2 still adore each other and still don't know the meaning of personal space.  i still look at them almost daily and wonder how the heck i got so lucky.  i'm already worried about brecken not having a twin because i've never seen a sweeter relationship...

- brett turned 30 and caught up to me.  k and b made him cupcakes.  i let them make them anyway they wanted to and this is how they filled the pan.  they were huge!

 

hope my long-lost blog friends are doing well!

brecken

late reporting, but we have a brand new addition to the family...

 

brecken emmaline lane was born december 2nd at 10:33 am.  she weighed 6 lbs 6 ozs and was 19 1/4 inches long.  i miraculously made it to my scheduled c-section, and was 39 weeks, 4 days.  she was (and still is) a little peanut to be full-term, but is perfectly healthy.  she actually seems huge to us because she's the biggest baby we've ever had...twice as big as blakely was.

kennedy and blakely LOVE their new baby sister, but we've tried to keep them away for the most part.  we keep her in our bedroom most of the time since she sleeps so much anyway.  we want to get through her first month and get a little weight on her before we let the germs k and b bring home from preschool come on full-force.  we know we can't hide her forever, but with newborns being susceptible to rsv, we're trying to hold off for a few weeks.  it makes me sad because they both keeping making comments that "they're not big sisters" because they're not getting to hold her and change her diaper and feed her like they thought.  in time...

life with 3 is crazy busy for now, but we sure love our 3 little girls.