More house pics for Aunt Arlene and Leah :)

So here is the rest of the house....I was waiting until we were finished with updates, but we are taking a little break from projects until we can afford to do a little more....So, these are our works-in-progress. 

The first is the dining room. We still near to add the boxed chair-rail/molding like we had in the dining room at our last house, and we may also change out the light fixture.

 Here is our family room that we are using as a toy room. This room is almost complete, with the exception of adding a few pics to the one wall....We'd also eventually like to replace the bed with a pull out couch or something, but this works for now.

 Here is the downstairs bathroom. We took down wallpaper and painted. Still need to add fixtures and hope to replace floor at some point.

 Here is our mud room/laundry room. We pulled down the "rainbow bright" wallpaper and painted. Also replaced the washer and dryer and light fixture (not shown in pic). We hope to replace the flooring eventually too.

Life these days...

Well I haven't been able to post pics because we are having issues with our hard drive/backing up pictures at the moment, but figured I'd at least do a quick update.

The girls are really just growing up and doing so much right before our eyes! Even Lisa (grandmom) has said how she notices so much more in just a weeks' time.

Ashley is talking so much more, using complete sentences, makes sense when she's talking (and totally makes sense of what you're saying). She is doing great with counting, number recognition, etc.

She has also been so much fun with her imagination and playing. She likes to pretend that I'm Cinderella and she's the fairy godmother, that I am a scary dragon who chases her around the house before she "locks the door", etc, etc.

She has also been very intuitive lately, picking up on moods or expressions. I'd like to say that I am calm and patient 24/7 (I really try hard to be as patient as I can), but if I have a moment of frustration, Ashley will notice and say "you not happy", or "you happy mama?". It's sweet, but I also don't want her worrying. I try explaining that sometimes we all feel happy, sometimes we all feel sad, sometimes we feel mad, etc...and that it's ok...and no matter how we're feeling, we still love each other. (I know, I totally sound like a therapist I'm sure..haha).

She is also already starting to notice/compare/ and "need" what others have (scary that it starts so young). For instance, she was looking through a catalog for Christmas gift ideas, and she saw a picture of a baby wearing a santa's outfit. Suddenly she needed to have that. So luckily I had bought a few Christmas dresses in different sizes for different ages a few years back at a consignment sale...so we proceeded to put on her "santa outfit", along with fall stockings that she picked out, then she "needed"a Santa's hat (we used her hat and mittens) along with her "movie star" sunglasses. It was so hysterical--I will be sure to post a pic soon!

She is also starting to skip naps sometimes. At first I thought it was because she was excited about afternoon plans, or about someone being over at the house, but now it's just hit or miss. There's about a 50/50% chance she sleeps. If she doesn't, there's also a 50/50% chance of grumpy behaviors to follow when she starts getting overtired. Either way, I still have her stay in her room for some quiet time. It's good for her and also for me :)

Emily is doing great. I can't believe she's about to turn one. We've been getting ready for her party, and having fun planning for it. She isn't walking yet (still wondering if she will be by her first party), but she is really getting around quickly--scaling the walls, walking all around the house, furniture, and she's even tried balancing on her own a little bit. It won't be long!

She also is talking more, using words and trying to talk, point and reach for things. She also started to use my phone to call dada. Haha.

She is also teething, getting a couple more on the top and also on the bottom. Fun fun I'm sure.

Emily is also finally starting to sleep a little later, and goes down very easy for bed. Also, she used to wake up crying and upset, and now she is starting to wake up happy and more pleasant which is nice.

She is absolutely loving being a "big girl"...she loves eating like a big girl, playing like a big girl, getting around like one, etc....although there are still moments when she just wants her mama and wants to be held and cuddled.

We are getting toward the end of our nursing too. She's at the real basics now, and I know my milk supply is slowing down too. Kinda sad to think that this is it. I may still stick with the night time nursing a little longer, since she still seems to like nursing (whereas Ashley was totally done and had no issues with giving it up). Emily still loves to be held, rocked, and LOVES to hold/play with my hair all the time. Haha.

Well that's all for now...

11 Months and Halloween Fun!

Well, let's start with the fact that my baby is 11 months old. How is that possible??? I don't know. I feel like this past (almost) year is a blur, it whizzed past me WAY WAY too fast! Emily is doing fantastic. She isn't quite walking on her own, but she does great walking around the furniture, walking with assistance of people and her toys. She is also quite a pro at climbing up stairs and other things.

She is quite expressive these days. She does a lot of babbling, saying words or attempting to. She also lets you know when she's not happy about something too, and will try to demand her way. Haha.
Her new thing is also to reach for things that she wants, and try to point or grab at them.

She is also LOVING foods. She started eating real food about a month ago. A little late start, but with her choking issues the doctor had said to take it slow, and I kind of followed her lead with how she handled her baby snacks. I think she is thrilled to be eating "big people food" now and devours most of it up--from pastas, to veggies, to fruits, and even a little meat. Thankfully she hasn't had any choking issues so I'm hoping we're past that.

She's been on a pretty routine schedule for sometime now. Emily is quite the early bird--she is typically up between 6-6:30, sometimes even earlier (ugh), and on a rare occasion, sometimes later. This is hard for me because Ashley was always a great sleeper and would sleep until 8 (she still does 90% of the time). I am NOT a morning person, so it's a struggle for me waking up that early since I'm usually still in a deep sleep. Anyway, she'll typically get up around that time, nurse, have open playtime and one-on-one mommy time until Ashley wakes up. Then we'll have breakfast around 8:30, and she's down for a nap by 9/9:15. She sleeps for an hour to hour and a half, then we have an open window until 2 where we play, eat, go out, etc. Then she'll nap for about 2 hours at 2, then bedtime at 8. So overall not bad.

Ashley also continues to grow in leaps and bounds. It's funny, I had posted a video on Facebook not long before we moved of Ashley singing the ABCs to Emily. At that time she was a little over two and sang some and then babbled/made up her own song. Now she can sing it, recognize 1/2 the letters in the alphabet, counts good, is learning the days of the week and months in the year. She knows which days are daddys' short days and which are his long days.  She gets what is going on around her, and is also quite observant.

On that note, Halloween was obviously a blast this year. Ashley totally got what was going on and loved it. Emily loved it too! We carved our pumpkins a couple nights before. Ashley had fun picking out the faces to carve on them, and was having fun reaching in and feeling the seeds and pulp, and helping daddy carve.
She loved trick or treating too. She was so anxious to go from house to house to get more candy. She did pretty good about taking only 1 or 2 pieces, although at one house she told the person that she wanted a lollipop. Haha.
She had fun ringing the doorbells or knocking on the doors. One of the first homes she tried to lean in to see the house/people, and asked to go in to play :) She also asked if she could please touch some of the halloween decorations and/or lawn decorations that people had out. It was so cute and fun to watch her.
Emily obviously didn't get it yet, but she had fun going to the doors. She was holding a bag of chips and a piece of candy in her hands and was quite happy and content. She kept holding them up to show people/try to hand to people when we'd knock on their doors. It was too cute. Grandmom and grandpop got to come along to partake in the fun this year too since it's our first local halloween.
Matt and I dressed up too--Matt went as a nascar driver, Dale Earnhardt Jr, and I went as a pumpkin to match Emily.

On our way back we stopped to look at this house in the neighborhood that was majorly decorated. It was like the Christmas Vacation movie, only for Halloween. Ashley had fun trick or treating there.

Well that's about it for now.

Fall fun

Fall is in the air. I have to say, this year is lots of fun. Ashley is at the age where everything is so fun and exciting to her. We took out some Halloween books at the library and she wanted to do everything that they did in the book...so we did. We have had fun with art projects--making ghost cut outs, scary witches, hats, play-doh with halloween cookie cutters, and coloring pages with Halloween pictures. Poor Emily just gets to watch, but I'm sure by next year she'll be just as involved.

We also have Halloween costumes all picked out....Emily is going to be a pumpkin (her costume looks so cute on her), and Ashley is going to be a bumble bee--as she requested. My friend Rachel offered to loan us a Cinderella or Tinkerbell costume, so I was thrilled since it's free and Ashley likes them both, but she didn't want to. Out of nowhere she kept saying she wanted to be a bumble bee. So I was on a search for a bumble bee costume, and found a really cute one. I thought it was fitting since she has such a love for insects right now. She also would say that she wanted to be a bumble bee and sting daddy...lol. So she would wear her costume and go up to Matt and "sting" him.

Matt and I are going to dress up this year as well. Matt's going to be Dale Earnhart Jr, and I am going to be a pumpkin to match Emily. Ashley had wanted me to be a bumble bee like her, but they were sold out. So I figured I'd try to match Emily instead. Should be cute :)

We've also done fun stuff like going to the pumpkin patch and getting a scarecrow for our front yard, and this weekend we are going to a Halloween parade. Should be fun. We also like to walk around the neighborhood and look at everyone's decorations.

Here are a few pics from recent fall fun...

What a difference a year makes....

My 33rd birthday was a couple of days ago, and I was just reflecting on what a difference a year makes. Last year for my birthday, I was about 7 1/2 to 8 months pregnant with Emily, living in South Carolina, and spending the day climbing up a mountain! Had you told me then that we'd be living in NJ  for my next birthday, I probably would have laughed at you.

This year, I celebrated my birthday with my husband and now two children, and some great friends in our new house in NJ. It was a great day. Matt had decorated for me with balloons and streamers, he had surprised me a few days early with pretty flowers, Ashley had made me a cute picture that was hanging on the wall and she sang happy birthday to me, and we spent most of the day hosting a party in our new home. It was a great way to start of a new year. I wonder what next year will bring??

On a quick note, Emily is now walking with assistance....life is too busy to post updates on the actual day of these days, but a few days ago (probably like 4 or 5) she started walking with her toy stroller, walking around the furniture, and sometimes she'll walk holding onto our hands. I have a feeling she will be walking by the time she is 1, quite possibly by 11 months even. Oh boy!!!

Ashley continues to be such a big girl. Yesterday we had a lazy relaxing day after a busy weekend, and busy week in general. She and I did mani and pedis--she had so much fun and loved it. She opted for green nail polish on her fingers and toes. I let her paint my nails--I have to say, I was pretty impressed with her painting for a 2 year old. It certainly wasn't perfect, but it was pretty darn good for a  2 1/2 year old!

Just a cute little tidbit--I had made chili the other night with kidney beans, and Ashley was saying "Oh, I like kitty beans"...haha. Kids say the cutest things sometimes.

Lastly, I have started shopping around for an office and working on marketing stuff this week to start work again...I feel mixed feelings. In one way it's been fun meeting different people and seeing different offices to find the right fit, and it's exciting to think about starting up my own practice (very part time initially).  I also find what I do very rewarding. On the other hand, I feel really bummed to have to return to work. I always wanted to be a full-time stay at home mom until my kids went to school. It was always a dream of mine, and I feel it is so important and crucial in child development. Unfortunately we are not in a financial position to be able to do that (especially now being back in NJ where the cost of living is A LOT more). Thankfully though I am able to be home most of the time and work very part time--something that I am so fortunate to be able to do. Money will still be very tight for a while, but it's a sacrifice that we are willing to make in order to be home with the girls.
That is one gift that we got out of moving, I was able to be a full-time mom for a few months which I absolutely loved.

Well that's about it for now.