So this is what happens…

June 14, 2013 ~ hunt2005 ~ Leave a comment

when you take three small children who haven’t had naps, who are screaming their heads off, and see what happens with the gloriousness of cartoons.

side tangent: WHAT did parents do back in the day of tantrums and fussiness without a little TV?!

Anyways…

Step 1: Place smallish children on daddy’s lap.

2) Leave the house to run a few errands. Come back to find this.

3) Remove the two non-sleeping children from the equation by taking them outside. Resulting in this.

Lessons learned:

Apparently, though Mommy’s lap isn’t good enough for them to sleep anymore, daddy’s still is.
They only care if someone is touching them when it’s mommy in charge. They don’t mind all cuddling with daddy at the same time.
The pink princess rejects the concept of sleep. That said, she was probably the only one to actually have fallen asleep during nap earlier that day (prior to one of the others climbing in her bed to jump on her or lay on her or do any number of things to wake her up.
All small boys like to sleep rump in the air, apparently.

So while they have not fallen asleep on me in at least 18 months, they finally fell asleep. On daddy. Thank you Disney Junior.

Wait, where’d May go??

June 1, 2013 ~ hunt2005 ~ Leave a comment

So someone told me today that it’s June 1st.

Hold the presses. Are you kidding me? How did that happen?! That means in less than 19 days, the three little penguins will be TWO. 2. How did that happen??

May was a busy month, and I know I haven’t kept you up to date much, so here’s a few photos to recap!

To start the month off, Steven went to Massachusetts for his sister’s graduation from LAW school. Well, since we had to drive him to San Fran anyways, we figured we’d hit up the amazing Arts and Science Exploration museum, and meet an amazing twin mom (mom of FIVE girls, plus one more baby on the way!). It was incredible to meet her – we have been friends for almost two years online and just now met up. It was awesome in every way possible, and her girls are so sweet and well behaved it gives me hope for the future! Two moms with 9 children definitely causes a bit of a commotion though!

We had a lot of fun in the sun now that it’s actually pretending to be summer more often than it’s pretending to be winter. And by summer, I mean it’s finally in the 60s on a regular basis with sunlight! When it hits 80 there’s even a heat advisory!

As I’ve thought often before, I don’t know why I buy the children any toys. All you need is a box and it keeps them happy for hours. I mean, why get toys to put in the toy bins when you can play with the bin itself??

We’ve mastered the art of tantrum throwing (these are both Jaina).

And a certain big brother “graduate” Pre-K. They still have one more week of school, but it’s all fun and games (you know, more so than normal), and then it’s off to summer! Most people are sad when their kids don’t have school. Me? I’m glad I don’t have to drive twice a day every day anymore!!

And that about recaps it! Here’s to the start of another busy month!

Quick photo update

May 18, 2013 ~ hunt2005 ~ Leave a comment

I got the saddest email the other day. It was titled:

“Your 23-month old toddler”

Um, didn’t they get the memo? I won’t let them turn two. Not happening.

So in honor of them staying 23 months forever (it’s kinda like turning 29 for an indefinite amount of time), I figured I should update you with some of the latest pictures:

First, the benefit to having three littles who don’t know that chores aren’t that much fun yet? They scrub your walls for you.

The next ones are from a kid zone at a race that we went to. They had a blast! Aiden played too, but wasn’t as photo-cooperative.

And that’s all for now. Coming up? 2 years since I stepped foot in Madigan Army Medical Center, a soon-to-be-two update, fundraising updates for Team Fisher house, and end of the year pics for Aiden!

Sneaky little children

May 3, 2013May 3, 2013 ~ hunt2005 ~ Leave a comment

When you first get pregnant, every one tells you about what to expect. From night feedings, to first milestones, someone somewhere has advice. Often conflicting advice, but advice none-the-less.

Then as your baby starts to crawl, you are educated on the dangers of baby-proofing the house. They warn you about marbles, small legos, delicate objects placed precariously on a counter just in arms reach… They warn you about doors and stairs and wobbly old chairs.

And then your child gets older. They warn you about the “terrible twos” and the “trying threes” and tantrums, time out, 1-2-3 magic, Love and Logic, and a hundred other parenting styles.

What no one EVER tells you about is how sneaky they can be.

So here are some lessons for you:

1) They can climb. And if a window is open, they will start to play with the screen as if plotting an escape.

2) They like to copy each other. If you have more than one? Good luck.

3) They look cute an innocent. But really they’re plotting against you. Don’t let the sweet faces (and dresses courtesy of an amazing neighbor) fool you.

4) If there is an object to help them gain a height advantage, they will use it. Not only that, but they will pick it up, carry it halfway across the room, place it in the perfect location, and then retrieve the Wii remote that they’ve wanted all day.

5) If you pin daddy down and get him to hold one child, the other two can then jump in and try to steal the items they wanted. All objects are fair game. A chair leg. A daddy leg. A box on the floor. Doesn’t matter. If it adds height, it’s worth the risk.

I’m sure I’ll have an addendum as they learn to coordinate more effectively and become a force to be reckoned with.

Signing off while I’m still in charge and haven’t been overthrown by the horde.

You have to start somewhere

April 27, 2013May 3, 2013 ~ hunt2005 ~ Leave a comment

My husband and I talk about this all the time, but this site reminded me about it today. If you haven’t checked out Tales of an Unlikely Mother, you should.

Imagine this. You’re hungry. And really really really don’t feel like cooking. But you’ve got young children (number here doesn’t matter, just that they’re younger than considered old enough to behave appropriately in public on their own accord). You could (not that I’ve ever ever ever done this) have cereal for dinner. You could order pizza/takeout/delivery. Or you could go to a restaurant.

Sure, it won’t always be perfect. Sometimes you might show up and they only have one or two high chairs. It’s possible to improvise, or be patient, or, yes, you could go somewhere else. But it’s manageable.

Sometimes? You might have to consider asking them to just box the food and take it to-go, because the waiter didn’t realize that when you asked for the kids’ drinks and food ASAP, you didn’t mean 20 minutes later, scalding hot, with no cold plates in sight. Upside? Chugging beer for the first time since college.

Sometimes? You might get through the meal, the waiter is taking too long to bring the check, and one parent takes the kids out to the car and gets them buckled while the other patiently waits.

Sure, you might have to put a little more than your usual 20% tip for good service because while the service wasn’t the best you’ve ever had, your children’s food all over the floor and mashed in between seats calls for a little extra.

Note: I am not saying you have to, but I always try to pick up at least a little bit (or until someone sees me and tells me to stop). It’s just the nice thing to do especially on the messiest of days.

And sometimes? They will astound you. Dinner the other night, we sat down at a nice table. They played quietly with their forks. Drank their water without spilling too much. Ate their food. We had polite conversation (albeit a little loud once in a while). And then we walked out of there with brother and sister holding hands like civilized people.

And you might have to ~~bribe~~ ~~coerce~~ guide them with sweedish fish to get them to follow you back to the car rather than diving off the wharf to swim with the sea lions.

Some times will be epic failures, but you’ll get better at it. And they will. And it’ll be great! Start early. Start often. They’ll learn quickly (probably quicker than you will) and some day when you’re just not up for cooking the thought of braving public for dinner won’t seem worse than cooking does.

Is it… summer?

April 22, 2013April 22, 2013 ~ hunt2005 ~ 2 Comments

Last year, while the kids sure enjoyed the outdoors, I couldn’t really just let them play out there unsupervised. It was a long summer where mommy either couldn’t get anything done, or they were cooped up inside. They hadn’t quite mastered steps yet, so I couldn’t leave the door open for them to come in and out at their leisure, and so we didn’t play out much at all.

Today? It’s 73. And sunny. And, honestly, hot. Our house is already at 80 and it’ll get worse before the night is over (yay no A/C and west facing windows!)

And I’m sitting here on the computer, drinking some iced coffee, while they giggle and laugh with glee. Outside. By themselves.

Sure it’s not perfect. There are fights for toys every now and then. And a few pinched fingers in doors, or bumps from falling. But overall? It’s heaven. I could get used to this.

Field Trip!

April 12, 2013April 12, 2013 ~ hunt2005 ~ Leave a comment

If you were a 5 year old boy, what would be the coolest thing in the world?

A firetruck.

If there could be anything cooler than that?

Two firetrucks.

And if there was any remote possibility of beating that in your wildest dreams?

Firemen. Showing off their gear. Letting you look at, touch, and sit in a firetruck. Showing you around the station. And telling you all about it.

That was totally our day.

First off, should there be any doubt, we look with our eyes, and listen with our ears. And, if, after asking AND receiving a “Yes” answer, you may touch.

Or just climb on in. Scary how big he looks in this picture, isn’t it???

As for me? 30 5 year olds, on a hike, walking the half mile from school to the fire station and back? Makes me want some of this.

I don’t know how they do it. It amazes me every time I see those teachers with smiles on their faces and calm pleasant voices. I mean, a phrase I never thought would come out of my mouth did today. “We don’t show our friends our underwear.” Yeah, I think I should buy them all a ~~bottle~~ case of wine for graduation. Those teachers deserve it!

Happy Easter (almost)

March 30, 2013March 30, 2013 ~ hunt2005 ~ Leave a comment

You know how you walk into Target attempting to just. buy. ONE. thing? Yeah. Happens to me at least three times a week.

Do you know how many times I walk out of Target with that one thing and ONLY that one thing? As often as I get to sleep in or pee in peace. Aka: Never.

Hence the Easter Basket shopping fun. You see, the Easter Bunny had a few small things in mind, the perfect sized baskets to fill, and was all prepared for just a couple things.

Somehow I ended up putting things back and STILL didn’t have room for it all.

Let me back track a bit to what the table was used for earlier today, however. Egg dyeing.

Wait, you think… I didn’t realize that Nikki was crazy enough to attempt egg dyeing with four kids 5 and under? Oh yes. I am. I’m not crazy enough to let them keep their clothes on yet, however I have learned some fun tricks.

The first: Use a larger bowl under the small bowl of dye. The small bowl WILL get tipped. Or knocked. Or an egg dropped in and splashed everywhere. And the bowl helps at least a *little* bit.

The second: Use a whisk. Now, everyone I know had issues with this method because of the obvious: How do you get the dyed egg out of the whisk after dyeing it without getting it all over your hands?? The obvious solution: Use an old crappy whisk like I have where you can bend the metal easily. You pry it open, scoop the egg from the dye, and voila! Magic clean hands and clean babies.

You might argue that it’s just not as much fun if they don’t get messy. I argue you’re not the one who’d have to bathe them tonight.

Hope you had a great Easter weekend and can’t wait for the crazy festivities tomorrow!

Don’t forget the REAL message behind Easter (and not the slogan from Weight Watchers due to the insane amounts of sugar and chocolate consumed). There’s more to Easter than just eggs and bunnies 🙂

Love, The Hunts

Phones

February 28, 2013 ~ hunt2005 ~ Leave a comment

While it’s nice that we have phones to take pictures of things quickly, sometimes, you also don’t realize just how many photos you’ve taken on there that never get sorted in with the rest.

So here is a small assortment of what you may have missed.

Whack a baby:

It’s like Whack-a-mole, only a baby and a laundry basket instead. This was all purely voluntary, for the record, there were no babies harmed in this process and they chose to do it to themselves.

And here is one of our more recent visits to the park. Thank goodness for fenced in playgrounds with gates that shut. And for playsets that aren’t too high up when they decide to try and head dive off.

Such big kids! Jaina enjoys going down the slide herself. Unfortunately, she’s so light she just flies off the end! Jacen enjoys the slide, but doesn’t like having to go around and climb back up each time. And Valerie likes laughing at them while they do it.

The Happiest Place on Earth!

January 16, 2013January 16, 2013 ~ hunt2005 ~ Leave a comment

So I’m finally getting around to the Disneyland post. Sorry for the delay! Honestly? It was an absolutely amazing 3 days. A bit crazy at times, and far different from the Disney experiences of teenage and college years, but worth every minute of it!

We made amazing time headed down there. Boy do car trips go better when you have toddlers who don’t require a bottle every 3 hours! There were a couple of monkey-related issues, but otherwise it was a issue-free trip. We might need to get one of those grabber things for Aiden so he can retrieve toys for us (like this) in the future!

We got there in such good time, in fact, that we arrived before the room was ready. You know, the big giant room where they had to move a small table so that we could fit three cribs. That room. It was pretty awesome, though, and now I’m kicking myself for not taking a picture. There was a curtain to seperate a lowered area of the room where we put the cribs, so we were actually able to put them down early and not have to sleep ourselves quite yet (though we did anyways).

We waited around a little bit, got into the room, unpacked, loaded up the stroller, and off we went!

Once in the park we were off! One of our good friends from Washington was actually in town at the same time so we lucked out and got to spend a lot of the first two days with them, which was wonderful!

We, of course, had to find the Star Wars area. Aiden said that he wanted to do that ride first, and daddy didn’t object. I think I saw a beam of pride as well. The Storm Troopers were out and found his R2D2 sweatshirt immediately and took to him!

In past trips to theme parks, it’s always been ride after ride with nothing in between except waiting in line. With four kids? You start to enjoy more of the magic of it. The parades were a big hit (Jaina wanted to take off after them). And the kids really enjoyed the music and lights!

Of course, there were rides as well.

There was actually only one ride that Aiden wasn’t able to do, but that was okay because the line was over 2 hours long for it anyways! We had a lot of fun enjoying the kids rides with short waits, and took turns taking him on rides while the other person hung out with the kids.

Part of the fun going was that it was still decorated with all the holiday goodness. There were lights, decorations, and the cars in CarsLand were wearing Santa Hats. How much cooler could it get?!

Day 2 began nice and early and we had to rock the princess dresses and mickey tights. The first day we didn’t do too well with the napping in the stroller, but by day 2 even Jacen gave in and decided some sleep would be worth it!

There were a lot more rides, some more time spent with our friends, and a lot of fun to be had that day. The benefits of the park hopper pass and Disneyland is that you can actually go back and forth between the parks all day, so Aiden got to ride the Buzz lightyear ride ~~umpteen~~ nine times while still enjoying our fastpasses in California Adventures.

Back track to how we told the kids about the trip – we had Aiden open up a package with some Mickey and Minnie shirts that a friend had made us. It wasn’t as effective as they make it look on TV (no jumping up and down, no screams, no real excitement at all actually until we explained it), but they were adorable for our last and final day there!

We even managed to get a family picture or two, which is pretty unheard of. It was quite nice to have all of us in a photo!

Overall, the magic of Disneyland still exists. It was there for the children in the music and rides and parades. For us in watching their faces light up as they tried to comprehend why the characters from that magic box at home that makes noise and shows movies were full size and standing in front of them. It was there for the newly engaged girl who had just been proposed to in front of the castle (in the group of people behind Aiden’s head in the picture). It’s so much better this way than just running ride to ride. While you are more frustrated by tourists and crazy people in the mobs of people at the park, it’s also refreshing to see all of the laughs and smiles from kids and adults alike. I mean, it’s the happiest place on earth, right? I can’t wait to take them back in a few years and see how much it (and they) have changed!

And Babies Make Six

Photos