In the Summertime

I must get myself to bed, but I wanted to post these cute little videos of the girls at the pool in Ohio this past weekend.

Mollie is VERY cautious about most everything, pools and water definitely included. She barely wanted to wade in the baby pool until all of a sudden she saw Natalie going down the slide all by herself. Then she said, "My tun! I side!" So I kind of ignored it for a bit, but she persisted, so Brad took her down. The first time, the sounds she made were less than enthusiastic, but that little thing trucked herself right back up and wanted to do it again - and again - and again - and AGAIN. I am not exaggerating AT ALL when I tell you that Brad took her down about 30 times, I took her twice, and Sheila took her probably 15 times. I think Mollie went down the slide more than anyone else!

Here are a couple clips of Mollie sliding and RUNNING back to the stairs.




Natalie had an absolute blast and has no fear of the water. In fact, I wish she had a little more fear, but we're working on it. :) She keeps her trusty Puddle Jumper on (as does Mollie), and she's good to go. I was proud of her sliding all by herself with her cousins. She (like her dear old mom) is not quite as coordinated with the sliding and ends up completely dunking herself at the bottom, but it doesn't phase her one bit!

Potty Training 101

So my whole idea of posting every day hasn't been perfect, but I have posted a LOT more than I was, so that's good! :) When I wrote HERE, I was more than frustrated with attempting to potty train Mollie. We gave up the 3-Day Potty Training method later that day (which, as I said, was day FIVE). We went directly 100% back to diapers and decided to try again maybe after her birthday. End of story.

Fast-forward 8 days, and who is showing MAJOR interest in the potty? Mollie. All of a sudden, out of the blue, after 8 days of ZERO interest. Yesterday she spent the entire day in panties and had no accidents. She even woke up dry from her nap and overnight. She's not initiating it every single time, but we're only suggesting going at the "usual" times, like before and after naps and bed, before we leave the house, the same times that we would tell Natalie to go, with maybe an extra "before mealtime" thrown in. We are just in shock that it could possibly be this easy (although those five days were H.A.R.D., still not as bad as months or even weeks of accidents).

Tomorrow, she'll wear panties at daycare! We're really hoping that she does well there! Fingers crossed! I can't believe my baby may have just basically potty-trained herself! :)

Oh, and in case you're wondering what's been taking up a lot of my time, get a load of these sweeties:



More to come SOON!

Little Miss Observant

So after I noticed how dirty Mollie's face was on the way home from work today, Brad said that that when he picked her up, she had a rock in her mouth. I said,"You put rocks in your MOUTH?!" and Mollie replied,"Yeahhh." I said,"Oh Mollie, we don't put rocks in our mouth!"

Fifteen minutes later when I was getting her out of the car seat, she said,"Wocks in a mouf. No NO! Wocks in a mouf. No NO!" I started giggling and repeated to Brad what she said. Then her eyes got big with this puppy dog look, and she said,"Hi laffeen? Hi laffeen? (Why laughing?) I just told her it's because she was cute - which is TRUE! :)

06/05

It's been a long day. Hmmmm I feel like just stopping there. :) I'll have fulfilled my daily blog commitment, right?

Here's an interesting tidbit:

I've been doing monthly meal plans for a few months now, and I love it! We save money, eat out less, eat healthier, and throw less food away! Win, win, win, and WIN!

These were on tonight's menu:

Baked Lump Crab Cakes with Red Pepper Chipotle Lime Sauce
http://www.skinnytaste.com/2010/04/baked-lump-crab-cakes-with-red-pepper.html

and
Baked Seasoned Fries with Skinny Garlic Aoili
http://www.skinnytaste.com/2011/02/baked-seasoned-fries-with-skinny-garlic.html

and
Sweet Corn on the cob.

YUM!!!! Everything was so yummy! My crab cakes looked nothing like the photo, but they were still good. :) My fries looked very similar to the photo and they were amazingly yummy!

Now I'm trying to remember if anything happened today that was especially noteworthy for any particular reason . . . OH! For the second time, Natalie helped hang up clean laundry on hangers! This is SUCH a HUGE help, and it makes her feel like she's SO BIG! I told Brad we need to make it a Sunday night tradition for everyone to help with laundry that I've washed over the past few days. Mollie's not too helpful yet. She tries - with washcloths. She holds them up like we do, then says "FOWD IT. FOWD IT. FOWD IT." While she attempts to fold it, and it's just about the sweetest thing you've ever seen. I pretty much died from the cuteness. Then she started stealing all the socks and tossing them in a corner. ;)

New Month, New Idea - June 1, 2011

In attempt to get back on track with blogging more regularly, I'm planning to post something every.day. in June about what's going on with us. We'll see how it goes! Not promising photos every day necessarily, but hopefully a little tidbit.

We'll start with a fun, good thing. Last night a friend said that she'd started reading chapter books to her 3.5-ish year old and it was going swimmingly! I've been giving this a lot of thought and have been dying to start with Natalie but wasn't sure how she'd like it. She's still incredibly involved in the pictures in her books. Not to say that she doesn't listen to the stories, but she's VERY interested in the people's (or pigeon's or dog's or whatever-you-have-it's may be) expressions and actions. We have to dissect the pictures many times over. So I wasn't sure if she'd enjoy the experience as much without that. I happened to have Alice's Adventures in Wonderland (free!) on my kindle (LOVE!), so I decided to start there, since she loves the movie (Disney, NOT Tim Burton, we haven't gone THERE!). Well it was wonderful! She listened attentively, didn't complain about the lack of pictures, and even giggled at appropriate places! Win win win! :) Can't wait to really get further into the book with her! :)

And the not-so-great . . .

So today (and ever since this past Saturday - meaning this is day FIVE) my mind is preoccupied with potty training Mollie. We've been trying the famed "3 Day Potty Training Method" (now remember, today is DAY FIVE), and it's going - well, um, what's the word I'm looking for? Oh! How about we relate it to a book of Natalie's? Horrible, Terrible, No-Good, Very Bad. Yup. She's supposed to be completely and totally trained in 3 days with no accidents, even at naptime and bedtime. HA. HA HA. HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA. YEAHRIGHT. She had two huge successes on the morning of Day 3, and over the course of 4+ days, she's had roughly 30 accidents. Yes, 30. I'm not kidding. You read that right. 30 puddles on the tile or wood floor - or sometimes even on the carpet! Oh, and 3 pairs of panties full of poo. I'm not even going to lie, I threw away yesterday's poopy pair. It was too horrible to explain. So yeah, Woo hoo! Potty training! Thankfully, I'm actually not knee deep in it today, I'm at work and Brad's at home. The girls' daycare is closed this week for teacher training, and we're taking turns staying home with them, so we thought it was the PERFECT time to potty train Mollie! We had 9 days with no daycare (including weekends before and after) and she's 22.5 months. The book says 22 months exactly is ideal. Ideal, she says! Baloney, I say!

So I'm ready to throw in the towel. Try again in a couple months. Brad hasn't given up hope. We'll see what tomorrow brings. Today, I'm just thankful that no one in my office is likely to stand in the middle of the breakroom floor, begin to pee, spread their legs into a wiiiiide "V" and then flip their head down to WATCH -and then expect me to mop it up and find them dry panties. Yes. THAT HAPPENED. Last night. Good times!

Just to clarify - I am NOT alone in this. Brad has been an equal partner in crime when he's home, and does more running a peeing child to the potty than I do when he's there. I couldn't have made it this far without him!

OK OK OK I have to end on a high note about Mollie since she's totally awesome and wonderful and this potty thing has nothing to do with her being ornery - it's just a lack of understanding. I'll keep it quick - my new favorite thing that she's been doing is calling everyone "Honey." As in, gently telling Natalie, "No no, Honey." when she's doing something MG doesn't think she should. As in, handing Brad her sippy cup and saying, "Here go, Honey." Cracks me up!! She's just too cute! :)

MOLLIE!

OK so if you wanna know why I can't get totally awesome and amazingly beautiful pictures that truly capture the essence of Mollie, here's why:

Perfecting the POUT


Looks like she's gonna be our brown-eyed girl!




Downward-Facing Dog, Anyone?




*SIGH*
The other night, she would sit in my lap, and I'd ask if I could take her picture, then she'd stand up, face me, say cheese, then plop back into my lap, all within about 15 seconds. Then she would say, "I see it!" Yeah . . . I could barely even raise up the camera, much less take a photo. So for now, these are what I've got. :)

Happy One-and-a-Half to Mollie!

I'm about 10 days late in posting this, but better late than never, right?! Mollie had her 18 month well-child appointment today, and she's doing great! We are all THRILLED with Mollie's language development over the past month or so. Getting tubes in her ears has been the best decision we've made with her! She is adding new words to her vocabulary all the time, and it's SO much fun to be able to really communicate with her. Natalie asks her things all the time, and for some reason, Mollie ALWAYS either nods yes to Natalie or gives the typical Mollie "Yah." Which prompts Natalie to run in telling me things like, "Mommy! Mollie says she LIKES piders!" or "Mollie says she wants to watch Elmo!" and I'm sure Mollie doesn't have a clue what she's agreeing to half of the time. :)

The girls were apart all day today, and it warms my heart to see how excited they are to see each other at the end of days like that. They were kissing and hugging, which then turned into kissing Mommy forty bazillion times, which I certainly cannot complain about! :) They really seem to be the best of friends already.

Mollie is still a huge fan of baby dolls, and with Natalie's help, she's becoming a big fan of tea parties as well. It's so funny to walk into their playroom and see things like this:





Mollie's also become fairly adept at making funny faces. I wish I could catch the REALLY good ones on camera. Here's one from today when she was being silly:


And I just thought this one was cute:


And finally, here's the obligatory pic in the chair with the pink bear :)


Oh, and I don't want to forget (because I have no clue which box her baby book is in! EEK!) that she weighs 22.8 lbs and is 32 in. tall! That's kinda on the small side for weight, and she just took a pretty good leap length-wise putting right at average. :)

A LONG Overdue MG Update

I feel terrible that I haven't really updated much about either of my girls, but especially Mollie lately! I keep meaning to, and I keep thinking that she's going to grow up thinking that we didn't care about her as much as Natalie because every line in Natalie's baby book is painstakingly filled out (accurately!) and honestly, I don't think I've even filled in the day that Mollie cut ANY teeth - and she's got at least 12. *sigh* But I hope that someday I can truly convey to her that the reason I wasn't able to be so thorough in recording every detail about her (or Natalie, after Mollie was born) is that there is simply no time leftover - and it's not ONLY because I'm a harried working mama of two (although I am at times), but it's also because I like to spend time ENJOYING them. That doesn't give much free time to write down how much I enjoy them, but trust me: IDO!

Currently, I am absolutely LOVING Mollie's little language explosion. It seems like overnight she went from only saying "Dada" and "Uh oh" with the occasional "Nan-ye" (Natalie) thrown in (yes, you read that right - she did NOT say "Mama") - and now she's saying all of those things, PLUS Mama (still not often) as well as "A-see" (Casey, who she has a HUGE obsession with) "Baby" (Another HUGE obsession), and all kinds of other words here and there. It's honestly like she has a whole vocabulary now overnight!

If that weren't enough, the child obviously understands pretty much everything we say and do, which is obviously great, but it's also really funny. Yesterday, when I was getting Natalie ready to head out the door for dance, Mollie grabbed her jacket and went on the hunt for her own shoes. She was upset when we left (sorry, I am just not mentally stable enough to handle Mollie in a teeeeny tiny dance studio for 45 minutes), but luckily, she and Brad went out to get some dinner for themselves, so she got to go somewhere too. I have no clue why, but close to bedtime the same evening, she brought me her jacket and shoes - oh yeah, she says "SHUSS!" - so I put them on her, just for kicks. What I didn't realize was that I inadvertently played into her idea by going out to the garage to get something I left in the car. She totally thought we were leaving together - and when I realized what she was thinking and brought her back in, she threw a FIT. I'm talking laying on her side on the floor, scissor-kicking her legs, yelling, FIT. She's officially a toddler now, folks. The fits have arrived.

MG is so different from Natalie, but they have at least one thing in common: their stubbornness. What a thing to share, right? Mollie has been obsessing over standing in the kitchen chairs lately, and also getting into basically anything and everything she shouldn't. We give her quite a few warnings, but we've had to resort to attempting Time Outs. She gets really mad, and definitely isn't as obliging about them as Natalie was when we first started - Nat would sit on the TO stool, get bored, and take all of her clothes off. Mollie just cries and tries to run away.

On a really sweet and fun note, Mollie is really enjoying her baby dolls. It's so much fun to watch her comfort them, sing to them, feed them, and her favorite - put them to bed, which entails totally covering them with anything that resembles a small blanket. We find babies all over the house, just laying in the middle of the floor covered by blankets and we just smile. I finally figured out what to get her for Christmas - a super cute doll stroller, pack'n'play, bouncy seat, and diaper bag! I'm soooo excited to see her reaction to all her new little mommy stuff! But SHHHH - don't tell Mollie (or Natalie!) that's what's she's getting! Of course, I knew a riot would ensue if Natalie didn't have a doll stroller too, so I got them matching ones - Natalie's not getting all the other stuff, though, she's getting her first scooter and helmet! :) (AGAIN: BIG SECRET!) :)

I took a bunch of pictures of Mollie playing with her baby the other day, and I'll post them soon!

Zane's Baptism . . . & Stuff :)

So I know I haven't had a really good post in forever, and it's late, so I'm not going to stop to write much, but I wanted to post a few photos from Mr. Zane's baptism, and then a few other random ones. :) His day went well, and boy was he a trooper! :)



























Mollie has developed a fascination for Zane. It's so adorable! She watches him intently and attempts to share toys with him. We caught her trying to figure out how to pick him up out of his bouncy seat, and here she was obsessed with giving him hugs. :) :) :)


And just a few cute random ones :)