Life with Three

Hey y'all..

SO, my little brother is here visiting for a couple of weeks and let me just start by saying that life with three kiddos isn't overly different than life with two, only having a boy around is super different.  I'm so used to my girls and I find myself struggling a little to figure out activities that we all want to do.  My little brother is 8, and I don't know if it is just because he is raised completely different than I was or if it's just because we are the opposite sex, but man, are we different.  He's sweet and calm most of the time, but his interests differ greatly from mine.  He's a huge sports fan/athlete, and I'm, well... not.  I'm more of the artsy craftsy kind of person who likes to be still most of the time.  I've seen his karate routine I can't even tell you how many times and am trying to come up with new adjectives to describe it.  "wow", "awesome", "cool" etc... only go so far.

He's done well with the girls, but sometimes he just really wants my attention (usually when I am putting the girls to sleep or cooking) and it's hard to get him to just wait a minute.  He's not used to that I don't think (he's pretty much an only child since I've never lived with him) whereas my children are definitely used to it now.  Nick is a huge help when he's home, but that's been pretty limited lately.  He is taking a driving course (more on that later...) so after working all day (7-4), he was at his course from 5-9, then this weekend he has been there from 7-3:30.  Today is the last day and boy, am I glad.  He's taking next week off (the whole week!  I'm excited!!!) to play with us and spend some quality family time with us.  That will really help because I'm running out of activities for us all to do without Nick around.  When he's around we can do all the things I had planned out.  We're going ot be going camping, to the children's museum, NASA, the museum of natural science, the zoo, the aquarium and we're taking Ryan go-carting.  He's never done any of that before... so it will be quite the experience for him I think.  He's quite homesick, especially for his cats, so hopefully being busy will help him.  I remember how that used to be, so I'm trying to be as sympathetic as I can be about it.  He's awfully brave for coming to stay with us for two weeks since he doesn't really know me that well (he was just 3 when we moved to Scotland and didn't get to visit too often).  Hopefully the weather will get better for us.  The first two days he was here it was 111.  Yes... without the heat index.  OUCH!  Then the past few days it has been POURING down rain.  Like, to the point that our power went out and my backyard is now a marsh.  Fun.

We're still working on getting moved into our house... man, it's a slow slow process when you've got two small kids.  I have yet to hang anything up (other than Clyde, my Dad's stuffed pheasant).  I can't wait to get the boxes all out of here and feel like I'm really at home.  The new neighbors are awesome... they have 4 girls (one of which has already come to babysit for us once, although I didn't leave... just unpacked a little) and are really nice.

We went to visit my grandparents some and they have some big news, although I can't tell you what it is until everyone knows and they have it out and about.  We also went to Papa's wedding to Linda... Liara was the flower girl and did an amazing job.  Man, she was cute and we are so proud of the great job she did!

Ok, well, I have to get going because my girls are up and causing all kinds of trouble while I'm over here typing.  I should have loads of pictures next post of the fun stuff we'll do this week!

Here's the rain again... geez, I wish Plainview would get some of this!