Twins 10 months

Our babies just keep growing! 10 months old already!

It's getting more difficult to take their monthly pictures because they love to move around.

What a cutie!

I've been waiting a long time for them to wear their Thing 1 and Thing 2 shirts.  Now they finally fit!

The babies love to eat and are not picky.

And they still make a big mess during meal times but that's okay!

Tyler had everyone laughing till they cried with this perfectly timed photo.  Melody's baby food on her lips look like tiny buck teeth.

Looks like our babies have inherited the goofy gene also!

Christian is pulling himself to stand and will walk holding onto things.  He is getting his leg muscles stronger and stronger.  We suspect he will be our earliest walker.

Diaper babies!  Melody is also pulling herself up to stand.  We set up the gate like this so they can play in their room and see what is going on.

Good morning!

Christian is very lively.  He is always exploring and wanting to move.

Uh-oh! Christian is being a little too rough, but Melody is used to this and knows how to let her dissatisfaction known.  She can be loud when she wants to be heard!  Christian just wants to have fun.  He is always smiling.

These girls are so sweet.

Andrew took this close up of Melody.

They seem to always have more teeth coming in.

Close up picture of Christian, also taken by big brother Andrew.

Melody is wearing some of my favorite baby jammies.

Time to get squeaky clean.  Melody's hair reminds me of a dairy queen ice cream curl.

Fun in our back yard.

Sleeping babies are the most perfect thing in the world.

One morning I heard some extra commotion on the baby monitor and it was because the big kids had snuck into the babies' room INTO the cribs!  I tried not to show them how funny I thought it was to find them all snuggled together.

What are the big kids up to? Christian can't wait for the day when he can keep up.  That's why we think he is in such a hurry to walk.

We use the baby walkers everyday.  They like scooting around the house in them.

Melody loves books.  She mostly chews on them but sometimes she looks at them which is just adorable.

Hat backward cool guy

Peek a boo!!

Another shot of the twins in their Dr. Seuss onesies.  It was too cute not to include.

We love our crew!

This is my favorite picture of them all together.

Father's Day

Happy Father's Day to Daddy!  We love Tyler with all of our hearts and the kids were excited to give him their gifts.

Sylvia picked out a special card for Daddy and we made a couple of crafts too!  Sylvia and Tyler have very similar personalities, like their silliness and love of ketchup among other things.

Tyler is the steadying force in our family.  He always knows how to make us smile and has the ability to melt worries away.  And we are lucky to have our resident Daddy look-a-like in Christian boy.

It is always the best time of day when Daddy comes home.  The kids could listen to him read books or tell dragon stories for hours.

They also love wrestling with Daddy too.

Twins!  It is cute when Andrew and Daddy coincidentally match but this time Daddy did it on purpose because it makes Andrew happy.   This is just one example of things Tyler does to bring a smile to our faces.

It is cute to see how excited the twins get when they see Tyler.  As evidence, they both said da-da before ma-ma.

Matching again! This time on accident.  Tyler is an exemplary father and it is no wonder the kids admire him so much.  

Daddy sometimes is gone for training or has to work long hours but he always makes sure the time he spends with the kids is quality time.  We love you so much Daddy! And he makes sure they know he loves them too.

Andrew's 5th Birthday Party

Happy Birthday Andrew! We celebrated by having his birthday party at the beginning of July because Grandma Carson was going to be in town and we would be traveling without Daddy during his actual birthday.

Andrew is almost five years old!  He is our handsome, tenderhearted, very smart, and playful boy.  

And he loves ninja turtles!  That was the theme he picked for his party this year.

The kids couldn't wait for the guests to arrive so they waited out in front of the house.

We rented a bouncy house for the party.  It was surprisingly easy because the company came and set it up, tables and chairs were included, and then they came the next day to pack it all up.  It was a big hit!  Since it was a hot day we also had our inflatable pool so the kids could swim and cool off.

Ninja turtle fruit and veggie faces.  Thanks Pinterest for the idea!

Cheese and cracker pizza because TMNT love pizza.  We also had actual pizza to eat as well as green finger jello as the "toxic ooze" that turned the turtles into ninja turtles.

The cupcake cake 5 turned out differently than planned but it was yummy!  They are lemon cupcakes with lemon buttercream frosting.  Andrew requested the flavors of his cupcakes and cake.

His main cake was chocolate with chocolate frosting covered in M&Ms!

We also had ice cream to go with the cake.  Yum!

Eating lunch.

Here are some of the girls.

Mommy made three ninja turtle games, one was to throw cardboard pizza into Mikey's mouth (pictured below), one was to throw rings on cones with ninja turtles faces, and the last was punching cups covered in tissue paper to find the bad guys.

The big surprise of the party was a special guest.... Tyler ordered a Beebop (TMNT villian for those unfamiliar) costume and crashed the party.  Here's a picture for reference for who Tyler is supposed to be.

The party favor I made for everyone was a pool noodle covered in tape in the middle to look like a ninja turtle's staff.  When we were doing all the games I kept telling the kids that ninja turtles need to work together and so when Beebop arrived all the kids rushed to defeat him as we played the TMNT theme song.

It was absolutely hilarious and all the adults couldn't stop laughing.  Some of the girls and younger children didn't know what to think and maybe were a little scared, but most of the kids go really into it.

Tyler was such a good sport and had a lot of fun being chased around the yard by the kids.

The final take down.  I love how happy the kids' faces are in this picture.  After this they took Beebop to "jail" which was inside the house.  Tyler emerged from the house shortly after with all the pizza asking if he had missed anything.

After lunch and the big battle it was time for the pinata!

We found the perfect one!  The purple turtle, Donatello, is Andrew's favorite.

Everyone got a turn.

Then it was cake time!

We had a fun group of kids are the party! Andrew's best friends, Bennett and Liam were there along with their siblings and another family from church.  Two other families weren't able to come because we planned the party a little last minute but all the kids had a blast.

He didn't want us to sing to him again this year so we just said, Happy Birthday Andrew! And he blew out his candle.

Opening present time!

We had a really fun party in the morning and in the afternoon we even played in the bouncy house again.

We are also really glad Grandma could be there for Andrew's party and join in the fun!!

Sylvia walking to play in the bouncy house again.

Happy birthday to our big boy, we love him forever and we are glad we could have the best party to celebrate his 5th birthday.