Since my last blog post we have...

 ... announced the upcoming arrival of our 4th little one (a boy!) when he was about 17 weeks along...

 ... trick-or-treated as a giraffe, chicken, and a butterfly...

 ... said what we were thankful for...

 ... ate "macky-cheese" dressed as a chicken...

 ... and celebrated Christmas.

 Amelia had her first piggy tails

 and her first "morning after sleeping with piggy tails" hair soon followed.

 We rang in the new year with a low key family game night with my parents and some tasty snacks 

(that Claire and Amelia are helping themselves to).

 We transitioned Amelia to a toddler bed for a short time to get her used to the idea of not being in the crib anymore (since there would soon be a baby in need of the crib)

and celebrated her birthday with a Very Hungry Caterpillar cake.

 Claire had her first trip to the dentist,

 helped decorate birthday cookies to share with her classmates at preschool,

 enjoyed unseasonably warm weather in February with an al fresco birthday lunch,

 and celebrated her 4th birthday with a Rapunzel cake.

 We then had several days of intense snow that coincided with mommy getting an awful bout of the stomach flu, so dad took time off to care for the kids so mom could sleep like a dead person.

The snowmen the girls built with Matt after the second snowfall covered them up.

And of course we had to make snow ice cream for the first time .

The spare room was painted to become Amelia's new room, and she got her own "big girl" bed

 so the nursery could be decorated in a more boy-friendly fashion.

 Claire got her first haircut, which consisted of about two 1-inch curls that were longer than the rest of her hair.

 I finished crocheting the blue baby blanket...

 ... so we could have our baby boy, Blaise Anthony, on March 10th.

 The girls were immediately in love

 and we thoroughly enjoy being a family of six!

We came home from the hospital, only to go back the next day for a 2 1/2 day stay in the NICU due to what turned out to just be some very tricky boogers that caused some breathing problems for our little man.  Armed with some saline solution and a bulb syringe, we headed home for "Take 2" of  life as a family of six.

 The second trip home was successful, and the girls dote on their baby brother to no end

 He's still not too sure what he thinks about that, but I'm sure he'll get used to it.

 We celebrated Blaise's baptism on Palm Sunday

 and Easter the following Sunday.

 We took the first trip to the ranch of the year to plant potatoes.

 Blaise gave us his first smiles the day before he turned one-month-old.

 Melanie celebrated her 6th birthday with a Rapunzel cake.

 Matt had facial hair

 and then he didn't.

 Spring finally came to stay (but not without a final dusting of snow)

 Claire had her final day of 3-year-old preschool

 Melanie had her first dance recital and loved every minute of it!

 And finally there was Mother's Day.

Now you're all caught up with the Stockemer family and I can resume my irregularly scheduled blogging program.

February Fun

In our latest installment of "Mega Posts to Get Caught Up On Blogging" we present for your perusal...

Claire in yet another random sleep location.  

Coloring really is hard work, just ask her!

Cuddling with Amelia while she picks my nose.

Amelia is making it easier to tell where she's been snooping around recently

Be honest now, who among you is trying to figure out what canned goods are in our pantry?

It's OK, I'd probably be doing the same thing if our roles were reversed ;D

And yes, there is a LOT of canned pumpkin in there.  Pumpkin muffins and pancakes are popular items around here.

Amelia is also quite persistent about climbing the chairs at the kitchen table.  I try to keep them pushed in all the way to prevent her from getting on top of the table.  This leads to some frustration on her part.  Poor kid.

Making Valentine's Day cards

Decorating Valentine's Day cookies

I had the *brilliant* idea to let the girls place the M&Ms in various designs on the cookies instead of just mixing them in like normal. 

Beautiful, aren't they?

(the girls and the cookies alike)

I especially like the face cookie Melanie made that has "teeth" inside the smile.

Claire was all about thorough chocolate coverage.

Good idea, unfortunately it didn't really turn out as nicely as I would have liked.  I knew they wouldn't since chocolate chip cookie dough is so soft, but I powered through and tried anyway.  Gotta prove myself wrong from time to time (or would it be proving myself right in this instance since I knew it most likely wasn't going to work?)  The girls really enjoyed it regardless of how the cookies looked to me. 

Melanie also gave white chocolate pretzels as part of her Valentine's treats at school, and the big girls really enjoyed eating the "stripes" that fell off into the bottom of the container.

Amelia's newest talent: getting her shoes and socks off.  She especially enjoys doing this when we're in the car, proudly announcing her accomplishment with a joyous "Uh-oh!"

Uh-oh my foot. :P

Claire can gallop, and it very much reminds us of the galloping in "Monty Python and the Holy Grail"

Matt caught a picture of all three girls enjoying the bedtime routine
(as well as a rare occasion of their floor not being covered by baskets full of laundry waiting to be folded and put away)

There are enough pictures below for an entire post on a day we spent at the ranch, but I've already been working on this post "in my spare time" for two days, and I don't want to have to download them again, so here is a post-within-a-post full of outdoor fun at Spring Creek.

I'm pretty sure this is the first time Amelia has been able to be down on the ground by the creek.  She was pretty fascinated by everything.

The newest form of amusement was trying to toss rocks across the creek into a hollowed out old tree, where they will plunk their way back down and out a hole in the base and into the creek. 

Their were discussions about coming up with some sort of "Spring Creek Challenge" to be executed on the 4th of July, with the Hollow Trunk Rock Toss being one of the things you had to accomplish.  We're open to suggestions for additional events to add to the list.

Everybody enjoys a good Gator ride!

Sweet picture of Amelia and Grams

An evening on the deck with Gramps after a fun day of outdoor play.  What could be better?

"Hospital Day" at preschool

(aka pajama day)

The kids received a hospital bracelet upon being "admitted" to school in the morning, were assigned an illness that started with the same letter as their first name, and had a visit from a nurse and learned about good hygiene and general health. 

Playdate with Melanie's friend and making pretzels for a lenten treat.

Arms folded in prayer just like a pretzel!

A dear friend came home from a deployment, so while his wife and daughter went to meet up with him and attend the welcome home ceremony we volunteered to "let the dog out" while they were gone for the day.  Of course while we were there we made our own little "Welcome Home!"  surprise for him.

The girls really enjoyed making the "Welcome Home" banner.

Welcomed home with a strawberry rhubarb pie and "cards" from our girls.

FYI, if you are mailing something internationally, don't go to Dillons to do it.  We tried to send a care package to our friend while he was deployed, not realizing we would need to fill out a customs form.  The employee at the customer service desk at Dillons didn't know either, so we paid for a package to be shipped only to have it sent back to us a week later since it lacked customs forms.  We were dubious that it would make it to him before the mail cutoff date at that point, so we just saved it for when he got home.  It's the thought that counts, right?

Mustaches the girls got from the toy tower at the doctor's office when we went in for Amelia's 1-year well-child checkup.  

Obviously not a significant part of our month, but I thought they were funny.