Exciting News

Most of you have probably heard by now, but for anyone who hasn't, we are expecting baby #3! I am about 5 months along and feeling really good now that I am over the nausea. I am due the very end of February. We are really excited! It has been fun with Brooke being older, she actually understands why Mom's belly is growing. A lot of times she will hug and kiss my belly and tell me that the baby is crying or talking to her! She has felt the baby kicking a couple times and that was very exciting for her. Whenever we would ask her if she thinks the baby will be a boy or a girl she tells us that we can't say yet, we have to wait and see. Recently she has changed her mind and she is telling people that she thinks it will be a boy AND a girl. Let's hope she's not right! A lot of people have been asking us if we know what we are having, but we won't find out until the day it is born! Jaycee has been really cute, too. I don't know how much she understands, but a lot of times she will come lift my shirt up and lay her head on my belly. It is really sweet. I think both of these girls will be excited to have a new baby!

So that's what the shoulder strap is for

This is Brooke riding home in daddy's truck after a sleepover at Aunt Addison's house.

Birthdays (cont'd)

On July 9th we had another birthday party, but this time just for Brooke and Jaycee. It was at our house and we had lots of family and friends there. We started the party off with a game of Pin the Tail on the Donkey.

Jaycee

Brooke

Next we played Drop the Clothespin in the Bottle, which is always a favorite. Here are Brooke, Jaycee, Aunt Addison, Aunt Gabby, Cousin Kyle, and Cousin Seamus.

No 4-year-old birthday party is complete without a good game of Duck, Duck, Goose!



Next, the famous Pop-the-Balloon-on-My-Ankle-Game. Not a big hit with the birthday girls, but I think the older kids had fun with this one!



Present time! They got lots of fun stuff!

Ever since we started planning the party, Brooke has been talking about her princess cake. We saw a really cute decorated princess cake at the store, but it cost way too much for a little birthday party. I decided I would have to come up with something on my own. Having no cake decorating skills whatsoever, this is what I came up with, and the best part of all, Brooke was very pleased with it! We had two orange candles for Jaycee, and four pink candles for Brooke!

After the party, Grandma Brinkerhoff read them some of their new books, and they both tried out their new sunglasses and backpacks!

They received packages in the mail from Grandpa and Grandma Anderson, which they opened a couple days after the party.

Posing for a picture.

Ready, set, go!

Jaycee likes her new elephant!

They received lots of books, a cuddly elephant, and a pair of pants for Jaycee. They got started reading right away!

Thanks everyone for helping them have such fun birthdays!

Birthdays!

Brooke and Jaycee had birthdays and I am late, as usual, telling about it! Jaycee turned 2 years old on June 16th, and Brooke turned 4 years old on July 3rd. Each month, the Brinkerhoff side of our family gets together to celebrate all the birthdays for the month. For June & July, we decided it would be easier to just combine and do one party for both months. We got together on June 30th to celebrate. Between both months we had 5 birthdays: Jaren (turned 1), Jaycee (2), Brooke (4), Gabrielle (9), and Ross (too old to disclose!). We met at Ross & Elyssa's house and enjoyed homemade pizza with brownies for dessert. It was a great time!

Here are the birthday kids!

Here is Brooke with some of her gifts.

Here is Jaycee with some of her gifts.

Cami made these skirts for the girls. They are super cute! They all happened to be wearing pink shirts so it was really cute with all of them matching!

Easter

I know I am very late posting about Easter, but I had some cute pictures that I wanted to share.

On Saturday the girls colored Easter eggs. I just gave them some eggs & crayons and they colored away. Here is Jaycee coloring her eggs with her most serious egg coloring face on.

Here is Brooke, posing for her Easter egg coloring shot.

"Hold your eggs up so that I can take a picture!"

Shortly after the egg coloring began, Jaycee got a brilliant idea.

"Look, an egg on a stick!"

(She had fallen on her face a couple days before this, which would explain the red, scratched-up nose.)

Sunday morning, the Easter bunny had left some goodies in our baskets. The girls were very excited about that. After church that day, we went over to my parent's house. The kids had a little Easter egg hunt & we had a delicious Easter dinner. Here are the kids after their egg hunt. From left to right there is: Brooke, Gabby, Julien, Addison, and Jaycee. Addison is upset about something! Brooke and Jaycee are mine & the other three are my brother & my sisters.

Here are Brooke and Jaycee in their Easter dresses. I love it when they match!

Jaycee got very excited when she discovered there were goodies in her egg.

We tried to get a family picture, but the kids were not having it. It didn't turn out very well, but here we are. We had a very nice day. We hope everyone else had a lovely Easter too.