I KEEP HAVING BABIES

Hey, it's me. Been awhile, and some pretty big things have been happening around here. First of all, we welcomed our second little girl, Lily Francis, into our lives on October 6, 2016. She was the happiest, sweetest surprise.

Our little squish

She is a doll baby. Not an awesome sleeper, but a terrific eater. And she loves to coo and chat and watch all the trouble her big brother and sister get into. Right now she is three months old. She is a very calm little girl. She loves to cuddle, and takes AWESOME naps if you can get her snuggled into you on the couch. She loves to sit in the bumbo seat and watch everything that's going on around her. She has navy blue eyes (but I've heard they can still change) and dark hair. She's going to be such a knockout someday!

Our Lucy is a gem. She is a peach. My parents always say it's like she has sunbeams shining right out of her face. She is the coolest kid. She's 18 months old, and she is the funniest little bossy girl on the planet. She knows exactly what she wants, and she never hesitates to tell you about it. She loves baby dolls, her little lamb & cat pacifiers, candy, whatever toy Leo is currently playing with, Sesame Street, and generally getting into trouble. She is talking up a storm. Her favorite things to tell me are:

"SHIT DOWN MOMMY!" (Sit down, Mommy)

"CANDY. YES PLEASE. CANDY. YES."

She loves to tell you the names of everyone in her family (she calls herself "cee"), and if you ask her how old she is, she will tell you that she's nine. She started walking at 11 months out of sheer determination to get into everyone else's business. She was Minnie Mouse for Halloween, and loves to "fix you" with her doctor kit.

My girl can EAT. She eats everything that we do, but her favorite things are eggs, pasta, cherry tomatoes, corn on the cob, pizza, candy (a candy necklace was hands-down her favorite Christmas gift), waffles, strawberries and juice. She only weighs 20 lbs., despite her enormous appetite.

 

Leo is the man. He started preschool at Veritas Academy in September, and he is doing really well! When I dropped him off last week, two cute little girls were fighting over who got to play with him first. So, it's starting early. Yeesh.

Right now he LOVES his baby sister, Lily. He does play a lot with Lucy, but she takes his toys, and that's not cool. He also loves Transformers, watching movies ("Shrek" is the current fave), building with Legos, reading books (we just started "Harry Potter!"), and interestingly enough, baking. He is a great helper, and he still loves to cuddle. He is so bright and smart.

He eats chicken nuggets.

Okay, I'm exaggerating, but that's pretty close to it.

His best friends are Grady and Beckett. He is very sad that I am going back to work. He is a sensitive guy, and he likes his mommy around. He has a super hero bedroom, and he loves to steal things from around the house (ex. Daddy's socks, the baby's burp cloth, Lucy's mermaid barbie, my earrings), and put them under his pillow. I have no idea why he does this. He also hates to throw things away. He still takes a nap, but he's starting to really resist it. He sings and talks in his sleep. He just learned how to cross his eyes, and I have actually found myself telling him to "STOP DOING THAT OR YOUR EYES ARE GOING TO STAY THAT WAY." My, how the tables have turned.

 

They are an absolute joy to me, and I have to start writing this stuff down more. I don't want to forget that I make Lucy leave her pacifiers in the crib before I get her up, and she sometimes cries when she leaves them. Or how Leo still likes me to sing him a song and tickle his back at bedtime. Or how Lily sucks her two fingers instead of a pacifier. Or how Leo is SO GOOD at Where's Waldo? that it's kind of ridiculous. Or how Lucy winks. Or how she calls Sesame Street "Geet" and Vinny is "Minny." I don't want to forget how surprised Lily looked when she rolled over after practicing all night in her crib. Or the way she smiles when you get her out of bed. I don't want to forget that Leo likes to give me eskimo kisses, and he loves to eat gummy worms, and his favorite part of "Frosty the Snowman" is when Frosty melts. Or how excited they are when I walk in the door, even if I've only been gone a few minutes.

This is my best life. My busiest life, but my best life.

Another lovely day with my babies.

Today was awesome. Keeping a toddler entertained while also feeding and changing and snuggling a newborn can be rather tricky, but some days things just click. We started our day early, since Leo has been waking up "when the sun wakes up." So, that's pretty early. Luckily, our Lucy has been sleeping like a champ, and only waking up once at night. 

So after double diaper changes and breakfast for everyone, we decided to get ready to go walk the trail at the township building. My mom said she would meet us there, so we investigated a front loader and the playground while we waited for her.

We took a really long walk through the "tree tunnel," with Lucy snuggled up and snoozing in the Moby. 

Leo actually ran pretty much the entire trail, so he was a sweaty monster by the end. Of course, he was then too tired to make the walk back, so my mom & I had to take turns carrying him. Note to self: always bring a stroller.

Lucy had her hearing test at 11:30, so Leo went swimming with Nanny. He had a blast, and Lucy passed her test with flying colors! We also got a little bonus mommy & Leo time to play in the sandbox. 

After lunches, we came home for naps and now we are just waiting for Daddy to come home. That's really the only thing that will be better than this lovely morning with my sweet babies. 

And then there were two...

Well, let's flash forward to 2015. Leo is now a big brother to Lucia Kate, better known as "Lucy" or "Lucy Girl" or "Lucy Kate" or "new baby sister." 

 

We are all adjusting to life with a new baby girl, but Leo is an outstanding big brother! He loves to kiss his baby sister and hold her little hand and "pet her."  

He loves to lay with her on her mat and he always squeals with joy if she looks at him or grabs his finger. It's downright precious.

I'm having a slightly more difficult time adjusting to life as a mom of two. Leo and I have been partners in crime for a while, and I sort of forgot how challenging and time-consuming the newborn lifestyle is. But my Lucy girl is a good, sweet baby, so that has been a huge blessing. I'm looking forward to getting to know her and seeing her unique personality start to show itself. 

So far, she has been mostly adoring her daddy. The two of them are the sweetest thing. He just coos to her and snuggles her up, and she already smiles when she hears his voice. That Daddy-daughter bond that everyone talks about is real!

Anyway, today was a great day for our little family! I got to spend a little time with Lucy while my dad took Leo to the Linear Park. He loves splashing in the rain puddles and running running running! Then Leo & I went to Dosie Dough to get a doughnut and watch the big trucks drive by.

It's his very favorite "date," and it was awesome to spend a little time one-on-one with him. 

We also did some coloring/painting! He loves to put his pictures on the fridge, so he made quite a bit of artwork to add to the display. 

He went down for his afternoon nap around 1:30, and I have a snuggly little girl taking a nap on me right now. We are just waiting for Chicky to get home to help us with a bath! Here are a few more recent pictures of our family of four (plus Vinny)! 

 

I'm back!

Holy geeze! It's been over a year since I wrote a blog post. I guess I just got tired (and lazy)...But things around here are always interesting and busy, especially now that we have a running, climbing, cabinet-opening, remote-stealing TODDLER.

That face!! Swoon.

Leo Bean is now just over 18 months old! It's hard to believe how quickly the last year went, but now we have a real little boy living with us. He's at that awesome stage where he has to run everywhere, all the time. I tell everyone that he's only got one speed: fast.

He loves to play hide & seek, to push around his lawnmower in the kitchen, and to throw the ball to brother Vinny. He's still into watching "Sesame Street," but now we've discovered the "Cars" movies as well, so there's a little more variety for Mommy.

 His absolute most favorite thing in the world is reading books. We are reading at least 5-10 a day, with his favorites being "The Sneetches," "The Wheels on the Bus," "Go Dog, Go!," "Is Your Mama a Llama?," and "Chicka Chicka Boom Boom." He loves to turn to pages and to point out the words he knows.

He is talking SO much! He says between 30-40 words, and he says something new almost everyday. Today he said "pirate," clear as a bell. Insane. He still uses some made-up words ("ga-guys" = pacifier, "maaa"= milk, "keys"= duck, "nin"= Vinny), but he chatters to me all day. My favorite thing is when I walk in the door and he first sees me, he sprints towards me, arms raised, and yells "MAMAAAA!" Best. Feeling. Ever.


I'm really trying to appreciate and take advantage of every moment that I get to stay home with Leo. It's such a blessing to get to experience all these new, exciting things alongside the coolest, handsomest little dude I know. Every day is an adventure. Life is SO good!

Sunday, February 3, 2012

Today was Superbowl Sunday!

It started with a looong night of Leo Bean yelling and waking up every hour or so. So, momma was pretty grumpy this morning. Luckily the cuteness of Leo quickly won over the grouch in me.

I mean, isn't he the prettiest baby ever? So he jumped a lot and hung out with his dad for a while until we went to my parents' for breakfast. They were super stoked to see Leo. We ran to the grocery store while Leo stayed with my parents. They even got him to take a little nap in the pack-n-play. It was really cute, because when we got back, I went to wake him up, but he was already awake and just laying in the crib staring at the ceiling. He's a funny guy. 

He was not overly interested in taking a nap in the afternoon, so he was pretty grouchy. But he watched some TV with his dad and played with Sophie Giraffe in his crib. We finally got him to fall asleep right before we planned to leave for Casey's. So he only really got 15 minutes or so. Bummer. 

Then we went over to Casey's to watch the game. It was nice to see everyone, and Leo really liked flirting with Ryan. He's going to be trouble; I can tell already. He wore his Eagles jersey, even though they were terrible this year. 

When he started squawking, I took him home so that we could watch the halftime show. Beyoncé was amazing. 

Unfortunately, Leo was so grumpy from his lack of naps today, that he fussed and was generally miserable during our whole bedtime routine. I was bummed, because that's usually one of my favorite parts of the day: snuggling him right before he goes to sleep. 

Fingers crossed he sleeps well tonight! 

Saturday, February 2, 2013

I'm beginning to think that everyday with Leo is a great day. Today was certainly nice. It started out a little rough, as our little dude did NOT want to sleep last night. He was up every hour from 2-4, which seems like forever in the middle of the night. But we finally brought him into bed to snuggle, and he slept until 7:30 or so.

Normally I'm the only one that gets to enjoy Leo morning snuggles, so it was really fun to watch him with his dad this morning. At one point, Leo had a grip on Chic's nose, but he was just chilling, watching the ceiling fan. He loves the ceiling fan.

Then Chic went out to get breakfast, and Leo and I continued our snuggles.

We tried to find something to watch on TV in bed, but Saturday morning cartoons just aren't what they used to be. Leo was not impressed.

Then, Chic came home with a surprise breakfast...Fractured Prune! Oh man, are those things good.

Leo bean had a bit of a stomach ache this morning, so he had a terrible, horrible exploding diaper situation. Not good. Then, we took a family trip to the Home Depot to get stuff to insulate our door a little better. We also stopped into Old Navy, and got Leo Valentine's Day & St. Patty's Day outfits. They are pretty awesome.

After we got back, and Leo did a lot of jumping, he was sitting on my lap when he started making his poop face. Before I knew it, there was green poop on my shirt. And it was veryyyyy smelly. Chic needed a special "mask" to deal with the diaper.

That kid is cute, but he is gross. But it must have made him feel better to get all that out, because he was super happy and fun the rest of the night.

 Here's hoping that tomorrow is just as great!

Friday, February 1, 2012

Happy Friday!

My day started at 2:40 this morning when I heard some strange squeaking sounds coming from Leo's room. It didn't sound like tears, so I went to investigate...turns out he was just kicking Sophie Giraffe in the corner of his crib. Pretty cute. I brought him into bed with me around 6:30, and he slept until 9:00. Pretty sweet.

I never get tired of looking at this face.

We got up, and Leo watched a little Sesame Street while I got the chili ready for dinner. Then he jumped in his jumper while I picked out a really cute outfit for him to wear. I can't believe he's already wearing 6 mos. sizes!

Then we went to visit Jan, Grady & Baby Beckett.

It's always nice to talk to another stay-at-home mama. And Grady is super fun. He wanted us to play with his trains and cars in his room. And he tried talking to Leo, which was pretty cute.

He kept calling him "that dude." So that was a really fun morning.

Then we came home, and Leo Bean took a snooze. I baked a cake and checked the mail...And on the front page of the Lititz Record today was...Uncle Joey!

There was a really great article about his involvement in THON. We are all so, so proud of him.

There was also a picture of Leo Bean in his snowman outfit. He's pretty great too.

The rest of the night we just hung out with Leo, talked to him, blew raspberries on his belly, sang songs, ate some cereal, took a bubbly bath and did our bedtime thing. I'm loving every minute.