Riley's birthday party

Here we are - ready to go to Riley's 3rd birthday party at My Gym. We went to our last My Gym birthday party in December.

Riley lives down the street from us. We're good friends with her parents. Age-wise she's smack dab in the middle of Sophia and Lilly. Well, she's a tad bit closer to Sophia, but not much. I have a feeling the three of them will be good pals in the years to come. Sleep overs, bike rides, etc. Lots of fun things to look forward to.

The girls have been to My Gym a lot lately, but they always seem to have a great time. We were just there on Tuesday for Lilly to cash in on a free class that she received at a birthday party. Sophia was allowed to join the class for the last 20 minutes and she "stole the show" she participated so well.

Of course today it took Sophia an entire hour to warm up. (One hour out of an hour and 1/2 party). Lilly was off exploring on her own out of the gate. There's such a contract (and a lot of similarities too). After the cupcakes were served Sophia decided she actually wanted to play and went off and had a good time. Before that she sulked, cried, hit behind our legs and whined.

Each of them got a free class as part of their goody bag so we'll be going back again soon. At Sophia's age they only offer independent classes meaning the parent doesn't participate in the class. Hmmmm....not sure if that will work with Sophia. I hope it does. I know she would have a good time if she let herself. Can you find Sophia in this picture?

March!

I want to soap box for a bit about my hatred of the month of March.

It's the longest month of the year to me. Spring isn't here yet, maybe the tease of a 60 degree day here and there, but then back to gray, dreary days with fierce winds. Maybe this year will be better, but I don't expect it to be.

There are no "days off" in March. In fact there aren't any days off until Memorial Day at this point. This year will be so much better because Will is off for a week.

It's cold. It's windy. It's still dark. It's still winter. Thankfully we live in the South because I don't think I would have survived a winter north of here.

The only good thing about it as far as I'm concerned is Will's birthday on the 25th, but that's not until the end of the month. Well you would think that the 25th would be considered the "end of the month", but noooooo there is an entire week left to the dreadful, dreary month.

Oh yeah, there's St. Patrick's Day, but the only way that impacts us is a party at Sophia's school. That and trying to capture a nice picture of the girls wearing their green St. Patty's shirts.

It's a good thing I have the girls to keep me so busy. (smile).

Anyway...in like a lioness...

Too messy for me

This room may look completely messy, but trust me, this is nothing! This is what Sophia's room looked like after I let the two tornados loose for 6 minutes. I just stood there and watched it happen. Usually I'm right on their heels picking up as quickly as they make the mess. Imagine what her room would look like after 30 minutes if I didn't clean up after them ASAP.

The other day I was hanging clothes up in Sophia's room and the tornados put every single thing in Lilly's room into her crib. We're talking every single thing! Even her baby doll crib. As a side note, I was hanging clothes up in Sophia's room because she changes clothes all day long and piles the cast always up in a heap. There are clean clothes all over the place. (I didn't dare that a photo of that disaster.)

I don't mind that she changes clothes at least 4 times per day, but I do mind the mess that it makes. And it's usually closer to 8 times per day, but if that's what she wants to do to exercise her creativity then I will oblige. I'll be happy when she can clean up after herself and until then I bet I'll be spending the majority of March hanging up clothes.

Actually Sophia either changes clothes all day long or she finds one particular fancy dress and dons it for days. Yesterday and today she's been wearing her purple party dress. I let her wear it to church this morning, but not to Riley's 3rd birthday party this afternoon. She was completely mad at me and she put it on as soon as we got home.

Reading the funny papers

Every Sunday Will and Sophia read the comics. They call them the funny papers and she only likes the ones in color...so Sunday is their day. It's cute. They cuddle up together and Will reads them to her. I highly doubt she gets most of them, but she pretends she does.

Do they look alike?

Well, 3 of you say yes and 4 of you say no. That's too close to call if you ask me.

There are times when I think they really look alike. I've found pictures of each of them wearing hats so their hair color is hidden and it's hard to tell which one of my children I'm looking at.

Mine!

Lately the girls have been fighting over toys.

Lilly thinks that everything she's holding is hers.

Sophia thinks that everything in the entire house is hers.

If Lilly has something and Sophia tries to take it they both start shouting MINE and playing tug of war over the toy.

If Sophia has something that Lilly wants Sophia picks it up and runs away into another room all together and shouts out that THERE ARE NO LITTLE SISTERS ALLOWED.

Stairs

Lilly can successfully climb up and down the stairs. A little dangerous, but still she can do it.

She's trying to hold onto the railing and "walk" up the stairs. She still crawls up the steps too, but she wants to be a big girl so badly.

When she goes down the stairs she gets on the floor, turns over onto her belly and slides all the way down. SEE-AH (what Lilly calls Sophia) never slid down on her belly, in fact, from the beginning she wanted to hold hands and "walk" down the steps. I attribute this to the fact that she was so tall.

My little baby is growing up. I can't believe it.

Changing clothes

Sophia is seriously into clothes!

We went through a period - maybe 4 or 6 months ago - when she would take all the clothes on the hangers in her closet and attempt to put them on! What a mess...every single time she was alone I would find her digging through her pile of clothes which needed to be hung up again.

She's always dressed in costumes too. Does that prove my point?

She's back to her old tricks except this time she can put on all the clothes. Dresses, sweaters, pants, shirts, tanks, socks, shoes, boots, hair accessories, etc...alot of time multiple of each item. The mess she is making is driving me up the wall because she's changing six and seven times per day. Per day! Oh, it's cute and adorable and I'm proud that she can dress herself and most of the time she comes out matching or giving me a new idea for an outfit, BUT it creates such a mess. Hangers all over the floor and tangled in the closet. Everything that she puts on comes off inside out.

Once last week she even took the drawers out of her dresser. Who knows why.

She slept in her dress last night AND she wore it to church this morning. She would have worn it all day, but I made her take it off before lunch. It looks stunning on her for sure. I was saving it until next Christmas, but it looks like it fits now so she might as well wear it...and sleep in it. (Smile. I bet my mom is cringing).

This is what Lilly wore.

Let's go riding in an elevator

I discovered this game at the library when Sophia was just a baby. It's called "Let's go riding in an elevator" or at least that's what we call it. Basically the adult (Will) holds the child and raises her a little bit at a time going up up up each floor in the elevator. When you get to the 6th floor it's time to come back down..and fast. Sophia loved it as a baby and still does today. Lilly is getting her fair share and loving it. See.

Both girls absolutely love playing with Will on our big bed too. It makes me so nervous that one of them is going to fall off the side of the bed, but Will's got it under control. He has as much fun as the girls. He tosses them into the pillows, tickles them, and throws them up in the air.

Update on the fish

His name is Pocket.

He's doing quite well.

Sophia feeds him every day when she takes her vitamins.

That's about it. All he does is swim or rest.

Lilly on Valentine's Day

This is what Lilly looked like on Valentine's Day. Both girls were decked out in bright pink.

I fell for it.

Yesterday Sophia found out what April Fools is. She played jokes on me all afternoon including hiding Lamby in the frig and making me find him. This morning she and Lillian were playing in Lilly's crib and Sophia asked me if I could go downstairs and get her Lamby. Like the serving mom that I am I went downstairs and literally searched every room without any luck. I yelled up to her that I couldn't find him and I went back upstairs. When I got up there she told me Lamby was in the refrigerator. I hesitated for a minute just to make sure she was serious and when she repeated it a few times I believed her. What a sucker I am. When I opened the refrigerator door I didn't see Lamby at all, but I did see one of her famous face drawings. April Fools!

Writing words

Sophia asked me to tell her the letters it takes to spell CAT, HAT, SANTA, HOUSE, and MOUSE this morning, but she got completely frustrated with her U in MOUSE and gave up on the effort. I only had to make dotted lines for her to connect to make the letters S and N. Should knew all the rest and she knows a lot more too, but it must be completely frustrating to not be able to write the first letter of your own name. S is am extremely hard letter to write. At least Lillian won't have the same problem.

Darn it.

I found my camera.

Two Valentine's Day parties

We had two V-day parties on Saturday. The first one at 10am was a play date for Sophia and Lillian. The second party which began at 7pm was a Going Away party for our dear friends, Mike and Audra Guthrie and their twins Jackson and Lola Grace.

The usual crew came sans Haley and Carlie came to the play date. Haley woke up with a stomach flu so they didn't come. Addie, Cameron, Trip, Sophia and Lilly had a good time. Trip found the 3 balls and 2 toys on wheels that we own and he was in heaven. It must be hard being the only boy in a group of 6 girls. Addie's mom is pregnant so maybe she'll have a boy. That's my prediction anyway.

The kids got to make Valentine's crafts, play pin the heart on cupid and color/design shrinkable art. After that we ate pizza and then the big girls took off to play princess and dress up. Lilly followed them around and Trip played in our ball pit. (Have you seen our dining room lately?)

The second party was really fun. Most couples brought their kids so we had a full house. The kids played together really well too and ranged in age from 5 years - 11 weeks.

Camera

I swear I have the worst luck with cameras. The first one we had was a point and click and it was just way too slow after a while, plus I think it broke. The next one which was an SLR camera was stolen. I absolutely loved that camera and it took fantastic pictures. Anyway, the one we currently have is missing! We had a Valentine's it's gone. I believe she either lost it in our house or someone stole it. I highly doubt that someone would steal our camera so it must be that she lost it. I've searched every single room, but I can't find it anywhere. I've even check in the potty seat. No luck...

So, for now I must make a decision. Be without a camera or get a new one which I've been talking about doing anyway because the zoom is kind of broken and so is the lense cap. I think I'll switch back to a really good point and click...if there is one. I want to be able to put it on my pocket and at this point that is overruling all other pros and possibly even against my better judgment.

So proud of her

We're so proud of Sophia. She's finally passed the "test" at school and has learned to write all of her letters and she's been promoted to her first phonics book.

The Marshmallow Bandit

If I could write a book it might be about Lilly's obsession with our kitchdn pantry. I guess it's pretty enticing to a 1 year old when the chocolate chips and baking supplies are on the bottom shelf. She loves to get out the paper plates and the napkins too (these are on a shelf within reach).

A few days ago I noticed that she was being unusually quiet AND she was in another room. She's usually in the same room as me, but this time I discovered her on the steps eating a plateful of marshmallows. Boy did she pitch a fit when I took them away from her.

A pumpkin

OK, so we have a cream colored ottoman. Kind of stupid with two young children, right?

Well, until last weekend it wasn't a problem, but on Sunday morning Sophia decided to take advantage of my nap (at 6:30 AM) and draw a pumpkin on the ottoman.

She knew better.

When Will got up and I told him what happened he yelled at her. She burst into tears and I could tell she felt bad. It tugged at my heart, but not enough that I wasn't still mad about it.

She knew better.

The markers are "washable" so you would think the marker would come out, but low and behold it's still there...only now it's smeared all over.! Hmph!!

Will made her help him clean up the mess. Of course, she was wearing a costume of some sort. In this case it was a winter hat and a velvet holiday dress over her clothes.

I have yet to get my hands on the mess and try to remedy the situation. I'm planning on doing it this week now that both of our Valentine's Day parties are over. But in honor of our two parties I did a task that I had been putting off for months. I painted over all the scuff marks and drawings on the walls. It made a huge difference and I swear I won't wait as long next time...(yeah, right).

We got a fish

Well I should say that we inherited a fish. Our very dear friends Audra and Mike and their twins are moving back to Colorado where they have their roots. We will be extremely sad to lose them from the area, but now we have a reason to make a west coast skiing trip.

Anyway, the fish is blue - some sort of fighting fish. I wonder how long we'll be able to keep him alive. He's about 6 months old now.

Sophia asked if she could feed the fish as soon as she woke up this morning. I wonder if she's going to clean the tank too.

Some Sophia-isms

Mommy, it's raining snow.

Daddy, can you save me from the Drama Queen (I guess she's picked up on this from me.)

More to follow.

Our trip toThe Little Gym

We met Haley & Carlie and Cameron & Trip for the Grand Opening of The Little Gym at the new mall close to our house. The Little Gym offers dance and gymnastics classes in a My Gym kind of environment.

We braved it through our single inch of snow and trudged our little butts all the way there just so all the kids could play and burn off some of their energy. The girls were running around for an entire hour and could have continued for another hour, but it was time to leave. Instead of going home we all went out to dinner at a completely empty restaurant. THANK GOODNESS because the kids were literally either crawling all over the floor (the older ones) or running drills around the entire place (the younger ones). Fun times.

Oh yeah, Sophia got her hair cut and you can see her new style in some of these pictures. Most of the pics are blurry because the kids were on the move . . . and we need a new camera again! But considering how often I use our camera I guess we might go through them quicker than most families. Who knows.

When she's mad

she throws things. When Lilly is in the middle of a temper tantrum she will throw anything you offer to console her.

* She especially enjoys throwing food all over the floor when she's finished eating if you don't rescue her from her chair fast enough.

* When she doesn't want to take a nap she will throw her blanket, her PAPI (paci) and her WAMY (Lamby) on the floor.

* When she's throwing a tantrum because she doesn't get her own way she will knock things off of tables and intentionally pick up objects just to throw them.

Too funny

This morning Sophia and I were playing in the FROG because she is banned from TV until she behaves at school. She will get her chance tomorrow to earn her TV time back. The back story is that she has been refusing to go into the classroom, she's been refusing to write her letters and on Wednesday she refused to do her craft. Her teacher thinks it's a battle of the wills with her. So do I, but she's a stubborn one (just like me).

Anyway, back to this morning. We were playing Snow White and this was our conversation.

SOPHIA: Mommy, can I be a princess when I grow up.

ME: Of course you can, honey. Which princess will you be?

SOPHIA: Snow White. Who will be the dwarfs?

ME: Probably some boys.

SOPHIA: I don't like boys. Daddy can be a dwarf. Which one is he?

ME: Daddy can be Doc because he's really smart.

SOPHIA: And you can be Dopey because you don't know everything yet.

ME: WHAT?

Bounce House

Last week we went to a bounce house with Haley/Carlie and Addie. We all had a great time. I even got to slide down a giant slides with the girls a few times. You should have seen Lilly after going down the slide. She squealed in delight and then begged for me to take her again and again and again. She loved following the big girls around and trying to keep up with them.

Later in the afternoon we went to the mall and I let the girls play at the train table in Barnes & Noble and then on the ride-on toys.

Both girls fell asleep by 6:30 pm. I guess I wore them out, but what an enjoyable evening for me.