Arizona Science Museum today!

Well, the awesome Star Trek exhibit is gone. I never got to post the picture of me sitting in the captains chair on the bridge of the Enterprise (against the rules, by the way. photos were not allowed) I don't have that photo anymore because I hadn't downloaded it to my computer before my camera was stolen during the break in earlier this year. Darn! The new exhibit is all Legos! Trevor would have loved it.

Here is Maggie aiming a catapult at a virtual castle and trying to build a wall that wouldn't be knocked down.Everything was set up in and around a Lego castle. They had costumes the kids could wear such as a princess, a dragon, or a knight. Here is Glen and Max inside the castle. Hey mom, can you tell Sean is holding the postcard of the logging truck you sent him? He carried it around all day.

Here is Max and I next to a dragon built out of Legos.



Spent lots of time building with Legos. Maggie had more interest building with Sean in the "under 3" area. She just wasn't into the regular legos they had for kids. She eventually wandered off to a computer and was doing something on that.

Sean had fun knocking his creation down also.

Came home for a late lunch. Sean only slept for 30 minutes (ack!). Then Glen took Sean and Maggie to the public pool while Max and I stayed home and made meatloaf and nursed in peace. We've been going to the public pool quite a bit. Bought a summer family pass. It has a couple waterslides, a zero depth entry in the kids area which Sean loves to walk into. The shallow area has some playground equipment right in the pool so Sean has a waterslide his size and some things to climb on. Push some buttons and turn some wheels to make water squirt here or there. Sean loves it. Maggie always makes friends with some other girls around and mostly hangs out at the waterslide and diving boards. Can you believe she dives off the low dive and jumps off the HIGH DIVE!??!!! I couldn't believe it. I didn't realize she was heading for the high dive or I would have told her to stick to the low dive, but she just jumped off and had no problems! She really had the lifeguard on edge though. He saw her up there and immediately stood up and had his life preserver ready. But Maggie had no problems. I made sure she knew not to try diving though. That girl is FEARLESS!!

Growing like a weed...

Maxwell is 2 months old, 15 pounds, and 24.5 inches.

Is it just me? or.....

...is Sean GIGANTIC???? Here he is playing in a pirate ship playhouse at the mall.

And here he is eating dinner after a bath. Every day he seems less and less like a baby/toddler and more and more like a little kid.

Stress levels have been high here at home. Maggie is completely bored and just like when she was 2 or 3, when she is bored, she is destructive and agressive. We've decided to send her off to some more daycamps where she can play with kids her age. She is excited about it, but I feel like a bit of a failure as a mom being unable to meet her needs this summer. Maxwell is a very easy going baby, but throw a toddler into the mix and I am constantly busy. Anyway, after 4th of July, Maggie has a weel of zoo camp, a week of brownie day camp, and 2 weeks of smart camp (at her Montessori school). After that, we have a week off at home and then school starts again.

Here is Maggie trying out the new afghan I crocheted. It was intended for Sean to take to school this fall for naptime, but I used too large a hook and the spaces are too big (I think) and Seans little feet might poke out. So I'm going to try again. I threw it on the couch and Maggie immediately fell in love with it. Nevermind that its 110 outside, she snuggles into while watching tv. You can't tell in the photo, but it is a very rich turquoise colorway with flecks of amber, purple, and green. The color is called "lagoon".

Pink eye is back...booooooooo!

Pink eye is the Hestenes nemesis. It seems as though everyone in this house gets it at LEAST once a year. We were feeling pretty good when Max was 2 weeks old and we kept Sean's pink eye from him. But now, at almost 2 months old, Maxwell is the latest casualty. He has a stuffed up nose, red throat, ear infection, and of course the goopy eye. I've been trying to heal it with breast milk. A little squirt in the eye sometimes helps as it has antibacterial properties. But I took him to the doctor today as it was getting worse. We are now on eyedrops and Augmentin for the ears. :( Sean also has the the stuffy nose and sore throat, but we are taking a wait and see approach with him. I hate to give my kids antibiotics as it wrecks havoc on their little digestive systems. So unless Sean starts complaining of sore ears, we'll just ride it through. Since Max can't talk, and I'm not sure the extent of his suffering, we decided to give him the antibiotics for relief and hopefully knock this thing out of the ball park.

Happy Father's Day!

Ok...I've been meaning to get a picture with all three kids in it, which has proven far more difficult then I thought. I finally was able to get some pictures today, but only while they were sitting on Sean's bed. I wanted to take some pictures outside, but the sprinklers (oddly) were on at the time, and Sean amd Max had a low tolerance for photo ops. So, this is the best photo I got. I'm going to put it in a small frame for Glen for Father's day.

Maggie took this photo of me and the boys.

And here is a picture of my latest crochet project. Maggie is modeling her little cropped cardigan for me over her jammies. I'm pretty happy with the end result considering this is the first piece of clothing I've ever made, and it actually fits. I didn't have any buttons, so its currently closed with a ribbon.

I've got a massive headache tonight, so I think I will blog more another day.

Sean and his love of shoes...

Ahhhh...hand me downs

Well, Maxwell wore his first hand me down today. Here he is at about 6 weeks old in Sean's groovy tie dye shirt.


And here is a picture of Sean at 3 months old wearing the same shirt.


Sean has been having a rough week. The newborn novelty has worn off. Sometimes he is sweet to Max, but just as often we will slap, try to step on, pinch or bite the baby. Usually when Max is in the bouncy or nursing. So, Max is rarely in the bouncy. Can't do much about the nursing except try to nurse on the sly when Sean is occupied.



Carbon (Sean's cousin on Glen's side) just left for Alaska to spend the summer working on a fishing boat. He was playing around with Sean the night before he left and put his hat on Sean's head. And there it has stayed, through naps, walks, and errands. Sean loves to wear that hat. Sorry Carbon! We will keep it safe while you are gone.


I finished off another little crochet project. I really don't have time to do entire blankets or sweaters. Maybe next summer. So for now I've been working on smaller projects. Its very satisfying to finish a project. Here is Maxwell posing with his new rabbit blankie I made.


I chose to crochet with wool so I could try a new technique (well, new to me). Felting! I didn't come out quite symmetrical, but hopefully everyone will be so distracted by the cuteness of the baby holding it that they won't notice. Did you?

Horseback Riding

Maggie's girl scout troop went horseback riding in Cave Creek (just north of Scottsdale) the other day. Grandma Nancy took her as I didn't want to be hanging around outside all day with a newborn in this hot weather. It actually only got up to 94 degrees that day, so it wasn't too bad. Grandma took all these pictures. There were definately other little scouts there, I just only post pictures of Maggie alone incase other kids parents object to photos on the internet. Anyway, the "little kids" did an hour and a half ride, had lunch, and then took a hike while the "older kids" did their ride. Maggies troop is a mix of brownies, juniors, and cadets. She had great fun. I heard more about the frogs in the stream and feeding the pig crackers than I heard about the actual horse ride.


Ready to go! In her bag was water and carrots for the horse.

Off into the wild desert. I guess the horses all know where to go and just follow the leader. Maggie said she passed someone when their horse stopped. She was excited about that too.

Grandma didn't want to risk riding a horse, so she hung back and "guarded" the food.

I included the next picture so you can see the tooth on the right sticking out. Maggie's front tooth is coming in an making her baby tooth loose and also stick out. I keep reminding her to wiggle it so it will fall out faster as it looks really wierd.

Feeding the pig crackers....

Sean is 2!

Happy birthday to Sean! My sweet baby boy is now 2! It seems so old! Here are some pictures from his party. First up is him with his loot.

Maggie kept "helping" him open his presents because he wanted to stop and play each time a new toy was discovered. It was late in the evening, so Sean didn't get a lot of time to play with his new stuff, so its hard to tell what his favorites are. Maybe we'll find out tomorrow what he likes. Grandma Nancy, Grandpa David, and cousing Tesla came over. (Tesla is staying with G&G over the summer while she interns at ASU at the BioInstitute recombining DNA or something like that. She is going into her senior year at a science and math magnet highschool where I believe she is on her way to being Valedictorian. Brains and Beauty! Maggie looooooooves Tesla)

Poor Max. He is usually slumbering around 8 or 8:30pm. So by 9:30, he had had it.

This is the toy Maggie picked out for Sean. He loves the 6 little cars that came with it. They would get scattered as new presents came over to be unwrapped and I saw him later on hunting them all out and lining them up together.

I planned on making Sean an applesauce cake with cream cheese icing, but Glen reminded me that Sean doesn't really eat cake. We saw him eat the icing and a bit of icecream at Maggie's party. So we ended up buying an icecream cake from Dairy Queen as I was running out of time today. I was a little sad not to have a homemade cake for him, but Sean was ecstatic about the car painted on the cake.

Love that hyper-dyed blue icing. Even though we washed him after this, a faint blue tinge remains. Eeeewwwwww....

Trying out Sean's new ball in Maggie's room.

Phew! 3 birthdays and an anniversary in the past month has left us party planned out. Now we can relax...

And lastly, I took this video before his party. He was having fun this afternoon rolling his big truck down the ramp. He is a little chatterbox nowadays, and is getting very good at repeating words you say to him.

Last night I have a 1 year old!!

As much as I hate to admit it, cheerleading suits Maggie. She has been asking to be in cheerleading for about 3 years and I've put it off until this summer. On the first day, her coach tells them how important it is to yell really loud so everyone can hear them. And as we all know, loud is one thing Maggie can be. In fact, the coach had her call out the start of the cheers since everyone could hear her. Anyway, she is having a great time.

Sean is currently enamored with shoes. He loves to wear shoes allllllll the time. He wants to wear them to bed, although we have convinced him to wear slippers at night. He likes to try on everyones shoes. Today we got Maggie tennis shoes on and wore them for several hours. It was so funny to see his little clown feet. The shoes were big enough to look funny on him, but small enough that he could move around in them. Tomorrow, Sean will be 2. He has definitely embarked on toddlerhood in a big way. Complete with independence, tantrums when misunderstood, loving smooches, and dirty face smiles.

After the kids are in bed, and if Max will sleep, Glen and I have a few moments in the evenings. He has been watching the basketball playoffs and I have been keeping him company while crocheting. Its been awhile since I have picked up the hook. Here is the first project I completed.

Our 8th Anniversary!

Thanks to Grandma Nancy, Glen and I (and Max) went out to dinner tonight for our 8th anniversary. We went to Monti's and had steak, walked around downtown Tempe, and had Coldstone icecream for dessert. The kids had fun at home pulling all the books off the shelves. Okay... that was probably just Sean. Maggie read a little for Grandma and she was duly impressed.

Earlier in the day, the kids had fun in the mud.

And Max is beginning to smile! Three times for mama and once for Maggie.

Adorable kids!

Zoo Trip!

Sean woke up at an ungodly hour. Well at least for most. But since I was already awake nursing Max, we just got up. So here it is, 7 a.m., and everyone is already dressed and had a breakfast of eggs, banana bread, and peaches, and played for quite awhile, so what should we do? Go to the zoo before it gets too hot!!