More Reasons to Love Spring

 When we were in town for my Mom's surprise party last month, Eliana and I went for a walk and found these extraordinary flowers.  Trisha let me use her nice camera while she and I went for another walk to enjoy the spring flowers.  The picture above doesn't even compare with how amazing these flowers were to find.

Many of the blooms are gone, but they sure are stunning while they last!

Bubbles and More

 Eliana got to spend some time with my parents for two nights this month!  It was a little hard for me to let her go out of town without us.  She had a lot of fun and came back with several containers of bubbles!  She just might end up with some curly hair after all!

 Is anyone else impressed that Ruli blew bubbles and then caught several of them at once?  I know I am:)

 This is one of my favorite pictures of these two special people!!!

 This could be titled "Super Eliana to the Rescue!" or "It always helps to have a giant sidekick!"

I'm so blessed that Rachel and Ruli live in town and love our girls! 

March Happenings

 Oh, how I love spring!!!

Eliana has continued to improve on her picture taking ability!  These two photos of Rachel and Natalie were taken by Eliana!  I'd say not bad for a 2 year old!

 Aunt Marcie came for a visit!  We love having family come and visit us!  Aren't you impressed with Rachel's ability to hold both of the wee ones at once?

 For the first time since we moved away from family, we spent Easter weekend back in our hometown.  It was great to see friends who moved away the summer we did, friends from our old church, and lots of family!!!  In the picture above, Kallie and Eliana are "hiding" their faces while Troy hid Easter eggs.  They loved it!!!

 Eliana was purely delighted with the hunting.  We had about 5 hunts that day, 2 the next, and several more at home.  Eliana enjoys hiding the eggs and then helping you find them.  You have to be quick to find them, otherwise she will help you find them before you've even searched for them.

 Natalie slept okay while we traveled.  She ate about every 3 hours instead of every 4.  Which is actually AMAZING compared to how Eliana traveled at that age!!!  Eliana is doing so much better in the car!  I think it helps that she has someone to look at in the backseat and that she can hold conversations with us up front.

What is this???  Eliana wanted to hold her sister AND smile for a picture?!?!?!  You bet I took a picture before she changed her mind!

When Natalie was 5 Months Old!

Natalie is now a few days into her 6th month, but let's step back in time for just a moment to high light her 5th month!

 She is at the wonderful age of smiles!  Since I know that is a season and not forever, I am enjoying these easy smiles while they last!

 Natalie learned how to make raspberries!  She has also enjoyed looking at other babies like her friend on the right Amelia!

 Natalie has joined us up at the table during meal time.  She was getting lonely down on the ground.  She is still just being breastfed, but she does enjoy chewing on her toys and hands.

 Natalie loves rolling over and enjoys sitting up.  She is much more content when she can sit up and enjoy her box of toys. 

She found her feet this month!  She is still waking up in the night.  She is having a feeding somewhere between 10 and midnight, and then again between 1 and 4am.  We're praying that she'll drop one of theses feedings.  Thankfully, the extra wakings beyond these feeds have stopped for now:)  Kyle has been a SUPER help in the morning.  If she gets up before he goes to work, she joins him for a little bit until she gets hungry.  That means I can get between 15 and 45 minutes of extra sleep.  Hooray for my fantastic husband!!!

February Recap

For the first time in nearly three years, I got to see the see the ocean.  It was only for less than half an hour, but I'll take it! There is just something about the ocean that soothes and excites me all at the same time.  I think it is in part because growing up we spent many family vacations visiting grandparents and seeing the ocean.  Awe.  We were near the ocean for Rachel's dad's funeral.  So, you may notice that Eliana wasn't with us.  She had an amazing day with my family.  We figured her seeing some of her favorite people mourning would rock her world a bit.  Natalie thankfully slept through the whole service and brought joy and comfort to those around us.

Any guesses what you are looking at to the right?  Well, I had cooked a turkey and then made broth from the bones.  I happened to notice that we had run out of freezer bags.  I was a little worried that the regular bags would open, so I put all 8 or so small bags in one large bag to freeze.  Can you tell what happened?  At least one bag did open and then all of them were frozen together.  They had been sitting on a bag of frozen veggies that had a bird chip clip keeping the bag closed.  As you may see, it was frozen stuck.  I hadn't planned on using all of the broth at once, but I ended up making some soup.

 Awe, cheesecake!  We had Jonathan and Julia over.  They brought yummy cheesecake for dessert!  Since they were mini cheesecakes, we got to sample all of the flavors!  Amazing!

 Eliana loves collecting things.  Lately, she has been collecting rocks!  It is starting to warm up a bit, so we are outside often again!  Praise the Lord for spring coming!!!

 Playtime with Kyle and Eliana is always an adventure!

 Dane and Natalie are distant cousins.  Just like Eliana and Dawson below. 

 If you look carefully, you'll see that Eliana is wearing a baby carrier.  It was so nice to have some company in the morning!!!

 Can you believe it?  They are both smiling at the same time!  That is a miracle!!!

Eliana continues to love changing her clothes multiple times a day.  Lately she likes to change into her Cinderella pajamas as soon as we get home from a walk or playing outside.  I don't mind so much since I know it will be different within a couple of hours.

 Sometimes I think God made dirt just to play in:)  Sofia and Eliana love dirt, throwing balls, and kicking balls.  I had so much fun with these two girls.  I had them run, run, running!

 All of that good running caused Eliana to fall asleep while we were praying before bedtime.  At least she made it through Bible story time!

It was challenging to get a one arm photo of us when we were a family of three, and it is simply humorous to try now.  I figure this one didn't turn out too bad.

Natalie is 4 Months Old!!!

For a few more days, Natalie will be 4 months old.  This month she swallowed a firecracker.  That is my best explanation for the sound she now makes when she is super tired or really fussy or just plain mad.  Thankfully, although we hear that noise a few times a day it isn't a-l-l day or even for super long periods of time.  She is awake for between 1.5 and 2.5 hours at a time.  She alternates between 6 and 7 feedings a day.  For the last few nights she has been fighting her last nap.

Natalie became the main focus of Eliana as she learned how to take photos.  The upper right photo is a self portrait of Eliana:)

 Natalie is still eating once in the middle of the night.  She has a new habit of also waking about an hour before I'm willing to feed her (somewhere around 1am) and then an hour before I'm willing to start our day (somewhere around 5am).  So she get the pacifier and thankfully goes back to sleep fairly quickly.  The only thing is that I am getting pretty tired from all of the extra waking up.  For many months she was eating around 3am and then at 7am.  That was nice.  I'm not sure what happened and why she started waking around 1am, but I remind myself that this is just a season.  One day she will sleep through the night.  Hopefully is will be a wee bit sooner than it took Eliana, but I'm still getting way more sleep than I did with Eliana.  SO, I count my blessings!

 We love making Natalie smile.  Now that I know these easy smiles are also a short season, I am treasuring them and basking in the gleeful, toothless smiles she gives me oh so easily.

Natalie loves to stand while holding onto our hands, to sit up with help, and chew on anything she can get her hands on.  If there is nothing to chew on, she finds a way to chew on most of her whole hand at one time.