swingin' and-a slidin'

I love spring, and I LOVE summer. Last August after I finished working for the March of Dimes, Leah and I had quite a routine. In the mornings we would walk to the park just around the corner from our house, come home have lunch and a nap and then play in her little pool or in the backyard most of the afternoon...I'm hoping for a similar routine this summer but that will all depend on Kiersten. We have a great little park just around the corner from our house. It has a swing set, a big jungle gym contraption with 3 slides, a seperate slide, a merry-go-round, the weird Dinosaur rocker and a little pond complete with ducks. Leah loves the ducks and a trip to the park wouldn't be complete without her trying to chase them. And nine times out of ten we are the only ones there. Of course that has to do with the neighborhood. We are surrounded by older couples or couples with teenagers, most likely due to the housing market...most families just starting out are opting for townhouses, but anyway...we love our park, it would be nice to see other kids from time to time, but we love it all the same.

This past weekend was GORGEOUS weather and we weren't bogged down with birthday parties or household projects so we were able to pack up the girls for a quick trip to the park. Leah loved it...I think Kiersten was a little disappointed. She wanted to try our the Merry-go-Round, ha! But here are a few pictures from our morning.

Blue Eyes

I never imagined that baby #2 would have such blue eyes. Of course it's possible, both of my parent's have light eyes and Mitch's mom has light eyes, but with Leah's gorgeous big brown eyes, I kind of thought baby #2 or Kiersten as we like to call her, would follow along those lines. But boy oh boy was I wrong. I swear they just keep getting bluer and bluer...is that a word, it doesn't look right?!? Anyway, As Kiersten becomes more and more alert I notice her eyes more and more. She is really starting to track things. It so cute to see her watch the dogs and Leah wherever they go. She is really focusing on Mommy and Daddy too. In the past week she really seems to have found her voice. It's very quiet and dainty, but it's there. She is making all sorts of coos and babbles and I LOVE IT!

We went back to the doctor yesterday for a weight check. At her 2 month appt. the pediactrician wasn't feeling good about her weight gain...or lack of I should say. Yesterday she was up from 9 lbs 4 oz to 9 lbs 11 oz. He was "okay" with it, but would still like to see more. He suggested trying to get one more feeding in a day and possibly starting to add rice to her diet already (she spits up A LOT). So we will take a few weeks and see how it goes and hopefully see some improvement in her weight at her 3 month check-up. She really is on a great schedule though, eating every 3 hours and sleeping at least 7-8 hours a night (typically, not always). Now I need to figure out how to get her to eat more without disrupting the sleep schedule, hmmmm?

Oh, My Leah...

Typically it goes like this "Oh My, Leah!" but today it is "Oh, My Leah." This rambunctious little lady is always doing something to make me shake my head, but today I am just thankful for all the joy that she has brought into my life. I just wanted to jot down a few things about her and her behaviors now that she is 2...so that I never forget all the things that she does that make me smile.

• Whenever you see a Mommy animal and a Baby animal together (toys, TV, etc...) you say "awwww" it melts my heart.
  


• A few months ago, I was cleaning the toilets. I left the room to get some glass cleaner and came back to find her scrubbing the toilet with my hairbrush.


• A few weeks ago I found her in the master bedroom, giving her teddy bear a bath in the dog's water bowl. She even thought it out enough to grab a handtowel to dry him off.


• Whenever Kiersten starts to cry she says "Baby Kiersten, Wa Wa!"


• She recently saw a commercial that had a donkey in it, now every time she sees it she says "hee haw"...it cracks me up.


• She is starting to use the arms of our couch for her balancing beam, and she jumps off and throws her hands in the air and says "TA DA!"


• Every once in awhile she looks at you and says "WHAT?" with the funniest little smirk on her face.


• Every morning I wake up to the sound of her saying "Knock, Knock" in her worst Boston accent and banging on her door.


• She is the biggest Daddy's girl and runs to the door when he gets home every night.


• I love the way she says "Gigi's house, Papa's house."


• It breaks my heart when she says "Macy's house, Colby's house."


• She loves to dig in the dirt and is always looking for "Slimey" (earthworms).


• She still can't get enough Toy Story 2 and Woody...what a tom-boy.


• It drives her daddy crazy when she asks "Why?" He thinks she is too young for this, I think she is just super smart :)


• I love that you can occupy yourself for hours with your toys. You have quite the imagination.


• Whenever you see a commercial or an Alvin and the Chipmunks toy you scream out "ALVIN!!!"


• Most of all I love your bedtime routine. You ALWAYS give mommy, daddy and Kiersten a kiss goodnight and even after you are all tucked in your bed you cry out "night night, mommy" just a few extra times.

There aren't words to explain how amazing the last 2 years have been and how much you have changed our lives and our priorities. Thanks for giving me a million reasons to smile and I look forward to all the memories we still have to make...my darling, Little Leah!

Leah turns 2!!!

Today my baby girl Leah is turning 2. Because her birthday falls on a Sunday, and Mother's Day we had her party yesterday. She had so much fun. It's hard to live so far away from all of our family for events like these. I would love for Leah to be able to share her birthday with all her grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins but that is not the hand we have been dealt. So we made the best of it. We have a few friends with kids, they all work with Mitch and so there wives have become my friends. They have great kids and we are so thankful that they were able to come to Leah's party. Jim and Jenn came with their 2 girls, Bella and Olivia. Rich and Kathleen (Caffeine as Leah likes to call her) came with their son Ryan, and Mike and Melanie came with their daughter Emily. We also had our wonderful neighbors Mike and Julie.

The party preparation started on Friday night of course. Mitch cleaned the house a little while I started working on the food. I made a few appetizer dips and baked all the cupcakes. I found a recipe on line for these cute little pink piggy cupcakes, they seemed easy enough, so I went with it. Mitch and I got a system down. He cut up all the marshmallows and dipped them in the pink sugar while I assembled the little piggys...aren't they cute???

On Saturday morning I went to the party store and imagine my suprise to find this...The most adorable little pink pig balloon. Well, knowing what my cupcakes looked like I just had to have it. I wasn't really planning to have a theme, but a theme party was definitely in the works. When I got home and told Mitch that I ordered the pig balloon he laughed at me.

Mitch went to pick up the balloons at 2. Leah woke up from her nap at 2:30 and came into the kitchen and gave me the BEST response. She stopped in her tracks and said "balloon" and then she saw the piggy and it was something like "PIGGGGGGY!!!" I loved it! It made the $8 piggy balloon totally worth it.

The guest started to arrive and before we knew it there were little ones running wild in the back yard. The wildest without a doubt was little Leah, of course!

They played on her little John Deere, her brand new slide and they couldn't get enough of her new wagon from Aunt Laura and Uncle Jeff. Dad's had to take turns pulling the kids around. It was a big hit.

Then it was time for the cake. We sang happy birthday to Leah and she got to blow the candles out on a real cake. Unfortunately I don't have any pictures of this. I was holding the cake and Mitch had the video camera which come to find out later...wasn't even working, oh well.

The little piggy cupcakes were a hit. All the kids loved them and the parents seemed to enjoy them too!

Afterwards we opened up all the gifts. She got a fishing pole, play-doh, a puzzle, an RC car, a tea set, and wiffle ball set, a my little pony...the list could go on and on. Not to mention the trike from Aunt Lori, Uncle Todd, Aunt Lisa, Uncle Brian and all the cousins in Minnesota. And of course the sand and water table and shovel/bucket/sand toys from Gigi and Papa. Leah is lucky girl to have so many people that love her.

Mitch and I were talking about how this is only the beginning. We have a lot more birthday parties in our future. It was a lot of work but totally worth it. There will be many more late nights, decorating cupcakes. I hope Leah had a very memorable birthday. I know my memories of her are priceless.

2 months

It was a big weekend at our house. On Saturday May 8th Kiersten turned 2 months old, and on Sunday May 9th Leah turned 2 years old. Both my girls are 2 and I am feeling twice as blessed.
Kiersten is really a good baby. I am enjoying her so much but as they all say...It is going way too fast. She is on a really good schedule these days. She eats about every 3 hours. She is awake after eating for an hour to an hour and a half and then she naps for an hour or an hour and a half. She usually takes a bath around 8:30 or 9 PM and then eats and goes down by 10. Lately she is waking up around 4, it had been around 6 so I need to nip this 4 AM thing in the bud and get her back on track. At her 2 month physical she weighed 9 lbs 5 oz and was 22.5 inches in length. Pediatrician says she is doing good, but he would like to see her gaining more weight. She dropped from the 25th percentile to the 15th percentile. We go back for a weight check on the 17th, so I'm hoping that we see a good weight gain then.

Otherwise she is meeting milestones right on track. She moves her head and eyes to follow us when we are talking to her and sometimes even when we aren't. And she talks up a storm sometimes and is perfectly quiet, just taking it all in at others. She talks a lot in the morning after her nap and she tells Daddy all kinds of stories while he is giving her a bath. It is too adorable. I tried to get it on video last night, but every time I would hit record she would stop talking...stubborn like her sister already :) Anyway, Happy 2 month birthday, Kiersten! We love you bunches.

The Practice Party!

It's hard to believe but this weekend my baby girl, Leah is turning 2! It seems like just yesterday she was fitting into those tiny little newborn diapers, and now she is just about potty trained...I'm not complaining about potty training mind you. One less kid in diapers around here would be just heavenly!!! She is doing really great with it for the most part, now she just needs to figure out the pants up and down part. But anyway, we were fortunate to have my mom here this past weekend for a visit. It's always so great for us to have family visit. They all live so far away and we miss them dearly. But It's always special to have "Gigi" here. She is such a big help and what girl doesn't love seeing her mom?!? It ended up being a gorgeous weekend. The weather was really warm which allowed Leah to be outside all weekend. We even brought Kiersten's little bouncy seat out and let her sit in the yard too. Gigi watched the girls while Mitch and I got a lot of things done around the house. Mitch finished tiling the front porch. I mowed the lawn and on Saturday we put all the fence post in together...now we just have to put up the actual fence panels. The weather was so sunny and warm we were able to blow up Leah's little pool and let her have fun in the water. She LOVES the water. I am looking forward to going home in June and taking her to the Country Club pool with her cousins.

On Sunday afternoon after her nap we had a mini-birthday party for her. She was so excited about the cakes. My mom found these cute little character cakes at the supermarket for $3 each so she figured since Leah was turning 2 she needed 2 cakes...sounds reasonable right? Anyway, one is a frog and one is an elephant. Leah couldn't wait to get her hands on them. Every kid loves cake and ice cream and Leah sure had her fill...I'm sure she will be just as enthusiastic this Saturday at her real party. Thanks, Gigi for the practice party!!!