Carried Away

Ahhh, life is good. I've got my mom and my dad, a new diaper on and a full tummy ~ it doesn't get much better than this.






Hmmm, what's that thing mom's holding?






Oh, it's that camera thing again ~ my mom tends to get a little carried away with it you know.



enough already! I just can't handle being so popular!
Now this is more like it, hanging out with my sister's, away from the paparazzi.

Diaper Detail

Guess who wanted to change her sister's diaper today?
She was a doing a great job until Gabie got tired of waiting and decided to make a grand get-away.








We spent a lot of time outside today. We're working a few different projects with the front flower bed and backyard sandbox. The girls enjoyed playing in the water table while we worked and played.
Once again a sleeping Rachel - does anyone recogize the blanket she's using?

More NE

Here are some more pictures from our week in Nebraska, there were a couple times I didn't have my camera along and Stephanie did, so she sent some to me, and they were just too cute not to share with you...

We went for a walk to stretch our legs before the long car ride home through downtown Lexington. We had plenty of stroller spaces for the girls....









but I think they were taking advantage of some last moments with family and preferred the carrying route when they got tired.









We get more comments and looks when Gabie has this plug in her mouth :0)trying to climb the wrong side of the stairs is a favorite game of Elie's (and also one that gets her in trouble a lot!) you can see she's putting on her 'I'm cute don't get mad at me face Gabie, Stephanie and Eliya taking a break on the right side of the staircase

Working Day

Both Mark and I worked all day today, while Eliya and Gabie played at their daycare for one of the last times before she moves. Rachel was an angel as usual and let me get a lot of creative memories and preschool stuff done. We road our bikes to pick the other two up and headed to the park for about an hour of play so I would call it a very productive and fun day. Unfortunately I forgot to take the camera to the park, so here's some random shots of the girls getting ready for bed.

Catching Up

we are slowly but surely catching up on sleep after a couple of really long nights (like not getting to bed till 3am!) but last night was great! We all got close to 9 hours of sleep, even if it was somewhat broken up for some of us. It's truly amazing to me what a difference sleep can make - I can see why they use sleep deprivation as a torture tactic!

This morning the girls and I played bug dominoes,
Eliya is starting to get the concept of matching the pictures to make a train. Gabie likes to make her sister mad by breaking the chain.
Rachel getting some tummy time in

George

We acquired a new addition to our nest today...his name is George. Although as you can see he was named Rody before, but Eliya wanted to name him George. George is a bouncey-blob-donkey-thingy. Reminds me of those big bouncy balls that have handles on them - I have one for my preschoolers, but the really cool thing about George is that he can hold up to 400 pounds - wow, our whole family could bounce on him together! He came to us all the way from Aspen, CO where Nana and Papa spent this past week at a retreat.
They met us in Pierre today on their way home from Mt. Rushmore and we had lunch. Happy Birthday Nana and 35th anniversary to Nana and Papa.

I keep trying to capture Rachel's adorable ears to share with you all, but pictures just don't quite show it ~ she has the cutest little what I call 'radar' ears. They stick way out right at the top :0) I'm sure she won't appreciate it as she gets older, but we love it and figure she can just grow her hair out over them as she grows up.

Cute Times Three

Our day included church, dinner, naps, bike ride, yard projects and lots of smiles (especially after the nap time!)

Back to Bora Bora

This is the first time in 3 years that we have been out on Saturday night together. Mark always has church, but Seneca was cancelled tonight so when we were invited to a Bora Bora party we were excited to have the opportunity to go!
Allison, Beth and Amber all dressed up for the festivities

The girls were all dressed alike in their twins outfits to root for the team - maybe they should wear these more often as they helped cheer them on to an 11-1 win!

When I woke up this morning I discovered that other than myself noone else was in their original resting place for the night, at least we got a little more sleep than last night (but not much!)
Mark was sacked out on the couch after getting up with Gabie at 6am ~ she crashed on the floor in the dining room.
Rachel was left sleeping on our bed when I got up to check on everyone after feeding her, and Eliya was on the floor in our room (half under the bed) coming into our room after nightmere last night.

Sleepless Night = Lazy Day

We had a bad night last night all the way around. Rachel had a hard time going to sleep and Gabie had a hard time staying asleep, so the rest of us were kept up too. This led to one of the laziest days we've had in a long time. We did a lot of games, coloring, napping - anything that didn't require too much thought or energy.

Mud Puddles and Tornadoes

More tornadoes! I was up feeding Rachel around 6am when the silens went off, checked the radar and sure enough...so downstairs we went. I did take some pictures of the sky which was just incredible looking, but of course the pictures don't really do it justice. There was grape-fruit size hail just south of town and a few tornadoes between here and the river, but all we got was rain, lightning and thunder here. This afternoon Eliya and I went on a walk while I ran an errand, there were puddles along the curbs so on the way home I got a little crazy and jumped in. We had a blast playing 1, 2, 3, jump! the rest of the way home in the puddles. We were quite wet by the time we got home. One of the best things about motherhood - not only getting to do all those fun things again, but also getting to see it through the eyes of my child :0) After supper we went for a family bike ride - 5 people, 2 bikes, but we made it.

Mirror Gazing

Eliya looked in the mirror this morning for the first time since her bite/sting and said "mommy, my eye doesn't open right". We are now thinking that she was actually stung by something as the swelling has gone down a bit there's a little dot, but as you can tell it's still not quite back to normal.
Rachel is an eating machine right now ~ another growth spurt! She actually kinda fits into some 0-3month clothes now. I put her in this adorable sun dress to help deal with the warm up we're having right now. The blanket underneath her was a gift from our dear friend here, Ellen, she's enjoying it's softness quite a bit!

Bribery

I'm reading a book right now titled "I was a Really Good Mom...before I had Kids" can any other parents out there relate?! Today was one of those days of realizing all those "I'll never do that with my kids" doesn't always work the way we think. Yesterday Eliya was invited to go to a softball game. She came home with a bug-bit on her eye-brow and it was a little red and swollen. By this morning it was quite swollen and by this afternoon...
so of course we've been putting the benedryl gel on it. I also wanted her to take some liquid benedryl to help with the reaction which of course doesn't taste pleasant so she doesn't want it. I give her some and she promptly spits it all over me. "Yuck mommy! That's gross!" Then she proceeds to tell me that what she really needs is Yogos, which are these little yogert balls that I'm quite sure have little or no nutritional value, but claim to be yogert therefore tricking us into believing this could be a healthy snack for our children. So what's a mom to do? She needs the meds and wants the snack so of course BRIBERY! "If you take the medicine you can have the yogos" works like charm, down goes the medicine and off goes Elie happily munching little yogert blobs. Yup, that's one I said I'd never do, but what can I say it works, and her eye is doing a little better now too.

I put together a camp hobo meal for supper tonight -
So while Mark was grilling and I was feeding Rachel Gabie decided to make her own supper all over the entry way and steps...at least she still liked the real meal too
Finally, just to satisfy my curiousity can anyone tell me what these flowers and this bush are? They are in my front flower bed and come back every year, people ask me what they are and I don't have a clue