Merry Christmas

Wishing you all a Merry Christmas! We had a great time with the kids, it was the girls first Christmas at home. We had lots of presents to open and they loved every minute. We visited Santa at the mall, that didn't go so well...they were hysterical meeting Santa for the first time. I think nate was overwhelmed by the entire thing and didn't want anything to do with Santa this year, who could blame him.We got a few photos of the girls, yes, that is drool coming out of Phoebe's mouth. Here is a copy of our christmas card this year too.
Have a wonderful new year!

Fall is here

Ahhh, the cooler weather and no humidity. love it. we took the kids to a fall festival and got a quick pic of "just the girls". P and P loved the pumpkins and we got to see several beautiful horses too.

The girls are loving to go for walks, they want to ride in the stroller less, and actually take turns being held when i am alone walking with them. Paige loves to hold my hand as we walk and Phoebe walks ahead of us, usually stomping through the grass and picking up sticks and leaves. They both love to play at the mailbox, opening and close the storage boxes.

Paige is getting a bit bossier, she points to things she wants, and she tells me when Phoebe is doing something she shouldn't; like taking off her socks or playing with the remote. Phoebe still steals what ever she wants from Paige, i guess that's payback for tattling. haha

Enjoy the photo, i hope to upload more very soon.

More vacation photos

here are a few more photos of our vacation. can't believe it's been 1 month already since we got back. we have been doing very well and the girls are getting so big. in just a few months they went from barely crawling to walking, running and the size of a two year old. Everyone comments on how big they are getting or that they are walking so well or that their hair is getting so long. It's amazing what just a few months can make.

Technical difficulties

having some technical difficulties publishing posts. i can get to the new post page, write a post and upload pictures, but when i get ready to publish post and i hit the button, nothing happens. when i put my mouse over the button, at the bottom of the page it reads "javascript:void(O). does anyone have an idea why this happens? i am posting this to see if it may be because of pictures. please leave a comment if you can help.

thanks

the rocker

here is what the rocker looked like that we took to the hotel on our vacation. obviously hotels don't offer anything like this, so i found this rocker that collapsed down into a bag for easy carrying. i found one with a high back, we are both tall and love to be able to rest our heads/shoulders on the back. if you are looking for one keep that in mind, some have very low backs. the final piece when packed up probably weighs about 30-40 pounds but since we were close to home and used our own car that was good for us. It worked amazingly for us, kids all were excited to be rocked at night time. I found this one at t@rget for $45. you can find them online probably cheaper if you get free shipping. ours is a c0leman.

thinking halloween

I just had to post a quick note about this site. i have seen ads for it all around but i finally caved and visited. i saw a post for these beautiful little princess dresses and had to get them while the price was right. buying for twins is twice as expensive these days. :-)

the site is zulily, and it is an online boutique that specializes in high quality products for moms, kiddos, and babies, is currently offering up a Halloween costume sale. Through 9/21 (or until they sell out– which I’m guessing may be soon!), i got these dresses for $12.99 each!

This will be the girls first Halloween! Can't wait to see them in these dresses, we might add some fairy wings to this too, we will deck them all out! Anyway had to share this with you. of course we will show pictures when we get them.

What were we thinking...

we decided a few months ago we would take a family vacation, we knew it would be a lot of work but we weren't going to go far and we would only go for 5 nights. Oh my gosh, it was way more work and more exhausting than we ever thought. the first two days were very hard; the kids trying to get used to staying in one room and schedules were all off.

it felt like we had packed everything the kids owned and then some. we took the pack and play, bottles, a cooler for milk and a bunch of food items, a rocking chair i ordered a while back just for this vacation (boy did it save the day and our nighttime!), a suitcase of kid clothes, diapers, swim diapers, night diapers, hats, bath stuff, a fan, baby blankets, all 3 favorite stuffed animals, nate's book bag of toys and stuff, camera, 2 strollers, diaper bag, bottled water, a thermos... and we squeezed in a few clothes for us. Yikes, our car was packed! We were crammed into one very small room with 2 beds and 2 pack and plays and all the other stuff we brought and 3 kids in a non-childproof room. What were we thinking going on vacation with 3 kids? :-)

After the initial shock and awe, we all started getting into our groove. things started to get a bit easier and after the second night we all were doing really well. the kids had a blast at the pool, they loved walking around the hotel and seeing the huge figures like buzz and woody from toy story. they really got into meeting all the characters, we got to meet: handy manny, mickey, minnie, all the princess', donald, goofy, pluto, chef mickey, leo and june from little Einsteins, and we ate dinner at Cinderella's castle and got to meet even more princesses. nate love getting all the autographs of the characters and even a few pictures with them, he has a book filled with autographs now.












































We went to two parks during out stay, Hollywood studios and magic kingdom. the kids had so much fun and really loved going to each of them. MK was the best and we picked a great time to go because the attendance there was very low, which meant very small wait times for the rides, we were even able to go on some rides 3 and 4 times without getting off. the girls loved the carousel and watching the parade, they loved the it's a small world ride too.

gettin out

well with the extreme heat we have been experiencing, we don't go outside to walk around and play too much. usually very early in the morning, when it's only 85 degrees, is when we can usually stand to be outside. we come back into the house after being outside for about 20 minutes and we are all drenched and looking for a cup of water.

here are a few pictures of the girls outside. walking like champs, going further everyday and loving their freedom.

The Beach

we had a great time going to the beach with the kids. this was the girls first time to the ocean, and i have to say they loved it! it took them a little bit to get used to the sand, they just sat under the umbrella, not touching or moving for a few minutes.

After they got used to the texture of the sand, they were non stop moving. they loved digging in the sand, and walking around on the beach. shortly after they started playing, a dragon fly landed on Phoebe's hat and didn't leave for about 20 minutes. Yep, just sat there, like a flower on her hat decorating her beautiful head. She was oblivious.

then all the kids and daddy headed for the water, they loved the water! this beach was fantastic for our family, the water was very shallow and we had a huge stretch of beach between the chairs and the water, for the wandering kids... no they didn't go far, but they did love being able to walk around with freedom.

Phoebe decided to try eating the sand, she literally scooped up the sand in the shovel and put it in her mouth. she did it twice before we were able to stop her!

the clouds started rolling in and it was time for us to leave. the kids slept in the car all the way home, exhausted from a wonderful day at the beach.

Momma

the girls are really getting good at saying my name, MOMMA! they say it often, and they can even scream it pretty loud too. they practically sing it as a song, mom-mum-mommaahh! they aren't saying too many words really, they do a bit of sign language, but their two favorite words are momma and uh-oh!

in the last few weeks they have each fallen in love with a stuffed animal. Paige found her sheepy first and then Phoebe found her panda bear. they just love their stuffed animals and can't be away from them for very long. they especially love to cuddle and sleep with their babies. the most adorable part is, they take turns finding the others animal and handing it to her sister to help make her happy. They will give their baby a kiss and then giggle with happiness. They are so sweet to each other.

Growing fast

i can't believe how much the girls have changed in the last 6 months. it's been officially 6 months since we arrived home now and as i look back at some of their first pictures i can't get over how quickly they are changing and growing. i am trying to capture some of their changes, as i said in the last post, they are walking now. they are loving their freedom and exploring the house and places we go. this exploration always makes for a great picture, sometimes hard to catch with them moving so quickly, hehe. i will show you two of my favorites from the last few days.

phoebe is exploring outside (this photo was a brief rest in the driveway), they both loved to find the flowers on the ground. paige didn't care much for the feel of the grass but phoebe walked through it no problem.





















i just love this photo of paige, her eyes, those lips! man i am just in love with them so much and can't get over how beautiful they are.















I will try to update more often, have to say though, i am a pretty busy momma lately :-). be patient with me, i know this summer we will have lots of "first" photos to share with you.

Happy 4th of July

wishing you all an amazing holiday! we took a few family photos today to remember our first 4th together.

as you can see the girls are walking now, they had fun trying to walk in the thick grass today. they are getting around pretty fast now, and love to get into things around the house. Their shirts say, "daddy's american sweetheart".

we are going to a party then to the fireworks. hope everyone has a safe and wonderful holiday.

No Confusion

there should be no confusion this time around. each has their name in the background. :-)

one of the biggest concerns i had when we found out we were adopting twins was, how will i tell them apart? Really, i was so scared that we would mix them up and forever call them by the wrong name. thankfully, from the first time we held them, i have had no problem telling who is who. i am not sure if they are identical or fraternal, i guess we would have to do blood tests to find out, someday we might. But for now i will leave you with these photos.

Peek-a-Boo

the girls love to do peek-a-boo. i caught an amazing moment when they were both doing peek-a-boo at the same time. they just love to play this, anytime during the day! the only time when it becomes a little less fun for mommy is at dinner time when they have food all over their hands and they want to play, you can imagine the messy faces... hehe
enjoy

Happy Easter

We had a wonderful Easter. I hope you did too.
The girls had beautiful dresses i bought several years ago, (remember it was a long wait) they were probably for a bit colder weather, so, last night i cut the sleeves off their dresses and made them short sleeves, it was necessary for today's weather. Today, we dyed eggs, did an egg hunt and they each got a cute little Easter basket with little goodies. everyone was beautiful today. I will leave you with some pictures of the kids in the park in their Easter best.