Got it down

I must say I think I've got handling the girls down to a fine art. We have our little routine. On Thursday morning we went to Target. I had initially planned to have Camille in the front section and Beatrice in the basket portion of the cart but when we got there Camille had fallen asleep. So I wedged her carrier into the basket and stuck Bea in the front section. I was very surprised Bea was great. She normally wants to get out and 'hold me.' But this time she didn't. Maybe it was because I gave her things to hold?? I was able to wedge the rest of my groceries around sleeping Camille. She did wake up, when we were almost done shopping but she was chill. It was a pretty good outing and I'm getting more confident with going out with them by myself. Thursday after school I dragged them to Joann's Fabric store and they were perfect!

Yesterday we gave Ruggers a bath out in the back yard. Bea helped me while Millie was in her bouncy thingy. I got so ambitious that I decided to clean out Rug's gross water bowls... and there were several shiny black widows that came out and I hate spiders in general but I couldn't just let them live! So I ran and got my hiking boots on and dried to mash them. I hope it worked. I'm only slightly worried cause the grass was already wet so I don't know if they were pretending to be dead. The bug guy comes in a couple of weeks and I will definitely inform him of our black widows. But with the black widow scare it made me want to clean off the patio just to be safe. So I did that yesterday as well. After that we came inside the girls watched The Wizard of Oz while I worked on Millie's invitations and sketched out Beatrice's invitations. Beatrice wants to be Dorothy for Halloween and she loves The Wizard of Oz so I decided to throw her a Wizard of Oz themed 3rd birthday party. I've been consumed with that since Halloween stuff is out and I need to think of everything I might need for her party that I might not be able to get in December! We had a full morning and then we were able to relax at Gigi's and Granpy's for homemade lasagna! Yum!

Greek Festival

Yesterday, Uncle Sergio and I took the girls to the Greek Festival. We had gyros and Greek fries, they were so good! Beatrice got to jump in a bounce house and she got to go on some other bounce house like thing. She didn't care for the gyros but she loved watching the people and kids. She 'got' to use the port-a-pottie (yeah that was an adventure.) She didn't quite understand why it didn't flush. As we were walking out of the festival she announced that she needed to use the potty again. I really didn't want to walk all the way back to the potties and I asked her if she could hold it. I didn't really get an answer but I drove to the next town over, maybe like 20 mins away and we stopped at a Baskin and Robbins where she got to use the facilities and picked out a scoop of strawberry ice cream. It was kind of a surprise to me that she chose that. I'd just never gave her the option before, besides one other time at a yogurt place and she chose vanilla. Of course I had to explain to her that she wasn't getting a bowl of strawberries. She ate all of her ice cream and was somewhat well behaved. But it was an interesting day and I would totally go to the Greek fest again.

Millie's Milestones!

This has been a crazy week of milestones for Camille. She's now mastered getting into the sitting up position all by herself. She can sit up all by herself. She can clap and she's even crawled! (Not just her normal army scoot.) She's also determined to stand up. She's been pulling herself up while holding on to things and she doesn't just stop there at sitting on her knees. Oh no! She just stands up, taking some time and lots of thought of course. I've decided that her crib is not safe! She's already gotten her arm caught twice in the thing just tonight!

Millie

Tutu Tucson Pictures

The pictures are out of order but...

Here's Millie's second plane ride. I totally forgot to take pix on her first flight! I don't know what I was thinking!

Bea wanted to take this baby home. But I explained to her that it didn't belong to us.

She's such a good swaddler.

Millie getting sleepy...

Working the cash register.

Millie made the drum work with her heart beat through her hands.

Future vet??

Playing with the train set.

Making hand prints.

She's got the African beat down!

Coloring.

Playing scrabble with Tutu and Zachary.

Lunch with the cousins! Jayden, Zachary, Gracie and Bea. (Josh wasn't there yet.)

Tutu Tucson

Over the weekend we went to Tucson to visit our Arizona cousins! This was Bea and Camille's first trip out there and Camille's first plane flight. They were both perfect on the way over. On the way back was a bit of a different story. I know they were just irritable because they were both tired. It was a long day for everyone.

Our first day there it was fun to see the kids warm up to each other. Beatrice loved it! Saturday morning she woke up wondering if she would get to see her 'friends' again, she later started calling them her cousins, and she also wanted to wake Tutu up. Every morning she did that. It reminded me of when I was little and wanted to do the same thing.

Friday night the kids ended up in Tutu's room unattended and one of Camille's diapers got flushed down the toilet! It was the funniest thing. I walked in there to get something and Gracie says: 'We flushed one of Camille's diapers down the toilet and it worked.' I said: 'That's because it doesn't happen on the first flush, it happens on the second one.' That might have been the wrong thing to say because all the kids then ran to the toilet and flushed it again! They said that it still worked but I could see the water rising. It was so cute and it reminded me of all the shenanigans I got into with my cousins.

The kids had so much fun just playing, swimming, setting up a pretend store and playing boys against girls. One of my favorite memories is when Gracie was going to get her swim suit on and as she was walking down the hall she was saying: 'Tinkerbell is my favorite' (her suit had Tinkerbell on it.) Bea was fast on her heels, her little head down and she said: 'I like Tinkerbell too.' They both disappeared in Tutu's room and when they came out they both had their swim suits on. Grace had helped Bea get her suit on!

Sunday we went to the Children's Museum. The kids had so much fun. Bea loved the dinosaurs and shopping area. There was so much to do there that it was hard to pull the kids away from one section and move on to the other.

It was a lot of fun just to get away and just hang out. Thank you to my Arizona family for such a great time! I love you guys!

Big Changes

Well. As you may you know, I have been laid off. I feel it really has been a long time coming. (Those of you that know the whole back ground can see why.) Anyways. I'm not going to say it was my favorite place to work and I'm not going to say anything negative about it. It is what it is. So today is the first day of.... of what? Of being a stay at home mom? Of hitting the internet for job openings? I really don't know yet. I am just gonna cool it for a few weeks. So I can feel what I feel, try to get over things. Regroup, plan... we'll see. I feel very stuck right now. But I'm just gonna let myself be stuck for a while. Right now I'm going to enjoy the sweet faces of my girls and spending time with them.