Introducing Joshua!

He is here!!!!!! Joshua Brig Le Sueur was born on 8/29/11, at 12:44 p.m., weighing 8 lb 3 oz, and measuring 21" long. He's a handsome, quiet, sleepy, snuggly, happy, sweet, perfect baby.

On the way to the hospital

All clean!

Meeting the twins

More pictures are posted on Le Sueur Street, and even more will be posted this week. We're so happy to have Josh as part of our family!

Three-Legged Races

We played a bunch of games at Le Sueur Family Vacation this year, but the three-legged races deserve a blog post all of their own.

It started with a race of all four 3-year-olds: Connor and Will vs. Bella and Anna. Obviously the boys were a little more serious about the game than the girls.

Later, that race was followed by a parent/child race: Larkin and Will vs. Allyson and Anna vs. Heather and Connor. I like Larkin's advice to Will before the race started.

"No cheating, all right?"

My favorite part of this video was Heather and Connor's finish. I think Connor grew bored with the race part-way through.

Then Larkin and Emma showed everyone how the race is supposed to be won. And William showed everyone how cheering is supposed to be done. "Go, Daddy! Go, Daddy! Go, Daddy!"

We'll post pictures of the other games and fun activities on Le Sueur Street soon. *Cross your fingers*

Summer Wrap-Up

My sister brought to my attention a little while ago that we haven't posted on the blog in a long time. In her words, "Has your summer been that boring?" Quite the contrary, actually. Our summer has been so jam-packed that we haven't had a chance to post about it. So here are the highlights.

1. Beach camping trip
Right after school let out at the beginning of June, we took the twins down to the coast and camped on the beach. It was so much fun! It was perfect because we went before it got too, too hot this summer.


2. Ohio trip
We made an unplanned, but necessary, quick trip to Ohio the following week of June. Although the circumstances for the trip were less than desirable, it was great to see my family again.



3. Utah/Idaho trip
This trip was planned, and we had a great time! We were in Utah briefly before heading up to the Le Sueur Family Vacation in Idaho, and we got to see Aunt Marie, Aunt Sally, and my old roommate, Jenny. Then we spent a great week and a half with Larkin's WHOLE family. It was awesome to have all of the family out for the week (minus Eric, who was able to come up at the end). We miss them all already, so I'm trying to talk many of them into spending Thanksgiving in Houston.



4. Scout camp
Larkin, as a dedicated Young Men's President, spent time at scout camp again this year. I don't have pictures of that, but it did keep us busy.

5. Woodbadge Boy Scout camp
Yes, Larkin spent another week at scout camp in July. This week was all training for BSA leaders, and he loved it.

6. Doctor appointments
And then more doctor appointments. And then another doctor appointment the next week. Followed by another doctor appointment. I shouldn't complain; I have had far less appointments with this pregnancy than I had with the twins. (I'm just ready for it to be over.)

7. Back to work
Larkin started easing us into his being back at work at the beginning of August. He would go into his classroom for a few hours a day instead of spending all day away from home. I must admit that it helped me a lot. However, now that school has officially started, he is back to working normal hours. I'm not ready for that. Maybe I'll have a baby next week. . . . That will give him some more time with us!

More pictures are available at Le Sueur Street - though we didn't post that many. We're trying to play catch up on that site, too.

And that has been our summer vacation! We need another vacation to recover from this one.

From the Mouths of the Twins

Will and Anna come up with some pretty funny things. I'm sure a lot of them are "you-had-to-be-there" moments that other people won't think are funny, but I wanted to document some anyway.

On discussing where we live:
Anna: We live in Houston, Texas! Houston is the city, and Texas is the apartment building.

On drinking milk:
Anna: Mom, is milk good for our bodies?
Mom: Yes, it has calcium that is good for our bones.
Anna: Oh yeah! My bones were coming out of my body, but now I drinked some milk, and my bones aren't coming out of my body anymore!

Practicing his Primary talk while dressed as a pirate:
Mom: The Book of Mormon. . .
Will: The Book of Mormon, arg!!! . . .
Mom: . . . teaches us about Jesus Christ.
Will: . . . teaches us about Jesus Christ, arg!!!
Etc. (This carried on through his whole talk. Luckily, he didn't add the "pirate-speak" when he actually gave his talk a few days later.)

At a friend's house:
Will: Where did you get this [train table]?
Friend's Mom: The kids' grandparents gave it to them.
Will: That was so kind! Did you write a thank you note?

On looking at baby pictures:
Anna: Will, is that baby you or baby me?
Will: That is baby me.
Anna: With that tube up your nose? [Will had a feeding tube up his nose for his first few days in the NICU.]
Will: Yeah, I had that tube up my nose.
Anna: (inspecting Will's face) Is it still there?

After playing dress-up:
Anna: Will, is this blue ring what you gave me when we got married?
Will: Yes. Mom, I gave Anna that ring when we got married.
Mom: You and Anna are married?
Will: No, we got married when we were grown ups.

And finally, my recent favorite quote that comes not from the twins, but from the source of their sense of humor:

Allyson: You said it in an obligatory way.
Larkin: I don't know what "obligatory" means, so I promise I didn't say it in that way.

We love our silly family!

Dress Up

The twins LOVE their dress-up box. It's fun to see what they decide to dress up as on different days. They often dress up and then put on "plays." Here are some of their recent performances.

The Adventures of Batman and Batgirl

Batman and Dorothy in Oz

Two Buzzing Bees

The Princess and the Pirate

The Cowgirl

Plays that I've missed taking pictures of:

Little Red Riding Hood and Batman vs. the Big Bad Wolf

The Ballerina and the Bee

Pocahontas and the Cowboy

I'm sure there are others that I've forgotten about. I'm excited to have Larkin home all summer so that he can fill the role of the Big Bad Wolf in my place. I've been "killed" by Batman enough to last me a while.

William's Prayer

Right before lunch today, the show Yo Gabba Gabba came on TV. I outwardly groaned, "This show is so weird!" The twins tried arguing with me about how it's not weird, the characters are nice, it's not boring, etc. I told them to ask Daddy what he thinks about the show when he calls us at lunchtime - because I know Larkin agrees with me.

Will said the prayer for lunch today. His prayer went a little something like this:
"Grateful for us food"
"Help it make us strong"
"Bless Daddy have a good day at work"
"Bless the baby to grow in Momma's tummy"
"Bless Daddy to say that Yo Gabba Gabba is not weird"



Despite Will's faithful prayer, I think I win this one.

Monday Morning

Things I woke up to this morning:




Not a bad way to start out a week!