A simple update

I know I still need to update about Reese's birthday party, I'll get to that, but today I just wanted to write a simple update about both girls. I love being able to look back at what they were beginning to do when.

Reese:
Reese is 2 years and 12 days old. I cannot believe this. She absolutely loves babies. She loves to feed her babies, rock them while sshishing them, kiss them and carry them around in their carrier. She loves to be outside. She loves to ride on the golf cart, play in the dirt, slide, swing and jump. She has begun singing these cute little songs that make no sense to us but are absolutely precious. She has basically lost her appetite that was once so hearty. Her latest favorite words are stop, go away, iant (I want) some, she still loves to say oh no, she loves to name off all of her school friends and teachers. She is so adorable, lovable, caring, mischievous, precious, beautiful and the most amazing toddler I know.

Ella:
She is 6 months and 7 days old. She is such an amazing and laid back baby. She has just begun sitting up. She loves to make these cute new noises, she's found her voice. She is so much more into toys than Reese ever was. She can roll from one side of the room to the other...she's mobile without being able to crawl. She has begun eating peas, green beans, carrots, sweet potatoes, pears, apples, peaches and bananas. She has liked it all! She also loves to be outside. She loves to jump in her jumperoo, roll around the room and play with her toys. She is still the smiliest baby I know. She is absolutely precious, fun loving, sweet natured, easy going, cuddly and the most amazing baby I know.

I love each of these girls so much, they completely melt my heart. My heart swells with pride and joy just looking at them. Below are the cute school pictures that were recently taken for Easter.

Reese's 2nd birthday

This blog post is going to be written backwards, from the end of the day to the beginning. The reason is because I have uploaded the pictures in opposite order and it takes too much time to move them all around.

Thursday was Reese's 2nd birthday. I do not know how 2 years have already past. The have been the 2 best years of my life and I am SO thankful for her precious life. Neal and I took the day off to spend with her. Below are some pictures that we took to capture the day. We ended the day with dinner with Gigi and Pop Pop, but I failed to get any pictures there and her Emmie flew in late after Reese was down for bed.

We took Reese to see her 1st movie. We were unsure how this would go but she ended up doing great. It didn't hurt that the theatre was completely empty so she was able to run around some. She did make it through a good 45 minutes sitting in my lap, BUT she had pop corn and dippin dots to occupy her. We loved the movie and were so excited to make it through the entire thing.

Before the movie we took her to Chuck e cheese. We played lots of games and got her some candy with her tickets. She had a blast.

We started the day with breakfast at a cute Rogers bakery and a trip to the toy store to buy a new toy. Not surprisingly she chose a baby. She loves this baby, that she named Jilly, and she goes everywhere now.

My cute girl while we were driving to our various destinations.

On Wednesday she celebrated her birthday at school. I got her a Yo Gabba Gabba cookie cake to celebrate with her school friends. I left my camera and asked one of her teachers to get some shots of her with the cake. She did such a great job and I know these are pictures we will treasure. Thanks Charis!

Her BFF Reagan.

We had her birthday party today and had such a good time. I have a lot of editing to do but I hope to have those pictures up soon. Happy 2nd birthday sweet girl!

shoe wars

Reese has decided she hates all of her shoes and that they all "huwt". We went through 4 pairs this morning and these are the only ones that did not cause a complete meltdown. And she insists on socks with all shoes, even thongs. No, we were absolutely not getting out of the house unless she had socks on with these shoes...stylish I know.

Remembering my sweet uncle

My mom is one of 6 children. My grandmother suffered with infertility for 12 long years. During that time she adopted my Aunt Beverly & Aunt Elizabeth. She then became pregnant with my mom and was thrilled to have a complete family of 3 girls. She was surprised to find out that she'd accidentally become pregnant and even more surprised to find out that she was pregnant with triplets. So, she ended up having 6 children under the age of 4!!!

Sadly, three days after Ella was born my sweet Uncle John, one of the triplets, took his own life. My mom was with us in NWA helping me with Ella when we got this devastating news. Unfortunately, being that I was just days out from having a baby I was unable to make it home for the funeral but they taped it for me. Today is the triplets birthday and it's so sad that we cannot celebrate another year for all 3 of them. Uncle John was such a sweet, soft spoken & caring man. He is greatly missed.

Happy birthday Aunt Maureen & Uncle Pat!

roid rage

Last Monday Reese woke up with some minor red splotches on her face. The child has skin that gets strange splotches at random times so I didn't think much of it. On Tuesday after waking up from her nap her school called me to let me know it was looking worse but it didn't seem to be bothering her. By Wednesday afternoon it was so bad and swollen and irritating to her that we had to skip swimming class (the 1st one of the season that I'd gotten her so excited about) to go to the pediatricians office.

The pediatrician really was not much help and suggested Benadryl and hydrocortisone cream (which we were already doing). Since that was not helping and she was scratching sores on her arms an face I decide to get her in to see a pediatric dermatologist on Thursday. She thinks it may be a sun allergy (terrible :() and wanted to take part of her skin to send off for verification. Since Neal was traveling and I had 2 under 2 by myself I decided I did not really want Reese to be dealing with stitches. She prescribed a steroid to clear up the rash and gave us a hypoallergenic sun screen to try. I told her if this persists through the summer we may consider sending a skin sample.

Reese and steroids have not been a good combination. She has been whiny, moody, mean and sad for a whole week. Everything causes a melt down and she doesn't want anything you offer her. If she asks for milk and you get it for her she then throws a fit for juice and if you give in and get her juice she throws a fit for water and if you get her water she then just throws a fit so you have to give up and let the fit happen. My best guess is that the steroids have made her feel awful. My mom said that they make her and my youngest sister feel awful so it's possible. I am pleased to say he has been off of the steroids since tuesday night and last night my happy, somewhat easy going, funny, super sweet girl was back. We had such a fun evening and I'm SO happy to have her back. She also got to go to swimming lessons for the first time this season and had a blast.

Below are some photos of the rash & her silly new "cheese" face: