I can't believe how much my girls are changing everyday! Eleanor has been doing a lot of pretend play lately. She is so imaginative and creative when she plays. I think this is probably much different than I was as a child. I imagine I just sat in a corner and counted things or something like that.
She likes to play hide and seek with Donald Duck, he's usually hiding in the closet in the family room. The other day she even wanted me to take a picture of him, which is pretty big for Eleanor because she LOATHES taking pictures. Here is Eleanor pointing to Donald Duck. He's sitting on the picnic bench next to Buzz Lightyear - you might not be able to see him (he's imaginary).
She's very much into tea parties with all of her bears. And lately has even added smoothies to the menu.
Today we had a pretty rainy yucky day so we stayed indoors. Eleanor kept talking about going to the park and finally I found her in the living room "going down the slide" and asking me if Penelope wanted to swing.
Then she wanted to ride the choo choo.
Eleanor is so full of energy! She is exhausting and wonderful and fun all at the same time and brings so much joy to my life!
Speaking of bringing joy to my life, Penelope is pretty good at that, too! You can't look at her without getting a smile out of her. Oh, she is cute!
Remember this little baby...
Well, I'm happy to report she now LOVES bath time.
Penelope is my little sweetheart. She is so patient and smiley and full of life. She wants to do everything that Eleanor is doing. She has even mastered going up the stairs. I love watching Penelope and Eleanor's personalities develop. They are so different in so many ways, but I just know they are going to be best buds!
On Monday night after I bathed the girls, I set Eleanor up downstairs watching Mickey Mouse while I went upstairs to feed Penelope and put her to bed. Well about halfway through feeding Penelope I thought I heard Eleanor come upstairs and go into the bathroom. I didn't think much of it because she had been wanting to put a clippie back in her hair after her bath so I figured she was just playing in the basket of hair stuff. Well I put Penelope down to sleep just in time to here Eleanor saying "uh-oh mama" over and over again. She had baby formula powder all over her and upon further investigation it was all over the bathroom floor and toilet. She had dumped out the entire can! Eleanor was only concerned about her jammies being dirty and wanted to pick out a new outfit. Mondays are long days as it is since Andrew has class until 11, so needless to say I got pretty frustrated with Eleanor! Well after all the yelling and cleaning up Penelope was awake and wasn't going back to sleep. It was our last can of formula so I loaded the girls up and we headed out to the store to get more formula. We stopped at McDonald's on the way home because there's nothing an ice cream cone or a hot fudge sundae won't fix!
I'm a little (2 months) behind in blogging so here's a look at what we've been up to ....
Penelope turned 6 months
Then Penelope turned 7 months and loves it when I play the piano
Eleanor thinks she's pretty good at playing the piano
Eleanor like to dress up as me and Andrew
Penelope is a crawling machine especially when she is on the hunt for paper or electrical wires
She also follows Eleanor around all day long
Eleanor thinks she is a princess. And speaking of princesses, we got Tangled yesterday and Eleanor has probably watched it about 5 times already. Which explains why I have a chance to blog. And hopefully Rapunzel can babysit her so I can get some spring cleaning done.
Penelope is loving food, especially real stuff like spaghetti, mac and cheese, cheerios, animal crackers, veggie straws, yogurt, string cheese. She also loves sticking out her tongue and is working on waving and clapping. She started pulling up on stuff last week and now she is obsessed with standing. She wants to stand any chance she gets. The race is on to see if she will walk before I did. But she's running out of time, she only has about 2 weeks left ;) She's also been a really crummy sleeper. She had RSV a couple of weeks ago and ever since then her sleeping is off. And I think she's about to cut a tooth or two. I'll be so happy when they come through because then maybe I'll get some good sleep. (fingers crossed!!)
My mom sent Eleanor a package of some Mardi Gras beads, a tutu and green sparkly shoes so she can be Tinkerbell! I think she went about a week without taking it off (except to bathe and get dressed, but then it went right back on).
These days she likes to pick out what to wear and sometimes she requests an outfit change several times. This is today's third outfit...
Maybe if it would ever warm up around here she could actually leave the house in spring dresses.
We had some nice spring weather that lasted about a week. Now we are back to cold winter weather and it is actually snowing as I type. We are so anxious for warmer weather!
And to close I had a video of Eleanor's favorite hobby, reading, but it is just taking way to long to load. She has been so into books lately, and I love it! Here she is after her nap just hanging out in her room and reading books. Some of her favorites are Go Dog Do, Five Little Monkeys, Fancy Nancy, anything princess, Hand Hand Fingers Thumb, Chicka Chicka Boom Boom (which is actually what she calls chicken now), Mr. Brown Can Moo, and A Fly Went By.
Second of all, there will be a lot of pictures here! I haven't blogged in about 2 1/2 months, so this will be the reader's digest version. I'm afraid if I don't just get some catch-up posted, I might keep putting it off and never get around to blogging again!
Penelope got her bottom two teeth the weekend she turned 4 months. The week before they popped out Andrew went out of town for work so I got to deal with my poor little teething baby who refused to sleep and my poor little attention starved 2 year old. Sounds like fun, right?
Being 4 months and having teeth means we get to start baby food. Here's PP giving it a whirl.
Here's our attempt at a Christmas picture in front of our tree...yes, this is the best one we got! The next few pictures basically sum up how you can find Eleanor most times of the day - with lots of accessories and junks!
I wish this next one wasn't so blurry, because I think it is priceless... This is after Penelope's teeth were in and she was back to her sweet smiley self.
The following week we were on our way to St. Louis to spend Christmas at my sisters house with my mom and all my siblings and nieces and nephews. Here's Eleanor in the backseat of our new minivan we got the day before leaving. Andrew's car wasn't going to last much longer, so we decided to trade it in while it was still worth something. Now I'm sporting a Toyota Sienna. Woop woop! It made the trip very doable! Eleanor was (and is still) so excited to ride in it. I think she loves being up high and able to see everything.
Here are all the grandkids minus one on Christmas Eve in their new PJ's Here's our little family. On a side note, Andrew got the worst haircut of his life earlier in the day, so don't mind his military-mohawk haircut :)
I'm afraid this won't be the last time I see my kids pull each others hair. Penelope looks very sneaky, not to mention very drooly, in this picture :) As luck would have it, my camera died on Christmas morning and I didn't bring a charger. Here are some family pictures we took with the whole clan once my sister Emily arrived on Christmas night. Mom and the kiddies. Mom and her 7 kids. Just us... (Eleanor is still working on her picture-taking skills) It was so fun to be with my mom and all my siblings. And it was especially fun to see my girls with their cousins. It makes me sad that we all live so far apart!
We stayed in St. Louis almost a week and broke up our trip to and from with visits to Children's museums in Indianapolis (on the way there), and Dayton (on the way back). Eleanor was able to get some of her energy out and it was fun to see new places!
We also stopped at a Walmart at some point and got some good footage. Eleanor grabbed a plunger and was walking with it like it was a cane...I'm not really sure where she learned that?
Luckily when we got back home all our snow had melted (yesss!), which made it a little easier to return back to reality. BUT the above-freezing temperatures didn't last long and we've been staring at several inches of snow outside ever since.
We celebrated the new year by staying home, ordering pizza and getting a redbox! We've been spending most of our days lately in our pajamas and watching Mickey Mouse Clubhouse or Tinkerbell, or doing any of the following....
Playing with Christmas presents Coloring or painting (Eleanor's newest hobby) Helping mom feed the baby. She actually did a really good job. I had set Penelope up in the high chair and was in the kitchen making rice cereal and I came out to find Eleanor already feeding Penelope. Here's a video.
Being really cute
Humoring mom by taking a sister picture Stealing dad's glasses Trying to steal mom's drink Dressing up in a "princess dress"/nightgown and dancing to "princess music"/Carrie Underwood Putting on any/all princess paraphernalia and sneaking mom's blush and putting so much on that you look like you have a sunburn Being cute some more
Penelope has also been a little scooty bug. She is trying to crawl already! She can sit up now and she has been rolling both ways for a couple of months now. Here's a video of her in action.
When we got back from St. Louis we did some sleep training with Penelope and it's gone really well. I think all that time away from her own crib made it easier for her to fall asleep on her own once we got home. She's finally on a somewhat of a schedule - She wakes up around 7-7:30 am, she naps around 9:00 am for an hour or two, naps again around 1:00 pm for about 2 hours, and is in bed by about 6-6:30. She sometimes wakes up one more time to eat before we go to bed, and then gets up one more time around 4:00 am, then back to sleep until 7 or 7:30 am. It makes life so much better once babies have a more predictable schedule.
And here's one more video of Penelope and a new little trick she's picked up.
Andrew's still working full-time and taking classes part-time. He only has classes on Monday nights this semester, but they go until 11:30 at night. We decided we'd rather that than have him gone 3 nights a week. It's also made Wednesday nights a breeze because I don't have to take the girls with me to Young Women's. Well, I think that about sums things up. Now I'm off to watch the Bachelor and wait for Andrew to get home from class.
