Here we grow again.

Well, it's official. There is a child in there. For those who can't tell, face is on the left, butt is on the right:
We had hoped to be able to reveal gender at the same time we went public with the pregnancy announcement, but baby was uncooperative, sitting on his/her legs and the umbilical cord, so for now we will all go on with our assumption that it is yet another Noyce girl due in August.

It has been showing some promising signs of spring lately, so we went back to rediscover our local park last week:






Livvy is turning into such a big girl lately. She has a vocabulary of about 20 words or so, including "drink, all done, please, thank you, Becca, Tia, Tess, ball, pup, belly, up, more and of course string cheese". She thought she was very pretty in this hat and kept saying "cheese" til I realized she was asking me to take her picture:
Tess and Liv coloring in the sunny spot (it's warmer there):
We spent yet another week with puking kids, I love how they don't all get it at the same time, it has to run down the line like dominoes:
Tia can read now. Here she is reading Tess her bedtime story (green eggs and ham) for me:
Tess chose a chocolate cake at the grocery store that I couldn't say no to because it looked so deliciously tempting to me too. Here she is after she devoured it:
And, just cause they're cute here's the whole crew:
Please excuse the poor picture quality. These are all phone pictures because I don't have a charger for my camera. The movers have it in storage somewhere. But, on the bright side, we have a move in date for the house of March 27!

February's over?!?

I never mentioned on here that we got a visit from Uncle Sean and Auntie Pamela a couple weeks ago. They came to get Henry. This is literally the only picture I took the entire time they were here. Tess taking Henry for a walk with a little bit of help from Uncle Sean:
Tess and Liv pushing their own cart at the grocery store:
Ha...do you see Tess' little face back behind Tia? Liv thought it was absolutely hilarious to push them in there and then slam the door on them. They were really good sports about it mostly because Liv's belly laugh is rare and contagious (i wish my video camera wasn't packed away somewhere, it really was very funny):
Ahhh, gotta love WI winters. All the kids at the bus stop were ice skating in our driveway:
And here's Becca scraping the windows on the van:
Thursday was Matt's 30th birthday. The girls were more excited than he was though I think:
Tia got him a popcorn popper:
Tess got him a little statue (?) don't ask me. She insisted that Daddy had to have it for his birthday and then was broken hearted when I mentioned that she was supposed to let him open it:
All of our books were either destroyed in the flooding of our house, or are packed away somewhere, so Livvy and Tess and I finally went to the library and Liv was so excited she couldn't wait for someone to read to her. She had to read all by herself:
They also had a cool wooden train set to check out. Tess played with it for like 3 hours straight on the first day:
Our incredible streak of bad luck continued this weekend when the van refused to start after I had taken all the girls to Target. We had a tow truck come for the van, but Matt was at school and couldn't get away until a couple hours later, so we walked to a McDonald's and played. Here is Tess when we first got there:
And Tess after she was done playing. She needed the shades to nap in the stroller cause the sun was too "hot on her eyes":
Everyone else playing for the entire time:
Isn't this how you carry all your most prized possessions?:

Happy V-day!

Remember Tia and I painted pottery for her birthday? The finished product as promised:
Does this count as a milestone worth recording in her baby book?:
The girls had jersey day at school last week:
Tia showing me her "love monkey" webkin that she named Val (short for Valentine):
Becca with her loot from her V-day party at school, and the box she made to collect it in:
The bus driver had a competition for all the kids to make and decorate their own paper heart. Tia came in second place and won this giant lollipop. I should have though to take a picture of her heart before she turned it in, but, of course I did not:
Tess needed to have her picture taken too:
We had chocolate fondue for dessert and by the looks of things, I'd guess it's safe to say that Livvy enjoyed it:

Tiny little Tia...

Can you believe Cecilia is 6 years old?!? She's one of those kids though, sometimes you swear she's 6 going on 16!
Here she is, my kids have worn me down over the years and have started their own tradition of choosing one gift to open in the morning before school. Here is Tia's:
If you are curious it was a Webkinz figure. She was very excited and took it for show and share.

Livvy sometimes just needs some Becca love:

Tia with her crown she got to wear all day at school:
As soon as Dad got home we opened the rest of the presents. Becca is helping Tia read some of the cursive on the cards. She can read pretty well on her own, but not if you write in cursive!
She asked for Barbies this year:

She got about 4. But I didn't think you needed a picture of each one.

"Yay!! Monies!" She doesn't have the concept of money's worth figured out quite yet, but she knows she can buy stuff with it!"

This was one of her favorite gifts of the whole night. Not sure why, but she loved this blue shirt from Grandma Barbara:
Becca was in charge of distributing the gifts in the "right order":

Is it a giant tootsie roll? No it's a...

"A LOVE MONKEY!!!"
We told Livvy she had to wait to have her ring pop until after dinner:


Princess cake:


So, we gave Tia the option of going with me to get a mani/pedi or going with Matt ice fishing today (Saturday). She was really leaning toward ice fishing, but when we woke up this morning it was 50 degrees and all the snow was melting/melted. We decided that probably wasn't a good idea, so she had to go with me...yay for me!!



I think she ended up enjoying herself. I know I did, I will take any excuse I can get for a pedicure!

Next door to the nail salon was a paint your own pottery place. She painted a penguin mug and I painted a mug as well. I will put pictures of the finished product after we pick them up, probably Wed.
Check out that concentration... She got bored after the first coat of paint though, and they strongly recommended at least 2, preferably 3. So we'll see how our masterpieces actually turn out.
What would a birthday party be without Starbucks!?
"Aren't my nails beautiful?!":