Kids Not Included

Preview of The Paper Chick's first weeks class.

Okay, I better update the blog before you angry blog readers attack me in my sleep. We're doing okay on our own, Kendall has recently acquired the annoying habit of waking up around 6am. Today it was about 6:15 but yesterday I got the wake up call around 5 and then we had a bit of a power struggle until 6:30. Not fun. But, other then that we're good. She has been saying a lot of funny things lately. Here ya go...

She repeatedly informs me of things that she should not eat, "Is that paper? I don't eat paper" or "I don't eat dirt" "I don't eat toilet paper"...

She keeps telling me, "I'm so tall". Ah, sure honey, you keep telling yourself that.

This morning in bed she snuggled in close to me and asked to hold my hand. We were all cuddled up and I told her that I loved her and she said, "You stinky mommy" Ah, hello, you woke me up, you are in my bed with your head on my pillow and you are complaining about my breath? Of course she is unaware of the source of the smell so she says, "You change your diaper mommy?"

She has always loved books but the last week she has been even more in to them. She will sit and look at a stack of books for an hour. Another love that has been rekindled lately is any and all baby dolls. Kate kept trying to get to Mimi today so I went upstairs to find her a little doll of her own, we came down with about five "Mimis". Kendall holds three and Kate holds two. Kendall rocks back and forth with them and shhhhh's them. Kate shoves their hands into her mouth or she attacks them on the floor and "kisses" their bald heads.

Brian sent out an email that said he had ate "Pig Lung Soup". Ah, gross! This is the man that claims my cooking is too "adventurous" because I try new recipes. He is in for it now. If he can eat that or chicken with its head still on he can try my Beef and Butternut Squash Chili. By the way, he has had that chili but I called it "Winter Soup" and he liked it. He later realized that it was squash and not potatoes and now refuses to eat it (he had it about four times first though).

I'm All Alone...

We watch Shrek a little too often here at our house (maybe because it's the ONLY kid's DVD that we own) at one point in the movie Donkey sings, "I'm all alone, there's no one here beside me..." and that is running through my head this morning. Brian is off on his adventure to China, I hope that he has fun and stays safe. He deserves this and I know that he is looking forward to it. So B if you are reading this, have fun and don't worry about us I'll 'hold down the fort'. Also, I had every intention to slip sweet cards into your luggage but they didn't make it, :( sorry! With Brian goes my camera so we'll be relying on Lorie for photos. I do have a few from yesterday to show you though.

Also, Kendall is learning new words with this holiday season and the influx of new characters has kind of mixed her up. She calls ghosts, "goats" and then when she saw a goat in a book she called it a "moose" Wha? Huh? Every store we go to has a headless or bloody man in their decorations and Kendall cracks me up because she just stares at it then says, "Is that scary?" So I just say, "No, he's not scary it's just pretend" and she says, "OH okay, can I touch it?" Oh how I wish it were that easy for me to get over my fears!

Last night we went to a wedding. I had so much fun. I loved having that time 'alone' time (with all the other people, ha) with my husband. I'm so thankful to have Lorie here, she kept both of my kids. I think it may have been the first time that someone other then me put Kate to bed, I gave Lorie the directions and told her that Kate will just roll over and close her eyes and not even cry. Lorie said that Kate wasn't buying it, Kate looked at her as if she were saying, "Are you crazy lady?" She did roll over though, and immediately sat up and started crying. Poor Lorie. But she went to sleep (Kate not Lorie) and Brian and I stayed out till 11pm! Man, we're party animals. Note that the last five pictures are courtesy of last night's babysitter. I laid out the girls' costumes because I thought Lorie might bring her camera :)

Just busy living here. Brian leaves on Sunday for China, so sad. But mom comes on Thursday, yippee. Last night the four of us spent some time in the basement due to Tornado Warnings (or was it Watch, whichever is more severe-I think). I actually enjoyed it. I love watching Brian with our girls, he is so sweet. Kendall was just standing next to him talking his ear off and he was sitting on the ground just listening and rubbing her little back, cute. Tomorrow I'm taking the girls to a local garden with a picnic lunch for a Halloween event, they'll be wearing their borrowed costumes so stay tuned for pictures. The girls are actually each wearing Anna's 1st and 2nd Halloween costumes, I'm so creative this year, aren't I?

I've really been trying to live in every moment lately, Kendall and Kate are both growing up SO fast. Kendall carries on a full conversation with you and is so funny and Kate is already trying to pull up on stuff. She is such a happy girl and she thinks Kendall is pretty cool (even though Kendall is still having a bit of a hard time sharing with her). I did see a bit of improvement today but I changed strategies a bit. I was being super watchful to see her doing something nice and I made a huge deal out of it. She still had plenty of 'bad' moments but there was some improvement I think. Tomorrow is a fresh new day so we'll get to try all over again.

I'm Exhausted

At night as I'm putting the girls to bed I think in my head, "Tonight I'm going to stay up late and get some cleaning done" for instance as I was feeding Kate tonight I decided that I would mop the kitchen floor as soon as Kendall was in bed. But then I sit down and sort of become one with the chair and all my energy is gone. So much for good intentions.

This past week we had Jessy with us, she is such an awesome kid. I'm so proud of who she is and we had a great time with her. I hardly changed a diaper the whole time she was here and she would just jump in without being asked, feeding Kate or doing whatever needed to be done.

Saturday we drove up to Indiana for Sarah's absolutely beautiful wedding. The flowers were amazing, the cake was beautiful and the dresses (brides and bridesmaids) were just gorgeous. I was very impressed. Kendall was in heaven going from one person to the next asking to be held. I was a tiny bit embarrassed she made it seem as though she is neglected at home. Really, she is just a lovey girl and has been that way since birth.

I took Kate in to the pediatrician this afternoon, I thought she may have an ear infection. Since Kendall had so many I am hyper-aware of ear infection symptoms. But, I was wrong, it's just a cold. She did warn me that they have seen a lot of ear infections at the end of this cold so to be looking out for one. Don't worry lady, I'll be there, I want to nip those things in the bud!

I'm working on a couple ideas for more online Paper Chick classes. These will be short (week long) classes that will help you to make personalized gifts for the holidays. Each will be only $5 and you will get a discount if you sign up for all of them (5 or 6 I haven't decided). I have the email addresses of all of you that took the previous class but if you are interested in receiving information about the upcoming ones send me your email address.

Throwing it Back

Kate is learning to drink from a sippy cup. She has found that the easiest way is to just throw your head back and let the force pull the water into your mouth.

Toy Tornado

I'm not against toys, I love that my girls have toys to choose from, I especially love toys that encourage them to a) be creative b) use their brains. However, I am against the explosion of toys that has taken over our house. Since we "live" on the first floor and the girls' rooms are upstairs I can't expect them to keep all of their toys in their rooms. I have found that if there are a TON of toys out that the girls are actually more bored then entertained. I always have kept about half of the toys in the basement in boxes and we would rotate them upstairs so that things seemed 'new' but I find that I don't rotate often enough or that things come up and nothing goes down. SO last week I started a new toy sorting idea. I got four large plastic bins and divided all of the toys into them (with the exception of puzzles, balls, legos, books which are always out) all the bins are in our hall closet and every day a different bin is out. Kendall has been playing with things that have sat untouched in our living room for the past 6 months. She is also so much better about cleaning up because she knows exactly where everything goes...into the bin!

It's not as easy as it looks.

Lorie is a great photographer...

Sometimes the girls give her a hard time though.