Life Lately - January/February edition

Time to play catch up again! My last post was at the beginning of January and here it is already mid February. Time flies when you are having fun!!

We have had some unseasonably warm days here lately. Ella had her friend, Jossalyn, over after school, and it was the perfect day to play outside. I am so thankful Ella has such good school friends. 

Paige is looking more and more like a two year old and less like a toddler everyday. She is always busy. When she is not playing she is probably into something she shouldn't be. She talks up a storm. Her vocabulary amazes me. She seems to pick up new words daily. Paige is such a joy, but the girl wears me out! 

Paige has figured out how to kiss. It's the sweetest thing to see her pucker up and know she wants to kiss you. This girl is pure sugar!! 

Ella had a pj day for spirit week in January. She is all about participating in spirit week. It would make my life so much easier if she could just wear pj's everyday. 

Paige is obsessed with her zipadeezips. She has slept in one since she was five months old. I just bought the last size they have for this spring and summer so after that I'm not sure what we will do. 

Adam was out of town for a week in January. Ella sleeps with me while he is gone. We typically go to bed after Paige goes to sleep and watch tv. Ella obviously loves it. 

 Adam turned 37 a few weeks ago. We celebrated by going to Kanpai, and then coming home for some bday cake. 

Ella picked out this shirt for Adam for his birthday, and then had to have one just like him. They love to play minecraft together. 

Paige had her first cold/ear infection in January. It was so not fun. The poor girl could not sleep. On day four of the cold she woke up with a fever, and cried almost all day. After a trip to the doctor I found out she had an ear infection. She was started on Amoxicillin. She HATED it just like Ella. I had to hide it in yogurt and yogurt smoothies just to get it down her. We didn't leave the house for days so once she was feeling better I introduced her to my favorite lunch at Moe's. 

Last week we had a couple of warm days so Paige and I soaked up the sun. We love taking walks around the neighborhood. 

Paige turned 21 months on 2.11.17. 

Autumn came over to play, and Ella realized she had the same outfit as Autumn. Ella changed so they could match when we went to Target. These two have the cutest bond with each other. I love to listen to their conversations. 

  Ella's class visited the third grade at the east campus last week. Ella has been at the north campus since Kindergarten. It's her last year there, and it makes me sad just thinking bout it. I didn't think this day would come, but here we are. Ella is not excited at all the be switching to the main campus so I can only hope it goes well. 

Ella's class had their last party on Valentine's Day. It is her last party at North campus. She has been with these friends since Kindergarten so next school year will be totally different. 

Snowy days

We woke up to some snow flurries yesterday which dropped only about an inch of snow. All Evansville schools were out EXCEPT Ella's school. The joys of private school. :/ Looking back I should have just taken Ella in a little later, but I didn't realize just how slick the roads were until I headed there. It was bad, and by the time I got home I was not happy. I slid out of the parking lot into the street coming out of school. Never again! 
Paige and I still made the most of the snowy day and played in it for a little bit. Ella hated snow as a toddler, and Paige loves it. They are as different as night and day. 

Once Ella got home from school I took them both out to play, and we stayed out until we were almost frozen. Paige had so much fun. She threw a major fit when we came in. I think she just loved playing with Ella. Ella would probably never admit it, but I think she got a thrill out of helping Paige sled. Some days it's so hard being a mother of two kids with such a big age difference, and some days it's so rewarding to see them together. I was so proud of Ella for sledding with Paige again and again, because Paige wanted her to. That is a big deal for her to do that! 

Perfect snow for a snow angel

Paige got the biggest kick out of Ella throwing a snow ball at her. 

Big sisters are perfect sledding partners!

Four Christmases | 2016 Edition

Christmas has come and gone, and it was a whirlwind as usual. We had four straight days of Christmas this year. Throw a stomach bug in there, and it made for an interesting Christmas. 
Let's recap!
Christmas Eve Eve:
We did Christmas with Adam's dad and step mom at our house. I was just getting over the stomach bug and little did I know Paige still had it. We made the most of our time together though. We ordered pizza, opened gifts, and visited. 

Huge candy cane or sledge hammer? 

 My father in law is so creative when it comes to wrapping. One year he poked a whole in duck tape, and put our money in the hole. Lol! I got the biggest kick out of the fact he added an extra zero on this hundred. 

After everyone left Ella and I made cookies for Santa. I can't even believe how big Ella is getting. 

Christmas Eve: 

I was up with Paige at 3am cleaning up puke in her bed. That poor girl just could not kick this stomach bug. After about an hour or so I had everything clean, and we were back to bed. Adam woke up that morning feeling terrible so he stayed home, and I took the girls to my parent's house by myself. Before we left Paige broke out in the mysterious rash on her back. I'm hoping next Christmas we won't have any illness, because it definitely made Christmas a lot more stressful. 

Ella and Autumn love to open gifts together. It's of course the first thing we do, because they can not wait. 

 Paige got in on the action as well. 

By the afternoon they were in their pjs and played minecraft. Ella loves to play minecraft, and she got Autumn hooked now too. 

We ate, drank, and had a fun time on Christmas eve. I always love Christmas with my family. 

Christmas Day:

Ella busted in our room at 5am so excited over the fact that Santa left her a hatcnhimal. I told her on Christmas Eve that if she wakes up when it's still dark she can come down to see what Santa left her but she had to go back to bed until the sun came up. I even told her that if she received a hatcnhimal she could take that back to bed with her. That obviously didn't happen. 

We still had to wait for Paige and daddy to get up so by the time 7:00 rolled around Ella was tired and bored from waiting. 

Paige finally got up around 7:30, and it was time to open gifts. Paige figured out the unwrapping gifts part of Christmas so she was all about it on Christmas Day. 

All I wanted for Christmas was pictures of my girls together, and they were both happy to do that for me. 

Paige learning from the best gift opener around!

It was so fun watching Ella open gifts. The looks of shock were so cute. I have a feeling this might be the last year Ella believes in Santa so I definitely soaked it up this year. 

When Ella figured out Santa brought her a hover board. 

Christmas Chaos....

I have cooked a big meal on Christmas the past two years, but it didn't happen this year. We were all pretty exhausted and ended up ordering Chinese. It was delicious! Paige threw up in her bed during nap that day and broke out in a rash. I gave her benadryl to help with the itching, and it made her extremely irritable. I won't be doing that again. It was a Christmas day to remember!

Day After Christmas:

Everyone woke up well this past Monday. It was our first normal day in a week so I was thankful for no puke finally! 

We had Christmas with Adam's mom, step dad, sister, and her boyfriend that afternoon. Before we left I wanted to get a family picture. This is the best we could get with a self timer. 

We had lunch, opened gifts, and hung out most of the day. It was unseasonably warm so it was a nice day to sit out on the porch and watch the rain. 

We had a great Christmas, but it was definitely a little stressful dealing with the sickness we had going on. We still enjoyed a lot of food, family time, and fun!