March 2013

Sorry to get this post up so late, we've been slacking lately with everything going on - holidays, vacations, plumbing issues, random dance-offs, landscaping projects, basement floors, etc.  Now that the excuses have been aired out, lets focus on the girls.  Hopefully this post is worth the wait...

March saw Whitney take her first steps.  On Easter Sunday, Whitney took 5 consecutive steps without holding on to anyone or anything.  But even to this date(4/15) she still has only repeated that feat a handful of times.  She just doesn't want to let go!  Besides walking, other physical accomplishments for Whit include using a fork and a spoon at meals and using a sippy cup all the time.

Downward Dog!

Whitney has added a few new words to her vocabulary.  Now she says "thank you" when you give her something.  Randomly, Maren taught her to say the word "turtle."  But her favorite word(and sign) lately has been "more."  The girl can put down some food!  She routinely eats more than her older sister at mealtime.  No matter how much you give her, she always asks for more!

Okay...so now we know where the food is going.  But most of the time we're pretty sure she's eating it.

She'll even ask for more eggs

During March, the girls got to go on spring break to visit their auntie in Lacrosse, WI.  They did a great job traveling in the car, but due to weather and illness, unfortunately they had to stay inside almost the whole visit.  The girls have been doing a great job sharing.  In fact, Emry had a rough bout with the stomach flu - which she promptly shared with Whitney - who shared it with dad - who shared it with mom!  At the beginning of the month, Whitney was really fussy and moody.  She was having some BM issues.

"I hate dressing up!"

After she battled the stomach flu, those issues went away, and Whit's demeanor completely changed.  The second half of the month, she was the happiest baby on the planet.

She can smile!

March was a dismal month for weather, so the girls were stuck inside pretty much every evening when we got home.  They colored a lot, worked on puzzles, and painted quite a bit.  The funnest project we did together this month was coloring Easter eggs.  Emry was so proud of the artwork she drew on the eggs...

the colors she dyed them....

and the stickers she used to finish them off...

"TA-DA!"

Even though we tried to do lots of different things, by the end of the month we were all getting stir crazy from being stuck in the house everyday.  Emry has been bugging us to go outside, but the weather just hasn't cooperated.  She constantly asks to go on walks or go to the park.

We finally had a nice day on Easter Sunday, so the girls got to go outside for their Easter egg hunt.  The Easter bunny hid lots of eggs in the yard and left a basket for each of the girls.  Emry was super excited about her jump rope!  The girls had a blast on Easter.  They liked getting dressed up for church in their Easter dresses and sweaters.  Emry ran all over the yard to get Easter eggs.  Whitney even got in on the hunting fun.  She loved shaking the eggs like a rattle. 

"I got puffs, what did you get?" "A quarter!"

Coincidentally, during the week of Easter, Emry found Maren's pink Bible and would not put it away.  She would sit in her pink chair and "read" it for long periods of time.  When she'd go to bed, she insisted on having her Bible with her.  We'd ask her if she would rather have a Curious George book or one of her other books with pictures, and she would say "I want my Bible!" Emry still loves all kinds of other books too. Even though we put her to bed between 7:30-8:00, she has been staying up past 9 o'clock routinely reading her books.

Reading Whit some Song of Songs...

"Daddy, what's it mean in Ch 2:3...his fruit is sweet to my taste?"
"Go ask your mother..."

Emry has been very technical and corrective in certain situations.  We would ask her if she was reading about Jesus in her Bible.  She would say "No."  Then we asked what she was reading about and she would say "I'm looking at pictures of the letters."  In fact, Emry developed a pretty sharp tongue over the past month...

One day Ken and Emry were putting toys away in the toy baskets.  Ken noticed that Emry had scribbled crayon on the wall behind one of the toy baskets.  Ken asked "Did you draw on the wall?"  Emry said "No, I decorate it!" (Lawyered!)

Another day we were playing in the living room.  Emry was wearing a t shirt and underwear (no pants was a common theme this month).  She kept reaching back and grabbing her bottom.  Maren asked if she needed to poop.  Emry said "No."  Maren replied "Well don't grab your butt, its not polite."  Emry said "No, I grabbed my underwear." (Lawyered!, again.)

One day Ken took Emry to the playground.  Emry was running across the playground bridge while Ken stood in the mulch next to the playground equipment.  Emry said "You're a fishy swimming in the water."  So Ken asked, "What are you?" Emry quickly responded, "I'm a girl, walking on a bridge." (She didn't say  "Duh dad!", but it was implied by her tone.)

Another day we drove by a daycare center that had a statue of a tiger out front.  Emry commented on the tiger and Ken asked "Does that tiger say rooaaar!?"  Emry said "That's not a real tiger, that's just a pretend tiger."  (Again...duh dad!)

Between Emry's silly way-with-words and Whitney doing cute things, the girls have kept us laughing almost everyday this month.  In the opening paragraph, I mentioned something about a random dance-off.  Well, one night the girls threw down an impromptu dance-off.  We'll end the post by letting you enjoy their sweet moves...

 

February 2013

February came and went in the blink of an eye, seems like it was a short month...oh, yeah.  The biggest event the girls had this month was celebrating Whitney's first birthday, so that seems like the appropriate place to start.  It's hard to believe, but we now have two girls over a year old!

The day of Whitney's birthday, we took a family trip to the children's museum.  The girls had fun playing and exploring all the exhibits together.  They really enjoyed spending time in the 1800's exhibit.  Emry was hard at work making a birthday feast for the family....

Stoking the fire is essential to maintain the temp on the rotisserie.

Now that Whitney is a year old, we thought it was important for her to start learning some new skills.  We skipped sign language and speaking, we opted to go straight to handwriting...

"Rirruto?"       "Those are Z's."      "They look like R's to me."
"That's not fair!  Rizzuto is not a word, he's a baseball player.  You're cheating!"

So she hasn't mastered handwriting yet, but Whitney has picked up some new skills this month.  She has been cruising on furniture a whole lot more.  In fact, she really got into a climbing.  The morning of her birthday she pushed Emry's footstool up to one of the dining room chairs.  She climbed from the stool onto the chair.  When Ken walked into the dining room she was in the process of climbing from the chair onto the table.  Crisis averted!

By the end of the month, Whit got to the point where she was standing on her own for extended periods of time, but still hadn't taken that first step yet.  Other physical things she's done lately are blow kisses, play peek-a-boo, waving and saying "bye-bye".  She also added "baby" and "uh-oh!" to her vocabulary in February.

How big is Whitney? So big!

But back to the museum...another exhibit the girls enjoyed together was the construction room...

If she doesn't make it as a project manager, she could always
try out for the Village People...

As you can see below, Whitney weighed exactly 23 lbs on her birthday, which was February 23rd.  We don't know the significance of that fact, but maybe Jim Carrey will make a movie sequel about it...

"Its bad enough you put me in this thing for a photo op...then you
advertise my weigh on the internet.  How embarrassing!"

After the museum visit was over, we went to Orange Leaf for some frozen yogurt  ice cream.  Whitney had birthday cake flavored ice cream with sprinkles, and loved every bite of it!

Whitney continued the celebration later that night by pooping in the bathtub for the 5th time this month.  We don't know what started this phase, but hopefully it will pass by quickly!  Luckily, Whit has an understanding older sister who is willing to wash her in the sink after she's ruined bath time...

Maybe she just likes bathing in the sink?

The next day, we celebrated Whit's birthday by having a small party with the extended family.  For Whitney, the whole thing was just another day on the calendar.  Emry, however, was a lot more excited about the cake, the visitors and all the presents.  Emry was a huge help when it came to making Whit's cupcakes and getting the house ready for the party. 

"Beater licker" is the most important job when it comes to baking

A lot of times you'll see a child hesitate when they are eating their first birthday cake.  Emry did such a great job baking that Whitney didn't hesitate to jump right into the cupcake!  Of course, she had Emry there to teach her the proper way to eat a cupcake...

"First you admire the beauty of the dessert."  "Ooh, nice!" 

"Next, you inspect the sprinkles"

"Check!"

"Then, you take a huge bite!"

"Yummy!"

"Finally, you show off your
messy-face."

"Like this?"

"I ate that cupcake like a boss"

After cupcakes, it was finally time to open presents!  As we mentioned, Emry was a lot more excited about all the gifts "they" had to open.  Whitney was more content with the paper and bows, but eventually Emry convinced her to play with the new toys...

"Whitney, you drop the ball in the top like this.

15 more years and she can pose with a real car...

The girls have been playing together really well lately.  One of the new birthday gifts that was a big hit with both girls was a trailer for the Cozy Coupe.  Emry and Whit have had lots of fun being pushed throughout the house together in their new ride.

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While its true that the girls have been playing well together and sharing a lot, sometimes they get in each other's way and take each other's toys.  They have even developed a little hint of a rivalry.  Its a friendly rivalry, and Emry seems to instigate it most of the time.  For instance, sometimes we'll play the game "How big is Whitney?  Soooo big!"  But Emry will quickly answer "Soooo tiny!" 

Emry has also been pretending a lot this month.  Sometimes Emry will assign each member of our family a certain role, and we have to address each other by our pretend persona.  An another example of Emry instigating the rivalry is when she assigns our pretend roles, she always gives Whitney a crappy character - usually an insignificant animal.  She sometimes pretends we are the neighbors, and she is Elise, Ken is John, Maren is Julie, and Whitney is the cat. Poor Whit doesn't even get a name!  When Emry pretends we are Disney characters, Emry is always Mickey, Ken is Goofy, Maren is Donald(or Minnie), and Whitney is always Pluto.

Emry is "sharing" Whit's new toy leopard, but at least
she was quick to comfort her.

Everyone is happy again!

Emry has been making us laugh on a daily basis this month with the things she says.  Besides pretending a lot, she has been very observant of the things around her and makes very inquisitive comments about them.  Every morning on the way to the babysitter's she talks about how the trees are naked.  We told her they will get new leaves in the spring.  Emry also has picked up a lot of random sayings from various sources.  One day Maren asked Emry to get a book from her room.  Emry sprang up from her spot on the living room floor and said "I'll be right back sweetie!"

Speaking of books, Emry has been reading like its going out of style.  Sometimes she doesn't want us to read to her, she just wants to flip through the books on her own.  There will be times when she gets a stack of 10 books and flips through the pages, looks at the pictures and talks to herself about what she sees.  When she gets done with each book she neatly places it in a new stack until she's read all of them.

A picture is worth a thousand words

Well another month gone by in 2013...it'll be no time before spring is here and the trees have clothes.  The girls are ready to wave bye-bye to this cold weather.  They can't wait to take the new car/trailer out for a spin around the block!

January 2013

January was an eventful month for the girls.  It was full of lots of ups and downs.  One of the high points of the month was starting swim lessons at the YMCA.  Emry showed Whitney how to splash and put her face in the water.  Both girls love being in the pool!  The lowest point of the month was when both girls were struck with illness.  They battled runny noses, gagging coughs and ear infections for about two weeks.  Both had to be put on antibiotics, and this marked the first time that Whitney had to show Emry how do something...because it was the first time Emry had ever been put on antibiotics.  In fact, the Dr couldn't believe she went 2 1/2 years without them!  Whitney did a great job showing Emry how to take the medicine.


Apologies for not taking nearly as many pictures as usual this month.  We can probably chalk that up to the iPhone effect.  However, out of the few pictures we took, Whitney was not camera shy at all.  She was kind of a camera hog this month.  She really opened up and started showing a lot more personality.  Here are some of the many faces of Whitney from January...

This is her punk look

Cheesin' like there's no tomorrow!

Doing her best Gene Simmons impression

Showing how much she enjoys one of her new
favorite hobbies...stacking blocks!

Smiling at her favorite book!  

Whit now recognizes mom and dad.  She says da-da when she sees Ken and ma-ma when she sees Maren.  Whit really gets upset when Maren leaves the room.  She will hold her arms up and call for ma-ma!  She has a new favorite hobby, which she is getting pretty good at...stacking blocks.  She also likes throwing things and she will sit to roll the ball back and forth.

Other things she's done this month include mastering the art of drinking from a sippy-cup...

Drinking with two hands is for babies!

...pulling up on furniture and cruising...(In fact, its only a matter of weeks before she'll probably venture out to take her first step)...

"I'm not ready to let go yet!"

...climbing...

Climbing up to help mom and dad with the dishes

...and mastering body control.

Mastering body control through yoga and chair-rocking!

Whitney tries hard to stand up on her own and it looks like she is practicing yoga sometimes.  She'll get in a plank position then move into a downward dog, but never quite makes it completely to her feet.  Its been a lot of fun watching her develop this month!

Emry was a lot of fun in January too, but she was also quite a handful.  Early in the month, she went through a really whiny phase where she would complain and start fussing over any and every little thing.  We felt like we were walking on eggshells for a couple weeks, never knowing what would set her off.  We thought this wasn't supposed to happen until the teenage years?!  She was also not eating well and became very picky about her food.  In addition, she would stay up late at night playing in her bed - sometimes until after 10 o'clock.  She just wasn't acting herself at all...but in Emry's defense, this phase happened right before she got sick, so that was probably what was causing her(and us) all this anxiety.

Emry's mood was slightly more sturdy than
this block tower for most of the month...

Over the past couple weeks she got back into her normal routine.  In fact, at the time of this post, she has been diaper free for 6 straight days!  We told Emry if she got potty trained that she could go to preschool next year.  We're pretty sure this might be the only time we'll be able to use "going to school" as motivation for anything!  

Emry didn't get a lot of camera time by herself this month, but she provided us with lots of entertainment.  The video won't make sense right away, but we suggest playing it and enjoying the music while you read the following stories.  It will be relevant later...

--Emry told her first really big lie this month.  Maren saw a scratch on her finger one day and asked Emry how she cut it.  Emry said she cut it on the ceiling fan in her room.  Maren asked how she did that.  Without hesitation Emry said she went outside, got daddy's ladder, brought it in her room, climbed the ladder and that's when she got scratched by the fan.  We were impressed by the details and facts she presented.  She must have taken notes during Oprah's interview with Lance Armstrong.
--Emry fell asleep under the dining room table one afternoon this month.  She calls that area "the cage" because all the chairs and table legs make it seem like she's caged in.  We carried her to bed, and when she woke up from her nap we asked if she remembered falling asleep.  She said "I fell asleep in my cage!"  Hopefully CPS never catches wind of that...

The Cage!

--One day during Emry's "cranky, runny-nose phase" she got up from the dinner table and went into the bathroom to pee all by herself.  Ken went in to check on her just as she was finishing up, and much to his delight, she had a successful trip to the potty!  Ken enthusiastically exclaimed "Great job Emry!" and stuck his hand down for a high-five.  Emry grabbed his hand with both of hers and wiped her snotty nose straight across his palm...eggshells.
--A few days later, Maren was laying on the living room floor and said her back hurt.  She asked Emry to rub it for her.  Emry rubbed it for a second then started patting Maren on the bottom.  Emry started laughing and started hitting Maren's butt with even more force.  She continued to laugh and said "Mommy's booty is really jiggly!"  All of a sudden Maren's ego hurt worse than her back.
--Another day Maren was singing the John Fogerty song, "Centerfield" from the video above.  She sang "Put me in coach, I'm ready to play..." Emry overheard and joined in singing "Mia and Coach, I'm ready to play..."

Other than just doing and saying funny things, Emry always impresses us with her memory and ability to put things together.  One evening Ken went next door to meet our new neighbor, we'll call him "James Farmer" for the purposes of this post.  Maren asked Ken 20 questions about him, and Ken told Maren "We didn't talk long because he came outside in a t-shirt and was probably freezing his booty off."  Emry overheard and repeated "He freeze his booty off."  So we left the house and went to dinner.  On the way home, Maren asked "What's the new neighbor's name again?" Ken responded "James Farmer."   Emry heard him say "James Farmer" from the backseat and said "He freeze his booty!"  Emry continued to ramble on for a couple minutes about his frozen booty and how he lived in Elise's old house.  We were amazed that she not only recognized the name after only hearing it once before, but that she also associated it with the neighbor who moved into Elise's house and Ken's comment about him freezing his booty off.

Nice hair Einstein!

The girls have been a complete joy to us this month.  They continue to grow together and bond each day.  Its fun to watch them interact and play with one another.  Emry still likes to help Whit do new things and is currently trying to teach her to cruise and walk.  Emry finally got to the point where she wants to hold Whitney, but Whit is getting to be too big for that already!

Fun times together!

"When did you get so heavy Whit?"

"Eat your citrus...Vitamin C helps keep the cold away"

Hopefully February will bring better health and even more happiness for the girls!