Baby Elizabeth needed a bigger car seat since she’s outgrown her infant-size one. Since all three seats have to fit across the back of my car, I researched narrow car seats, but they are so darn expensive I finally just bought a regular-sized convertible car seat from our local Costco for much cheaper that I knew I could easily return if it didn’t fit.

It fit! Barely. After a bunch of hours of frustration trying to install the new rear-facing seat myself (reading and re-reading the owner’s manual, looking up videos and reading reviews online) but still not getting it right, I called the county car seat specialist and scheduled an appointment for a car seat check. The lady spent 45 minutes checking each seat, making sure they were installed properly and adjusted to fit my kids’ height. Good thing we went in; the only way to get the new rear-facing seat to sit at the proper angle involved wrapping cut-up pool noodles in a towel and stuffing them under the seat.

And now we’re good to go until someone else outgrows a seat.

We went grocery shopping. This can be a lot of work. Carissa likes the carts with a mini-car in the front that she can ride in. She sits in that (buckles herself in, so she’s safe), Elizabeth sits in the cart seat up by me, and this time for Wes, I gave him his own mini-cart to push around and load with groceries so he could help. But he ended up riding it like a scooter all over the store and I spent a lot of time chasing him down and pulling him back by me. And he ate a big bite out of a head of broccoli and so we bought it. He does this almost every time I let him near produce in the grocery store.

Carissa likes to wear this special hat. Sometimes it’s a swim hat to keep her safe from sharks. Today it was a cooking hat to keep her safe from…I don’t know, something related to cooking.

I shouldn’t have let Elizabeth build towers out of Yoplait, because several ended up broken on the floor. But oh well.

This is still Wes’s favorite puzzle. He builds and rebuilds it all day long, every day. There is one stubborn piece missing and I don’t know where to find it.

This stinker is into everything and climbing onto everything. Such as climbing chairs to reach my laptop or get onto the table. We try to keep the chairs pushed in as far as possible.

Wes liked peanut butter, just like me. John blames this on me, and also Wes’s propensity for ice cream, but Wes also really likes chocolate and I blame that on John.

We were playing a game called “Ready, Set, Go!” and this is Wes telling Carissa to “Go!”

Our new early morning church schedule is a challenge for the baby, who usually naps during this time. She was really good overall today, but still couldn’t keep herself from hitting the floor near the end.

Our three-year-old is the newest member of the Primary program in the Sunbeam class. Today was her first day. She brought home a crown and a necklace with a picture of the sun, and she did really well.

I like watching Wes and Carissa on the couch together.

Carissa artisting and and Elizabeth watching. Captured two seconds before she got her fingers into the watercolor paint.