1: I am the only SAHM who lives in Utah County and doesn't know how to use a fancy camera. Or Photoshop.

2: Emmett can't sit on his own.

3: Owen can't sit still.

4: Samuel can't smile without looking like he's in pain.

And thusly, 5: It is impossible to get three children looking decent in one picture.

It sure was an adventure trying, though!

We almost might have gone with one of these, but that leads me to number 6: I'm too lazy.

Merry Christmas from the Briggs!

Warmest wishes to you and yours, from us and ours.

Owen got stung by a wasp.  It swelled up so fast, and Owen was just crying, "Owie my foot" over and over, that I thought he had sprained it.  Then we saw the tiny dot, and Erik pulled out a stinger.  Poor little guy limped around the rest of the day.

The Smoosh may have gotten smooshier.

The Olders sure do like the Youngest.

The lawn got its last mow of the season.  Taking all safety precautions necessary: boots and a bike helmet of course.

And the gymnastics bus came by again. 

September 25, 2011

It took me a long time to finally make it back to church.  Erik had been taking the boys for the last 2 hours.  I finally decided it was time, so I got myself out of bed at 6:30 to start the morning.  Erik leaves every Sunday at 7:30 for bishopric meeting.  The boys got up right after he left.  So I finished getting myself ready, got the two boys ready, then woke up Emmett to feed him and get him ready.  Erik came home at 8:50 and we were only about 5 minutes late for 9:00 church.  And they might have been wearing cute coordinating shirts.  Totally worth documenting.  Except that once we were back home, no one really wanted to be documented.  Oh well.  Such is our life.  That's why these pictures still make me smile. 

Samuel

Owen

Emmett

Six weeks in.  This is our life.  And we are still adjusting.  To say the least.  I feel like I should have the hang of it by now.  I definitely don't.

Over the summer I got so used to doing posts about all the things we DID.  Well, we aren't really DOING anything these days.  These long, never-ending, tedious and tiring days.  Yeesh!  

But I still take pictures.  And have to blog them.  So here they are.

I set down the little chub monster for a minute, and was surprised to come back and find him asleep.  He's cute.

Samuel is a very kind and attentive older brother.  He loves doting on Em, and he is great at teaching O a thing of two.  Like how to turn anything into the drums.

Finally got some chubby smiles on camera.

Samuel has been fascinated by climbing trees for a long time.  He has expressed often how disappointing it is that we don't have any climbing trees in our backyard.  One afternoon, he came running inside bubbling over, "Mom, Mom!!!  I finally learned to climb one of our trees!!  Hurry, you got to come see.  But first, I need to get some protection for my eyes.  It's very dangerous work to climb trees."

Owen loves to "cuh-der."  This day, he was seemingly inspired by my spray painting mat on the driveway.

I love those smooshy cheeks.

Chubalubs still hurts a lot.  He has good days and very very bad days.  Erik is good at calming him down and comforting his bubbly little tummy.  But you can still tell he hurts.

Did I mention he's chubby?  Scrumdiddlyumptious.

Sam tells me regularly that he doesn't like Owen.  Owen can often be heard shouting, "No, Sam, I not like that!"  They fight, they don't share, they push each others' buttons and know just what it takes to get the other mad.  But they're brothers.  And Erik tells me that's all normal.  They also make each other laugh and giggle, they play so well together, they're best buddies, and you can see how much they adore each other.

I was so afraid adding another boy to the mix would change their relationship.  Would Sam be as close with him as he is with Owen?  Would Owen and he become best buddies while Sam became the odd man out?  I still wonder what's going to happen as they get older, but right now I couldn't be more pleased to see these three boys of mine . . . three sweet little brothers who love each other mucho. 

Erik was working late one night, so while I grilled up some bratwurst outside, I told they boys they could come out in their rain boots and play in the puddles.  Which was apparently very loosely interpreted to mean, "Come out in your rain boots, but then take them off, and don't forget to get nakey, too!"

Throw all the cushions onto the floor.  This time it was a Hobbit hole.  Play in the tunnel.  Put underwear on our heads.

You know.  Respectively.

A few evenings ago, the boys were playing nicely upstairs while Erik and I were down here.  After a while, I heard them laughing.  Both of them.  Hysterically.  Seriously, one of the best sounds ever.  But still worth some investigating.  This is how I found them . . . both boys playing dress up in their Daddy’s clothes.

Last night, pretty much the same story.  But this time when I came up to see what the giggling was about, Sam hid his face from me.  He knew this one wasn’t quite as harmless as Dad’s clothes.  So I saw Owen’s makeover first.  Sam confessed to being the makeup artist for both himself and little brother.

They think they’re so funny.