Snow Day

We had snow here yesterday and ice today. This morning we freaked out a little bit when Joe went to take a shower and there was no water. We thought the pipes had frozen. Turns out the whole subdivision had no water. A water main burst during the night and the water company had turned off the water. We had water again by 9:00 a.m. Whew . . . glad all is well with that. I had a little bit of a nervous breakdown this morning : )

So Emily, Abigail, and I did not set foot out the front door today since the high didn't even reach 30 degrees! Instead Emily stayed in her PJ's and played. She told me today that her babies all needed to take a nap so she put ALL of them in her pack n play:
I also had a small heart attack during the day today . . . I was in the kitchen and Abigail was in her bouncy seat in the dining room watching Emily make some food for her baby doll. I heard Emily talking to Abigail and heard Abigail cooing at her but intermittently would hear Abigail make a funny noise. I went in the room to see what was going on and Emily was trying to put play shrimp in Abigail's mouth . . . have mercy . . . guess I can't leave Abigail in the next room to watch her sister play.

Abigail is 12 weeks old today. I CANNOT believe it. She isn't a little tiny baby anymore. She is my baby who loves to watch her sister and has her wake time after she eats and is happy and laughing when her belly is full instead of just sleeping all the time. She no longer cries because she doesn't know what to do when she is awake. Instead she loves to see what is going on around her. Tonight when I was putting her to bed I lingered a while longer just to hold her and enjoy the peace and quiet that comes with holding a sleeping baby . . . those moments will go by so quickly that I want to remember them. Here is my sweet girl:I also LOVE her hair! It sticks straight up in the back ALL the time. The second it dries from getting a bath it sticks straight up and stays this way. It's hard to get a picture of it but of course I want to remember this as well so here is my attempt at capturing it:

Back on schedule

We have spent this week getting back into the swing of things. I started back to work on Tuesday. I'm able to keep Abigail at home with me right now so that has been a blessing. I work while Emily is at school. No offense to the great company I have worked for since 1994 . . . . but I sure didn't miss working these last couple of months : )

We have enjoyed playing with all the new toys we got for Christmas. Emily got C@ndyL@nd from my sister and we have already played it a ton of times. It's fun to watch Emily play her first board game! If she happens to get a purple and then Joe or I get a purple she jumps up and runs around the room yelling "We both got puwple . . . yea"

Abigail has been getting into more of a routine. She still fusses when she gets tired but it's not as prolonged anymore and it's so much easier now to recognize what she needs. She still loves to hang out in the baby sling with me but also loves cooing and and smiling and laughing . . . and definitely loves watching Emily in action. Our nighttime has become a little more normal since I can anticipate her bedtime to be between 9 and 10 each night. About 80% of the time now she sleeps until 7:30 each morning and then only rarely wakes between 5:30 and 6:30.

We also got Abigail's hand and foot prints delivered to us today:

My mom got these done for us when we were little and passed down the tradition. Now I have two sets. Here are Emily's:
I sure do enjoy watching Emily when she is in play mode. Today while I finished up some work she got her stuffed animals out and grouped them together by category. She had her two red dogs together, her two reindeer together, and lined her 3 fish up together. She also had her baby taking a nap. There were some other random animals scattered about:

Happy New Year!

After we celebrated Christmas at home we hit the road to visit family. First we went to Auburn to see Joe's family.
Chaz and Sidney got Rock B@nd for Christmas and they let Emily try it out. Joe also enjoyed singing along with them:

On Sunday Joe went back home to work and I visited my parents for a couple of days and then went to my sister's house for a couple of days. We took the kids to see a movie at the dollar movie on Thursday. Abigail "watched" the movie with us. I was so afraid she was going to have major sensory overload. She did fine during the movie but then cried the whole way home. She fell asleep about 6:30 that night and didn't wake up until 7:00 the next morning!

Joe came to Birmingham at the end of the week for us to celebrate Christmas with my family:

We enjoyed watching the Aub#rn game on New Years Day:

Celebrating a touchdown:
We also enjoyed staying up late at night to play Settlers of Cat@n. I'm addicted to that game now. We played it two nights until 2:00 a.m. and then on the last day we played it again while the kids were awake. When it got time to eat we threw some food at them and they kept going and we kept playing. I wish we didn't require sleep so we could just pull all nighters enjoying each other's company. I had forgotten how much I loved game nights:

My parents got Michelle's family Rock B@nd as well so Joe got to enjoy playing again with everyone:
and Sam enjoyed playing video games with Uncle Joe:
As 2009 comes to an end and 2010 rolls around Joe and I realize how blessed we are!

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas! We had a wonderful Christmas together. We stayed at home for Christmas morning and it was so nice. Emily was really into Santa coming this year and has enjoyed singing songs all month. It has been fun getting ready for him to visit. On Christmas Eve we left reindeer food for Santa's reindeer:
We also left some cookies for Santa.
Before bed Joe read from the Bible about baby Jesus coming to earth. We have read this to Emily each Christmas and plan to do this for both girls each year.

Christmas morning was a lot of fun! Santa brought Emily a train table:

and a bouncy seat, car seat, and pack n play for her baby dolls:

He also left her a play violin, some puzzles and lots of treats in her stocking:
We got her some food for her kitchen:

Abigail got a few toys in her stocking too:
We hope you all had a great Christmas too!

Playing at the Park

We met Emily's friend Julia and her mom and sister at the park today. The girls had a great time together:

Abigail enjoyed snoozing in the baby sling. I got her a hat and gloves yesterday because she has been getting cold while we've been out and about:Yesterday we met some friends for lunch and on our way home I stopped by a store to return some things. Emily told me she wanted to try on shoes. So I took her to a shoe store and we sat on the kids aisle for about 30 minutes while she picked out shoes and tried them on. That's great free entertainment right there!

I also got this floor mat out yesterday for Abigail to hang out on. Emily had fun playing on it too. I think Abigail liked watching Emily more than anything. It's fun to watch Abigail try to find Emily when she is talking and moving around. She likes having her big sister near her.
I tried giving Abigail a bottle this morning just to see if she would take it . . .she wouldn't . . . the little stinker. Emily was never picky about whether I nursed her or gave her a bottle so I didn't think much about it with Abigail. But Abigail is definitely a pickier baby!

Social Butterfly

This girl cracks me up:
Saturday we went to a shoe store and when we got to the aisle I needed, there was another little girl there. Emily instantly ran to her and within 10 seconds they were both on the ground taking their shoes and socks off gabbing away with each other and trying on ladies shoes together. They talked and talked about how pretty the shoes were. Me and the other mom were laughing . . . and enjoying our few moments to look at our own shoes with no interruption. All children have an instant connection. It's like they are all long lost friends.

Emily has also enjoyed singing all the Christmas songs this past week. We listened to her singing Rudolph the Red Nose Reindeer over and over and enjoying hearing it. She also wanted to know the words to Frosty the Snowman. She kept singing "Frosty the Snowman had a lollipop in June" . . . pause . . . "Frosty the Snowman had a lollipop in June". It FINALLY came on the radio and we all listened to it . . . but I still can't tell you any of the words to the song.

Emily has still been getting up at least once during the night . . . this morning it was 4:30. I was greeted with her bow in my face asking me to put it in for her so she could go play in her room. So as I was lying awake early this morning I was trying to figure out a way for her to know when it was an appropriate time for her to get out of bed. I know she has no concept of what time it is so when she wakes up she thinks it's morning.

Abigail slept thru the night last night. This is how I found her this morning when I went to check on her. She had moved sideways during the night:
She is still more fussy at night than she is during the day but not as bad as a few weeks ago. I know that she is tired and it just takes her a while to get settled for the night to go to sleep. Since she doesn't take a pacifier she pretty much fusses when she gets tired . . . day or night. So we call her our "little fussy pants" . . . but I still think she is a sweetie! She has started trying to talk now and I L O V E those sounds. They are the sweetest sounds ever when your baby coos at you . . . sweet sweet sweet. I want to try to get her on video. I remember trying over and over to get Emily on video at that age and she would just stare at the light on the camera so I never got those sweet sounds . . .

Rainy Friday

We are taking it easy today. It's been raining all day so we have decided to let it be pajama day and laundry day : )

Emily enjoyed playing with my slip today. She did the famous long hair and cape play that all kids do:
She came to our room at 3:30 this morning wanting to know if it was time to get up. Then Abigail was up at 4! Luckily Emily didn't get up again until 7:30 this morning. I sure do wish she would go back to her regular sleep at night. Girlfriend is making me tired.

We also let Abigail have some tummy time today:

Emily did a great job helping:

My mom and Michelle made the blanket Abigail is on. She seems to like it. The outfit she is wearing was one of my favorites on Emily. I saw it in this picture of Emily today so I pulled it out of the drawer for Abigail. Emily was 5 months old when she was wearing it!: