Fox Family Updates

Well I'm pretty darn proud of myself! I've almost caught our blog up to date! Woohoo! For those of you who are tired of reading all these posts...don't worry, they'll be coming a lot less frequently (especially with a new baby coming next month!) I can hardly believe it! I remember seeing a post a friend of mine wrote about how fast she felt her pregnancy went, and I specifically remember thinking, "What?!? I feel like this pregnancy is dragging on sooo long. But here I am, in the home stretch! Which is why I knew if I didn't hurry up and get caught up on our blog, I would be overwhelmed with how much I had to do, and quit all together (kinda like my scrapbooking, which I hope to get back into someday)!

Here are this years pics of the kids. They're growing up fast!

Reagan is six and in first grade. She's had the most changes occur this year. She's losing her roundness, (although her cheeks look pretty round in this picture!) and turning into a long, lanky little girl. Her schedule is filling up, and I told Brad I don't know how mom's of teenagers keep up with all the activities. I'm wiped out with only one going here and there. She joined Hiz Kidz Choir at our church (I'll post a cute video soon), and also started JBQ, basketball, and is loving her new Daisies class. Whenever she walks through the door all the little girls come running to her with hugs. Her teacher pulled me aside one day, and said, "All the girls just love Reagan. She's so sweet and always gives them all hugs." Awww.. proud mommy moment. Now if she just treated her younger brother with that same love! =0)

Josiah is such a fun little guy! Every day he never ceases to bring a smile to my face. Most times, it's completely unintentional, although he is his Daddy's son, and told me not too long ago, "I love to make people laugh." =0) Josiah still loves trucks, trains, cars, and well... pretty much anything with wheels. He is the only one of our kids that will go into his bedroom and be completely content playing by himself. He is by far the most cautious of our 3 kids, and doesn't like to be out of control. A steep slide, a big hill, getting tossed in the air... are all things that he has no problem telling you, "Don't do that again." Most recently he started learning how to read. He blends his letters together really well, and started pointing out signs, people's t-shirts, and reading the words, so one day I sat down with him and asked him to read me a page, and he did almost the entire thing by himself!

Oh goodness. Where to start with Maddy... Madelyn is in a league of her own. Seriously. She's very independent, and often stuffs her hands in her pockets so nobody can hold her hand, or guide her where she's supposed to go. Within the past month, she's recently turned a new leaf and will actually sit down and watch a movie, but the only movie she will watch is, "Bob the Builder." If it's not, and one of the other kids want to watch something else she cries non-stop yelling, "Noooo! Bob! Bob! Bob"! She has no problem voicing her opinion, and gives it quite freely. When I'm putting her in a dress for church, she always tries to rip it off, or she'll trot over to her dresser pull out a pair of jeans and say, "No. I wear pants!" Oh man. She's going to be a handful. We've never had a child with such a strong will. I told Brad over a year ago, that if I had to guess at which one of our kids was going to be the athlete in the family, I would guess Madelyn. And I agree with myself (nice to pat yourself on the back every once in awhile...) even more so now. She very active and physical way more so than any of the other kids. In fact, she does things now at 2 that Josiah still won't do at 4. Most recent news is she is potty training herself. I don't even remember how it started, but one day she just said, "Mommy, I go potty!" Then promptly sat on the toilet and went. I sang her a little "pee on the potty song" that I made up with the other kids, and gave her a piece of candy, then went on my merry way. I fully expected it to be a one time thing (I am in no hurry whatsoever to start potty training), but every day she'll come up to us and tell us she has to go to the bathroom, or sometimes we find her on the toilet by herself yelling, "Treat! Treat!" =0) She still has wet diapers, and I'm not about to go gung-ho and potty train her with the holidays and a new baby coming in a few weeks. But who knows? Maybe if I wait long enough, she'll figure it all out on her own, and I won't have to do anything at all! =0) The other new news is we took her binky away. We couldn't find it after we went to Billings for Thanksgiving, so we thought we'd see how she responded if we didn't buy her another one. It didn't even phase her! She asked about it a few times, and we shrugged our shoulders and said, "I don't know? Where is it?" And we weren't lying. We really didn't know! We were amazed at how much more verbal she was, when she didn't have her plug! There are days when she walks around the house crying and whining non-stop that I am seriously tempted to buy her another one, but so far, so good!