Insta-February

I started following a local mom blog (http://citymomsblog.com/twincities/) and they challenged their readers and followers to post a themed photo a day on Instagram.

So I took on the challenge and it was pretty fun.  I wasn't super creative, but I think I got some good pictures from it.

Here they are:

 

 

 

Favorite-Things-Phone-Dump Friday

Happy Weekend!

And we're back in survival mode again.  Missing sleep.  So tired.  Enough said. :)

Here are the pictures.

Favorite Thing #1: Hanging out in her big sister's room. 
Notice the Kleenex in the background.  Non. Stop. Snot.

 

Favorite Thing #2: A present to myself- mommy earrings

Favorite Thing #3: Hanging at G-ma and G-pa's

 

Favorite Thing #4: Auntie Mari babysat and we got an ice cream date

Favorite Thing #5: Playing at home

Favorite Thing #6: Hanging out at Boom's house

Favorite Thing #7: Found this on Facebook today- so true.

Have a good weekend!

TBT

If you are on any kind of social media (Twitter, Facebook, Instagram) you know that Throwback Thursday has kind of blown up.  The hashtag #tbt is ALL over the place.

It is kind of fun to be a little ahead of the game on that one (even though they usually only go back a few years).

It is the end of the month, so time to post all the ones that I have left from July 2010/ February 2014.

Babies in hair bows

Lifelong buddies

Playing with the ocean wonders toy

Serious high chair babies

Summer hanging out vs. Winter hanging out

Weekend Wrap-Up: The 7-Months-Old Edition

Somehow this baby is 7-months-old today!

Oh Kona, sitting up like a person again.

She is so sweet and fun and silly and cuddly.  Before last night, she seemed to be getting the hang of sleeping through the night.  I had 3 nights in a row of 8 hours of solid sleep (partially because I was asleep by 8:30 or 9:00 each night).  Then came last night....it was kind of a disaster.  Oh well.  Napping on her own has definitely gotten better, and she usually takes 3 independent naps a day.  They aren't the longest naps, but between all three of them she gets about 3-4 hours of daytime sleep.  Let's see...other things about Maya... She enjoys when other people do things for her.  I know, she is a baby, but there are some things that she COULD do that she refuses to.  For instance, she refuses to put her hands up to even try and hold her bottle herself.  She still doesn't really like to roll over and would rather have people just give her toys instead of trying to roll to get them.  She sits up and plays, but only for how long she wants to, and then just starts freaking out to be held.  She's kind of a diva.  And we're totally catering to her every whim, because who doesn't want to see that adorable smiling face instead of a sad crabby face?  Right???  She's the cutest little diva ever, and has me totally wrapped around her little diva fingers.

As for the weekend, we spent Saturday morning at the condo for a celebratory engagement brunch for Auntie Yoda and Craig.

Hooray!  A new uncle!

We are so excited for them- and they are looking at having a destination wedding next year.  So fun!

Last night Chris had reserve duty so I put both girls to bed.  I tried putting Maya down first, but she was totally wired, so she came with me to put Callie down.  She felt SUPER cool bouncing on the big girl bed and reading books with her big sister.

Grabbing sister's jammies is SUPER fun.

IMG 0630 from Baby Goose on Vimeo.

They both seemed TOTALLY ready for bed, huh?  Thankfully Callie was out within minutes.  It's the little stinker that had her own idea about sleeping (or lack thereof) last night.  Needless to say, we did not repeat this little pre-bedtime ritual tonight, as adorable as it was.

Today we hung out at home and the Helds came over for lunch.  I managed to bribe the big kids with a cookie to stay still long enough to take a picture, and the little girls were more cooperative.

The C's and the M's

Later Callie went to play in the snow with Pa, and then we went out to dinner, and had some cuddle time.  At dinner Maya sat like a big girl in a high chair, AND tried some new foods: sprinkle cheese, pineapple, and hash browns.  The cheese and pineapple were a hit, the hash browns were not.  And she also downed a thing of baby sweet potatoes.  The girl likes to eat, just like her mama.

I can not get enough of those baby cuddles.

Hope everyone has a great week!  March (and maybe spring? probably not) is right around the corner...

50-Months-Old!!

It is MIND BOGGLING that we have been parents for 50 months.

When you're thick in the trenches of parenting a particular stage of baby/tot/child, it is amazing how much you forget about the stages before it.  At least I do.

And then I look back at pictures and I still don't really remember what it was like then, but I can't help but smile at the joy it brings my heart to see my big girl as a little girl.

So to walk down memory lane, I decided to briefly skim my photo folders and choose a picture from every February from 50 months ago until today.

2010: 2-months-old

2011: 14-months-old

2012: 26-months-old

2013: 38-months-old

2014: 50-months-old

She looks so big and old and beautiful and sweet.  My Punkin Pie.

Favorite-Things-Phone-Dump Friday

What a weird week!

No school on Monday.  I stayed home on Tuesday because both girls were sick/crabby.  Had school Wednesday and Thursday, and then had a snow day today.

And throughout the whole week gross head cold germs permeated our house starting with Callie and ending with me AND Chris AND STILL Callie.  Maya has avoided it so far, but we'll see what happens.

Sick Callie looks, sounds and acts a LOT like gluten-filled Callie.  It wasn't super fun to deal with.  But I have talked about that many times on the blog, so I'll just leave it at that. 

Maya has REALLY become a mama's girl.  Like REALLY a mama's girl.  And I love it, but only sometimes.  Ok, most of the time.  But look at that face when she realized that I wasn't holding her but sitting close enough where I SHOULD have been holding her.  And then look at the face pretty much immediately after I grabbed her and DID hold her.  Ridiculous.  But kind of great.  Sometimes.

Favorite Thing #1: Mama's girl- evidence #1

And then we have a video where she CLEARLY (not really) can totally say Mama.

IMG 0584 from Baby Goose on Vimeo.

Favorite Thing #2: Mama's girl- evidence #2

 

 

On to the other pictures...

 

Favorite Thing #3: Cleaning/Rearranging Callie's room!

Favorite Thing #4: Sister time at home

Favorite Thing #5: Playing School



Favorite Thing #6: Puppet shows at Auntie Cat's

Favorite Thing #6: Tuesday
Top: You know your 4-year-old is sick when she takes a nap!
Middle: Playful baby.
Bottom: Seeing our old neighbors, Ben and Hannah.
 

 

Favorite Thing #7: Wednesday at Pa's house and
dealing with the snow at home.

 

Favorite Thing #8: Thursday at G-ma's

 

Favorite Thing #9: SNOW DAY

Favorite Thing #10: I literally went to bed and was ASLEEP by 8:30pm the
past two nights.  OLD.  And a little sick.

But the sleeping things has gotten better.  I got to sleep from 8:30pm to 5am last night.  And the baby didn't even wake up until 5:45am...I was just up since I went to bed so early.

 

I know I just jinxed it, but there has definitely been sleep progress this week.

 

Have a great weekend!



TBT

So this week hasn't been too fun in terms of sickness.

All of our noses are raging (well, 3 out of 4.  The fourth one has teeth that are raging and a nose that I'm sure will follow suit soon).

Callie looks like Rudolph. Maya is super clingy. Chris and I are sniffling congested messes.

Is it bed time yet?  No, it is only 4:30?  Dang it.

Here are the throwbacks.  They are all 6-month photo shoot throwbacks.

All the pictures on the left are the ones Nik took at Callie's 6-month shoot.  All the pictures on the right are from the JCPenny's photo session a couple weeks ago.

Enjoy!

The sweet baby shot

The family shot

Callie's cute scrunchy nose- then and now

The artistic shot

Weekend Wrap-Up

Hey Everybody!  Happy Sunday!

Our weekend was pretty chill.  We hung out at home (I'm going to be SO glad when it gets warmer and we can be outside.  Our 4-year-old tornado wreaks havoc on our house, and it is pointless to even try and keep up with her).  We went to Frederic's 1st birthday party.  We had a family cuddle.  We went to Edinborough to play.

As you can see in a couple pictures, I had 2 leeches shadows on me all weekend
(when they weren't playing with each other or Kona). 

Callie, Donald, Frederic, Maya = Third cousins

The Family Cuddle- goofy faces included

Playing at Edinborough

Callie got another cold this weekend so that has been fun.  Now we're just waiting for it to spread to the rest of us.  Maya is getting a few more teeth on the top- not the middle two quite yet, but the one to the left of the middle two.  Weird.  So she's been WAY clingy to me.  And I kind of love it, but sometimes I'd like to go to the bathroom without her making it seem like I'm breaking her heart.

I'm going on a work trip to L.A. in a few weeks for 3 nights.  Gulp.  While I can't wait to be in a warmer climate with other fun adults (AND have 3 nights of uninterrupted sleep) the thought of leaving everyone, especially the baby, is pretty brutal right now.  But maybe I won't be totally alone, because Callie said, "Mom, I'm going to sneak in your lunch box when you go on your trip!"  If only I just needed to pack a lunch box.  That would make traveling super easy.

Hope you all had a great weekend.  Thank you to our presidents for another day off tomorrow.  We have a big day planned- a dentist visit for the older one and a flu shot for the younger one.  Wish us luck.

Well Played, JCPenny's. Well Played.

I got the groupon app a few weeks ago, and within an hour I had bought 3 groupons and spent $100. 

Ooops.

BUT.  One of the groupons I bought was a portrait session at JCPenny's for $25 that included a few free sheets of pictures and a CD of 3 pictures.

We went last Saturday at 11:40.  I was nervous about the timing of it all, since our little baby's naps are still pretty inconsistent.  But she took a solid nap from 9:00-10:30 and was ready to rock and roll for the pictures.

They could not have turned out more adorable (and sometimes hilarious).  We did a gray and red theme and Maya even wore a headband. 

Enjoy.

First up: THE SISTERS.

Then we have: THE OLDER ONE.

Next up: THE BABY.

Then: THE WHOLE FAMILY.

 

Then, she started showing me all the pictures on the computer and turned them all black and white.  Here are a couple of my favorites.

And then she was like a picture wizard and started making photo collages with just a few clicks of the mouse.

Yes, that is a picture of Maya's butt ruffle used in the background.  Brilliant.

So I see all of these and sheepishly ask, "What comes with my groupon again?"  And she says, "2 sheets and a CD of three pictures, but we can upgrade to a CD of all the pictures for $80."

You can obviously guess what happened next.

$80 is a small price to pay for these treasures.