Happy 5th Birthday Princess!

SA turned 5 last week. She is just growing up before our eyes, well... really at night when we're not looking, because we're surprised by it all the time. Her new words, new expressions, new ways to think about things seem to mature a little each day. She's such a good big sister to SJ, I am so thankful they have each other. She hasn't lost her "silly" but she has a new serious side too, and a gentle sweet girl side that is thoughtful and considerate. And she's been asked to make a lot of sacrifices lately in prep for the baby, like having her sister move into her room, and has not complained about any of it.

She had a Fancy Nancy party with her girlfriends where we dressed up, put on makeup, painted nails, ate sandwiches with fancy toothpicks, and made parfaits. Dad was the only boy allowed. I think she had a really fun day. Happy Birthday Princess, we love you.

Great Friends

We have such a supportive group of friends at our church that surprised us with a sweet, HUGE shower for the little guy on the way. We thought a few girls were getting together, but they invited all of V's friends at church as well and it was a bigger deal than we knew. The planning and time that went into it really made us so thankful to have friends like these who just wanted to do something nice for us. We had a blast getting to chat, our girls had fun playing with the other kids there, and we are very grateful for all the wonderful gifts that we can definitely use. Here are some pics - thanks again to all who contributed!!!

I also have three other groups of women that took me out to dinner or lunch on separate occasions to celebrate with me. I really loved doing it this way because I got to spend time in an intimate setting with a few good friends at a time and talk and catch up. This has been a really fun couple of weeks!

One other fun thing - my parent's celebrated their 40th anniversary recently (congratulations mom and dad!) and my dad bought my mom and me a day at the spa together. Of course, this was to celebrate *their* anniversary, but to have a massage and pedicure after all the other fun things, was just another little indulgence for me. My mom and I went to shopping, went to lunch and hit the spa in the afternoon while V watched the kids. After all of this pampering, I think I'm about ready for a newborn... I think.

Getting Ready for Baby Brother

We're getting ready for Baby Brother's arrival in a few weeks, so have made some room changes. SJ moved into SA's room (known as the Princess Room) and they now have bunkbeds! We were skeptical about how this would go for the first few weeks, so we made the move ahead of time to allow for an adjustment period. To our complete disbelief, from the very first night it has been great. I think they are comforted to have each other in the room, so they sleep better and there is no more getting up after going to bed for "one more thing." I wasn't expecting our sleep to actually improve when they started sharing a room... well, just in time for it to worsen with the arrival of a newborn.

We got a couple of cute polka dotted reading chairs for their room. Notice what they prefer to play with.

Baby Brother's room is a work in progress still. Paint is somewhat on the walls, furniture and bedding is purchased, crib still in the hall closet, pink floral ceiling fan is still hanging. It will be a cute boy's room soon we hope.

And, last but not least, we are now minivan owners! We loved the little SUV we had, but there was no way to wedge in one more carseat, so as long as we are going for a bigger auto, might as well get power-lift gate and power-sliding doors. I love this freakin' thing, it has already made my life so much easier. V and I know we're not cool anymore, so might as well embrace our new status in life. We're so excited about this used Hyundai minivan, you'd think we just bought a Lexus.

Haircuts

We got both girls' hair cut to a shoulder length bob. Not only are they the cutest look ever on them, but it is SO MUCH easier to deal with for everyone involved. Two seconds to brush, a clip on the side, a headband, or wear it down (which we could never do before when it was long), and we're ready to go! Why didn't we do this sooner?

Merry Christmas 2008! click to hear santa list

I have not posted in a while. The holidays were so fun this year with the girls the ages that they are (4 and 3), that I think we actually took part in every tradition you could possibly do for the holidays, except attend midnight mass - which will come when the kids are older. Maybe there are a few things we missed, please let me know, but this is every fun and meaningful memory for me and hopefully for my kids. Each could be a blog entry, but I'm so far behind, I'll just mention each one and include some pics. Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

- Had a fabulous turkey dinner for Thanksgiving in our new kitchen ala V, while going around the table saying things we are thankful for.
-Put up Christmas lights, decorated the tree, set up our nativity scene the day after Thanksgiving, we couldn't wait!
-Early Christmas celebration with my mom's side of the family with cousins, Mr. Chips the parakeet, Lil Tex the dog, and plenty of food and presents.
-Visited Santa at a Polar Express exhibit at the mall, and saw Santa again at our neighborhood PTA Christmas party
-Played in the snow!
-Decorated a gingerbread house with the girls (first time for the girls, and me too!)
-Had a few Christmas parties to attend through our church and even a neighborhood dinner party, which was so much fun! And skipped a few holiday parties to stay home with our family (a Christmas wish of our priest).


-Baked and delivered cookies to our neighbors, and received and ate way too many of our neighbors cookies and treats.
-Drove around and looked at Christmas lights three times with warm vanilla milk, including the 12 days of Christmas street.
-SA was an angel in her school Christmas pageant and had a line to say, "Today a savior has been born." It was our first star struck moment as parents. Of course, all cameras and recording devices failed, but she really did great!

-Visited a nursing home with other kids from our church to wrap gifts for the residents and eat cookies, and sing carols. We met Rosa that the girls really got to know and hugged when we left. Also, Innocentia was turning 99, and we sang Happy Birthday to her.
-Both girls were caroling angels in our church Christmas pageant on Christmas Eve at the Vigil Mass. We stayed afterwards for a beautiful Christmas Vigil Mass complete with ochestra performing Silent Night, Noel, Joy to the World, etc.

-Delivered gifts to our adopted family with other friends. Our adopted family was a father, mother, and two girls (4 and 6) and a baby boy, 9 mos. They welcomed us in and we handed out gifts and our girls stayed and talked to their girls. They were a sweet family and appreciative, and so great to teach our girls to give gifts instead of always receiving.
-Had a birthday party for Jesus, made Him cookies, and left some for Santa on Christmas Eve.
-Left a voicemail for Santa with our wish lists. (Click the title at the top of this blog entry to hear. Will take you to Box.net. Click on wav file. Click Open to listen.)
-Santa visited our house and left SJ a little 10" bike, and SA a kid's digital camera! They also got a Leapster to share! They must have been very good this year.

-Went to Nana and Papa's on Christmas Day to open more presents (new baby dolls) and eat lobster and crab legs - a Christmas tradition on my side of the family!
-Went to Galveston a few days after Christmas for almost a week to visit Gma and Gpa. V's parents' house is almost back together after Hurricane Ike, and we fished, cooked, played games, introduced the girls to my neice's and nephew's iPhone games (who needs a Leapster?) and listened to my nephew's awesome music (guitar, singing), played with Lillie the dog, and welcomed in the New Year with a Netflix movie. No champagne - I'm 7 mos pregnant, but everyone else opted out too. Just collapsed in bed at 12:01.


I am feeling very blessed and appreciative of this time with my kids while they are young and have really enjoyed the holidays. In fact, I'm kind of sad to see them go and have things get back to normal. But we have only about 10 weeks left before baby brother makes his debut, so I'm sure we can find something to do between now and then...

It's a Boy!

There's no mistaking, it's a boy! We're 5 months along and we went to our sonogram appointment yesterday to see what we could see. Everything looks healthy and he is measuring on track for a March delivery. We brought the girls to the sonogram, and SA (4.5 yrs) was so excited to see the sonogram and was just oooing and awwwing over her little brother. SJ (3 yrs) is not sure what to think yet, but really liked playing with all the cords to the equipment. We’re looking forward to welcoming this new little bundle and the adventure of experiencing a boy in our very girly household. Poor kid, he better like pink tutus and lipgloss, he will probably be wearing them a lot around here. We're excited to meet you little one!

Happy Halloween!

We carved our pumpkin the night before, and had it glowing on our front porch on Halloween evening. Sofia had a little costume parade earlier in the day on Halloween at her school. That evening, SA was Ariel and SJ was originally Sleeping Beauty, then changed her mind to Snow White, V was the lead singer of The Cure, and I was an old lady. We took the girls to trick or treat on our street with some friends and then headed down to the big party street in our neighborhood where the whole street had been blocked off with police officers standing at either end. It was a lot of fun to watch the girls this year, they get so excited about candy and all the excitement going on. We were gone so long that we didn't get to hand out much candy, we handed out some before we left, but have WAY too much left over. This was my favorite Halloween with the girls so far.