What are you thankful for?

People tend to talk about their blessings in November as Thanksgiving approaches. I don't want to wait another five months - I'm thankful now! 

It's easy to dwell on annoyances and tiny imperfections in our day to day lives. Dwelling only magnifies them but if you think about them in the grand scheme of things, they're nothing. 

Inevitably I'll forget some things due to Momma brain and lack of sleep, but here are a few things I'm thankful for right now:

• We don't have to worry about a leaky roof. The rain came down hard for a while today and I was just so thankful we had a good roof over our heads. 

• The transition from one baby to Irish Twins has been so much better than I imagined. I didn't know what we were getting into and have nothing to compare it to, but I think we're doing pretty dang good!

• Lincoln is young enough that we didn't have to deal with jealousy when we brought Liliana home. He loved giving her kissies from the very beginning. When she's not in the room he gets very concerned and says "Where's Sis?" 

• My children's mutual love for each other. In the mornings when I get him out of bed I'll say "Let's go get Sis" and he gets so excited. As soon as we walk in her room he points and yells "Sis!" and she screeches in excitement. 

• The kids have been able to stay home instead of ever going to a day care. (Not going anti-day care, just what works for us.)

• Lincoln sleeps through the night (averaging 12 hours). 

• My job offers great insurance. 

• My job and coworkers are flexible, allowing me to NEVER miss a kids' doctor appointment. 

• Happy children. 

• Turbo. 

• My husband. 

• Two reliable vehicles. 

• A garage. 

• Netflix - I barely even miss cable. Netflix is 1/10 of the price and really has a lot to offer!!

• Speaking of price, Stuff, Etc. Amazing. I buy 90% of the kids' clothes there and rarely pay more than $1.50/item. You can't even tell they're from a consignment shop - probably because at their age, children don't stay in one size long at all!!

Ok, there's so much more, but I'll stop here. I just felt compelled to spread some positivity. 

I Don't Want To Forget {5/10/14}

These are little things I don't want to forget or take for granted. 

[Lincoln: 18 months; Liliana: 7 months]

*Liliana plays with my face while I give her a bottle - usually putting her fingers in my mouth. 

*While finishing her last ounce of her bedtime bottle she puts her whole arm over her eyes, surrendering to the drowsiness. 

*Every night I read Goodnight Moon to Lincoln. When I read "And a picture offfffffffff..." building suspense as I turn the page and then say "THE COW!! jumping over the moon." Every time Lincoln squeals and has a huge smile. 

*After Goodnight Moon is over Lincoln gives me a kiss then lays his head on my shoulder and cuddles. No coercing, no fighting, just cuddles. 

*When Liliana cries, almost always Lincoln will find a book or toy to hand to her. He just wants to help her feel better. 

*I love love love how he randomly walks over and gives her kissies. 

Winter and Ped Appts

This winter just will not give up. Here in Iowa we keep getting one snow storm after the other, always accompanied with crazy wind and windchills. For weeks on end our windchill was -25 or lower. Today Mother Nature got even more bipolar on us. At noon we had a thunderstorm complete with hail, thunder, and and pouring rain. It's now, four hours later, snowing and we're in a blizzard warning for the rest of the night. 

With all that being said, out household has been hit with a stomach bug. Because it wasn't enough that we ALL had a cold a few months ago. So yesterday and today I've stayed home. Yesterday I didn't do much other than lay around but today I'm feeling a little more human. I've got to tell ya, today has been one of the best days with my kiddos. They've been pretty well behaved and such happy babies. I know I haven't done anything remotely regular as far as monthly updates on either kiddo, but I've got to say...

I think this is my favorite age of Lincoln's so far!! It's mostly because he's so happy and expressive. He loves his sister and shows her by giving her kissies roughly every 15 minutes. He helps burp her, wipes her face off (tries anyway) with her burp cloth, and rocks her in her swing and rock chair. 

He laughs constantly. He knows where his nose and mouth are when asked. He LOVES to dance. He knows how to run my iPhone. I put the Guided Access on while he's in an app so he can't get out if it. To get out of Guided Access you have to hit the home key 3 times in a row which brings up the screen for the password. He can already make it bring up the password screen. Yikes. I'm in trouble. Haha

At Lincoln's 15 month checkup he measured in at 32" long and 26.5lb. Unfortunately the Ped also found double ear infection. 

At Liliana's 4 month checkup she measured in at 26" long and 15.5lb. She's in the 95% for head, 90% for length, and I think 75% for weight. Long and skinny with a big brain!! ;)

And I'll leave you with a the best. picture. ever. 

Update on 2 under 1

Wow. It's been 7 months since I last posted. Life has been a little hectic as you can imagine. I don't think I have any followers on here that I'm not also friends with on Facebook or Instagram, but just in case, here's a brief update. 

Liliana Rose was born September 25, 2013 at 11:20pm. She was 8lb 3oz and 21" long. My levels were increasing and leading me into HELLP Syndrome so they induced me at 38 weeks. That didn't go well, though, so we switched to another emergency c-section. 

Lincoln was smitten with his little sister from their very first meeting!!

We had our work cut out for us that first month. Our hands were always full and recovering from a second c-section (10.5 months after my first) was more challenging than the first. I couldn't lift Lincoln for the first six weeks - over the weight limit. It was so hard not to be able to pick up my baby boy!!

Lincoln gives Liliana hundreds of kissies a day. He truly loves that little girl! I post tons of pictures of these kissies and all, but when my cousin was over and saw him randomly give her a kiss he realized how true and unprovoked the act is! None of the pictures are staged. Yes, we will sometimes ask him to give her kissies, especially at bedtime, but 98% of those kissies occur when he doesn't even know we're watching. Such a lover. 

To finish off this update, here is Liliana's growth:

Lincoln loves food . . .

Lincoln loves sitting in his high chair and loves eating like a big boy. He also loves washing it all down with a swig of water from his sippy cup.

The first couple times he tried carrots and peas he was less than impressed, so we had to mix each with pears to get him on board.

I'm proud to report that he now eats all of the following WITHOUT ANY MIXING NECESSARY (in order of preference): 

Pears

Bananas

Carrots

Sweet potatoes

Peas

He has had puréed apples mixed in with his peas a few times but not on their own yet. 

He eats three times a day. A whole banana, mashed, or pears for breakfast. He rotates between the veggies for lunch and supper.

I want to maybe add green beans into the mix soon. 

Any other suggestions?

Dining in Minneapolis . . .

I'm baaaack!

I had a seminar/training I had to attend for work up in Minneapolis (4 hour drive from home) Tuesday and Wednesday. We decided to make a mini-vacation out of it. Our first family vacation!! So I packed up Wes & Lincoln to go with me and we headed up Sunday morning...bright and early!

I'll get into more detail [including pictures] later. First...I feel the need to share this story. It is hilarious. I cried for half an hour straight after it happened...

Not tears of sadness. Not even tears of embarrassment. Tears out of "OMG. That just happened. This is priceless!"

Alright, so after 5 hours of walking around the Mall of America Monday, we took the Metro to downtown Minneapolis to walk around, explore, and have supper. After walking around a bit, the Marriott doorman asked if there was anything he could help us with. We asked what restaurants he recommended. He gave a couple of suggestions, but said Lyon's Pub was kid friendly and good. We headed that way, but as we approached, we could hear the music blaring out of it from across the street. We thought...maybe we should try something else. [Always listen to the local doorman.]

Next to Lyon's Pub was Murray's. I had never heard of it. On the 2nd story of the building was a large picture of a steak with a caption of "Home of the Butter Knife Steak" [or something to that effect]. Steak so tender you only needed a butter knife. Mmmmm! There was a guy standing outside of the building, at a podium. The restaurant has a doorman? It's own doorman? Eeeks, maybe not. 

Then again....the "A" in the neon Murray's sign was burnt out. How high class of a place could it be with a burnt out letter in it's sign?

Hard to spot the burnt out "A". It's on the  sign that is directly facing the road.

We decided to cross the street and check it out. As we got closer we saw the menu was posted outside. There were some very pricey things on the menu, but they also had sandwich meals for about $10. Do-able. By now it was getting near Lincoln's bedtime, we still needed to eat and make it back to the hotel [which was going to take a 10 minute Metro ride and the hotel shuttle picking us up]. Let's try it. 

We walk in, because the "doorman" didn't even acknowledge us, and see a bar area. There were people drinking and watching the baseball game on big screen TV's. Right up our alley!

Wes started looking at the wall of fame, so to say. A wall of people who had eaten there, I guess.

Here's a picture of Derek Jeter [with the owner, I'm assuming...?].

Context clues, people. Context clues. Red flags everywhere that we just didn't pick up on.

Anyway, while Wes is looking at these pictures, a nice man in a suit asks me how many. I say "two and a high chair," pointing at Lincoln in his stroller. Then I notice a wall of bottles of wine. Like a wine cellar. Full.

Oh God.

Let me build another picture for you. I'm in flip flops, gaucho capris, and an Aero shirt. Wes is in jeans, button up shirt, and backwards baseball cap. Lincoln is chilling [best dressed out of us all] in his Eddie Bauer stroller. We're classy, alright.

So they seat us...in a dim lit room with Frank Sinatra music lightly playing. Multiple glasses [wine, water, who knows what else for], intricately folded cloth napkins...the works.

Oh God.

They come and light a candle for us, bring us warm [delicious] croutons, and give us our menus. The waiter then asks what the occasion was. [Red flags, people!] At this point I head to the restroom, because Lincoln needed changed. There was no changing table. Luckily, instead of paper towels or a hand dryer, they had cloth towels to dry your hands with. Resourceful as I am, I laid those down to put Lincoln on to change. Not what they had in mind, I'm sure!

So they take our drink order and ask Wes' permission to pour his beer for him. Yikes. Red flags all over the place, I tell ya!

So then we look at the menu.

Forget for a moment that I've never seen a menu that didn't have cents in the price...there weren't even dollar signs. I look at Wes and said "Sooo...are those numbers after the item the price...?"

Those prices...were just for the steak. You have to purchase your side/potato, salad, etc. separately. Glance at the top...for a 24oz steak to share, it's $110. Yeah.

We looked at the waiter and kindly said "I think we'll just have the drinks and then be on our way. Thanks!"

So we chug the drinks. Actually, I didn't even finish mine. I started strapping Lincoln in and stood up and gestured "Let's go!" The waiter was MIA, so I figured I'd just pay at the podium where the people who seated us were standing. I got my wallet out and Wes was pushing the stroller. I got to the podium and one of the suited guys smiled while saying "Thank you. Have a great evening."

So I started walking out. I turned around to look at Wes and he looked at me confused. I just nicely said "Let's go, babe."

When we got outside he said "Did we just..."

"Yes, dear. We drank and dashed."

Then we promptly high-tailed it into Lyon's Pub next door to eat.

This is more like it for us...a table with a paper napkin, mugs, straws, and Heinz on the table.

I couldn't help but stare at the door the whole time we were there. I was just sure the people of Murray's were going to find us. As if they can't spare a beer and pop. They probably took pity on us.

Live and learn, I guess! hahahaha

I hope you enjoyed this through my poor story-telling skills. Maybe half as much as we enjoyed it? I seriously sat at that table pictured above and cried from laughter. I was in such shock. Yikes!

Moral[s] of the story:

*Just because a letter is burnt out in the neon sign, doesn't mean you can afford the menu.

*Always listen to the locals.

Rain, Rain, Go Away. . .

No, I did not fall off the face of the Earth. I have no excuse other than enjoying time with my baby and after he goes to sleep trying my darnedest not to follow suit (pregnancy is exhausting even more so the 2nd time around...!). 

We are getting more than our fair share of rain here in central Iowa. I knew flood watches and such were happening, but as of Monday around noon, all roads out of town were still passable. I decided to go out of town (south) to hit up HyVee (4lb of pears are puréeing right now for Lincoln!) and Walmart. After spending 2 hours shopping I was on my was home (same route I had taken earlier) when boom...road blocked off by a cop car telling us we had to turn. The highway i had taken 2 hours ago was now being closed due to flooding. Well shit. How do I get home? So I call up my brother to see what my best bet was because the only 2 ways I was familiar with were notorious for flooding. So I ended up having to turn around, head south (where I had come from) and take a massive detour. It took me an hour longer to get home than it would have pre-flood. 

Luckily, though, that is the extent to which I've been affected by the flooding. I know it could be much much worse. So, I've stolen some pictures off Facebook to share with you. None of these are mine. Enjoy!

(Mother-in-law posted from next town over.)

(The highway I needed to get home on - though this was taken by someone else the next day.)

(Pumping water out of the median to try to prevent having to close the whole road. Last I heard they have been able to keep one lane in each direction open.)