Easter 2014

My cousin Mary is in town to run the Boston Marathon tomorrow, so we got to spend Easter with her, which was awesome.

It was a gorgeous sunny day, we got to make the traditional bunny cake, the kids both played with the toys the Easter bunny brought, we had Easter egg hunts--good times.  By dinner both kids were DONE and so cranky, but we made it through.

From 2014 April

From 2014 April

From 2014 April

From 2014 April

From 2014 April

From 2014 April

From 2014 April

From 2014 April

From 2014 April

From 2014 April

From 2014 April

When I win the lottery . . .

I'm going to buy myself one of these fancy cameras, since Clair is taking hers away:

From 2014 April

And buy plane tickets down to Florida to visit them because these two were supposed to grow up together:

From 2014 April

Easter Baskets

This weekend Nicholas and I made new liners for the kids' Easter baskets.  When we bought these baskets last year I had a vision of replacing the generic white liners with embroidered cutesey Easter eggs on them with new liners every few years that would match their current interests.  This weekend I was bemoaning the fact that I hadn't done it and wouldn't have time to before Easter and Nicholas said, "Let's do it, Mommy!"  So he and I created a pattern using the liners that came with the baskets, cut out fabric, and sewed them.  The pattern needs some revisions but not too bad for a first effort.  And so fun to do a craft project with Nicholas again.  And that was the best he has behaved in a long time.  Reminder: give him chances to rise to the occasion.

From 2014 April

From 2014 April

Good Day

I hereby interrupt the chaos and stress and anxiety to remind myself that it is in fact a good day and of how truly blessed I am. Afterall, these two are worth every moment of it all:

From 2014 April

From 2014 April

Sibling Smiles

From 2014 April

Another Tooth

Nicholas lost his second tooth today! He now has a huge gap in front on the bottom. But not for long because the adult teeth (or at least one of them)has already cut through and is visible. Somehow I didn't get a picture today, but I will try to get one tomorrow.

5 Months

An abbreviated 5 month post:

• Elizabeth is eating solid foods like a champ.  She has had just about every 1st stage food and while orange veggies are her favorites, she'll eat just about everything.  We have started her on puffs in the last few days and the first couple times she gagged a little but she now has figured it out.  It is sometimes the only way to keep her from attacking OUR food. 
• She may have finally really figured out rolling over.  After doing it a few times a couple months ago and having a span where she was really trying, she basically gave up interest until this past week.  She has now been doing it off and on all week both back to front and front to back and it seems much more intentional. We'll see.
• She can sit up remarkably well, although is not reliable.  Meaning she has the trunk strength but not great balance and even more of a problem is that she doesn't understand that she can't just lean over.  She is always so surprised when she falls.
• She is a very smiley and easygoing baby overall.  The exceptions are when she is hungry or overtired.  Which of course means that she is often a cranky pants whenever anyone comes to visit because she is entirely out of her routine and too stimulated to either eat or sleep regularly.  Her worst time of day is 6-7pm because she really just wants to snuggle and eat and go to sleep and we ask her to put up with our routine.
• She adores her big brother.  Adores.
• She has a bit of stranger anxiety.  A month ago she wouldn't have cared if I handed her to a stranger as long as she wasn't hungry.  A couple weeks ago we went to a work function and everyone wanted to hold her but every time I passed her off, her lower lip would start to quiver and then she'd cry.
• She is still waking up every 2 hours at night pretty reliably.  Every once in awhile she'll do a longer stretch first thing.  The only way we can get her to sleep for a longer stretch after 11pm is if she is asleep in her carseat, bouncy chair, or swing.  It is something about the comfort of the sides around her, I guess.  I haven't gotten desperate enough to put her in one of these just to get more sleep but we've noticed the trend when we left her in the carseat after getting home late with her asleep or when I have resorted to one after fighting to get her back to sleep for over an hour.

It is getting hard to do the block pictures because she just wanted to grab the blocks to eat them.  Here is the best one:

From 2014 April

Baseball Boy

From 2014 April

Adventures in Eating

A few more pictures of Elizabeth's new world with solid foods that crack me up.

I want it NOW:

From 2014 April

Out like a light:

From 2014 April

A mess:

From 2014 April

Solid food

We started this a couple weeks ago. She had no interest in rice cereal, spent the first two days of veggies intrigued but unsure what this was, and then became a wonderful eater. The difficulty is keeping her hands out of the way.

From 2014 March

From 2014 March

From 2014 April

Lost Tooth

Nicholas lost his first tooth tonight at dinner. It has been loose for over a week now and the last few days has been so loose it was a little gross so I was perfectly happy for it to go ahead and come out. And he is SO excited! Let's hope the tooth fairy doesn't forget to come.

From 2014 April