Number 100

This is the one hundredth post on this blog, for the record. Thanks to all who still follow along with us!

Well, the baby arrived and I'm feeling great! Oh wait, not my baby...but I did get some practice with holding little Russell at the hospital. He's a sweetie!

We enjoyed an afternoon of sledding at Dad and Mom Schulz's.

Playing Cranium:)

All the kids decided they wanted babies in their tummies...(this was still a couple weeks before our announcement)

My kitchen helpers! I spent the month of January constantly behind on dishes, so they helped bail me out one day.

A sweet picture from the big Schulz Christmas in December that we received. Micah, Abram, Weston, Krista, and Asher.

The children finally got to meet baby Russell when he was a week old! They were in love! (And Levi was in a phase where he felt compelled to stick out his tongue every time I took his picture. Joanna is imitating him.)

Matt put up the shades in the new windows in the basement so they are all ready to go! The outside still needs some work when the weather warms up. 

It snowed the weekend of the 18th - perfect packing snow for building a snowman! When we were ready to go inside, Micah insisted he was going to stay out and watch the snowman until it melted. Thankfully, I convinced him that it might be awhile or he would have been out there for a few weeks.

Along with the weather came some nice ice for slipping and getting a black eye! Oops!

The week of the 24th kept us on our toes with classes on three nights, a planned doctor appointment and grocery shopping on the off-day, and squeezing in an unplanned doctor visit with Levi that ended in a diagnosis of strep throat and ear infection. In one way, the sickness kind of helped slow us down a bit because I had to cancel piano lessons on Wednesday and Thursday.

And then, our big boy turned four! In line with his character, it took him a couple days to adjust to the new age and admit that he was now four. He is not keen about transitions. But he enjoyed his birthday to the fullest!

Also fitting for his character, Levi had a very specific request for his birthday cake: a mint chocolate chip ice cream sandwich cake. It ended up being super simple; I layered mint chocolate chip ice cream sandwiches with cool whip (which I dyed his two favorite colors, red and blue). I wasn't feeling up to making a nice beautiful cake this month so I was happy for an easy-pleaser.

It actually turned out to be very colorful when we cut it open!

Our gift to Levi was a "four" puzzle that revealed the anticipated baby!

A favorite gift was this dog on a leash from G & G Schulz. It has had a new name about every day...things like "Caramel Eyes Apple" and "Leash."

The next day, I decided to keep all of the kids home from church because they had been coughing and had slight fevers and weren't acting well. These new stickers from G & G Massner came in handy that day! 

We were planning to host young couples on Tuesday, but since our children still had coughs and runny noses on Tuesday, nobody felt comfortable coming with their babies. So Nate and Lucy graciously offered to host for us. I made my meat and brought it up there, and then we spent a quiet evening at home. 

Levi got four dollars that he spent at Dollar General. A couple purchases were these capsule animals...

...and these beautiful lips that he just couldn't resist. Along with some candy and a card game. 

My mom sent home some of my old clothes. Joanna thought this ten-sizes-too-big outfit was the greatest! So retro:)

The first weekend of February, we went to Monmouth for Ray Defenbaugh's visitation in the afternoon. Due to the long line, we ended up being forty-five minutes late for supper at my mom and dad's. It was a very low-key "family night" because Jesse was sick in bed with pneumonia, Jonathan was still in Ames, and Bill & V stayed home with Russell since we didn't know whether Jesse was contagious at that point (and we are obviously just reckless parents when it comes to exposing our kids to sickness).

The next day was the funeral at the Biggsville gym. The children and I sat in the bleachers at the back of the gym in the non-designated AC children's section; Matt directed the choir. The funeral ended up lasting about two hours. We were so exhausted at the end of the day, but it is a funeral we will not forget for a long time. Ray was an inspiration to all of us.

The next couple weeks, I started to regain some energy to get caught up on two weeks' worth of dishes and laundry, do two months worth of ironing, put away the Christmas decor, and prepare meals containing meat again. My hormones have also started to rebound a bit after about a month of being down and depressed. So, I guess as February comes to a close I can say I am feeling much better overall.

The next birthday cake project was Micah's! He was so excited to turn three. I told him for the past several months that when he turns three he is going to start using the potty and wearing underwear. So far (2.5 weeks later), so good! 

The finished product (his request was a balloon cake)!

Birthday buds! Alan had his "birthday party" at our house the same night as Micah's. Only Alan's party was on the pond in the form of a hockey game!

Our Valentine's Day Bouquet! 

Around 10:30pm on Valentine's Day, my brothers showed up for a late night hockey game!

Micah and Joanna enjoyed splashing in the puddles one Saturday!

Drummer band!

Monday the 10th was our last day of foster care classes...it is so nice to have our Monday evenings back again! Our final home visit was the next Monday afternoon. It will probably be the beginning of April before our home study is finalized and approved and we have our license, but everything is out of our hands now.

On the 14th, I took the kids up to Muscatine to get groceries and eat lunch with Matt. That evening, Matt and I went with a group to sing for Jody Eberhardt, who was on hospice care at home. We spent the remainder of the evening at Mom and Dad Schulz's. That weekend was Travis and Kenna's wedding and we got the privilege of hosting four single sisters...two we knew, Cherelle and Liberty S....and two new ones from West Bend, Anna and Abigail Z. Sunday after the reception we went to Mom and Dad Schulz's for a family night.

A walk in the woods had the boys discovering a tree house!

The next week involved two trips to town, one for my doctor appointment and another for Joanna's 18 month check-up. Thursday evening we returned to town for Jody's visitation and got groceries afterward. Friday we attended potluck at Nate and Lucy's, and Saturday was memorandum at church.

Uncle Jesse spent the evening here on the Sunday of the Parent's Supper! He had spent the last two evenings babysitting our children, so I guess it was our kids' turn to babysit Uncle Jesse!

The boys wanted to match me on Monday!

On Tuesday, my mom came and picked up the boys to spend the day with them at Shug's Tiny Town in Burlington for their birthdays. It is kind of like a children's museum of sorts with all the different kid-sized shops to play in. The boys had a blast. They met Grandpa for lunch at McDonald's. They were wiped out at the end of the day but had many fun stories to tell!

The hair salon

Going fishing!

"We're fire mans," says Micah.

We kind of slowed down the next couple days. Joanna had a fever last Wednesday night and it returned Sunday and this Wednesday afternoon. Micah got a fever Tuesday night, Levi had a fever and sore throat all day Thursday, and Micah had a fever again on Friday evening. It doesn't make any sense to me...I never know if anyone is sick or healthy around here! But apparently we should just start assuming everybody is sick. I planned to host Baby Joy on Thursday but we ended up rescheduling since so many were cancelling with sick kids anyway. We also cancelled piano lessons and our evening plans so a very full-looking Thursday turned into a quiet day at home.

I was so proud of Micah...he learned how to put together this square block puzzle all by himself! I can't even do it, so that's saying something. 

"Orange" you silly!

We're looking forward to some beautiful weather this weekend as we take our big "leap" into March!

If you read our blog, please comment below with something inspirational. Or a simple "Salutations" would be great too! After 100 blog posts, I would love to hear something from our readers!