Pretty dress day

Yesterday, the girls wore their "Pretty Dresses". Leah wore my favorite little jumper dress that use to be Haley's. I love this dress so much. I remember Haley in it with little pig tails. I don't have access to the old pictures of Haley right now, but I would like to post one of Haley and of Leah in this dress. It took me so long to get a smile one of Leah b/c she was on the go! Haley did a funny smile haha. But, I got them both together even though Leah wanted to run away.

Happy 61st Birthday Grandma!

My mom turned 61 on Friday. Haley was so excited to have it be Grandma's birthday. She asked everyday for a week if it was her birthday. She gave her card she made for her and we gave her our gifts in the morning. We went to the Olive Garden for dinner with my brother and mom. The girls were great there. I am so weary of taking Leah out at this age. She's so active and doesn't like to sit still. Both girls ate mac and cheese and bread sticks. Leah ate crackers and nutragrain bar while we waited and Haley colored. The weather started to get bad while we were there so we made dinner pretty short. It was nice quiet dinner with no craziness! We then came home and sang Happy Birthday to mom and ate her VERY chocolate cake. Lyndsay made her cake. It's chocolate cake with ganache in the middle and chocolate cream cheese frosting. I guess I can say Mom has a sweet tooth haha.

Grandma and her granddaugthers

Today, mom got Leah up from her nap. Normally 3-4 is my time. It's my "General Hospital" time. I am lucky that Leah is normally sleeping during that time, but sometimes she wakes up. So, mom got her up today while I finished watching the last 15 minutes. Haley ran up and told me to hurry up and take a picture of grandma and Leah b/c she was sitting with grandma. Leah never sits with us. If she does, for like a total of 10 seconds and then wants down. She wants to explore and do her own thing. She sat with grandma and ate the Daddy in from Haley's old dollhouse. haha. She loves the Daddy to eat. Anyway, I got a nice one of Leah and Grandma and then of grandma and the girls. The snoopy Haley is holding is the one that my friends Lyndsay and Kristen gave me when my dad passed away 11 1/2 years ago. She's been playing with it all day today. Snoopy is one of my favorite cartoon characters.

Sisterly Love

Can you tell my girls love each other? I just can't get over how big Leah is now compared to Haley. Soon, she'll be passing Haley up in height. I do believe Leah will be taller then Haley.

Leah and Mommy Day

Today Leah and I had a day together. She had a gift card from Toys R Us that I never used for Christmas, so I thought it would be a good day to get her out of the house. We shopped for like 2 hours! She was so good the whole time. The thing with Leah, if you give her food or her pacifier she's a happy baby haha. If she gets bored of that, then not so much. We looked at everything there. I got such a good deals! I got Leah 2 pairs of tennis shoes for under $10, 2 pairs of sandals for under $4, two pairs of jelly shoes for next summer for under $4, 2 capri outfits and a 1 piece winter 24 months for next winter. All for under $50. I got Haley a little prize with a $5 gift card I had from Christmas. She got a Strawberry Shortcake little doll. I loved her when I was little. I was so excited to find a little doll. Haley loves those little dolls so it was perfect. It came with a little cat and an 11 minute DVD of episode of Strawberry Shortcake. I do admit she has changed a bit from when I was little, but still very cute. Over all, we had a great day. I love the first picture of Leah and all her teeth. She was actually looking at Joe on Blue's clues. This is how excited she gets when she see's Joe or Steve. I think it's pretty funny..haha

Future Cheerleader?

I found an old cheerleader costume while I was cleaning out the "chill room" closet. Haley just loeved it. She put it on and was pretending she was a cheerleader with her pom pom's. Do I have a future cheerleader on my hands? Only time will tell!

Valentine's Day

Valentine's Day wasn't really a special day this year. The girls were both still sick. So, unfortuantely we didn't get to do anything. We did manage to get a few funny pictures. My mom had gotten both girls matching red velvet dresses and tiny teddy bears holding hearts. I wanted to get a cute picture of the two of them and the three of us. Well, you can see how they turned out haha. Someone I didn't realize how messy the room was from the girls playing and then Jersey..who knows what she was doing. Then Leah wanted no part in a picture with her sister and it was lunch time. You can't get in between food and Leah haha. I did get a few cute ones of Haley while Leah was napping. I guess I tried! haha

Haley did make a really nice card for my grandpa. I cut out hearts three different sizes and she colored them and taped them onto a card. Then wrote her name and Haley's and to grandpa. My mom took it over to him in the nursing home. He liked it so much he read it twice! She was so proud of it. She loves grandpa so much, but is scared at the nursing home of some of the residents. I tell her that they are there just like grandpa is there for different reasons. I don't blame her though b/c I get kind of scared myself. I just try to go very quickly to his room when I have the girls.

These are the little bears that my mom got the girls. I got the girls cards this year. Haley did get new Hello Kitty underwear and Leah got a few new capri outfits.

And we have a PONYTAIL!!!

So, today I decide to try a ponytail in baby's hair today. TA DA! It's perfect length for a pebble do! I use to do these on Haley when she was like 6 months haha. Leah never had even enough hair for this. I'm so excited that now I can play with her hair. hehe This defintely the fun part of having girls :)

ps. She wouldn't stop eating the puzzle so this was the best picture I got haha.

Questions, Questions and more Questions

Haley is at the stage that she is asking so many questions. For example,
"What makes the earth and wind?" My non-biological answer.."A windy
Day." haha. "What would happen if someone had three eyes?" The question that I had to use the "ask your daddy" answer..."How do you get pregnant?" I was certainly not ready to answer that one. Especially in 4 year old terms. She asked me if a doctor puts the baby in you and then the doctor takes it out in the hospital. I said, well sometimes it happens like that. I could not go into anymore details. I just wasn't ready. So, honey you will have a ton of questions to answer when you get back haha. This picture is from last Friday when I got my hair cut. I felt like it was sooo short. It got messed up b/c of the snow but it came out pretty cute.

The Up's and Down's of Parenting..and French Vanilla Creamer

I feel like most of the time on my blog I tell everyone about the good times we have. But, honestly, 1/2 the time it's not all happy go lucky. I think we all know that. I'm at a point right now that I have had a super long month and half. It first started out with Leah starting to teeth 6 teeth at a time. She would wake up every hour to two hours screaming for a pacifier. That means I had to get up and give it to her. That started the sleep deprivation. It has just continued since then. Dave left at the beginning of Jan. That just sucked. Here I am again, along without my husband and living with my mother. I know I didn't have to move back with my mom, but honestly, I want the help. I don't NEED the help. I'm perfectly capable of doing this on my own. I have done this so many times by myself. That is just what a military wife gets use to. It's a luxury to have your husband home for more than 3 weeks for me. We just get ourselves back to normal bickering and all..then he's gone again. So, anyway, we moved back to Ohio and bang mom gets sick. She's sick for over 5 days. There goes my help for those 5 days. She gets better than Leah starts waking up in the middle of the night for hours upon hours. Haley did this at 15 months. She would be awake for 5 to 6 hours at a time in the middle of the night. I was working at WEST the afternoon shift 4-12am and would get home and have to stay up with Haley. Mom would help me thank goodness. I don't know how I survived. I think it was her molars when she did this, but I'm not exactly sure. It was my first time around as a mom, and I guess I didn't know you were suppose to keep track of all that stuff. I did a good job, but kind of lost count after she turned 1. Leah though, I'm right on with her records. So, that brings me to the point of my blog. Leah is making me get gray hair. I'm not even kidding! I have seen more gray hair and it's making me even more depressed. She's been up constantly every night for hours or will wake several times a night for a pacifier. Right now, she has a cold and is trying to teeth her last 4 teeth. Life just kind of sucks right now. On top of that, I have a head cold that won't go away b/c I'm barely sleeping. I think what made me write this is because I was trying to put her down for a nap and she's just screaming. How could a baby who was up for 2 1/2 hours during the night not be tired? Why do my kids do this and no one elses do? Sometimes I feel like I am the only one that goes through this stuff. I don't know any one's kids that don't sleep. Is there something wrong with them? Haley has gotten a lot better. She can sleep a solid 10-12 hours, unless like last night when she's woke up by her screaming sister. Okay, so I guess I'm getting my frustration out. I'm not asking for advice from anyone, just to know that this is what is happening in my life. I guess right now it's the "downside" of parenting. I just feel like I'm so sleep deprived. I'm not one that can take naps. I just have been relying on some coffee. Thank GOD for coffee. I don't know how I functioned without drinking it when Haley was 15 months. Maybe I should say Thank GOD for french vanilla creamer. Without that, I could not drink coffee. Yes, Thank GOD for French Vanilla Creamer. It's a lifesaver!

Sick Babies

The girls caught the bug...well the cold bug. Haley had it worst on Monday and Tuesday. Today she was much better just a little nasally today. Last night, Leah was up every 2 hours screaming. She was all snotty and just not feeling well. She took only a 40 minutes nap today during nap time. Then she fell asleep at 5:30. I made sure she only slept a half hour. She wasn't to happy about that. Haley was back to herself tonight. We made chocolate chip cookies from my new Bisquick recipe book. They were yummy! The girls are sleeping right now. Let's just hope they continue to stay sleeping all night :)

A new Game

Leah has been getting into EVERYTHING. She is such a curious baby. She doesn't like being pinned up and always tries to escape any kind of blocks. So, I decided to give up. I put the gate up to the kitchen and just blocked the area that is a not baby proofed and let her go. She thinks it's so fun now! She's having a ball. She loves to get into her food and snacks. She comes out holding stuff and talks and talks. Well, baby talk of course. I think she said "G" in the bathtub tonight when she was holding the "G" letter. I love the second picture on her, it's of Leah's little diaper butt haha. It's just so appropriate b/c those are the only pictures I get of her anymore of her on the move. She is one busy little baby. So, unlike how Haley was. Haley was so calm and so content being pinned in. Never tried to escape..Leah's totally different. So, curious about everything and wanting to see everything and touch and eat everything. I love that my kids are different. It just makes parenting them more fun and exciting to have two different personalities.

Sledding Fun!

On Sunday Haley and I went sledding for the first time with Val, Erica, Paul and Papa. We went to Mill Creek Park. I had a lot of fun, but Haley haha not so much. She liked going down the big hill, but not having the snow in her face. She went down 1 time with me, then snow got in her face and she said that was enough. Well, we did convince her to go down three more times. It was so cute watching her walk up the HUGE hill to the top. I had a hard time walking and she kept slipping and sliding. I wish we could of gone down a few more times, but it was cold and it's tiring. I'm glad we left when we did, because Haley started coming down with a cold on the way home from Val's. She said her throat hurt and then it was full fledge that night. Poor little girl! So, we haven't played in this blizzard since Sunday. Maybe next weekend..

Happy "Early" Valentine's Day

Dave sent me a Valentine's Day gift through the mail. I got it a few days ago but decided to wait to open it. Well, he hinted it might now be good by the time I opened it on V-day. So, he let me open it early :) It was 5 chocolate heart roses and a box of chocolates. YUM! They were so good. Haley as you can tell, was more than excited to see chocolate. I think she has her grandma's chocolate addiction. Thank you honey :) I love the chocolate and love you. Happy Early Valentine's Day!!!

Snow Days

This snow was so crazy we got last night. I think at my mom's there was 9 inches. I really wanted to take Haley out today. She hasn't really gotten to play in this much snow before. We took her out 1 time last year, but not this year yet. I bundled her up from head to toe. I put three different layers on her. I did the same for myself plus 3 pairs of socks. We were all set to go out. Haley first thing thing fell right in the snow pretty much face first. She laughed though. She had so much fun. We tried to make a snowman, but it wasn't packing snow. We were out only about 1/2 hour. I didn't want to get to cold, especially with all this flu going around. I'm glad I got to take her out though. I felt like I was a kid again playing with her. I can't wait till both girls can go out and play. So much fun! Now all we need is a sled. Mom, went to Walmart but couldn't find any. I guess they were all sold out. I think I'm gonna go on a hunt tomorrow for one.

Dancey Dance Day

I have been doing a lot of cleaning out of my mom's house the last few days. Dave and I are planning on staying with my mom a few months after he gets out of the Navy so we can get our bearings back and then find a place of our own. Well, I have found some fun things the last few days. I found old dance things, old toys, costumes..etc. It's so fun looking through these old things. It brings back my dance memories. I miss it so much :) It's fun though seeing these things through Haley's eyes. She thinks everything is so fun! She played with this shamrock guy I had from college days all evening. We ended up losing him somehow, but I'm sure we'll be on the hut for him tomorrow.

"Saved" by Haley

Today Haley wrote a story. She was very upset that we weren't going to Kohl's today to buy a new toy that she remembered from the last trip two months ago haha..so I tried to divert her attention to something else. So, she decided to write a story for her cousin Jason. She drew and wrote the letters and pictures all by herself. She named it "Saved". Just in case you can't read her writing, it's about a princess named Onalen (Haley made up her name) and the witch named Vampire locked her in a castle. The prince named Kevin came and rescued her and that was the end. :) I hope you all enjoy it.