Dead Computer

My computer has officially died. No word yet on whether or not it signed a DNR so it may be salvaged or it may not.

Babies of Christmas past & present

Alana - 2006 Chubby and grouchy

Alana - 2007 My favorite christmas dress ever!

Alana - 2008 Too busy looking at the presents to take a picture

Alana - 2006                                                

Ava - 2009

Yesterday I put Ava in an old Christmas outfit of Alana's. Of course I had to take a picture to compare. The older Ava gets the less she looks like Alana (plus she's lucky enough to not have her daddy's forehead like her sister). I'm so glad to have Ava for Christmas this year. Babies only get one first Christmas and I want to make it special. Alana's first Christmas was definitely memorable. David went crazy buying stuff because he was so excited to have her.

Buying presents was definitely different with 2 girls to buy for. David actually had to control himself a little bit more. The presents aren't piled up to the ceiling like with Alana's first Christmas. He didn't buy four "Babies 1st Christmas" ornaments. We actually waited too long to buy Ava an ornament and I had to make her one. At least hers is personalized!

I'm just really grateful to have both of my ladies this Christmas and happy that we are able to get them lots of presents. Alana is growing up too fast and she's finally able to open her own presents without help from us. Ava is probably just going to try and eat the wrapping paper because that's how she rolls - she eats whatever she can put in her mouth! I know we'll have lots of fun and eat too much (probably just me) and make lots of memories.

Arizona winters

Today I went to Walmart and due to the fact that its December I put on my sweater and put jackets on my ladies and a hat on Ava. Then I actually went outside. It was like 70 degrees outside! I took my sweater and Ava's hat off since I was already sweating. How am I supposed to get in the Christmas spirit when its so hot? On Thursday we went shopping in Tucson and I stupidly wore a sweater. I was hot all day and kept trying to push the sleeves up but it didn't help! That's why I usually don't wear long sleeves. They are for people who live where its actually cold.

Not that I don't appreciate beautiful Arizona weather. You can actually go outside in winter without a coat and you don't have to scrape ice off of your windshield everyday. The sky is blue and clear almost all of the time and my heating bill is super low. I watch the news and people in other states are getting like 30 inches of snow on Halloween and I'm grateful that all I have to put on is a light sweater and I'm plenty warm. July and August leave a little to be desired in Arizona but beggars can't be choosers.

I didn't used to be hot ALL of the time. I actually thought it was cold a lot of the time and I would take a sweater to the movies in the middle of the summer because of the freezing cold a/c. Then I had babies. Pregnancy changed me. I actually sat in the lobby of a movie theater for the entire duration of Transformers 2 because the a/c wasn't working right in the theater. I was pregnant and so hot all of the time that there was no way I could tolerate sweating through some crappy action movie. Everyone said I wouldn't be as hot after I had Ava. They were SO wrong. I'm still hot and its December. I guess I should appreciate the low heating bills and just shut my mouth. I probably won't though.

I love this swing!

I am so grateful for this swing! Ava has loved it since we brought her home from the hospital. One of my favorite things about it is that it plugs into the wall - no buying hundreds of D batteries for me! Almost every nap that Ava takes is in this swing, I just put her in it after she nurses or when she starts to get drowsy and she goes right to sleep. Sometimes she complains a little but when I go to pick her up she's asleep. After having one baby who needed to be coersed into sleep its so nice to have one who just decides to go to sleep whenever she's tired. She doesn't even get cranky when she's really tired, she just gets drowsy and lays her head against my chest. I don't know what I will do when she's too big for it or if she decides she doesn't like it anymore. Maybe one of my babies will actually sleep in the crib! Probably not.

Imagination run wild

The past few days Alana has been a crazy person dreaming up all kinds of things when she is playing. The other day we watched A Garfield Christmas and after it was over she was pretending that Garfield was sitting on the couch with her and after that he was hiding with her. Then on Monday she kept running around yelling "fire, fire, its gonna get me, put it out!" I have no idea where she got that from! She was saying "its everywhere, get it!" and stomping on the kitchen floor. It was pretty funny. The most recent crazy thing she's been doing is pretending that random inanimate objects are her "yittle baby" and she has to parent them. For an entire day it was a variety of dress up shoes that were her yittle baby. She would burp them, rock them, ask us to hold them and even pretend to nurse them when Ava was eating. This morning she was insisting the remote was her baby. That was my least favorite because I wanted to change the channel. I can only watch Wow Wow Wubbzy so many times in a row without losing my mind. Finally she decided the remote was not her baby and decided to mother an actual baby doll, Baby Belle. At least she has an active imagination!

Old lady Ava

Ava is four months old today! She is so cute and sweet and I'm so happy to have her. She is already rolling over from front to back, which shes actually been doing for a while now, and she loves to eat rice cereal and oatmeal with bananas or peaches. She likes jumping in her jumperoo (thanks for the loner Aunt Dole) and laying on her floor playmat so she can stare at herself in the mirror. She is full of smiles and giggles and will chew on anyones fingers who dares to get too close. She is starting to get "baby pattern baldness" on the back and sides of her head which really stands out since the hair above and below is long and thick. She's gonna end up with a little baby mullet! Hopefully her bald spot won't get too bad since she doesn't spend too much time laying down on her back. She is growing too fast and already weighs 14 lbs. She is constantly sucking on her thumb and 2 fingers and that is how she usually falls asleep. Babies grow up way too quickly and with Ava I just want to enjoy every moment that I have with her while she is still small. I'm in no rush for her to become a toddler. Not at all.

Team Edward/Team Jacob

This is just a funny clip from SNL with Taylor Lautner debating for Team Edward. Nicole you have to watch it. Its pretty funny.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ldXyF3rr2HE

That's how she rolls!

Ava has been rolling over now for almost a month. She is my little over achiever! Either that or she just really hates tummy time!

My cute ladies!

My two ladies are so cute! I never really pictured myself having kids and now I can't picture my life without them. I also have never been one to gush and be all lovey-dovey but having babies did that to me. It made me a giant sap. Alana is so smart and pretty and she is always saying things that make me laugh. Yesterday I went to the doctor and she asked the nurse if they keep blood in the cupboards. Then she told the doctor "Good job Dr. Kruezer!" It was pretty funny. Ava is so sweet and pretty and good natured. She sleeps till 4 or 5 in the morning almost every night. That is amazing to me since Alana didn't sleep through the night till she was like 2. Ava loves to smile and lay on the floor with her big sister watching cartoons. She doesn't cry, just kind of protests when she feels shes being mistreated. The only time she gets upset is if Alana is crying, then the bottom lip comes out and she looks so sad! They are so cute and I'm so glad that I have them.

Santa Claus is coming to town!

In the past I wasn't always excited about the arrival of Christmas. After you reach a certain age it loses some of its magic. The element of surprise is gone. You no longer believe in Santa Claus. No one leaves cookies and milk by the tree for him or gets up early to see what he has left. Looking back there were lots of clues that my parents were Santa. All of the gift tags were written in my dad's all capital letter handwriting. Santa's gifts and my parents gifts had the same wrapping paper. It doesn't take a genius to figure it out. Once you do figure it out Christmas doesn't seem as magical or mysterious. You know where the presents come from and you even make a deal with your sister to tell each other everything you got. The only reason you know all of your siblings gifts is because now that the charade of Santa is gone your parents make you wrap all of the presents. Not that we were never surprised. One year all 6 of us got new bikes and an air hockey table. It was pretty awesome, even though being excited about a new bike when you're in seventh grade is kind of dorky. Other years they managed to hide a few things that we didn't know about. Now our family is getting so big with all of the grandkids that we add each year that we now draw names. My parents only get gifts for 2 people, whoever is lucky enough to have their name drawn by them.

Now I'm on the other end of the Santa Claus deal. I'm the one buying the gifts with David and telling my ladies (mostly Alana right now, Ava is too little to be bratty) to be good or Santa won't bring them presents. Thats a flat out lie. We love them too much to not get them presents. We went shopping last week with the intention of buying some presents for ourselves. That used to be the main thing we spent our Christmas budget on. LOTS of presents for ourselves. Now we go shopping and end up buying a new bike for Alana and lots of new little toys for Ava. Not that there was nothing we wanted, we just couldn't pull the trigger and spend the money on ourselves. We are officially lame. I do have to admit that Christmas is now 100% more enjoyable with kids. Someone believes in Santa again. There is a reason to get up early to open presents on Christmas morning, not open them a week before Christmas because no one is telling you not to. (David and I actually did that one year and Christmas morning was kind of boring.) Being on the giving end is more enjoyable and exciting.

  **David is like a little kid at Christmas time buying gifts and making me put up the tree before Thanksgiving and lighting stinky pine scented candles so "it smells like Christmas", so in a way its like I've always had a kid around at Christmas. Even when I had no desire to decorate or celebrate.

Torture my kids week

Today is day 2 of torture my kids week. Don't know how I'm going to follow the dentist and shots but I'm sure I'll think of something. ;) Yesterday Alana had her first ever dentist appointment and I had a gut feeling it wouldn't go well. I was right. She is so stubborn she hardly lets me brush her teeth so she has some pretty obvious cavities on her top molars. When we got there she was fine. I had brought some toy story toys for her to play with and Barbie and the 3 musketeers was on the TV in the waiting room. When they called us back she sat in the chair for like 30 seconds and then started crying. No one had even touched her teeth yet. She wouldn't get back in the chair, which I thought was crazy cause they had TVs on the ceiling. That is the most awesome idea ever. I wish they had that when I was a kid. She wouldn't let the hygienist take xrays and I had to hold her down for the dentist to even look in her mouth. Thats all he did. Looked in her mouth with the little mirror thing. She was crying hysterically. Then they declared Alana too stubborn to go to the dentist under normal circumstances. They have to gas her. They call it conscious sedation. If only she would cooperate just a little. I guess then she wouldn't be Alana.

This morning I had to take my sweet little Ava to get shots. I personally think that shots are just as traumatic for the mother as for the baby. At least the baby forgets about them. I will always have the memory of the nurse stabbing my poor sweet unsuspecting baby in the leg 3 times while I could do nothing but hold her. She didn't even cry until the second shot. Thats how different my girls personalities are. Alana cries when the dentist looks at her, Ava doesn't cry when she gets shots until the second one. It was like she was willing to forgive the first one, but after the second her feelings were hurt and she couldn't believe they were doing that to her again. Why? What did she ever do to them? When I put her back in her carseat she just had one big fat crocodile tear at the corner of her eye. My poor little lady. :(