So proud

Charlotte is so busy. Her newest thing? Standing up! No, she's not even 7 1/2 months old. Yikes, we're in trouble here!

She loves to pull herself up, where she can. She is still really wobbly, but her crib is a great place to practice since it's soft when she falls. Her favorite place though is the dwarf lemon tree. We keep it inside in the winter since it can't handle the freezing temperatures. She loves to pull herself up and eat the dirt.

I love this picture. The girls adore Charlotte and she them. They make her smile when no one else can. She giggles, laughs and talks to them all the time. If they're not playing with her she starts "yelling"-- you know, to get their attention.

I love this picture because it shows how proud she is of herself!! Seriously adorable.

Time is flying by

How is time going by so fast? One minute I think it's August, and all of a sudden it's almost December. I blink and a day is gone. I blink twice and a month is gone. I feel like I'm scrambling just to catch the special moments because they're only here for a split second.
My children are growing right before my very eyes. My sweet Emily has matured so much just since she began school that I can hardly believe it. She's a little girl now. Not a baby, not even a big toddler. She can do monkey bars on her own, asks how to get to heaven, and talks about germs in her body.

She is starting to put words together and just seems so big. Helping with chores, taking care of Charlotte, helping me cook, taking care of herself, caring about other people's feelings. It was just yesterday that she was a baby Charlotte's size. Wasn't it?

Nan speaks like a 4 yr old with a little 2 yr old voice. She asks for things that 2 yr olds don't often think about-- things like healthy snacks, cuddles, songs. She seems so big as she shares with Charlotte, gets herself a drink, practices using the bathroom (be there soon, hopefully!) and can actually draw things, like spiders and people now.

She seems so big when she picks out her own clothes and puts them on. When she tells me how the leaf truck works and what schoolbuses do. She seems so big when she puts her plate by the sink. And even when I cuddle her at night, I marvel at how she is too big for a crib now and has to sleep in her twin bed. How her pants which she's been wearing for a year, now come above her ankles. Wasn't I just holding her little newborn body in my arms, marveling at what a beautiful baby she was?

Even Charlotte is growing. Did you know that she crawls now? She started being mobile before 6 months and two weeks ago, at 6 1/2 months she officially start crawling. Don't you like the above picture? She just finished eating a brownie that Nathalie had given her. Today she pulled herself up into a standing position in her crib! Stay a baby Charlotte! Don't grow up (but please, please, start sleeping through the night).

Charlotte, my sweet little girl. The one who looks at me and says, "mamamamama". The first baby to say my name before their dad's. The earliest crawler, the most precious cuddler. Please, baby, stay little.

My children are growing so fast. I love seeing them grow. I love each new milestone for each of my daughters. I'm so glad that they are growing. But it's going by so quickly. Before I know it, they'll be gone.

I love them so.

A Tale of Dragonfire, Three Brave Knights and Two Damsels in Distress

Once upon a warm fall morning in the faraway land of Ohio, sat two damsels. The damsels, after spending a morning of labor, were enjoying the fruits of Etsy-ville. "Think you," said the first damsel, to the second, "that these are cuter than the first?" The second damsel replied, "Ladybugs, Mommy."

At that moment the first damsel heard a noise coming from a nearby laundry cave wherein were housed two dragons, the Water-Washing Dragon and the Fire-Drying Dragon. Normally all humankind had good relations with these dragons and provided them with much nourishment. But on this day, the Fire Dragon had had enough. She bumped the Water Dragon, who made the noise, then started spewing fire out her throat.

The first damsel ran to the cave, expecting to see the Water Dragon's rage everywhere. Instead she noticed the Fire Dragon's wrath and saw flames heading toward her. Quickly she moved the nourishment out of the way of the Fire Dragon's fire and grabbed her magic red metal wand. "E-gads! I must have bravery or we all perish. Pull, squeeze, sweep!" she thought as she waved her magic wand over the Fire Dragon.

The Fire Dragon was subdued. The damsel in distress then did what any self-respecting damsel would do. She called the wise man.

"Ah, dear daughter! How good to hear from you!" said the wise-man. "I give you this counsel. Heed it well to calm the Fire Dragon and preserve your lives. Call in the three brave red knights on their trusty steed. Have them best the Fire Dragon."

Trusting in the sage's advice, the damsel called the three red brave knights. They arrived in their red and chrome glory and jumped out to the rescue. "Don't worry, brave knights," said the damsel. "I have conquered the Fire Dragon and am only asking for some knowledge."


The two of the brave knights went into the dragon's lair, whereon they found that if they so much as touched the dragon's throat, fire spewed forth again. However, thanks to their courage, they removed the fire cord of the Fire Dragon. "Damsel," said the oldest of the knights, " 'Tis a simple fix. To truly change the Fire Dragon, you must replace it's fire cord with that of a better tempermant. Only then can you live without fear of the Fire Dragon's wrath."

"I thank ye kindly, dear brave knight!" exclaimed the damsel. And with that thanks, she escorted the knight back to his horse. Where she found the second damsel ready to ride the red and chrome steed with her knight in shining armor. Luckily the first damsel convinced the second to stay by her side always and they returned to their cottage.

The End.

*********************************************************************************
We had so many blessings this morning. One, that I was home when the dryer vent caught fire. Two, that the washing machine made an unusual loud noise that caught my attention and took me to the laundry room. Three, that there was a fire extinguisher right next to the laundry room. Four, that even though I've never used a fire extinguisher, I was given the knowledge immediately on how to use it. Five, that my dad convinced me to the call the fire department. Six, that the fire department responded promptly, thereby being on the scene when the vent caught fire again. And seven, most important, that Matt and Charlotte slept through it all.

I have known this for some time but today it was really evidenced to me that I have a loving Heavenly Father who is truly watching out for me and protecting my family.

I can't help but feel like a bad mom

We spent the weekend at my in-laws house (the girls and I), checking my husband's grandma while my in-laws are out of town. At some point I was feeding Charlotte and Emily asked for a pb&j sandwich. I feel like I say, "Just a minute!" way too much to the girls, so I asked if she could make one herself. And she did!

And then tonight, at 7:40, I was putting Charlotte to sleep. Emily told me she was tired so I asked her to brush her teeth and go downstairs to read books. She brushed her teeth and decided she was going to bed. She walked past me, said, "Good night Mom" and climbed into bed. When I checked on her literally 4 minutes later, she was out.

Nathalie was waiting for me to read books to her...but got tired while I was putting Charlotte to bed. (And I put Charlotte to bed from 7:35 to 7:45 tonight, it's not like I took an hour!). So she came upstairs and climbed in bed all by herself.

I put Charlotte down and she fussed for a minute, then fell asleep all by herself.

I know I should probably be celebrating that all these things happened without me nagging, rocking, singing, repeating.... but I can't help but feel like I failed. Shouldn't I be putting Emily to bed instead of her putting herself to bed? Shouldn't I be rocking Charlotte to sleep, cuddling with Nathalie and getting Emily a pb&j? What's wrong with me?

Imagine a circle...

Our main floor is basically a circle. You enter into the living room/foyer area. Straight ahead is the kitchen. Obviously stairs are to your right and the living room is to the left....


Here is the foyer. The living room and foyer are one big room. BIG room. Right now I have the couch making some kind of a division, but I'm going to get a table to put behind the couch to make it more distinct as well as a rug in the living room to kind of bring all the furniture "in", if you understand. The stairs are a flat paint, chocolate brown. Ugggggly. And they're really dirty since flat paint is hard to clean. Matt and I are probably going to carpet the upper half of the stairs and replace the lower half because they're also really squeaky.

Here is the living room. The fireplace is actually a little less purple, but ugly nonetheless. Matt and I aren't sure what we're going to do with it long-term. It's not wood-burning, so pretty much useless in our eyes. Matt wants to rip it out...but I'm not so sure. Look at the french doors on the right side. That leads you into the dining room....

Here is the dining room. It's really big!! Our table, which looked so big in our little apartment, has oodles of room to spare in the dining room. We will be keeping the dining room mostly the way it is. We're going to replace the windows eventually and put a little window seat there and we may be knocking out a partial wall to open it to the kitchen a little more, but we'll see. You see the picture on the right side of the little window? Right next to that picture is the entrance to the kitchen from the dining room.

Here's the kitchen from the dining room entrance. This is where our next major renovations start. The cabinets have GOT to go. The floor is shoddily done and doesn't go under the cabinets. The stove and refrigerator are both free-standing and in the way. We have several ideas, but the most popular one right now is to move to the stove over to where the cabinets are, then knock out part of the doorframe between the foyer and kitchen and put the fridge there. I will lose my pantry, but we're going to use a small cut-out area in this wonky kitchen and put shelves there. There is a built in original chimney in the middle of one of the kitchen walls (you can't see it) and we're having a hard time working around that because we're not even going to try and remove the chimney. We'll be replacing the floors with tile instead and putting a maple wood countertop in. We will have white cabinets which will be on the bottom and then, because the kitchen is small, put shelves on the top to leave it a little more open.This will be next summer's project. And we'll try to do most of it in a few days so that we're not without a kitchen!

Right next to the refrigerator and on the left of me if I'm standing in the doorway of the dining room looking into the kitchen is the doorway to my LAUNDRY ROOM AND EXTRA HALF BATH!!! Oh my GOODNESS I love this room. Look at all the cabinets!!! And the farmhouse sink! And an extra half bath!! We will be replacing the floor in here too, because it is lineoleum with paint splatters all over it. We'll probably also be rearranging a few things here, but that's a long-term plan. We're thinking a couple of years out because this room is very functional and mostly attractive the way it is.

Here's a view of the kitchen from the doorway between the foyer and kitchen. See how the fridge sticks out and is in the way of the back door? Yeah, we definitely need to do something like that. Unfortunatly the kitchen is small and we're working around the original chimney. Maybe we'll uncover the chimney (it's been built around with drywall) and put a built-in stove? But that would require TONS of moolah and we don't want to invest everything in this house. So there you have it!! This is the main floor of our house!

The price of a little peace and quiet

You know those times when you realize your children are being really, really quiet? And you think, "Hmmm...I wonder what shenanigans they're in to." Well, I chose to ignore the other day. It sounded better to finish nursing Charlotte in peace than to get up and go investigate.

The great thing about my children is that, after they do the deed, they come and tell me about it! Nathalie, ever my princess, came down a few minutes later and said, "Look Mom! I'm so beautiful!"

Emily wouldn't let me take a picture of her again. Emily had mascara for blush. Nathalie put the mascara on her lips and in her ears. Oh, my ladies.

A Tale of Two Kitties

Halloween 2011. This was the only picture I got of Emily because she's shy. Emily figured out that the more houses she hits, the more candy she gets. We ended up finishing trick-or-treating with Nathalie and me going on another 2 blocks with Emily before she wanted to call it quits. Emily wanted to be a kitty again just like last year and of course, Nathalie wants to be whatever Emily is! And now there's way too much candy for them to eat. Or me.