19 months

This was the look on Allie's and my face after the doctor informed us we had missed our 15 month appointment.  Ah, child number two. So sorry.

Checking out her battle wounds from the day... Fortunately Nonna has ice cream.

2 Weeks

2 months

 5 months

6 months

9 months

Well Pal,

Let's face it.  You've got a scatter-brained mama.  I have no idea 1) where I put the 12 month picture of you at the doctor...did I even take you?! AND 2) How I completely forgot about the 15 month appointment (maybe it was all of the Halloween candy I was inhaling?).  Regardless, so sorry.  You don't deserve it.  While not the total easy-going Pal that you were as a baby you still go with the flow and don't seem to be nearly as shy as your sister or Mama.  Sometimes when we're walking I see people smiling at us which makes me look down at you only to see you smiling and waving at complete strangers.  People seem drawn to you.  We hear how beautiful you are often. 

Maddie is your role model. (for better or worse)  Sippy cups and high chairs are so not cool.  I'm hoping the diapers follow suit soon too.  You're not a fan of having stinky dipes.  You crinkle your nose and let anyone and everyone know when you need your diaper changed.  Which is often.  Maybe it's the excessive carbohydrates you eat.  Bread, cheese and cereal are your main staples.  The other night you reached for a piece of broccoli and I about died.  I think the fact that it was covered in salt helped but we'll take it.

Ah, a perfect segue...salt.  Swimming lessons (in the salt pool...that works right? I tied the paragraphs together seamlessly) are going well.  You LOVE the water and have no problem doing eyes-in or going down the slide. Now we just need you to move.  You're a tiny baby with 4 gigantic floats on your body and you just sit there.  Run, run, run, reach and pull, reach and pull, reach and pull.  Miss Megan, your instructor assures me you're processing it and in no time you'll be moving.  You've got another month.  Tick tock.

Love you Pal.  Promise I'll take you to your 2 year appointment.

Random

Crappy no-light cell phone picture but too hilarious not to post.

Pig Pile!

it ended well. no worries.

TobySawyerCooperJack

Sonja and my dad both got new puppies.  They are lab/golden retriever mutts and SO incredibly adorable.  Madeline in in love with the dogs.  She wants to spend every waking moment with them.  Sonja has yet to pick a name for her dog but Maddie insists that it's Jack. Or Sawyer. 

And WHO is this girl who looks so grown up?!

2/20/11

Skiing Again

We went up skiing, again.  After two runs and a list of ailments that would rival a 96 year old man Maddie and I took a hot chocolate break.

After a little sugar and many clothing adjustments we were out and back on the hill.

 

She's actually learned how to turn now and is attempting to stop in ways

other than rolling herself onto the ground. It's really a lot of fun to watch.

She did not want to go home.  This was our last run where she begged for "just one more"

 

And then she was OUT

love these two

This sums up the latter half of our day

Allie woke up far to soon from a nap with a horrible mess in her dipe.  Maddie never took a nap.  Zaide called to tell me some bad news...Hads threw up on her mama.  Uh oh.  While I held a mellow Allie in my lap Madeline was playing with her trains on the floor when WHAM- projectile vomit. Now she has a nest, and a bowl, on my bedroom floor.  Round 502 coming up.  Let's hope they're right when they say this thing only lasts 12 hours.
And by the way, Maddie doesn't want to "grow-up" again. 

Ferber Who?

Bedtime story: Check

3.5 years later she still has us fooled.  I just tried to wake Kip up. To no avail. Maddie gets company tonight, in her own bed. As opposed to making me the meat of a very hot sandwich in a too-small bed. I swear, we never sleep trained her and we still pay the price to this day.

I got a little tan today!

The mountains were gorgeous today.  Kip and I took Maddie up skiing.  Allie stayed in Seattle with Nonna.

We couldn't find Maddie's gloves this morning so bought a new pair up at the mountain.  These things are the best invention ever.  They're called L-Bow or something like that.  They have gigantic cuffs so no snow down the gloves or gloves that won't stay on.  The best part is when I was buying them Maddie called me mean because her hands were already warm (bare) and she didn't want them.  It made me so happy.

But then we shredded out on the slopes and all was good again.

Can't wait

For warmer weather.  These two LOVE to play outside. 

Re-doing Allie's room

Have you seen the website pinterest? So great.  Except you can get trapped for hours.  I typed in "little girl's room" and came up with so many cute ideas.  Fortunately I had my mom to make these pom poms because no way was I going to have the skills to pull those off.

Technology

At the ripe old age of 3.5 she can navigate e-readers better than I can.

Allie Cat Copy Cat

(You'll probably have to scroll to bottom of page to hit pause on music for this to work)

Uncle Chris is on the other side of the camera making faces and noises.

Nap Time

I was doing some touch-up paint in Allie's room so Allie had her first big girl bed nap. I think I'll keep her in her crib/prison a bit longer. She loved the freedom of climbing down to get toys. Fortunately I only had to go in once to warn her to lay down and close her eyes. Maddie was happy to sleep in our bed and very excited the Pal was in hers.

Sunday Morning

Snuggled in bed peacefully playing with the iPad and Nook. If only this happened every Sunday...and for more than five minutes.

OMG

Kip was putting Maddie to bed last night and I heard him talking to her sternly about scissors. Then he walked in holding hair, followed by a very sheepish looking little girl. Of course she wouldn't answer when she did it and said it was her doll's hair. Her new layer up front would indicate otherwise. I have no clue where she got the scissors and no clue when she did it. A+ for my watching skills.

So thankful

Without sounding too much like life is all rainbows and unicorns I just want to say how thankful I am for everything we have. Watching my little girls hang out with their grandparents just makes my heart burst. We talk about them all of the time and I am pretty sure I'd get ditched in a heartbeat if there was a choice to be made over who to hang out with that day.


And this little girl's zest for life is so infectious. She is always so enthusiastic about things. Last night while Kip was brushing her teeth I heard him ask if the green toothbrush was okay. Her response, "I LOVE the green toothbrush. I love it, I love it, I love it." She does this with so many things in her day. She will be a great actress one day if she continues down this path. She also LOVES her wormies and spends all of her time outside digging them out of the garden to re-home with our veggies.

And those blue eyes...you can almost look past the awkward smile :-)

I am so thankful.

18 months

Fortunately not a lot has changed in the last week because we're a tad late on this post, but my oh my has this little baby girl totally blossomed into a little toddler. She loves to follow her big sister around and has learned a few tricks that I wish she hadn't. Allie is an expert at moving stools and chairs in order to climb up and get into trouble. We no longer have a bread drawer. It's a "get the bread as high as you can get it cupboard." Bread is her basic staple. If she were to play Oregon Trail I don't think she'd buy anything but carbs. Anything resembling a vegetable goes immediately to Rudder who rests his head on her chair during dinner.

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We just started swimming lessons with Allie. After three lessons of screaming her head off she now enjoys them. A lot. She goes down the slide, jumps in, and even gets her face wet with nary a sign of concern.

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Allie is also very outgoing. While leaving the gym today someone opened the door for us and she announced, "thank you." She waves hello and goodbye to everyone and always has a smile on her face. Speaking of smiles almost all of her teeth are in and they are huge. And adorable.

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The last thing about Allie that I want to mention is her love of her babies. I think that her survival of the fittest mode kicked in when she learned not to love just one specific baby (can you even imagine?? I can't even keep track of my car keys!) but loves to snuggle with any stuffed animal you hand her.

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We love you Pal! Happy 18 months.

They got their hairs did

Disregard our crust. We just wanted to show off our new haircuts.