I'm a big kid now!!

No more babies in our house....Emily is officially 2 now! What a big girl! She really has turned into such a wonderful, fun, caring, sensitive, incredible little girl.

In order to show us what a big girl she now is, she decided that she was ready for a big girl bed. She discovered how to climb out of her crib, and continued to do so repeatedly; so we thought it was time to convert her bed into a big girl bed. So we carried on the tradition of converting the crib into a bed on a holiday (Ashley's was changed on Christmas day, and Emily's was changed on Thanksgiving day--just one day before her 2nd birthday). She was ready for it...mommy and daddy weren't...lol. We were hoping we'd get a few more months out of the crib before we had two kids "loose" around the house. Haha. It was another bittersweet moment while we changed it--so exciting to see her achieving another "big girl" milestone, but also sad to think that there would never be another crib in our home again.

We had a fun birthday celebration. We celebrated on Thanksgiving day with us, grandma, Aunt Cheryl and cousin Alyssa, grandmom and grandpop. Grandpa had hoped to come too, but we had a little snow storm the day before, and he was still getting snow the day of and roads weren't good to drive. We went to see Frozen on Ice that morning, came home and had Thanksgiving dinner followed by cake and presents afterward. It was fun. We plan to do a joint friend party for her and Ashley in January since December (midway for both) is sooo hectic with the holidays.

So the latest....
Aside from the fun festivities, it's been a challenging time in some senses. First, we all got a touch of the stomach bug in one form or another. Poor Emily got it first. I felt bad because it happened on a day when we took a trip down to South Jersey. Prior to leaving, Emily was a little clingy to me. I didn't think anything of it, because she is a momma's girl and likes to be held a lot to begin with. Then we went to a party with our friends where she acted normal and had a great time playing, but she didn't really eat anything. I thought maybe she didn't like the foods, so offered her cereal which she also didn't eat. Again, with all the commotion I didn't think too much of it (kids would rather play than sit and eat), but in hindsight the signs pointed to something was wrong). Well, on the way home, out of nowhere, she threw up all over herself. We still had an hour to go. It was awful. Then she continued to get sick that night. Two days later, Ashley got it. Was fine all day up until 15 minutes prior. She complained that her stomach hurt and thought she might have to go to the bathroom. She gets settled into bed, tucked in, say goodnight--five minutes later she calls us crying, and had thrown up all over herself and her bed. This continued throughout the night. All of this is a few days prior to Thanksgiving/birthday celebration. Grandma, Cheryl and Alyssa were supposed to come the next day, but we pushed it back 3 days to be on the safe side. They came up Thanksgiving day when we thought we were in the clear, then I start feeling nauseous and have an awful heading during the Frozen performance. I never actually threw up, but had stomach issues and still felt slightly nauseous for days....Then Aunt Cheryl reports that Alyssa got sick the night they got back, then she and Billy got it after....grandmom and grandpop had a slight touch of stomach issues too....one heck of a stomach bug. I felt bad for everyone.

In addition to that, Emily has been having a ROUGH time with sleep the last few weeks (even a week or two prior to switching her to the bed--in fact, that's prompted the change because she kept fighting sleep and got so mad that she decided to climb out). She has been FIGHTING sleep like it's the plague. She just does not want to sleep, and she wants us to rock her, or sit there and hold her hand until she falls asleep (which takes a while sometimes), and it's just not possible. She also has been waking up 1-2 times in the middle of the night, and sometimes not falling asleep for an hour or two. We have tried EVERYTHING. It's been sooooo frustrating, and mentally and physically exhausting on all of us. We read that it is normal for her age and has to do with her REM cycle. But this girl goes from being one of the sweetest, happiest little girls during the day to a tantruming, kicking, screaming, pounding on the door, banging, throwing things kid at night when she doesn't want to go to sleep. We tried the cry it out method, and it went on for forever. We read up on it and are reassuring her once or twice, then trying the recommended approach of going in there, saying lovingly but firmly that it's bedtime, put her back into bed, and leave. Supposedly with consistency she'll learn the drill, but we haven't reached it yet (and we are good about being consistent). It's very trying. Matt has been working a lot these days (he picked up a second job), so I'm basically doing the single mom thing every single day of the week from morning until they go to bed. We're both tired and exhausted by the time it's bedtime, and it's very hard to stay calm and patient for the next long round of stress...but we are trying our best. I'm just praying it's not too long of a phase.

But aside from those two stresses, and the chaos of this time of year, all is good....We've been enjoying life, each other, having fun decorating for Christmas, visiting Santa, going to some Christmas parties, etc. The holidays are lots of fun this year. They are both old enough to understand what's going on (at least to some extent for Emily). Ashely is old enough where she'd ask questions and get excited when I told her about the different ornaments on the tree, they loved to "help" with the lights and decorations. They love to take the ornaments of the tree and play with them (I put the breakable ones up high so it can be hands on below). Ashley is so excited to have Chippy the Elf back too. We visited Santa and both girls were happy to see him. Santa was also a special guest visitor at the party we went to yesterday, and Ashley drew him a picture. Here most kids are asking Santa for things, and she's giving him something. I thought it was so sweet. Santa even read us The Night Before Christmas. It was lots of fun.

Well, that's about all that time will allow for right now.

The past month

Well...it's November 1st, 2014. In 27 days, my "baby" will be 2. I am still in shock. She's 23 months now--the same age that Ashley was when Emily was born. I still cannot fathom that--both that I had a 23 month old and a newborn at the same time, and also that my baby is now the age that Ashley was when she was born. Sniff sniff. In fact, today she is wearing the same outfit that Ashley wore in the pictures from when we brought Emily home from the hospital. I LOVE the fact that the girls were born in the same season. Emily has lots of new/different clothes, but she also has some of Ashley's hand me downs. It's soon nice to see her in it and reminisce about when Ashley wore them, and some of the clothes I just love so much, it's nice to get use out of them twice.

Emily suddenly seems so grow up too. She is talking a lot--words, sentences. She says some cute things now. Some of her latests:

Mom, Cheryl and Alyssa came to visit a few weeks ago. Ever since then, every day, Emily has asked "where's Aunt Cheryl?", and we tell her that she is home, and she'll say "oh" as if she's surprised by the answer every time. Or sometimes when she asks, we'll say "I don't know, where is she?" and she'll say "up". Haha. She has also started asking about others too. If I go to get her in the morning when she's waking up, she'll say "where's dad?", I'll answer, then she'll ask "where's Ack-ee" (Ashley)? It's too cute. She'll ask about grandma, grandmom and grandpop, etc.

The fact that she says Ashley (Akee) is so cute too.

She is also OBSESSED with cookies, or as she called them for a while, "coo coos". Whenever grandmom comes over, she will bring over her homemade cookies. Emily has started saying "coo coos" first thing when she sees her (even before she says hello)--it's like classic conditioning. Haha. Any time you'd ask her what she wanted for a snack, she'd say "coo coos". I'd joke and say "you're going to turn into a coo coo".
My mom was asking if I had picked out any themes for Emily's birthday, and I hadn't come up with one yet...but when we got to talking later about her current coo-coo phase, I was saying how she is a real-life Cookie Monster, and it clicked--it'd be very fitting to have a Cookie Monster theme for her this year. She just recently started calling them cookies, after a good 2-3 months of calling them coo-coos.

Emily has also apparently been reading up on the "what to expect" books for her developmental stage, because those 2 year old behaviors are slowly creeping in...so far they've been cute though. She has just started making a pouty/mad face and will talk "fresh" in a grumpy tone to you at times or talk back to you. She also will have mini temper tantrums and will fight you to get into her car seat. Other times she'll want to get right in and buckle herself in.

Emily also is obsessed with the car and keys. She is always wanting our keys and my mini purse to carry around. We moved her toy car in from the garage into our mudroom downstairs so she can play with her car and "drive". She is always begging to "drive" our car too.

She also loves to shout for me when she wakes up now "mom, mom, mom"....I'm remembering to write this because she's doing it now. Lol.

Emily is still loving going to "class" while I go to the YMCA. It makes her feel like such a big girl.

Emily is also really big into babies right now. She carries her babies around a lot, went through a phase where she wanted 1 (or 3) to sleep with. When she'd see a real baby (or even a pic of one) she'd say "shhh baby" (because they were sleeping). It's so sweet.

Her FAVORITE movie is Tarzan. I remember when Ashley was her age, she was obsessed with The Polar Express Movie--well this is Emily's version of that. Any chance she gets, she wants to watch Tarzan.

I'm sure there is a lot more but that's all I can recall at the moment. This is why I keep these journals...lol.

As for Ashley, she's getting so big too, it amazes me.

She has a real thirst for learning. She has also really gotten into the "whys" a lot more. You'll explain something, and she'll say "but why mom, why?". She is also wanting to spell and sound out lots of words. She can spell her first and last name, Emily's name, and a few basic words like STOP. She likes to practice spelling words with our foam bath toys, and likes to trace letters. She learned a song at school : A says (a sound), A says (a sound), every letter makes a sound, A says (A sound). We practice with all the letters.

She's a good balance with activities--she is still so confident, outgoing, and friendly (most of the time) with kids, and loves to play and engage. Then other times she wants to stay home all day and just veg and play with toys (and watch TV all day if I'd let her).

Ashley still loves to dress up a lot. She loves wearing dresses (I invested in a few pairs of warm tights and sweater dresses). She likes to match--is conscientious of matching her headband (and will even try to have a matching bowl at breakfast).

Matt's cousins Josh and Ethan are teenagers now, and have totally outgrown their power-wheel jeep, so they gave it to us. Ashley loves to drive Emily or friends around (and actually does quite well). By the time she's a teenage she will be a pro. Haha.

Ashley's nature class has ended, but she liked swimming so much that we just signed up for the next set of classes. She's really done well, a lot less reserved about jumping in, comfortable..doing great. She really likes her teacher, Miss Sally.

Ashley has gotten so big that she has started to call us mom and dad more often than mommy and daddy....which makes me sad....I thought I'd at least get it until 5....

I went away for a few days as a late birthday gift...found a cheap flight and flew down to SC for a few days to have a "girls weekend" in Myrtle Beach then drove back to Greenville. While I was away, Ashley made a project in school. They had to color in a picture of a helicopter, then it said "if I could go anywhere on the helicopter, I would go _____". Ashley filled it in saying "to Myrtle Beach with mommy". I thought that was so sweet.

We also switched Ashley's big girl bed into an even bigger big girl bed. Her crib converted to a toddler bed, and then to a full. She was getting so tall that we thought it was time to switch it. The funny part is that her full sized mattress also happens to be the same full sized mattress that was my very first "big girl bed" in my 20s (prior to that, I always had a twin). Lucky girl. That was also a bittersweet moment for me. First off, she has a lot of furniture and her room's not that big, so when we switched it, it meant getting rid of her rocking chair/glider. This was the one that I had helped cover with the lavender minky-dot fabric when we were putting her nursery together, and this is the rocking chair that I rocked her in every single night since the day she was born. Even now at almost 4, I'd rock in it with her while we read our bedtime stories. Sniff sniff....I was sad to give it up. But we explained to Ashley that if she wanted a bigger sized bed in her room (vs a twin), it meant that we had to get rid of it, and she was totally ok with it. It was also bittersweet because my "baby" was REALLY a big girl now. Crazy. Although I have to say, as sad as I was to give up the rocker, I'm actually really enjoying the bed--now I crawl in it with her, and we lie in bed and read stories and talk. It's fun and a great bonding time for us (and daddy, we alternate reading to the girls each night).

Well, I think that's it for updates. Aside from school, classes, playdates, and the usual activities, we've also been enjoying all the fall festivities. I celebrated my 21st birthday for the 13th time at the beginning of the month too. Grandma, Aunt Cheryl and cousin Alyssa came down and we went to this new (huge) pumpkin patch where they also had rides, animals, mazes, activities, etc. Then we went to a smaller one with grandmom and grandpop another weekend. We also had our towns Halloween Parade, and Ashley had a school party (which I had to miss because Emily turned out to be sick that day, I was so sad), and Halloween Parade (which I did go to). Last night we went Trick-or-Treating. Emily was still sick with a cough and cold, but was acting ok otherwise so we took her out locally. Ashley wanted to be Elsa from the Frozen movie, and Emily was a strawberry. They both looked so cute. It was fun to watch them running to each house so excited.

Well that's the update for the kids now. I never got a chance to backtrack on updates like I had hoped to do, but the biggest one was that Cheryl and Billy got married on August 4, 2014 up in Kennebunkport, Maine.