Storms, muffins, and sleepless nights

We are in major need of a routine around here as the kids are a little wilder than usual and I am sure it's just the change of having Josie here and that things are not as "structured" as usual. It will come though, hopefully Maggie and Owen won't kill each other in the meantime. Josie is doing great and already is so alert which Maggie loves. She always says she is looking for her big sister when her eyes are open. Joe took Maggie and Owen swimming Tuesday night at the indoor pool to get them out of the house a little, they had alot of fun. Mom and I gave Josie a bath while they were gone and she really seemed to like it.












She is always very alert for about 30 minutes or so after her baths so they must wake her up. She is doing really well at night as she is eating every 3 hours or so and goes right back to sleep after nursing. I can't say I am rested in the mornings but it is better than having to fuss with her to get her back to sleep.

Maggie loves cooking with mom, especially making banana muffins, her favorite. But this time Owen got in on the fun as well and had a blast, he especially loved licking the batter out of the bowl.









I think that this was the 3rd batch she made while she was here as they are a huge hit with the kids. They have had lots of fun with her here and Maggie has had enough MIMI soup to last her quite sometime. Mom headed home on Wednesday, we decided to let Dad have her back as I am sure he is tired of eating out! Tueday night we had a huge storm and woke up to a tornado basically outside our window. I felt like we lived in ILlinois again! We had to get all the kids down in the basement and stay there for a while until it passed. It really did alot of damage around here, but aside from being without power we were fine. Joe put Maggie in bed with mom and she barley woke up aside from saying, "mimi, this is fun." Owen on the other hand was pretty scared and once we went back upstairs could not go back to sleep so we put him in bed with us and he was quite the chatter box. He kept saying, "daddy, let's play hide and seek". Not really what Joe wanted to do at 3 am. Needless to say, we didn't get alot of sleep that night.
Debbie got here Wednesday afternoon and is staying until next week to help out with the kiddos. I am not sure how I am going to keep up the attention the kids are used to getting when it's just us again!
Here is Josie enjoying her new Moses basket that Neila Susan got for her.








Tomorrow I have an appointment to get the kids valentines picture taken. I am hoping it goes well, Maggie and Josie will be easy, but we will have to see how Owen does! Nothing else going on around here, we are all pretty busy trying to keep everyone content! Josie is the easiest at this point as she seems very laid back. Hopefully she'll stay that way!