Christmas Pictures

The girls were really disappointed that Steve had to go to work today. He'd been home 14 of the last 15 days, so they were pretty set on the dad as a permanent playmate routine. So it made for a long morning of "I want my daddy" whining. But we survived it and both girls took naps this afternoon (of course it had to be at different times). Olivia had a great time during Abby's nap playing with all the toys Abby never lets her touch. She was really fascinated with Abby's new "real talking" Woody and Jessie dolls. She kept pulling the string and smiling when the dolls talked to her.

Abby has had a major growth spurt in the last couple weeks and went from being comfortably in size 3t to comfortably in size 4t. We have been back to checking the stores for good deals since most of her wardrobe in now in a box to be saved for Olivia. Today we scored 3 Disney Princess outfits and 2 dresses half off at K-Mart. Abby was really excited about the dresses because they each came with a matching dress for a doll. We had to take them right out when we got home and dress the dolls. Abby ended up wearing one of the dresses over her clothes for most of the morning.

I undecorated the Christmas tree today, but we left it standing. It still looks and smells great, so I didn't see the point in removing it altogether, but I wanted it to be ready to haul out to the curb when the city picks up trees. Last year we missed the pick up and ended up with a skeleton of the Christmas tree in the backyard until sometime in September. I'm aiming to avoid that.

Olivia got another tooth today - that' s 2 teeth in 10 days for those of you keeping track. She now has both bottom central incisors, the top right central incisor and the top left lateral incisor (weird... she had the outside tooth before the center tooth came in). She's really close to having the other two upper incisors and I don't think the lower incisors are too far behind. She's been really mastering real food. Tonight she had a 6 ounce jar of baby food beef and veggies and then downed a whole slice of pizza. She would have probably eaten more, but I cut her off. Yesterday at lunch both girls had the same thing and Olivia ended up eating every bite of her lunch just like Abby. She has quite the appetite!

Olivia's First Blizzard

Okay... so maybe it wasn't a blizzard by U.P. standards, but all our downstate friends would have been panic stricken over the 12-ish inches of snow we got yesterday. I took Abby out to shovel it while Olivia napped. We didn't get much shoveling done. Mostly I spent my time putting mittens back on and making paths for Abby to walk in, since 12 inches of snow is a little much for a girl of her size. I only got the snow plow residue shoveled up along the road and the sidewalk to the front door before we had to quit. Steve had the hard job of finishing the driveway when he got home.

Olivia is feeling much better. She's finished her antibiotics and no longer has a fever or excessive crying. She still has a pretty bad cold and has been throwing up the snot she has been swallowing, but even that has been much improved from earlier this week. Abby has also been showing some cold symptoms, so we are hoping she is feeling better soon too. We have way to much celebrating to do this month. And that celebrating starts with a trip to St. Ignace on Sunday for a party at the home of Dr. & Mrs. Krantz - the newest dentist who works for the tribe in their St. Ignace office. I'm hoping the girls will be feeling well so we can all go.

And, life around here should be slowly resuming normalcy since Kimberlee and Ryan brought baby Felecia home today from the NICU. We are very excited to meet her once the girls are feeling well again. So I will be back to just my kids and the occasional visit of my other kids. Not that we don't love having them around - I just don't have the energy to deal with 7 kids. I don't know how my mother survived it. I'm still exhausted just thinking about taking care of that many children.

We are hoping that we won't have too much more snow this weekend. We have been scoping out new snow blowers this evening since the 30+ year old hand-me-down machine we have is pretty well past it's prime (and I can't start it so I'm no help with it around - or I should say I couldn't start it and Steve wasn't around to show me the trick). Steve and I are pretty sore from hand shoveling - it was not fun with heavy, wet snow.

Happy Thanksgiving!!!

Olivia and Aunt Hannah - Olivia finally made up with her on Sunday after Hannah tickled her and ticked her off on Friday. Abby wasn't too sure about letting "tickle Hannah" near her baby. I'm happy to report we have made progress on Abby letting Hannah play with her "tiny baby sister."
Olivia and second cousin Lydia - they are about 5 weeks apart and had some fun exploring each other and the present pile from Meg's wedding shower.
Abby and Jack showing off their Just Dance skills - Abby has become obsessed with the game, particularly dancing to Ring My Bell. She has some funny moves.
Here's Abby and best buddy cousin Jack taking a break from hockey time.Olivia and Jack practicing their goalie skills.

Well, we survived perhaps our most interesting Thanksgiving weekend. I doubt we will be able to top it for just plain craziness. I had some moments where I wondered what kind of crazy mental illness I had acquired, but we survived and it didn't seem to result in any irreparable harm to my sanity. We ended up filling the car with people instead of luggage and Maize... here's how that all happened.

Since the last post (10 days ago), we've still been waiting for Kimberlee to bring baby Felecia home from the NICU. She's doing much better and should be out soon, but in the meantime there are still lots of kids to take care of. We had last weekend (the weekend of the 20th) off from extra child watching duties since they had a friend come up to spend Saturday through Tuesday with the kids. During that time little Rian had another seizure, so that time got bumped to Wednesday so that they could start him on his medications and watch for any adverse side effects. So on Wednesday we got two 11 year old girls and a 9 year old for the weekend. It filled every seat belt in our car to head to Hastings Wednesday night (and when all the seat belts are full we have no cargo space). Poor Maize had to stay home alone for the weekend - luckily she had an amazing dog sitter letting her in and out.

We had a great time in Hastings seeing family - we got to spend Thanksgiving day with the Hodges family and saw Great Grandpa Harley and Great Grandma Lorraine, who just happen to be two of Abby's very favorite people. She was really, really looking forward to seeing them. On Tuesday night she had gone to bed with big girl under ware on and when she woke up dry on Wednesday morning I gave her the option of calling one grandma to tell them what a big girl she was. She picked Grandma Lorraine. Our big girl friends did good all day, although Evelin's diabetes was a big challenge since she was burning off sugar faster than she was eating it and her blood sugar was going really, scary low. That made for a stressful night of checking her to make sure her sugars didn't go too low.

We spent Friday with Steve's family and the girls enjoyed seeing their cousins. Abby is finally figuring out that big kids aren't going to hurt her, so she is doing better with the boys and with other kids. Maybe it's because we've had so many big kids around for the last few weeks. Olivia is still pretty uneasy with the big boys getting into her personal space, but I have a feeling she will hold her own once she gets a bit bigger. Our big girl friends had lots of fun playing with our nephews, so that made our day much better. We also got a better handle on the diabetes, so it was much less stressful for Steve and I.

We had fun Saturday taking Abby and the big girls to see Tangled. She really loved the whole movie theater experience and was super quiet and attentive to the whole movie. After the movie we had a bridal shower for cousin Meg, who is getting married in like 3 weeks. The girls all did good with the entire Osgood family around. Olivia did lots of cuddling and Abby did some cloth diaper modeling for cousin Sarah's new business endeavor. But, Olivia also started to feel sick. No fun.

Sunday was a long drive with a sick baby, tired toddler, and tired big girls. We survived it and made it home to a house that was 50 degrees. We turned up the heat, shoveled the 5 inches of snow that had accumulated on our driveway, and then headed to dinner and the store. By that point both Steve and I were pretty much exhausted. I'm sure our dinner conversation was pretty lame, but I honestly can't remember any of it. And Olivia was pretty miserable - runny nose, coughing, runny eyes, low fever. So... long night, with not much sleep for us. I ended up sleeping on the couch with Olivia so she could be upright. We didn't end up with any extra kids since they had a little guy with croup and we definitely didn't need to mix our sick kids with theirs. Luckily, a grandma was available to come stay with the kids and big Ryan, so we are off the hook for child care right now. We need that so that Olivia can get to feeling better.

Olivia wasn't better yesterday, so I took her into the after hours clinic when Steve got home from work. She's got a really bad cold and a double ear infection, but as of this morning she was doing much better. Not great... but better. We've got her on antibiotics and ear drops, so that is really helping. She's almost acting normal today and at least a little happier and more on her regular schedule. Now we just need to get her sleeping all night, in her own bed. And I need a vacation... but that isn't going to be happening for months. So we will see... I think I'm still sane, but it may be questionable.

I Learned This From My Mother

I have an awesome mother - how awesome I did not realize until this week when I had 7 kids to take care of at the same time. Now, she may have only had 6 children, and there was a little more space between us than between the group I've had lately, but still... my mom is amazing. I don't know how she survived it, or how we survived it for that matter. This little girl is the reason I've had 7 kids under my roof on and off since Wednesday. Her name is Felecia and she is the little sister of the whole bunch of big kids that have been staying with Steve and I. I have three wonderful friends up here in the frozen north, but of the three I spend the most time with Kimberlee - we go to church together, live closest out of the bunch, and I have a backyard that her boys often need to blow off some steam in. On Monday she had an emergency c-section and we added Felecia to the bunch of babies that come and play at our place. Except that Felecia, like her soon-to-be best friend Olivia, has been giving us a big scare and spending some time in the NICU. She's making major improvements, but there isn't a definite timetable for her to be home. So, until then we are on-again off-again parent stand-ins for the rest of her brothers and sisters. We are off this weekend after a long couple days of entertaining and comforting kids who were really missing their mom.

So here's my happy bunch (from left to right: Huron (2), Nia (11) Nikomi (11), Olivia, Rian (3 1/2), Abby, and Evelin (9). They've been really awesome and the big girls have been super helpful. And we've even learned how to take care of Evelin's insulin pump and manage her diabetes - I hope we NEVER have to do that for one of our own kids!In the middle of all the crazy I took Olivia in for her check-up and flu shot. She was a healthy 18 pounds (50th percentile) and was up to 26 1/2 inches (25th percentile). And she was super friendly and inquisitive, so we got the all clear, good job, looks like she's doing great from the doctor. He'd even forgotten she'd been in the NICU since she's done so well since coming home. We are certainly blessed beyond measure. She is going full bore on the army crawling and stealing of Abby's toys. It won't be long and she'll be crawling for real - she's already up on all fours, she just has to figure out how to make her limbs go. It's amazing how fast she's growing up. It seems like we just brought her home from the hospital.
Abby has been enjoying having some round the clock friends and her first slumber party. It was her first and last co-ed sleepover and all 3 toddlers did fine after some initial tears because the boys really, really missed their momma. The three of them really love each other, so I've had a fun week listening to them play together and enjoy the company of a kid from another family. Pretty soon they are going to think of each other as siblings instead of friends - Abby had already been calling them her brothers for a few weeks.

Abby's also doing good potty training, although she's had a few accidents with all the chaos and me forgetting to remind her to run in and use the potty. But she's back to staying dry all night, so I'm betting we will be done with the pull ups full time in the next few weeks. She sure is growing up fast.

Where To Begin...

Well, I'm not sure where to begin in the explanation of how 10 days have elapsed without me having a single spare moment in which to sit and collect my thoughts. It has been, perhaps, the most stressful week of my life. Or maybe that was Olivia's first week... I haven't had enough perspective yet to decide.

We have managed to have some great times in spite of the chaos that has been going on in life of the Lewis family, who since December have been involved with our bible study and basically become great friends. They have a baby that could arrive at any minute (she is scheduled for her c-section one week from Tuesday), 5 kids on top of that including a little boy who has become very much the terrible two that his age creates, and 3 kids who have medical issues - one diabetic, one who has had seizures since age 6, and another who's seizures that started last weekend and created all the chaos we have been living through). Pitching in to help their family out during some scary medical emergencies made Steve and I so grateful for happy, healthy children.

We tried to get pictures of the girls in the leaves, but by the time Abby decided to join us, Olivia had decided she was over it. Oh well... we can try again later. And we bought clearance Halloween costumes, which have been a source of much entertainment for Abby the Pirate and Abby the Red Queen. So... I am still working on processing my life for the last 10 days. It has involved lots of extra kids, lots of prayer, and lots of hugging my own babies. One of these days I will catch up and be able to comprehend reality again... until then, sorry for my ramblings.

Halloween Hangover

We had a lot of fun on Halloweekend. It is a lot more fun with a girl big enough to be excited about trick or treating and understand the idea of going door to door and saying "trick or treat" and "thank you" to each house. Abby had a great time. We had a party and went trick or treating with all her best friends. When I say we went trick or treating I mean Abby and Steve - Olivia slept through the entire costume part of the party. Now the hard part is regulating the candy consumption, since we had quite a bit of leftover candy (I may have overdone it with 4 bowls...).

Olivia is getting quite close to figuring out crawling. She's been practicing picking her belly up off the floor for the last couple of days. She's going to have me running around chasing her soon. And I'm going to need to get my baby gates up before I want to. Olivia's also working on night 3 of the Cry It Out method of sleep training tonight. I wish she could have been easy like Abby, who started sleeping through the night at 8 weeks and never stopped after that. Olivia, on the other hand, has been up once or twice each night since about 6 months (we had that brief interval from 4 months to around 6 months where she slept all night, so I know she can do it). We started Sunday night with the CIO plan. Olivia woke up at 11:45 and after Steve checked on her and put her back into bed she cried until after 2:00. It was a long, long night laying in bed listening to her cry. I hated every second of it, but I hate feeling exhausted even more. Last night she woke up twice, but only cried for 10 or 15 minutes each time, so I'm hoping after another night or two she will have the system figured out and will just put her little thumb back into her mouth and go to sleep.

Abby is still cracking us up. She has been really into barbies and dancing lately, so we had a barbie dance party last night. She had all her barbies lined up around one of Olivia's blankets and they were all taking turns dancing. She also dances at any opportunity (music on t.v. shows, songs she makes up, even the nintendo wii dancing game). I think dance class will be in her future - and I know her dad is not looking forward to all those dance recitals.

Can A Mom Get A Break Around Here?

And lately the answer has been no. But that's okay - like I told Grandma Jennie, there will be plenty of time to rest when I'm dead. Or when they grow up and move out. Then I'll probably wish I was back to the craziness and exhaustion that has defined my last few days. In fact, as I am typing this, my children are both confined in Olivia's exersaucer and jumper (yes... Abby climbed into the exersaucer again and she can't get out. I am leaving her there for now. It is safer).

So... our craziness started Saturday. We took the girls to Mackinac City for the day with the intention of getting Abby some winter appropriate shoes of some sort and we heard that the Hush Puppies store was having a sale. It was a great sale, so great that they were all out of Abby's size. But we had a good time being tourists and checking out the other stores. Sunday was also busy - we attended the birthday party of Abby's friend Autumn and tried to get cleaned up a ready for a busy week. And I committed myself to helping our friend Andrea with two extra emergency foster kids (she already has 2 adopted foster kids and another that she has permanently and will be adopting). So yes... I willingly put myself into a situation where there would be 7 kids and 2 adults with all the kids under 5 and two of whom didn't speak English. It was a hard day to begin with, then my friend Kimberlee called to tell me that the doctor thought her water had broken and she needed someone to take her two little boys so she could go get that checked out. So... 9 kids, under 5, two who can't communicate with Andrea and I. Yep... I'm tired. Still. Luckily, Kimberlee's water hadn't broken, so we are still waiting for that baby to arrive in a few weeks. And the Spanish speaking foster kids were moved to a Spanish speaking foster home near the school where the little boy attends. But boy, did that day wipe me out.

Olivia hasn't helped matters any. She has reverted to newborn sleeping habits at night. She is up at least once, and some nights twice. And if I don't nurse her, she is not going back to sleep. We tried Monday night to get her back to sleep without nursing. After 1 hour I gave in and fed her. After 2 hours she finally was sleeping soundly enough for me to lay her down. Grr..... Some days I wonder why she can't get with the program. It wouldn't be so frustrating to be up in the middle of the night every night had she not slept for 11 hour stretches just a few months ago (for like 9 weeks). I know she can do it. I don't know how to get her back into the sleeping habit without depriving the rest of us of a lot of sleep. The Ferber (cry it out) Method does not work for this child. So yeah... I definitely have 2 strong willed children. This could be a long, long 18 years.

And all of that only brings me to Tuesday, when my willingness to watch Kimberlee's kids for a dentist appointment and house viewing turned into another 5ish hours of extra children. They had a lot of fun. Maize, maybe, did not. I am happy to have them around to entertain Abby, but it makes resting or getting anything done impossible. Abby loves having "her boys" Rian and Huron over. She even thinks they are her brothers. So, we'll keep them around. Then she can have 2 "brothers" without me having to have 2 more kids.

Now onto Thursday and Friday and then Trick or Treating. And maybe by December my life won't be so crazy busy. Or Olivia can sleep through the night. Or something...

Abby and Olivia's Disney Adventure

Well, we made it to Disney and back in one piece. After we returned... well that may be another story. We had a great time enjoying some warm weather (okay... hot... high 80's may be warm for some of you, but we are yoopers now and that was HOT!). Abby really enjoyed the swimming pools and splash pads around our resort. Olivia liked the water too, as long as it wasn't splashing or spraying around her. We probably caught Abby at the bottom of the tot water slide at least 100 times. It was marvelous and perfectly clear and sunny except for Thursday, when some hurricane related clouds rolled through.

We had great flights and mostly great behavior from our little helpers. Neither one of them really had too much trouble on the plane. Olivia cried a little, but not too much and it was crying because she was tired not because her ears hurt. Abby had a great ride both down and back sitting between Grandma Mary and Grandpa Scott. She really had a wonderful time with them (we all did) and their extra hands made the vacation a lot less stressful. Let's face it, watching two small kids at a busy resort and theme park is hardly vacation. It's more like work. But with help from my parents we had a great time and even got to squeeze in some relaxation.

We took Abby and Olivia on their first visit to the Magic Kingdom on Wednesday. Abby was super excited to finally see the "princess castle." She had a great time riding on the rides. She rode most of the rides a person of her size can go on. I was bummed that It's A Small World and the Spinning Tea Cups were closed for refurbishing, but we still managed to fill our day with lots of great fun. And I'm pretty sure that the Buzz Lightyear Space Ranger ride was Abby's favorite anyway, since we rode it twice. We also stood in a very long line to meet the Disney princesses. After waiting 30ish minutes to meet Aurora, Cinderella, and Belle we were excited for Abby to have her big moment. It did not go as planned. Abby and I went to meet Aurora and you could tell Abby was a lot freaked out by the fact that it was a real woman and not a statue like the Aurora we saw at Downtown Disney. She did pose for a picture and said thank you to Aurora. Then we got into the line to see Cinderella (which at this point was one person long since they let a small group into the princess pavilion at a time). Abby looked at me and told me it was my turn to see Cinderella and she would take pictures with Dad. So, I sent Steve to take her and meet Cinderella. Again, the look of terror was on her little face, but she smiled for a picture. We finally got to the line to see Belle, who is her all-time favorite and who she had been asking to see all week, and she told us there was no way she wanted to see Belle and that she was done. So we left without the Abby and Belle picture. She went out and told Grandma Mary that "Belle was over it and I didn't want to see her." Oh well... maybe next time.

Along with that great quote she had some other funny moments. We were feeding her and Olivia some cheerios for breakfast one morning (yep... Olivia is eating cheerios and everything she can get into her mouth), when Abby announced to Grandma Mary that we got Olivia, or "that girl" as she is frequently called, from a Happy Meal. If only it were that easy... I'd have a whole slew of kids. She was also shocked and amazed when she saw another random girl at the pool with the same bathing suit. She kept looking at the girl and saying to me "hey Mom, that girl is wearing my swimming suit." She had her other suit on, so she was sure the girl had gone into our room and stolen her bathing suit. I couldn't talk her out of it. She also got to be on the big screen at the Mike's Laugh In ride, which is a screen show based on Monsters, Inc. If you've seen the movie then you'd know that she looks a little bit like Boo, the toddler girl in the movie. During the ride's show, they used cameras to show various people from the audience on the screen as characters from the movie. Abby was amazed when her little face popped up in front of the whole theater. She hasn't stopped reminding me of it yet.

So... you can tell we had a great time. We enjoyed the Grandma and Grandpa time, the pool, and some quality time with our girls. And now we are enjoying some laundry and cleaning to get our house back into shape. And I'm working on new recipes, since last night "the dinner" made Abby throw up (her words, not mine).

Not A Newborn

Olivia is decidedly no longer a newborn - she knows this during the day, but at night she seems to forget this. She had her 6 month check-up yesterday and continues to grow well (17 pounds 12 ounces (75 to 90th percentile), 25 3/4 inches (25 to 50th percentile), 17 inch head(50 to 75th percentile)). She also got her shots. And in the last week she's mastered feeding herself little snacks, which Abby would very much like to get her hands on. But she persists in waking everyone up at least once in the middle of the night - like 2 am middle, not 5 am. Last night we tried to make her cry herself back to sleep. After an hour I went in and tried rocking her. After an hour and a half of crying I nursed her and laid her back into her crib. After two hours she finally fell asleep. At that point Abby woke up - why she didn't wake up during the two hours of crying baffles me. I really need a vacation...
Which is perfect, since we leave this week for Walt Disney World. Now I'm just hoping and praying that Olivia doesn't scream the entire plane ride, which is a very real possibility. Abby is beyond excited to go. I'm hoping that the excitement will translate into being brave enough to enjoy Disney and not be glued to my leg. At least Abby and Olivia are both going to be able to get into the park free, so if it's a total bust we won't have three or four tickets to buy.

I finished another kitten bonnet for cousin Emma and started one for Aunt Emily, but we had a slight knitting mishap with Emily's hat. I missed the count on one row and all of a sudden the kitten ear was sticking out the side instead of on the top. Oops! So I pulled that one apart and started again. Maybe we can get that done this weekend, if I can find the energy after all my sleepless nights and days... man do I miss Abby napping.

Sometimes Happy...

Olivia, who has up until the last week been an incredibly happy baby, has had a very bad week. We can barely see her two little front teeth that just about have made it into her mouth. I'm praying they hurry up and pop through so that the poor girl can get some relief and I can get some sleep at night. She's been either happy or shrieking for about a week. I've been beyond exhausted for about that same amount of time.

We had a really fun week this past week. We got to witness the adoption of our friends' foster daughter and celebrate her adoption into their family. She'd been with them since she left the hospital, so it was exciting to finally (18 months later) celebrate that she was official. We also got to enjoy visiting with Great Grandma Lorraine and Great Grandpa Harley. They hadn't been up to see the new house yet, so we had fun showing them around and the girls loved playing with them. Abby was pretty bummed out when they left Sunday morning and has been checking for their car out the window just in case they come back. We took them to the must-do tourist spot in town (The Antlers Restaurant). While we were having dinner Abby fell asleep at the table. She almost fell out of her chair, but we caught her in time to let her sit up on my lap and sleep. It's amazing the places that little girls can fall asleep.

And... for the "Abby-isms" file of things I need to remember, we had the following play out this weekend:

Abby was playing with her dolls and wanted to put her doll's bottle into the fridge, since I had just put her milk into the fridge. Her toy fridge was upstairs in her bedroom. She took the bottle up and then came down and this conversation happened.

Abby to me: Can you bring my fridge downstairs?
Me to Abby: You need to ask your dad if that's okay.
Abby walks across the room to Steve.
Abby to Steve: Can you bring my fridge downstairs?
Steve to Abby: If I bring it downstairs you won't have any toys in your room.
Abby walks across the room to me.
Abby to me: Dad said yes.

Oh are we in trouble....

Whoa! Where Has Time Gone

Okay... so a week later, and I don't really know how the week flew by so fast. Except for maybe the fact that we were away from home for the holiday weekend and that I've had some extra crabbiness around here due to teething children (both of them - lovely). We had a great time down-state visiting family and managed to see all of the grandparents and great-grandparents again. Steve and I also went to our 10th class reunion. We can add that to things we will never do again - both because there won't be another 10th reunion for that class and because we paid a lot of money for bad food and no program or slide shows or anything. We did get to catch up with some friends, but it certainly wasn't 70 dollars worth of fun or food. Oh well...

Abby is officially over napping except on days when she has been really busy or she was up late the night before. I'm not sure I like this new phase of life. I need my naps too! But, we are learning to make it workable. Olivia, unfortunately, hasn't been napping well lately either. I think the travel threw her off her schedule, so she's been extra crabby since she's been missing her 3 hour afternoon naps (and she also doesn't want to miss out on anything anymore, so that complicates things). She's generally the happiest kid in the room, but with the teething and the lack of naps she's been off lately.

Now that we are home for a few weeks in a row again, we've been getting back into the swing of having friends around. Last night Olivia and her little friend Hugh discovered each other and rolled across the rug to get together. It was pretty cute to watch them discover each other and try really hard to get within reach of the other. Olivia also had some quality time with Wyatt (whom we've been told has laid claim to her, so apparently she is not available for your sons). It is great to have friends with kids the same ages as our daughters - they have such a great time with their little playmates.

A Bowl on the Table...

Is worth a mess on the toddler, right? It is in our house anyway. We have some bowls that have a handy little suction cup on the bottom. They work great for keeping little people from picking up their bowls of sloppy, wet cereal and walking all around the house. At least I thought they did. Then Abby tried to pick up the bowl to drink the milk out of her cereal and the entire bowl of cinnamon toast crunch ended up coming down on top of her. I laughed so hard I couldn't breathe for a minute or two, then I took her picture, then we cleaned up the mess.

We also cleaned up a very big mess inside. We had a bathroom with a major ceiling mildew problem. Part of it was pre-existing, but the rest was our own creation from not running the vent fan so that we didn't wake up Abby any earlier than she got up on her own. Needless to say after scrubbing the ceiling with bleach and repainting the whole bathroom, no one in this house will be showering without running the vent fan. But, the bathroom went from a blah (and dirty) light blue to a fabulous "Tinkerbell" green, so I think it was well worth the effort in the 80+ degree heat.

Olivia and Abby are both cutting teeth. Abby has her last two molars just about through and Olivia has been chewing her fists for a solid 3 weeks. They both also developed snotty noses over the weekend, which for Abby has always been a sure sign that the teeth were just about through. No coughs, no sneezes, no fevers, just icky running noses. I hope their little teeth hurry in - Olivia kept me up most of the night since she couldn't lay flat to sleep and she is definitely too big to be crammed into an infant car seat, even if it is the most comfortable way for her to sleep. So, after keeping me up all night (I'm operating on maybe 3.5 hours of sleep today), Olivia took a big long morning nap. Of course, I had to stay awake to watch Abby who is wearing her big girl panties today. So far no accidents... I hope she can keep that up.

Welcome Home to the 1437th!

The local troops returned from their deployment to Iraq this afternoon, so I hauled Abby and Olivia out in the cold, windy, almost rainy weather to stand by the road and watch them come home. We don't know any of them personally, but I wanted to start teaching the girls early to value the sacrifice of our military. We are looking forward to "Uncle" Ron to be home soon too - I'm sure "Aunt" Meghan is even more excited that he will be back! Abby really enjoyed watching the soldiers come back through town. They had a police and fire escort along with dozens and dozens of motorcycles from the local VFW. We waved our flags and I talked to Abby about how special it was that the soldiers would protect her. We also had a little lesson about the American flag and how one star was for Michigan, where we live.

Olivia screamed for most of the parade. She really hates loud noises. I can't even yell at Abby or Maize without making Olivia cry. And she didn't want to nap today, so that only made her more irritable. But she did love holding onto the flag like her big sister. And she had fun playing with Abby in the double stroller. They are getting great at entertaining each other.

Need Versus Want

Does anyone have a good way to explain the difference between the words "want" and "need" to a toddler (and a baby too... but I'm willing to give her the benefit of her age and not scream because she doesn't understand). Today seemed to be an all day battle over listening and responding to what I was asking. For example, I want to sleep later than 6:30 a.m., but it's not a need. And today it didn't happen since Abby decided to crawl into my bed, kick for about 30 minutes, and then loudly announce that she needed breakfast (which she consequently did not eat, so it must have been a want, not a need). I, personally, needed coffee. Not wanted... needed.

Then there is my favorite recurring dialogue:

Me: "Abby, do you need to go potty?"
Abby: "No, I don't want to."

Two minutes later she pees her pants (or worse...). We did this at least 3 times today. Apparently when I ask if she needs to go potty what she is hearing is more like "Abby if you want to use the potty that would make mommy happy, but you can also pee all over yourself and the floor since you are insisting on wearing big girl panties... your choice." Ugh!

Apparently "you need to take a nap" is also not translating well. Fortunately "stay in your bed or I will give you a spanking" was heard loud and clear, so eventually Abby did take her nap. Olivia... not so much. She is going to be one crabby baby later this evening.

A Hitch, A Pump, and A Pony

We spent all week this past week at Grandma Mary & Grandpa Scott's house on a new adventure. About 6 months ago a new family moved to our area and was invited to our Bible study. Since then, Kimberlee and I have become really good friends even though we are just about total opposites on a lot of levels. One of those things that is totally different is family size - they have 6 kids total and a 7th on the way thanks to a blended family. We, obviously, do not have a big family. But we do know a thing or two about being part of a big, crazy, happy family. And I love it :-)

So... this past week Kimberlee's daughter, who is 9, needed to be at DeVos Children's Hospital (where Olivia spent her week in the NICU) to receive an insulin pump, since she has type 1 diabetes. I went into the week not knowing much about the disease, since it is nothing like the gestational diabetes I had with Abby. I can now say I am getting pretty good at helping a little person with the disease (I don't know how to manage the pump yet, but I'm sure that is on the way). It is one thing I pray we never have to deal with for either of our children. But, thanks to amazing modern technology, Evelin now only has to be poked once every few days to move her pump instead of getting a shot before eating anything and before bed. I'm sure she is going to be very happy about that. And, since Kimberlee is getting pretty far along in the pregnancy and wasn't comfortable getting around in Grand Rapids, the girls and I went along for the adventure to keep them company. We were all thankful that my wonderful parents were willing to open their home for a few days. Both Evelin and Kimberlee talked about how much fun it was most of the ride home.And in the process we managed to do some things I was pretty excited about. One of them was having Abby (and Evelin) experience their first horse back rides. Let me just assure you that Abby, as you all probably would guess, was terrified of Lucky the miniature horse right up until the point when I called her a "princess pony." There is nothing Abby won't do if you label it a princess thing. She rode Lucky bareback with me holding onto her and Aunt Emily leading the horse. It was only about a bazillion percent humidity and in the high seventies, so Abby and Evelin rode while the rest of us swam in our sweat. Yuck! We also perfected Abby's swimming skills and taught her friend Huron (Kimberlee's youngest son who is 2 this week). And we had a hitch put on the car just in case we can find a great pop-up camper. That was an adventure in itself (the dealership guy said it would take 2-ish hours... seven hours later I left with a very cranky baby in tow). Olivia was a real trooper in helping me get a hitch put on and dealing with not one, but two toddlers trying to play with her all week. I think all the grandma hugs made up for it.

After all that fun I am pretty sure I need a week (or two) to recover. After I clean all the toddler mess and snacks out of the car that is ;-)

Think Pig

Abby is on a pig kick since her week visiting Hannah and Emily's hogs at the Barry County Fair. We have been watching pig movies, playing with her toy pigs, and changing ourselves into pigs with her magic wand. We even took pig pictures at Great Grandma Jennie's camper when we stopped by their campsite to visit them yesterday. Someday Abby will either love this picture or really, really hate it. Personally I really love it - I crack up every time I see her little nose smooshed up and her squinty eye.

Since the weather on Saturday was bad we skipped camping for the weekend (like we had planned) and instead just made a day trip over to Blind Sucker Flooding on Sunday. We had a lot of fun visiting and brought back a whole GALLON of wild blueberries. YUM! We had so much fun we are thinking of going back to camp this weekend, since the weather is supposed to be much, much sunnier. And it can't get much cloudier than today. We had rain all day - Abby spent over an hour playing in the rain on the deck. Olivia just spent time whining since there weren't any grandmas around to hold her while she napped. It's been a lot of spoiling lately!

Getting There...

Abby did a #2 in the bathroom today all by herself. And I want to emphasize the all by herself. She went in without telling me, had her pants off, and couldn't figure out how to get onto the big potty, so she went on the floor. At least she knew what room to use...

Olivia has slept in her crib the last 3 nights and has slept all night. Hooray!!! Now I just need to start sleeping all night again.

Do I Have Food on My Face

It has been hot and humid all week. So hot we don't really feel like doing anything. And mostly too hot to sleep. So... with Olivia being days away from 4 months old (when we gave Abby her first meal), I thought to myself, if I feed this kid maybe she will sleep all night and I won't have to be awake in the middle of the night in this miserable heat. Wrong. Instead, she fills her little belly in the evening and wakes me up even EARLIER at night. So weird! But, Olivia is a champ at her rice cereal and, as you can see by comparing pictures, she is a much neater eater than Abby.

Other than feeding kids, which is practically a full time job, we've been busy putting our home and lives back together after the scabies invasion. I finally have all the furniture and toys back into their homes. Now I just need to finish the laundry, which was a humongous pile since one person's entire dresser got sent down the chute. But I think I have only 4 or 5 loads left. If it weren't so humid I'd be working on them today. Instead I might just melt. Or maybe make some homemade ice cream. Hmmm.....

Big Girls

My baby is no longer the youngest in the family. We are happy to have a brand new niece, but now Olivia has to be a big girl to make room for the new babies. I don't think she'll mind too much. In fact, in the next few days she'll be starting rice cereal. Wow... time is flying!Here's a cute Olivia smile. Of course, we can only get one kid to smile at a time, so I have another "model pose" picture of Abby for you.
Abby has finally figured out the potty training thing. She is finally using her potty all the time when we are home, but nothing outside home yet. At least it's a good start! And yesterday I finally got both girls to take an extended nap at the same time so that I could get some yard work done. It was great!

We are still working on de-mite-ing our house. Hopefully sometime mid-week next week we can spring our furniture from lock down and get it steamed well to kill anything that's left hanging out (and hopefully make it all smell a lot less like dog). It is going to be a lot of work, but in the end we should have a cleaner, mite-free home.