Besties

Mary Beth's school was on spring break the week before ours and I am so thankful we got some good visiting in! We got to hang with she, Alex, and Maelea and we had a blast. Ingrid thought Maelea was really fun too. We dream of them being besties as they get older too! Hopefully our dream can come true if they move back this way. Ingrid was ready for her first sleepover, apparently. As I was getting her pjs on she whispered in her i-know-the-answer-is-no-but-i'm-going-to-ask-anyway voice: "Maelea sleep in Liv's bed?" hahaha. I cracked up. She was ready for Maelea to spend the night. The girls had fun with their matching snack cups, love for TOMS, and killer dance moves to the Mickey Mouse Clubhouse song! Liv was content snuggling with Alex and Mary Beth and watching the older girls play. And just because I'm a sucker for flashbacks, here are the girls last year on the Hatches spring break visit. It's amazing how much they have changed in one year!

Amelia Claire is 3

OVER a month ago, my precious niece Amelia Claire, turned three. She had a fabulous Mickey Mouse Clubhouse birthday party at a gym in Springfield. Ingrid was sooooo excited for Amelia's party. She practiced singing her happy birthday for days and insisted that she too, would be three years old. The party was so much fun. The only downer was that my camera battery died almost immediately upon arriving. Derek got a few snaps with his phone but I didn't get nearly as many as I would have liked. The girls were running around so quickly, I might not have had a chance for many anyway. Amelia had a precious, precious, precious disney dress on that Heather had custom made. I loved this dress so much! I wanted the little girls to have some festive attire too, so I stitched up a few Minnie Mouse head appliques for them to wear. They were too cute. Amelia had so much fun showing off all her gymnastic skills. She was so appreciative of all her gifts, oooohhing and aaaahhhing over each one. She is too fun to buy for because she genuinely loves every single thing. She is extremely smart and beautiful and I love her with all my heart!

Milestones

It's very hard for me to wrap my mind around how quickly time is flying by. Liv is already 4 months old?? And yesterday she reached two new milestones. She rolled over from back to tummy and had her first meal of rice cereal. She's been working on rolling over for quite a while now but as never made the full rotation. Now that she has it down pat, she keeps doing it over and over! Tonight I laid her down on her back and while I changed Ingrid into her jammies, she rolled onto her tummy and then onto her back again. She is laughing so much and "talking" up a storm. Ingrid loves to hear Liv's little voice. It always makes her laugh.

Thinking about rolling... Almost there... Success! All with one hand in her mouth! Cue crazy mom song and dance. Laughs at crazy mom.

Now that Liv is four months old, I decided to start her on rice cereal. She tried it for the first time and loved it. She acted like she eats it every day and that eating from a spoon was no big thing. Tonight was another success!

A scare beyond scares

Whew. Last week we had the biggest scare yet. Our little Elise Mae was hospitalized very suddenly due to an allergic reaction to the medication she was taking for an ear infection. What started out as a few little spots at a birthday party turned into a severe rash covering her entire body. Scalp, eyes, face, ears, and body--just covered in huge red welps. It was so scary. They would no go away. They showed no signs of improvement. They just kept getting worse. Dose after dose of benadryl and high powered steroids were not making our girl better. She was itching and hurting and then started swelling. It was so scary. I think every single person we know was praying for Elise and the power of prayer proved to work again. Almost overnight, she started getting better and was released from the hospital, after four long days. Heather was so strong through the whole thing. I am so proud of her!!!

This really makes you appreciate the normal. The ho hum of the everyday. I have really struggled with going back to work. I am very thankful for my job, and I know I need to work to help support our family financially. But I've still been sad about going back. But I look forward to coming home and spending every second with my girls. I love my everyday life. I love my family. I'm on spring break this week and thanks to my parents and in-laws, Derek and I got to spend a night away together in Branson. We were able to recharge and relax a bit. I'm reallllly hoping I can get caught up on my millions of posts while I'm on break!! So stay tuned.

Four Months Old

Dear Liv, Happy four months! I cannot believe how quickly time is flying by. You are such a happy girl. You smile and laugh at us all the time. You smile with your whole face and I love to see your eyes sparkle. You love it when I tickle you and give you kisses. You love to hold your toys and chew on them. You've become quite the little slobber monster! I have to keep a bib on you all the time or your clothes are soaked. You are on a pretty good nap schedule, with a morning, afternoon, and evening nap each day. This past month you started sleeping in your bed. Mommy was super concerned about this transition since you share a room with Ingrid. I didn't want you to wake her up when you woke up each night. It's gone pretty well! You sleep in your bed until you wake up fir your first feeding. I nurse you in my room and then you sleep the rest of the night in the sleep and play beside our bed. After your first big block of sleep, you are usually pretty restless so i havent tried putting you back in your bed for that time period. This routine has been working really well. You have woken up your sister a couple of times, but not too many! You are still nursing which makes mommy so happy. This is about the time Ingrid refused nursing, so I'm hoping you will make it longer than her! We do supplement one to two formula bottles a day because I can't quite pump enough to keep up. You take those bottles just fine. You are the sweetest little angel baby. I love holding you and giving you millions of kisses and cuddles. You seem to be growing so quickly. At your last well-check, you were three and a half months and you weighed 12 pounds 6 ounces and you were 23 and 1/4 inches long. I am counting down the says til summer so I can see you every second! Love you so much! Mama

French Braids

I love Ingrid's hair. Yeah, yeah, I know it's not the most important thing, but who cares? I absolutely love her beautiful blonde hair. It's getting so much longer and it has a lot of body and curl to it. I can't wait until it's long and I can fix it a million different ways. I want her to get used to sitting still and getting her hair combed and pulled and twisted this way and that. I don't want her to have a tender head and not ever want it fixed. So I'm starting her out young. I've been doing different french braids on it and I love how it looks. She is good to sit still if she has something to occupy her like a book or a toy. She doesn't complain (much) about how hard I pull. I don't know how to do too many hair styles, but thankfully you tube is full of tutorials on different types of braids. Here's my little blonde braided princess.

20 months old

Dear Ingrid,

Today marks your twentieth month. Twenty months sounds dangerously close to 24 months...TWO years old. EEEEK. I still want you to be my little baby. But you are a big girl in so many ways. This past month you had to go through more changes. That's all your life has been for the past three and a half months. You had to go from seeing Mommy all day, every day, to just in the evenings when I get home from school. You are adjusting very well. You've definitely become clingier to me when I'm home because you realize you aren't seeing me as often. Another change you've undergone is having Liv sleep in your room. She's been sleeping in her crib for the past week and sometimes she wakes you up when she wakes up. You've been a champ and you've gone back to sleep each time after Mommy has explained to you that Liv has to get up to drink her milk. I'm so proud of you for rolling with the punches.

You are interested in the alphabet more than ever!!! You love playing with your ABC flashcards and magnets. You can name 22 out of the 26 letters very consistently. The letters that trick you the most are J, L, and W. Sometimes Y. Your favorite letter is "I for IngIng." You can find I's everywhere. Tonight we were reading a book and you stopped reading with me and started staring into space. Or so I thought! You were looking at the WARNING label on Liv's car seat. You walked over to the car seat and said, "IngIng's car seat Mama." I told you yes it was yours when you were a baby but now it is Liv's. You pointed to the warning label and said "I-N-G for IngIng." I had a good laugh at that. Then you proceeded to spell out your whole name--trying to get the point across that I-N-G was indeed in your name. You are a smart little toot!

You love reading books, singing songs and nursery rhymes (a couple of your new favorites are Itsy Bitsy Spider, 5 Little Monkeys Jumping on the Bed, and I'm a Little Teapot), playing babies, building with Legos, coloring, stickers, and playing with "your guys." These are the little people and animals that live in your barn and doll house. You love to have them go to food parties and eat every food you can think of. It's quite a fun game.

This past month, you became completely obsessed with jumping. At first, you couldn't get both feet off the ground at the same time. You wanted to so badly. You kept trying, and trying, and trying. And you've succeeded! You can now jump with both feet leaving the ground. And you are very proud of yourself. You jump everywhere all the time. You are so full of energy. Running, dancing, jumping. Whew! You keep me on the move. You love to use silly names sometimes. You call yourself Ingy-Boo-Boo. Liv is Livy-Pooh or Livy-Lou-Lou. I'm Mama-Tootie or Mama-Boo-Boo. We all crack up at you all the time.

I love you so much. You make my days brighter than the stars.

Love,
Mama These pictures are special to me, because you are wearing a dress Mama made for you!

A Valentine's Post on March 5th

I had hopes and dreams of posting about Valentine's day in the month of February but they crashed and burned. I'm so behind. In most areas of my life. But I'm in the moment every evening with my girls. And that's where I want to be. Yes, I have 1.7 million photos I need to upload, organize, and blog. My house needs dusting and vacuuming. I have laundry that needs to be washed, folded, and put away. There are papers to grade and lessons to plan. Groceries need to be purchased and homemade meals cooked. But each night I try to push those things out of my mind and just focus on playing with the girls. We play dollhouse and barn. We give babies stroller rides and diaper changes. We build Lego towers and robots. We read a zillion books. We sing songs and nursery rhymes. Derek and I crack up at the things Ingrid says and does. We clap and dance every time Liv laughs out loud, reaches for a toy, or rolls over. So all those other things can wait. These are the important things right now.

Back to red, pink, white, and all things hearts. I got to sew a lot while I was on maternity leave and it was the most fun I have had creatively in a long long time. I loved every second of it. I made Valentine outfits for all four girls. I didn't get pics of Elise's shirt and skirt though :( I made Amelia a jumper with heart pockets and an appliqued bird. I sometimes wish I had a fancier sewing machine so that I could buy millions of cute applique patterns and applique my heart out. But it is challenging not having that. Challenging in a good way. I created the bird myself, from a sketch, and free handed the beak and legs. It was fun. In hind-sight I should have added stabilizer to the red fabric before I lined the dress so the bird wouldn't have puckered the material so much. But it's still a cute little jumper. I made Ing a jumper too, but a little different style. A higher neckline, thicker straps and unlined. This fabric was pretty thick, so I didn't want to line it and make it heavier. So I got to use single fold bias tape for the first time. I have only ever used double fold bias tape--that you see from the outside of the garment. I really liked the finished product. This picture kills me, because I didn't remember until seeing this pic, that I had made ingrid a bow out of the heart fabric to match her dress. Liv's dress was the easiest because I had made the onesie before she was born! She got too big too fast and never wore it. So I sewed on the skirt and cut the onesie so that it would fit her. She looked so presh in it. I couldn't get a good photo because she was too sleepy after church. And we were too rushed before church to get any pics. I love Valentine's day! But now my mind is on the next big holiday---Easter! I hope I have time to make a couple of cute things.