Ella and Paige || Weeks 35 & 36

I am getting so behind on these weekly posts that I can't even keep up with what weeks they should be anymore. Every time I sit down to do this something comes up, and then another week goes by. Story of my life!
January is definitely my least favorite month of the year. It's cold, dreary, and seems to drag on. We have not been getting out much. I forgot how much work it is to drag a baby out in the cold. I finally did get Paige going to the nursery at church. I'm not sure why I waited until winter to do this, but better late than never.  She has been twice now and could really care less. 
Ella had a dentist appointment last week. She got to leave school early, and she was so excited.  She loves going to the dentist only because of the treasure box. Ella has lost four teeth so far, and her six year molars are coming through. Her front tooth is a little crooked, but the dentist said it could straighten on it's own. I'm still planning on braces, but we will see. 

Paige is SO close to crawling. I left her on the middle of this rug and she ended up like this. She was so proud of herself. 

This past Friday Ella and I ordered pizza and played games. You can't tell in this picture, but she was wild. 

Paige is loving her walker. She gets a little fussy after awhile, but it's fun to watch her scoot around the living room.

I don't think these bouncer seats are meant for sitting up. I only use this when I take a shower so Paige can sit in the bathroom with me. I obviously have to strap her in now. 

Paige loves mornings. She wakes up around 6am everyday which means I do too. 

Paige loves dinnertime! She is now eating baby food 3x a day. It's hit or miss sometimes, but most of the time she will eat it all. 

Ella and I went to see the new Alvin and the Chipmunks movie last weekend. It was her second time seeing it. During the movie she told me the teenage boy in the movie looked good. I have a feeling we are in trouble. 

Paige pulls down her crib bumper when she wakes up from nap so she can watch for me. She is always peeking out when I open the door. 

Adam always has girls fighting over him. :) 

Paige || 8 months old

I'm not sure how it's already been 8 months since Paige's birth. She has changed so much in the past eight months but is still proving to be the laid back baby she was on the day she was born. 
Day by day her personality is beginning to shine.  Paige can be described as incredibly sweet, happy, laid back, and pleasant. She rarely cries and if she does you know it's for a good reason. 
She has stolen all of our hearts and continues to everyday. 
What's new....

• Paige weighs 17.5 pounds.
• Paige is SO close to crawling. She constantly wants to be in the "crawling position". When I'm holding her she even tries to wiggle her way into that position. She can move herself in a circle on her stomach, but her little legs are not mobile YET. 
  
• She loves sleeping on her stomach. For awhile she was getting stuck, and I would have to go in her room to help her. She can now move around freely in her crib. 
• Paige has started communicating by babbling and yelling. She has started saying "da da". We also loves to scream. Adam says it sounds like we have a chimpanzee living in our house. 
• Paige has started eating baby food on a daily basis. She loves bananas, peaches, apples, and pears. She is not a fan of vegetables with peas being her least favorite. 
• She can now sit in a shopping cart which makes my life so much easier. 

Likes and Dislikes...

LOVES playing with toys but is a tiny destroyer. 

LOVES watching Ella and playing with her. 

LOVES riding in the car but doesn't enjoy being in her carseat for a long period of time. 

LOVES being held

LOVES bathtime 

LOVES Elliott and Brody 

DISLIKES loud noises (trash bags imparticlar)

DISLIKES being in her car seat for a long period of time

DISLIKES strangers

Sleeping...

She is still not sleeping through the night. UGH! She slept through the night two times before Christmas. I thought it was a fluke, and IT WAS. I still long for the day I can sleep all night again on a consistent basis. She is a wonderful napper. She takes two, two hour naps a day. She goes to bed at 6pm every night. She typically wakes at 12 or 3 to eat. I lay her down awake, and she always can get herself to sleep. Besides not sleeping through the night I can't complain about Paige's sleeping habits. 

Eating...

Paige is a great eater. She typically takes an 8 ounce bottle. I am noticing that she is only liking her bottles when it's time to sleep.  She very rarely finishes a bottle when it is not nap or bedtime. I have been trying to get her to eat baby food at least three times a day, but sometimes she doesn't want to mess with it. She loves fruits but doesn't seem to like vegetables. We will work on that. 
Play....

Paige really enjoys playing. She received all kinds of goodies for Christmas that keep her busy. She loves her exersaucer and jumperoo. She loves playing with balls. She likes books but either tries to chew on them or rip them up. She likes toys that play music. Her favorite toys seem to still be our phones and remotes. She did get a toy phone and remote for Christmas but still loves to try to grab ours. 

Paige has been such a sweet addition to our family. We are so blessed by our little surprise! :) 

Paige's First Snow

Paige's first snow!! 1.10.16

Ella and Paige | Week 34

Last week was Ella's second week of Christmas break. She definitely needed to recover from all the hype of Christmas. I took all the Christmas decorations down on Sunday night. It was so nice to have the house back to normal, although it does look kind of bare. 

Monday morning it was POURING rain, but I was determined to make a trip to Target. We needed just about everything. We ended up being at Target for almost two hours. By the time we were done it was like a monsoon outside. We had to wait it out until the rain let up just so we could get to the car. Paige didn't mind to chill in the cart!

 The best part of Christmas is playing with all the new toys after Christmas. Paige received all kinds of fun goodies. 

 Ella was scared to death to sleep one night last week, because she was scared of ghosts. She woke up at around 3am and wouldn't go back to bed. By 7am she was out like a light on the couch. Between Ella and Paige I think I had about three hours of sleep that night.  Thankfully, this was only a one night ordeal. This mom needs her sleep! 

All the rain brought cooler temps. Paige and I went out one day to brave the cold to get a few groceries. She is not bothered at all by the cooler temps. 

 We celebrated the new year at home. None of us made it to midnight, and I am not complaining! 

Saturday Adam and I spent some time with Ella by herself. She of course wanted to go to Chuck E Cheese. We played games and ate pizza. Ella was in heaven!

We finally got a treadmill last week. Ella thinks it is so fun, but I have to watch her like a hawk. She likes to sneak upstairs and get on it when no one is watching. 

Four Christmases 2015 edition

Another Christmas has come and gone. This Christmas has been a whirlwind, and I'm sad to see it end. The last four days have been full of gift giving, gift getting, eating, drinking, and celebrating. To say we are exhausted is an understatement. 
Let's do a little recap, shall we? 
Christmas Eve:  We spend Christmas Eve with my family. We have opened gifts on Christmas Eve my entire life. I have fond memories of being a child and about to burst at Christmas Eve mass, because I knew Santa had come while we were gone. I can still remember the smell when we walked in the house of my mom's baked beans in the oven. It's the little things you remember most. 
Ella is always SO excited to go to Mammy and Peep's on Christmas Eve. I can't imagine why?! I'm most excited for the food usually. It's my favorite meal of the year. I only wish I had two stomachs so I could eat more. 
All I wanted for Christmas was a good picture with my girls and a good family picture. Ella was not happy about it at first, but she always comes through for me. These two are definitely the best gifts I have ever received, even though they wear me out daily!

The girls wasted no time in opening gifts. They started tearing into them as soon as we walked in the door. 

Paige watched and took notes while the girls opened their gifts.  She loved opening a couple of her gifts until she got tired and slept the rest of the morning/afternoon.

It was unseasonably warm which made it a great day for Ella to ride her new Scooter. These three wheeled scooters are so cool. Ella has been riding it through the house for days now. 

Thanks family for cooperating with my picture request with no complaining and smiles all around!

Ella did not want to go to bed that night since she was so excited. I now see why my parents had us open gifts on Christmas Eve. Ella can never get to bed which makes it extremely hard for Santa Claus to assemble toys. Once I thought she was in bed Mrs. Claus went upstairs to help Santa assemble her gift. All of the sudden I hear little foot steps coming up the stairs, and I seriously almost had a heart attack. Ella probably thought I was nuts, because I screamed. I caught her before she hit the top of the steps and led her back to bed. Crisis averted! 
Around midnight we had everything ready to go. Ella's big gift was upstairs assembled, and we wrapped the empty box. 

Christmas Day:

Ella came busting in our room around 7:30 on Christmas morning. I was impressed she slept that long. Paige had me up twice during the night so I was still sound asleep. I went ahead and woke Paige up so she could join in on the fun. 

Ella had presents opened in no time! That girl can unwrap faster then any child I have ever seen. 

I sat Paige on the floor, and she immediately started tearing into the paper. I think she thoroughly enjoyed her first Christmas. 

 Paige sat and played like this for at least 45 minutes. She really loved what Santa brought for her. 

 This was the first year since Adam and I have been together that we were able to stay home all day on Christmas Day. It was so nice. Anyone who wanted to come over was welcome, but we wanted to be home. I made a big meal for dinner (turkey, dressing, mashed potatoes, corn, rolls). It was good but next year I may simplify and buy a turkey already made to heat up. I'm all about simplifying these days. 

December 26th:

On the third day of Christmas we celebrated with Adam's mom, step dad, sister, and her boyfriend. We went to Winslow for lunch and to open gifts. 

You will notice as the days go on I took less and less pictures. I at least got some though. Paige was more than happy to sit in front of the tree for some pictures. Ella was too worried about opening gifts to cooperate with my picture taking. 

 Ella is obviously thrilled with this GIANT ball. We were going to make her wait until spring to play with it outside since it's so huge, but Adam had a weak moment. It's currently sitting upstairs blown up. 

Paige was in full on present mode again. She loved her gifts! 

Ella was thrilled with this surprise box of 40 shopkins!

 

Christmas is exhausting!!

By Saturday night we had toys everywhere and our house was a mess. I couldn't take it anymore so I did some cleaning out and organizing. I even took our upstairs tress down. I would have taken our tree down in our living room, but we still had one more celebration to do. Three hours later I had everything organized and clean upstairs.  

December 27th: 

We had our last Christmas celebration with Adam's dad, sister, and boyfriend at our house. We kept it simple and ordered pizza. I unfortunately didn't even get my camera out, but I did snap a couple of pictures with my phone. 

Ella got a new lego set that should keep her busy for quite some time. Let's hope I can keep track of all 365 pieces. 

Paige's life is officially complete. She now has her own phone and remote which are her two favorite things. 

We received a nice gift as well. Sometimes the best gifts aren't things, and we greatly appreciate our gift from Poppy! 

Later that day after everyone was gone I immediately started taking down the tree. Once it's over, it's over! I had everything taken down and packed away without a trace of Christmas in our house by Sunday night. 

This was such a special Christmas because it was Paige's first Christmas and our first Christmas as a family of four. I'm thankful to our families who made it such a nice Christmas for our girls and Adam and I as well. Christmas 2015 will be etched in my memory forever.