pics

Happy 2nd Birthday, Noah!

Wow, my baby is TWO! I can hardly believe that it's been two years since Noah entered our lives and changed our world forever. He is such a sweet boy, and it's truly the joy of my heart being his mommy. I love his sweet heart, curious mind, adventurous spirit and great sense of humor...and he's only two!

Sweet Noah, we thank the Lord for you each and every day. You are such a blessing, and it the greatest privilage to be your parents. Thank you for all that you add to this family, just by being you! We love you soooo much! Happy 2nd Birthday!

Summer Solitude

Now that "summer" is here, my moms group and Wednesday morning Bible study at church are both on break. :( I so enjoy those times during the year. However, this morning I took part in "Summer Solitude" and it was wonderful. For the next three Wednesdays I will go to church, take my kids to childcare, pick up my coffee, biscotti, ice water, and some notes and head up to a room all by myself. For 2 hours, I will read, journal, worship, pray, listen, wait and spend time alone with God. WOW!

This morning was so wonderful. Elizabeth (our Women's Ministry Pastor) gave us some ideas of how to spend some time alone with God at home. Many of you moms know how had it is to find "alone" time. I know that it takes a lot of effort to find a time (of any significance) to spend with the Lord. One of the ideas that Elizabeth gave us was this:

Get a basket and fill it with:
-a Bible
-a journal
-a pen
-thank you cards
-note cards for prayer/writing scipture
-a coffee mug/tea cup
-a favorite snack
-some worship music

When you have your free time, take that basket and spend some time reading, journaling and praying. If you have time, write some Thank You notes...sip some tea or coffee...eat your favorite little snack, and enjoy some time with the Lord. Maybe it means 15 mins...5 mins reading, some time journaling and some time praying...maybe 10 mins. The amount of time isn't important, the only important thing is getting some time alone with the Lord. I'm going to be putting my basket together today...I can't wait to find some time to grab my basket and spend some time with my Lord.

random thought and kiddos

-While parked in front of a pizza place I noticed the sign on the window said, "Free Deliver". Really? Someone took the time to paint that on the window without anyone saying anything about it? To make matters worse, there was a sign on the delivery car that said, "We Delivery". You have got to be kidding me!!

-Have I mentioned how much I love my kiddos?!?! I'm having so much fun with my ALMOST 2 YEAR OLD!!! and my sweet 3 MONTH OLD! Noah is super fun and super funny. He has such a great sense of humor, and knows when he's being a goofball. He still loves his little sister to death and in the mornings when he wakes up we hear something like this, "Mommy, mommy, mommy. Daddy, daddy, daddy. Ellinana, Ellinana, Ellinana!" He's back to his normal wake up time of 7-7:30...thank you Lord!! Elliana is doing wonderful. She is such a sweet, mellow little girl...and she's been sleeping great too!!

Here is Noah with his very first faux-hawk. I did his hair like this for our JH 8th grade banquet...I just knew the kids would love it. :)

My sweet girl:

She likes to be swaddled just like her brother:

Noah found his pockets:

Someone loves his mama's homemade salsa...

Big Boy Bed

As of tomorrow, Noah will have been in his big boy bed for one full week!! It has been an incredibly smooth transition...yay! The only issue that we've had is that he has decided to move his wake-up time from 7am to 6am. He doesn't get out of bed, but will call "mommy" and "daddy" until we go in. Once we're in there (trying to convince him that it's much too early to wake up) he gets so excited and can't wait to start the day and play. Typically he watches Sesame Street in the morning when he wakes up; he's not understanding why mommy can't turn Sesame Street on at 6am (Elmo is still sleeping of course!). He really is so cute...I just hope I get to begin enjoying my sweet boy about an hour later. Since it's only been the last 3 or 4 mornings, I'm hoping that we can slowly get back to the 7am wake up time However, I'm THRILLED that he's doing so well in his bed; what a BIG BOY!

Mother's Day

I had such a nice Mother's Day. Any day spent with my family is a good day. :) Here are a couple pics of my little sweeties...I just can't get enough of them.



I just had to include this one...such a funny face:


The weather was beautiful so we decided to head out to Victoria Gardens after naptime. As soon as we got there Noah eyed the fountain, and all the kids playing in it. He was SO excited to get out and play in the water. We didn't have extra clothes for him, so I decided to pop into Children's Place and get him some swim trunks...I think my favorite part of the day was watching him in the water. He had the time of his life!

Little Miss was as content as could be watching her brother play:

After playing in the water and walking around a bit we had a nice dinner at The Yard House. We sat outside and continued to enjoy the lovely weather. Noah was thrilled to have his favorite, mac and cheese, and even had a special drink...what a lucky boy. Elliana slept through dinner.



Thanks, sweet family, for treating me to a great Mother's Day.

catching up...

I have lots of catching up to do. We just got home from a week long vacation in Colorado so I'm trying to get back into the swing of things. Check back for some fun pics this week.

Elliana had her 2 1/2 month check up today. :) She's doing great! She is still in the 95th percentile for length (25 inches) and 75th for weight (12 lbs). She's such a happy, smiley baby...this is such a fun stage.

more later...