You never realize…

How much you use the letter c until Danna pulls it off of the keyboard.

How much 4 toddlers can destroy a house in a matter of 10 minutes until you leave the room for 11 minutes.

How much laundry you go through with quadruplet toddlers until they need an outfit change after each meal and trip outside.

How many times a toddler boy pisses himself until you start potty training.

How much they look up to you until you start hearing phrases that you use all the time coming out of their mouths.

How mad someone can make you without even saying a word until you walk into your spotless basement to see it wrecked after one morning play session.

How many teeth a two and a half year old has until you count them on the bite marks left on another two and a half year old.

How nice it is to be able to take a shower until you are forced to make a decision between a shower and a nap.

How nice it is to take a nap until you are forced to make a decision  between a nap and a shower.

How small 6 tons of gravel looks, but how much it actually is until you move it 30 feet.

How many pieces are in a board game until every one of them that you have are dumped all over a room.

How much you can love something until you are blessed with kids.

With love from the Graf house,

Billy, Moni, Pius, Forrest, Danna, and Laine

And then?

NO AND THEN!!!

I thought this afternoon was so humerous that I decided to blog on it. You're not getting any pictures or videos because, 1.) I don't know where the camera is, and 2.) I'm pretty lazy at the end of my days.

Today I took the kids to the zoo to meet up with our long lost friend Aunt Melody. Melody is one of Moni's nursing school friends and was one of our most faithful helpers when we first came home from Phoenix. Melody, and her mother, Marilyn met me and the kids at the zoo this morning for some animal-gazing. Pretty normal morning, especially when the kids asked for Taco Bell for lunch. We went and got them their mexican food that they love so much, and this is where the day took an odd turn. I ordered all of my food with volcano sauce and all of the kids' and Moni's food with mild. The restaurant missed the mild part of the order, so before naps we had a wrench thrown into our day.

We calmed them down with extra drinks and everything was fine. They went down for their naps pretty well and when I got them up is when everything went off track. They started "talking" and playing around 3:45 and I went to get them up. They had taken their window cover (a decorated piece of plywood that fits perfectly over their window to keep the room dark) off of the window. I walked in and here is the conversation (I apologize if you've heard the story).

Me: "Who touched the window?"
Laine: "The boys."
Me: "That is very naughty!"
Pius: "That is very good."
Me: "No. That makes Daddy very mad."
Pius: "I don't want to fight right now, Daddy."

And he walked out of the room. I'm not going to lie. It pissed me off a little that he walked off in the middle of our conversation, but it was a pretty funny response.

Anyways...we came out into the front room and changed diapers. The boys wanted to go downstairs and play, so I "opened" the basement and they went down to play. Danna and I stayed upstairs and watched some Sprout channel. I went downstairs to check on the boys (after 10 minutes) and they were in the laundry room. I went in there and all three of them had detergent scoops and were covering each other in laundry soap. Of course, Laine got some in his eyes and he was crying and saying, "Laine has chemicals in his eyes." I brought him upstairs, flushed his eyes with water, and calmed him down.

Danna had decided to go downstairs, and Laine wanted to go back down there so we went down there to play. When I got down there, Danna had decided to pull EVERY book of the shelf and throw it on the floor. Really? Danna, you can only read one book at a time. I picked them all up, reshelved them, and looked for the boys. Laine and Forrest were still downstairs with us, but then I heard a chair being dragged upstairs. SH*T! Pius had come upstairs and gotten into the bag of tomatoes that our neighbor had just brought us. No big deal right? Well Pius had decided to take one bite out of 7 of the tomatoes. In the meantime, Laine had came up to see what Pius and Daddy were up to. So I cut up two of the tomatoes for them to eat. While I was cleaning up the tomato mess, Laine had finished his and decided to go back downstairs with Danna and Forrest.

It was way too quiet in the basement so I went downstairs. Forrest and Laine decided to start peeling wallpaper in the basement. They peeled a good 10 feet of wallpaper in the basement. Really? When Moni gets home I'm not sure who she is going to yell at more...me or the kids. I honestly said to all of the kids...."NO AND THEN!" They were not being bad kids, they were just being SO ornery. It was like I had a house-full of two-year-olds....oh yeah!

They continued to bounce off the walls until bedtime, at which time this is what they each wanted to pray for (in their turn):

Danna: A doggy
Pius: Needles
Forrest: Another doggy
Laine: A swimming pool party

With love from the Graf house,
Billy, Moni, Pius, Forrest, Danna, and Laine

What’s Going On Here?

 

To the few of you left reading the blog...ha ha, here in the Graf house it has been a whirlwind of a month. I started potty-training with the boys, Danna is getting dismissed from Rainbows and talking up/screaming up a storm, Moni started a full-time position at the new Via-Christi/St. Teresa Hospital, and I took up full-time Daddy Day Care. I will give you a profile on each of us and what we are up to these days.

 

I quit the Oasis Lounge a couple of weeks ago, but will still fill in when they are in a bind and I am able to. With Monica going back full-time (and making pretty good money) it just made more sense for us to have me stay at home. I could go find a job and turn the check around to daycare times four, but that would have us spinning our wheels, and we would not fully be in on this very important time in the kids' lives. I have not NOT had a job since I was thirteen, so it has been an interesting experience and will continue to be an interesting time in my life.

Monica has been able to charge her battery with a couple vacations in the past 2 months before she went back to full-time. She went on her annual quadmom vacation at the end of June with some other quad mothers she has gotten to know very well over the past four years. A week and a half after that, her little sister Emily gave birth to her first daughter in Colorado Springs. Emily asked Monica to be the Godmother and Moni was honored and happy to be there for the birth. Right after Monica came home from the Springs, she started full-time at Via-Christi/St. Teresa not to mention she still had a week left of work at Wesley hospital so she doubled up on jobs for a week, so her plate has been stacked pretty high.

 

 

 

Pius James has become quite the performer. He LOVES attention. He usually starts off pretty bashful, but after he sees he can command the stage you have to watch him sing, swing his baseball bat, play catch, run bases, throw anything, eat, etc., etc., etc. Like I said, he LOVES attention. Another thing Pius loves is the San Francisco Giants. I am not lying even a little when I tell you the story of the Giants being on during an afternoon about a week ago. He sat and watched a full 2 innings with me (which is a lot for a 2 1/2 year old). He knew when we were pitching and he knew when we were batting and cheered accordingly. Pius knows how to get something he wants. He will go ask every adult in the house until he gets what he wants. He is freaking adorable and he loves to make people laugh or clap.

 

 

Forrest Michael has finally figured out that he is the biggest and strongest. This has led to a lot of fights. Forrest really is kind of a butthead. He wants every toy, book, and person at his disposal. He will not let anybody play with something if he has already claimed ownership. Despite all of this, Forrest is the absolute best cuddler in the world. If he is in the mood he will sit on your lap for hours and just cuddle. He is a little boy with a wonderful heart, but sometimes he forgets his manners and can cause quite a commotion.

 

 

Danna Lynn has finally become all of the things that we used to joke about. She really is a little B sometimes. Since she has really started talking and communicating with us she sees herself as the princess of the house. If she doesn't get what she wants she SQUEALS like nobody's business. If one of her brothers or mom or dad take something away she SQUEALS. If she can't get to what she wants she SQUEALS. Let me tell you guys that it might be one of the most annoying sounds in the world (think Lloyd and Harry in Dumb & Dumber). Rainbows (our local ECI) was helping us to get her up to speed on her language, but they will be dismissing her after this month's appointment. She is so smart and she really is incredibly beautiful. I'm scared for the rest of the world in a couple of years.

 

 

Laine Ryan is our little bi-polar piranha. He is incredibly smart and sometimes this works against him. The last couple of months he has really seemed to calm down with fewer and fewer tantrums. He gets so mad, and it is hard to get him to "snap out of it" sometimes, and when he is pissed he bites. We have been embarrassed to take his brothers and even his sister once or twice out into public. He bites everywhere on the body including the face and nose. Hopefully that is something that he will grow out of because everything we've tried hasn't worked. On the other side of his personality, he can be the sweetest boy in the world. When he is in the mood he will randomly walk up to me, Moni, his brothers or sister and just give them a kiss and pat our arm or back. Luckily for us he has seemed to be in that mood more often lately.

 

    

And for the most recent weights/heights from their July check-up appointment:

Pius – 30 lbs 6 oz – 36 inches

Forrest – 31 lbs 6 oz – 37 inches

Danna – 22 lbs 8 oz – 34 inches

Laine – 29 lbs 2 oz – 36 inches

 

     

The Graf Quad Squad continues to grow and amaze their family everyday. We have understood all along that with bigger kids come bigger problems. I wouldn't say that is any easier today than it was on day 1 when we were fighting different battles, but I also wouldn't say it is any harder either. All four of them are so sweet (most of the time) and they make Monica and me so proud.

With love from the Graf house,

Billy, Moni, Pius, Forrest, Danna, and Laine