muddy puddles

Hailey and Jack love to get dirty and they love to play outside...so, days when it's rainy and there are muddy puddles are pretty much the best days ever, according to them, anyways :) I even got in on the action a little this time (since I had just bought some rubber boots) and I gotta be honest- it's not really that much fun! I don't like being wet, I don't like being dirty and I'm not a huge fan of doing either of them on purpose!! It was fun to watch them have fun, though! (as long as i didn't think about all the extra laundry it was creating...)

how nice of Daddy to have cut down a few trees and stacked the wood for us so that we could have a nice little bench to take breaks on! 

we had to search out all the puddles in the neighborhood, because we didn't have enough to occupy us for too long :) 

the m&m's aren't huge fans of jumping in muddy puddles, either. At least not yet...I give them a year and then I can almost guarantee that I will have 4 little muddy puddle jumpers on my hands :)

this is how the twins spent most of their time in my womb- head to feet and I've found them like this a lot in their bed- apparently old habits die hard, even for babies :) 

fun, fun, fun

it's fun to be a baby at the Konietzki house :)

a special time

"a special day, for just me. Jack can't come, you can't come. This is just me, right momma?" she said to me the day before she left. I think she was excited to have something that was just her; something that made her special and unique. It was special and precious of my sister to think of asking Hailey to spend the weekend at her house and I think the whole family benefited from it. With four tiny kids that are all so close in age it does get hard to make each one feel special (I'm guessing just the simple fact of having 4 kids makes it hard to make each one feel special- there are only 2 of us and 4 of them) It's been fun to see some of the pictures that Auntie Fysh has been sending over- looks like so much fun and Hailey has a big, big smile on her face in every one of them :) I think she's enjoying herself! 

We've also been enjoying ourselves. It's been a little quieter, a little less crazy, a little less hectic, a lot less going on, much less chatter and talking and that's been a little nice. I miss my crazy little girl with more than enough personality to go around, but it's been a nice little break from having to entertain her all day! :) Not to mention- we have all really enjoyed being able to really shower attention on Jackson. He often gets over shadowed by Hailey's amazing amount of personality and it was kind of fun to watch him flourish and have a chance to be the "big boy" all weekend long. There was a lot of truck playing and story reading. Korey and I got a babysitter and went on a date and even the babysitter enjoyed her special time with just Jack. (we put the babies down before she came) We'll all be happy to see our little Hailey come home, but, for a few days it was kind of a nice little "break" for all the kiddos to have a chance to get some one on one attention!  

 the m&m's really enjoyed all the running around they could do without their main "tattle tale" at home! They pulled toilet paper off the roll, they stole Jackson's trucks, they threw all the toys all over the house...they had a grand old time :) 

Jackson got to sleep in Hailey's bed on Friday night, because Aunt Kelly and Uncle Ben stayed with us for a night, but when it came time for a nap he desperately wanted to sleep in Kelly and Ben's bed and isn't he adorable?? He looks so tiny in that big bed!!

 the twinnies also did some pretty cute sleeping...I think Maysen was cold and climbed under Maelle to use her for a blanket ;) 

 the biggest news of the weekend is that Hailey forget her baby Fina, so Jack's been trying to take good care of her. He has taken his job very seriously and even slept with her at night to keep her from being scared :) (isn't his soft heart just so precious and sweet?) It's always good to have a little brother whose got your back, right Hailey?! :) 

It's always so nice to have a sister who loves my daughter almost as much as I do, so I don't have to feel sad while she's gone! I know that she's having the time of her life and probably only misses her mom at bedtime! :) 

11 months

Can hardly believe it...my little m&m's are only 1 month away from being a year old. I don't know whether to cry or cheer! I know, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that it was God who brought our little family through the last 11 months and I know I say it often, but I, honestly am in awe of the simple fact that we have made it this far. I don't know what the other option would be...I don't even want to think about the other option, but there are so many blessings that I see when I look back on the past 11 months that I can't help but stand in awe of the fact that God chose my little family to pour out His blessings on. 

 here's my little Macy girl- looking every bit of 11 months old! The bigger of the 2, weighing in at 16lbs 11oz, she's definitely tripled her weight, already. If there's a more "contented" one of the 2, she would be it- unless she's sick or teething, then she's all crank and whine!! :) She loves to be wherever Hailey and Jack are- she follows both of them around the house, determined not to be left out of the action! 

 Ellie-belle and Macy girl- two little goofy and crazy babies! 

So in love with these two!!

 My sweet little Ellie- belle. She's such a little goof and already has the funniest and craziest little personality. She's the smallest of the 2- weighing in at 15lbs 9oz, but she makes up for it in spunk. She's determined not to be left behind by Maysen and is constantly on the move! She's also the one that if I'm holding her sister, she'll throw herself down on the ground, put her head down on the floor, cry and look at me with pitiful little eyes until I pick her up, too! 

 both of these little ones have their top 2 teeth.

Maysen has one of her bottom ones and Maelle is working on hers. 

 the girls can go up the stairs like champs, but only Maysen is good at going down the stairs. Maelle tries and most often I have to catch her. Thankfully, Maysen has only gone up and down the first few steps and she and Maelle tend to stick together, so it hasn't been too many steps for her to topple down. It is probably one of the cutest things, though, to look down our steps and see these two little ones climbing up together! 

 ahhh, yes, when they're not getting in trouble together- they're creating trouble by going in opposite directions. I have absolutely no idea what I'm going to do when they start walking (besides stay home and NEVER go anywhere in public). We have a new game we play at our house- "find the baby"- mostly because we're always losing one of them! (but, partly because it's super cute to see Hailey and Jack run around the house calling and searching for a baby) :) 

 Jackson calls both girls "Maysen and Maelle" and Hailey calls them "that baby" 

  Happy 11 month birthday, Maysen and Maelle! I love you two princesses so much. You keep me on my toes and I love that about you. My life was not so full and so wonderful before you came. I love nothing better than snuzzling with the 2 of you in the morning before the other 2 are up! Nursing you two peanuts is the best thing that I've ever done and I love every minute of it. I love to kiss your little heads and I love the feel of your little fingers. Nothing is sweeter than you two and I don't want you to ever grow up!! 

what happens...

to the other 3 kiddos- when mommy has a baby in need of a diaper change, an emergency bath and some necessary laundry- you never know. Some days its rather cute, some days its rather annoying, some days its rather dangerous, some days its rather naughty, some days its trouble with a capital T but most days its pretty funny. Thankfully, God graciously allows my kiddos to do some cute and funny stuff, rather than always find trouble. That's exactly what happened the other day- Hailey found my camera and took some cute little pics of her other 2 siblings playing around, while I took care of Maelle! 

still am not entirely sure why Jack and Maysen were in the shower, but I guess I'm not gonna ask too many questions- they weren't playing in the toilet, they weren't scaling the walls, no one got hurt and it did make for some cute pictures! I think I need to get a new camera so that my little girl can have my "old one". She is turning out to be quite the photographer! 

a few little somethings

our little m&m's have been a riot lately, so I wanted to give you a little showing of what they've been up to. I had a video of them playing together, but go figure- I can't seem to find it...that's the kind of day I've been having! Our sewer backed up, Jackson has been crying about everything and anything, Maysen just wants to be held and Maelle and Hailey are feeling a little left out of all the action :) so, needless to say- this momma is enjoying some good "downtime" with her Bible and some apple cider (thanks to some leftovers from a mommy spa night at my house last night- which is probably what got me through today- all the laughter and good fellowship we enjoyed- not to mention the cute finger and toenails that I painted) :) Hope you enjoy these videos as much as I've been enjoying these precious girls, lately!! 

a little bit of work...

 the weather was beautiful and we didn't have any plans, so it was a good weekend of "getting stuff done" around the Konietzki house :) We've been starting to throw around the idea of possibly selling our house soon, so there are a lot of projects that need to be completed before we even begin thinking in that direction! 

 isn't this awesome?? I don't know of any other place, except Sam's Club, where you can find a cart for 4 kids :) Definitely made shopping for some flooring for our upstairs bathroom a little easier when we weren't chasing any kids around the store :)

don't the m&m's look so happy about being here?? 

another job was going through all the baby stuff and getting rid of it all...sigh...good thing my cute little twinnies helped me out, otherwise it might have been a little sadder :) 

another project was outside work...isn't there always so much work to do outside?? We took out some "bushes" that were really small trees and trimmed up some other bushes. It definitely made our back yard look a lot better and all the kiddos enjoy being outside, so it's always fun to have an excuse to take the 45 minutes to change 2 diapers, take 2 kids potty, put 8 little socks on, find 4 little jackets, put on 4 little shoes, wrestle 2 babies into snowsuits, put 4 hats on, re-put on 2 of them over and over and over again, then chase babies so they wait until you get some shoes on to head out...only to realize that you have to go to the bathroom...to go outside and "play" for a little while! To be honest, I love the outside and Korey and I always have worked side by side outside, but since the twins have been born I almost dread going outside because it's just so much work and 90% of the time not worth it. 

I figured out how to get the m&m's to stop eating leaves- put mittens on their hands!! 

 sorry about Jackson being sideways, but if you could see the picture well you would see a little boy using his golf club as a chainsaw and helping Daddy trim up the lilac bushes :) He's so precious and cute! 

work truly is the best fun!

 I enjoy the weekends where we can just get some stuff done around our house, especially when it includes me and Korey working together! I really do enjoy working with him and just "doing life" with him :)

a little bit of crazy...

never hurt anyone, right??!!

"Checking the ads, making a menu, looking on pinterest for some inspiration. Oh, this momma is heading out grocery shopping" :) (sing to the tune of Santa Claus is coming to town) 

I guess the craziness of heading to Piggly Wiggly this morning with the 4 kids is getting to me...I was singing this song to myself on the way home ;) 

Lately I've had a few more trips to stores with my four kiddos and most of the time we've had a fairly good time! It requires a lot of planning, a lot of patience, a lot of "I don't care what anyone thinks of me", a lot of only needing a few small items (there's not much room left in the cart or patience to look for too many things with all 4 of them), and a lot of timing required to make it work well, but surprisingly the more we do it the easier it gets! Hailey and Jackson are actually fairly easy- as long as I can keep them contained and/or not really care if they run a little wild around the stores. And the m&m's are fairly easy, too...as long as we have a shorter list or only one store to go to. They get a little tired of sitting in the cart in the front seat together or they get antsy and try to climb out- which isn't such a big deal, as long as we're at Sam's Club- where they have double seats and 2 seat belts, but it gets tricky and difficult when there's only one seat belt it doesn't fit around the 2 of them anymore! (I do more often buckle Maelle in and leave Maysen unbuckled, because she's a little more apt to try to crawl out than her sister, but they've both been known to do it) 

(I took these pics with my phone- so, forgive the "bad" quality) 

sneak preview

a little tiny sneak preview of a little photo shoot that a friend took of Maysen and Maelle...

our dear friend, Sheila, is laid up with her knee and not able to take some pictures, but we had a friend that was willing and able to fill in for her :) let's just say that I love the pictures. I know you can't really go wrong, in my eyes, because I love my kiddos and think they're precious, but they're adorable :)

 she even brought them pink and purple tutu's!! whoohoo!!

 Hailey and Jack were hamming it up for the camera, too. 

 we even got a fun little family photo :) 

so glad that we have friends willing to take pictures of our girls, so that we can have so many reminders of these crazy, delightful days :)

 (mostly 'cause I'm assuming the sleep deprivation is gonna kick in soon and we're not gonna remember much of this time of our life) 

duck hunter extraordinaire

Hailey lived every little girls dream tonight-going duck hunting with her Daddy :) 

(oh wait- that's not every girls dream come true??! It sure was Hailey's...this little girl was so excited to go with him that she cold barely contain herself all day long and had to tell everyone that we saw about it)

 doesn't she look all sweet and cute and little in the boat all by herself??

 oh yeah, just chillin' in the duck blind!

 my beautiful precious princess and duck hunter extraordinaire 

 thanks for making sweet memories with your daughter, Korey! Just one of the many reasons I love you and think you're the best Daddy ever!!

we're breaking out...

lock your stores down, shut your gates, put away all breakables...the Konietzki's are leaving the house and headed for the mall :) 

ahhh! a full length mirror- what do we do??! let's make faces in it and wave to ourselves 

 oh yeah! we love lawn tactors!!

woohoo! ride 'em cowboy!!

the little m&m's were so well behaved and loved their graham crackers for supper :) 

 love, love, love this little face. I just can't get enough of it...

 our first supper out with our family of 6...we splurged and went to Taco John's :)

 eating potato ole's is so exhausting, isn't it, Jack??

such a smiley silly little girl :)

 did you notice that the m&m's have little sprouts on the top of their head for the first time?? Hailey and I did that for them this afternoon and I gotta admit that they are adorable with it! :) 

life must be getting easier and better around here, if Korey and I are willing to venture out and about with our kids :) It was definitely obvious that we don't get out much, though...the kids were so giddy and so cute and I don't think I was much better. Hailey kept saying over and over how much fun she was having playing on the toys. Both kids were running up to and hugging the "headless people" with clothes (aka- manicans). I had to basically pull myself away from the stores and was thankful that in the rush to leave I had forgotten my wallet and so had no $, definitely made it a cheap trip. :) (not that I woulda gotten much shopping to do with these 4 kids and their Dad following me around- not to mention that the double stroller doesn't fit very well in the aisles)