Busy, busy!

Wow, I can't believe it's been so long since I've posted! We've been busy! We had a wonderful Thanksgiving with Fred's family.  Yesterday our sweet Avery turned 3! Grammy, Papa and the 4 of us went out to dinner to celebrate.  The festivities continue this weekend as we are headed to Silverdale and Gig Harbor.  On Sunday, we'll be going with mom and dad, Jody, Ryan and Grayson and Fred's parents to the Canterwood Country Club where the girls and Grayson will get to have brunch with Santa. Avery will also get to pick out her own new friend at Build-A-Bear. I hope she's going to love it!

Our sweet little sis Natalie is 8 months old now.  She is a big eater and her favorites right now are puffs, yogurt melts, cheese, pieces of bread, bits of banana and canned green beans! The other day I cut little pieces of cream cheese and rolled them in smashed up cheerios so she could pick them up easier and she ate those faster than I've ever seen her eat anything! I'm so glad I have a good eater.  It's definitely a switch from Avery. :) Natalie also loves to sip on water after she eats. She became a pro at the sippy cup in about 2 days, which really surprised me. She still has "stranger danger" so it'll be fun to see what she does when she meets Santa!

Here are a few pictures from Thanksgiving weekend. My friend Delayna of http://www.quietstarsphotography.com/ took these photos.  She did an amazing job! 

Our crazy girls!

Our girls are as different as night and day. Which is great, but I think we've got a little someone who is going to give us a run for our money!  Natalie is so sensitive. She will definitely let you know when she is not happy. Avery is always so easy going.  Natalie LOVES to eat and she will let you know when you don't move the spoon to her mouth fast enough.  Avery hardly ever ate much when she was a baby and Natalie will finish two jars of pureed food in two minutes flat.  Avery always let people hold her...she didn't care who it was.  Natalie has "stranger danger" like nobody's business!  I always feel bad for whoever asks to hold her.  They're taking a gamble on that girl!  As her dad would say, "she's sassy like her mom."  Hey, she just knows what she wants! Gotta love her for that.  But she and Avery get along so well together.  I like watching Avery make her little sister laugh and how Natalie's face lights up when she sees her.  It's so great that they have eachother!



Avery is doing well. She loves watching Disney movies and she has such a great imagination! Her stories are so funny.  The other day she was asking me about my wedding ring. I told her that I wear my ring and daddy wears his ring and it means that we are married.  She looked at me and said, "oh, just like me and Theo."  Theo was the ring bearer in Nik and Lilian's wedding back in July! I couldn't believe she remembered his name and made that connection of marriage and being in a wedding.  She's too smart for her own good!

Family Pictures

A couple of weeks ago we had family pictures taken.  Irina Cyr works with my friend Alice and I've always been in such awe of her work ever since I saw the pictures she took at Alice's twins' birthday party.  She sent these to me as a little sneak peek. I can't wait to see them all! Thanks Irina for taking pictures for us and for working with a 2.5 year old who never wanted to look at the camera!

5 Months

So now that Natalie is almost 6 months old, I thought I'd post some 5 month pictures!

She started rice cereal awhile ago and really liked it. She is now eating one meal a day of rice cereal and a puree of a fruit or a veggie and she is such a good eater. I'm getting used to it now, but I wasn't at first because Avery never ate much - and she still doesn't. I'm excited for her to try puffs and yogurt soon!

Maui

On Labor Day we woke up at 3:30 (in the morning!) to get the girls ready to catch a 6 AM flight from Yakima to Seattle. Avery was so excited to ride in an airplane. We met up with Fred's parents in Seattle and we were off to Maui! The girls did fantastic on the flight, with the exception of a little crying the last 20 minutes or so. I think that's pretty good for a 5.5-6 hour flight! I can only imagine that their ears hurt, although Avery also said she felt like throwing up. We had the little baggie ready for her but she never did. Poor thing. She also had plenty of toys, coloring books, food, and her dvd player which kept her very busy.

Fred and Ceil got a 3 bedroom, 3 bath condo in Kihei for all 8 of us (our family, Fred and Ceil, and Nik and Lilian). It worked out perfectly. We had a full kitchen and hit Costco once we got there. We went out to dinner each evening but made breakfast and lunch in our room mostly. It would have been a nightmare taking the kids out to eat at every meal. We did have a special birthday party for Fred's dad to celebrate his 70th! We BBQ'd steaks at the condo and had a great time.

Nik and Lilian rented surf boards and did a lot of surfing. Fred got to join them a couple of times and he had a blast. I mostly enjoyed the pool or the beach with the girls, Ceil and Fred. We got to do some shopping at the Grand Wailea Mall (which was amazing!) and we also went into the cute little town of Lahaina and shopped as well. On Thursday, Lilian treated me to a spa morning for my birthday at the Grand Wailea resort. It was amazing and by far the best (and largest) spa I have ever seen!

On Friday we took the girls to the aquarium. It was a really neat one, and Avery loved seeing all fish and even the sharks. She kept yelling out "Look at the big yellow fish!" or my favorite "Look at the big big shark! It won't get me!" Friday eveing Laura and Rob each had a "girls night out" and "boys night out". Ceil watched the girls for us so that I could go with Lilian to celebrate with Laura and Freddie could go with Nik and Fred to celebrate with Rob. We went to the Marriott's Mala bar/restaurant. The guys went to Tommy Bahama's.

Saturday was Laura (Fred's sister) and Rob's wedding. We met them at the Grand Wailea and had family pictures taken near a beautiful waterfall. The wedding and reception were both at Gannon's Restaurant. Their wedding was in a grassy area that overlooked the ocean, a beautiful golf course, and tons of lush tropical flowers and trees. A funny little tidbit about the Grand Wailea and Gannon's is that both of these places were filming locations in the movie "Just Go With It" with Jennifer Aniston and Adam Sandler.

We flew home on 9/11. And while I felt like I had an anxiety attack the day before we left, I did feel safe traveling that day. The reason I don't ever want to fly again on any 9/11 day is that it took FOREVER to get through security and with two little ones, it was a rough start to our trip home. There were TSA agents and policeman everywhere. That was both a little reasurring and a little scary. Once we got past security and we were at our gate, they were grabbing random people and doing hand residue checks. Fred was one of the lucky ones. They just swiped a white piece of special paper over his hands and then put it through their machine. I've flown many times and I've never seen that one before!

All and all, it was a great trip! The kids did great with the time change. I think it was Fred and I who had such a rough time re-adjusting to Pacific Standard time! But we all had a really fun family vacation!

Here are just a few pictures (in random order) from our trip -

July

Why am I always so behind? Oh, that's right, it's because I've got 2 kids and I'm working and trying to keep up with our daily lives! July came and went in a blur. Fred's mom and dad came over to stay with the girls while our daycare was on vacation . We did many things, including a trip to the Woodland Park Zoo. Fred's dad also did a few things around the house and we appreciated that so much!

On the 21st we headed to Semiahmoo Resort in Blaine, WA for Fred's brother's wedding. Lilian looked so beautiful and the location, wedding and reception was just breathtaking. The sun was shining and everything went perfectly. Even Avery did a great job as the flower girl. By the day we had prior to the wedding, I didn't think she was going to pull it off! She was cranky and threw tantrums (ya know, a typical 2 year old). But she did it and we were so proud of her! Here are a few pictures taken by Fred's sister Laura.

Our sweet little Natalie turned 4 months old. She is giggling and smiling all the time. She's a wonderful baby and we're so lucky to have her. At her 4 month appointment, she weighed 13 lbs and is around 25% for both height and weight. She is officially half the size of her big sister who right now weighs about 26 lbs!

Updates

Natalie is 3 months old! She is just the sweetest little thing with a really big attitude! She definitely knows what she wants! I can't wait to see how her personality progresses. She is starting to interact with Avery and always smiles when Avery talks to her. I love it! What I don't love is when they simutaneously start crying at the same time, when I can't reach over the car seat when I'm driving to put Natalie's binkie back in her mouth or when I'm right in the middle of feeding Natalie a bottle and Avery yells that she has to go "poop". But we make it work. My house might not be as clean as I'd like it to be and dinner might not get on the table until late but it's times like that when I just have to remember how blessed I am.

If you are looking for bows, clips or headbands for your little sweetie, check out Briar.Claire at www.facebook.com/briarclaire. They have the cutest hair accessories. Avery has a ton and I've already started a collection for Natalie! Briar.Claire is an etsy shop (http://www.briarclaire.etsy.com/) and they also have a blog (http://www.briarclaire.blogspot.com/). The best part is that they have a sale going on right now! They have $1 clips and 25% off everything. I just bought a cute white headband with a white flower with little rhinestones in the center for Avery to wear when she is a flower girl next month in Fred's brother's wedding. Avery loves her flower girl dress, shoes and headband and calls it her princess outfit. Now only if she'll actually walk down the aisle...I hope so!

We also have another family wedding coming up. Fred's sister Laura is getting married to Rob in Maui on 9/10/11. We are so excited to take the girls! I think the fun they will have will definitely outweigh any traveling anxiety that I may have about flying with 2! We've done it quite a few times with Avery. She's done great on long trips - we even flew with her to Hawaii when she was 12 months. Let's hope it goes smoothly with a 2 and a half year old and a 5 month old! Thank goodness I got a baby Ergo for Mother's Day. That thing is going to be my lifesaver!!

2 Months Old

Natalie is two months old today. Time goes by so fast, I can't even believe it. I've packed away the newborn clothes. Not sure if I will sell them or save them for the next person I know who has a girl. Either way, we won't be needing them. We're 99.9% sure that our family feels complete. Natalie is so sweet and loves to smile and "talk"....lots of cooing and screeching in the evenings! Her 2 month appointment is next week. I'm excited to see how much she's grown!

Mud Pies Anyone?

Yum. We bought Avery a Little Tykes "Makin' Mud Pies" outdoor kitchen the other day. It's been so cold that we haven't been outside to play with it. But it wasn't so bad today and she really wanted to "use the sink." While we were outside, she made me chocolate chip cookies and apple pie. This will definitely be a fun toy for the backyard this summer!

Camping

Fred can't wait to take Avery camping this summer. I'm sure that when Natalie is a little older, it will be a fun family adventure! But for now, Fred is excited for some father/daughter time with Avery. He was anxious to see if she liked sleeping in a tent so he set up a tent in the backyard. He actually set up 2; the small one is our tent and the bigger one is our friend's tent. It's huge!! So that is the one they slept in. Avery loved it! I went out to say goodnight and she had her flashlight and was "looking for animals." It was so funny! She has such an imagination. Fred said that she was talking to someone in the tent last night. She was talking about strawberries and daddy. We asked her this morning who she was talking to and she said "Greg". I don't know where she comes up with this stuff!

Springtime

It finally feels like Spring! Avery loves being outside and loves flowers. She watered my flower pots and had a great time! Last week I was able to capture some first smiles from Natalie. She is just too sweet. :)