We Moved

This move was bittersweet for me, its where we have spent the last 3 years of our lives. Olivia has spent 3 birthday's here, we grew from a family of 3 to a family of four, this is where we brought Benjamin home for the first time, and he was able to spend his first year, learning to crawl and walk. We have made so many memories in these walls. 

But we move on and we make new memories and hold the old ones close. Over the next year we are working to save ever penny we can so we will soon be able to buy our own home. We are lucky enough to have our families who support our dreams and are there at every turn to make sure they come true.  

 

Going, Going, Gone

Growing Up with An Older Sister

I knew that this day would come! I have seen the result of an older sister/younger brother situation, my cousins have pictures. So when I came back into Olivia's room and found Benjamin dressed up in one of her fairy costumes all I could do was laugh.

I let him keep it on just until Daddy came home! Benjamin didn't seem to mind that much that he was sporting a dress. I like to think he was just trying to make his sister happy, and that she was just because he was dressed up just like her.  It was cute to watch her brushing his hair and telling him what to do.

Mom, one day I am going to get you for this.

Trying to butch it up a bit.

13 Months {Benjamin}

He is officially over 1 year old now, a toddler and no longer my little baby boy. Ok so let's be honest he never was really LITTLE! But I now have 2 TODDLERS, where has the time gone?

Benjamin is just growing, growing, growing and he is becoming more and more like a boy. At least what I assume little boys are like, since he is my first experience. He is into EVERYTHING! Touching, picking up, putting it in his mouth, and throwing EVERYTHING! He has choked on his fair share of stickers and eaten stale cheerios he found in his hidding spots. Daddy and I have learned to be very watchful over this one now.

He is even showing a little sign of a temper, that damn toddler temper! Olivia will come and take something away from him or Daddy and I will remove something that he shouldn't have from his hands and then it hits. He screams and puts his head down or lays on the ground in a short temper tantrum. But as quickly as it starts it's over and he is on to something else. Thank goodness for that.

Now that he has 8 teeth he is way more interested in eating regular food. If you are eating it he wants it! He still gets a bottle of milk when he wakes up in the morning, then a little later he will have his breakfast which usually consists of cheerios (his favorite), oatmeal, fruit, and banana's. He snacks throughout the day on puffs, yogurt melts, and whatever he can get his little hands on. Lunch he gets a little fruit and veggies and then dinner is whatever we are having or if he can't eat it we make him a variety of noodles, green beans, rice, chicken, mashed potatoes, carrots, and he also gets a fruit and yogurt. Yup this kid can eat. We end the day with a bottle before bed.

We are working on getting him off the bottle and have done really well. He drinks out of a straw which I never thought a 1 year old could figure out or his sippie cups but they also have straws. The only thing is that he will only drink milk out of his bottle. If you put it in any other type of cup he refuses to drink from it. I do remember Olivia going through this same thing but I have no clue how we fixed the problem. Oh well things could be worse right?

Lucky for us this little boy still loves his naps, and takes 2 naps a day for about 2 hours each. There are still rare days where he will only take one but they are far and few between. All you have to do when you see he is getting tired is put him in his crib and down he goes. I will be so sad when these fall off his schedule. Especially because his second nap generally falls in line with Olivia's nap.

He is beginning to say more words now, he knows;

Mommy

Daddy

Truck

Baby

Ball

Duck

Banana

He also is learning animal sounds:

Cow - Moo

Duck - Quack Quack

I just want to freeze time because he is so much fun right now!

A Whirlwind Weekend

This past weekend was well a crazy and fabulous weekend. I think we saw every family member, all of our friends, and made new ones. Between Saturday and Sunday we attended 4 birthday parties and 1 surprise party, Leah turned 2, Emma turned 2, Anna turns 30, Nathan turned 1, and Hannah turned 3. We also squeezed in a group date night with margaritas and mini golf. After all the parties Saturday I really enjoyed those margaritas. I even was able to do a photoshoot for an amazing family. More on that here.
So check out the photos because it really sums up the weekend.

Leah's 2nd Birthday and Olivia got her face painted for the first time which topped off her day.

Leah enjoyed every bit of icing from her cake and then went after another.

Heading to Party #2

Anna's Surprise 30th

Emma Grace's Lady Bug Birthday, adorable.





Date Night at City Walk



Nathan's 1st Birthday was a hit he loved his sprinkles. Olivia went to her very first school party for her friend Hannah. She wanted to know if their teacher was coming.



So tired.

Grocery Store Run

Happy Birthday Benjamin

It's here, it finally happened, Benjamin is a ONE year old today!!! It's such a mix of emotions for me, excitment and sadness that my little baby is not a baby anymore.

 One Year Stats

Height: 29 inches

19th Percentile

Weight: 20.13
45th Percentile

So we are starting off his second year with 6 teeth. He puts those teeth to good use too, he is still an amazing eater. We are down to only 3 bottles a day which we have transitioned over to milk. Ok yes, I would not have done that a week early with Olivia but this boy he can handle it. He eats 3 meals a day and has snacks in between. Favorites still seem to be his puffs, yogurt, and anything that is on our plates.

Benjamin has been walking for awhile now and he is really getting the hang of it. 95% of the time he walks although there are times when he knows he can get there faster by crawling. He keeps right up with his sister, it's so cute to watch him follow her everywhere she goes.

He still is an explorer, we have to put everything in our mouth. That makes Mommy and Daddy's job super hard to make sure that Miss Olivia picks up anything that Brother here can't get his hands on. We have had numerous occasions where he has thrown up because he choose to eat a sticker. But Olivia is learning that if she wants to share her stickers that they have to go on his back.

Mr. Motor Mouth may talk just as much if not more then his sister does. He wakes up talking and goes to bed talking. I only wish I knew what he was saying. I have been assured that he has the vocabulary of a 15 month old. Here are the words that he can say so far: Mommy, Daddy, Hi, Bye Bye, Ba Ba, Duck, Papa, No No, and Ok.

Happy Easter

Bath Tub Fun

Olivia and Benjamin love their bath time. They get in there and splash like they are at the pool. Olivia has always wanted to help wash brother and she is getting really good at it lately. Here are some pics from their bath last night.

ONE Year Photos {Benjamin}

Oh by the way I began a little side business, Olivia James Photography! I have had a small obsession with my camera since I had Olivia and finally decided to do a little more than my own kids. So far I have been honored to do engagement photos for my sister-in-law and they were beautiful and a family/gender reveal session. Check out my blog page Olivia James Photography.

Back to this post though. This past week I took Benjamin out to do a little one year photo shoot. He was all over the place, very unlike Olivia who posed and smiled. But we still got some great shots of this little boy. Yup he is a boy and not a baby anymore! Yikes!

Mama's Faves {Benjamin}

Growing

Almost ONE

Walking Boy

Here is a little video from Valentines Day when Benjamin started walking.

Life with a Toddler

There is never a dull moment in my life. It ebbs and flows with sweet amazing loving times and crashes with crazy loud toddler shenanigans. And it is in those times when we find ourselves looking at each other wondering what the hell just happened? Those times are many living with a toddler. It is like living with someone going through menopause, you're hot, you're cold, you're hot... You get the gist, toddlers change with the wind, their attitude and as I am finding out her clothes! One minute they are a little angel and the next devil horns have sprouted and they are shooting fire from their precious little mouth.

We are going through a change (one that I hope has a very near end in site) and with that change said toddler, ahem Olivia, is becoming quite demanding. Each morning she wakes up and demands gummies (fruit snacks) apparently the new toddler crack! When we say no, to which we say every morning, we are met with kicks, flails, and then she is laid out on the floor in the ultimate fit. Ahh the days before we had children, those glorious delusional days, when we thought to ourselves, our child will never do that. I look back at my childless-self and laugh as I step over the screaming toddler and carry on about my business. Then it's quiet and we all know that no good can come of this.

When there is trouble to be caused you could call a toddler a little ninja, she can get into something without us even noticing she is missing in action. Between the quiet and her small size she can move stealthily from one place to another. She fits perfectly behind the height of the sofa, counters, and tables (I'm sure it doesn't help that her Daddy and I are not the tallest people in the world, hell I'm only a couple inches from being the same height practically). How do you think this little magic happened?

Yes, this happened while she was supposed to be playing in her room and Daddy was cleaning up from dinner (Mommy was out of town). It is also when we find her streaking through the house to the tune of my-shirt-is-wet-so-I'm-changing, or you find her climbing on chairs to reach in her dresser for new panties because she wants Dora instead of Cinderella, or we-must-dirty-every-pair-of-leggings-we-have-so-Mommy-can't-ever-get-caught-up-on-laundry-again.That is if she even wants to put clothes back on, I can't count how many times we have eaten our dinner while she sports only a shirt after she goes potty. Don't judge me sometimes I would like to eat without getting indigestion from arguing with her! I sometimes wonder if I will be visiting her when she is older at her home on a nudist colony?

After 4 days of single parenthood (Daddy's little vacation) I wanted to change my name! I never realized that the reason we marry and then have children is so that there is someone else's name for them to call scream for a hundred times in 2 hours. In the car she asks to watch her movie and silly me I wanted to talk to her about her day so I said no (I lied and said it wasn't working, otherwise it would be "Mommy I wanna watch my movie" on repeat for 15 minutes). Well she didn't want to talk about her day, so my questions went ignored, who out there knew that a 2 1/2 year old was smart enough to just pretend you weren't talking to them? Oh You were talking to ME, Mom? Silly me I thought you were talking to the other little girl in the car. Instead she wants to talk about everything else, Mom why are you stopping? (asked 50 times while we were moving) Mom, what is that? (from the backseat while I am driving and then getting mad that I have no idea what she is pointing to on the ground behind my seat) Mommy, I have to peepee! (It never fails) Mommy, I want a waffle. Mom I don't want a waffle! Mom stop! (when I am singing along to the radio that I have turned up to not hear my name). Mommy I want a poptart. Mommy I want gummies! Mommy (something in a super soft voice) that I then have to ask 15 times for her to repeat and she thinks its funny so she continues to say the same thing the same way. Ahhh life as a mother of a toddler!

It's as if she lives her life on a stage in a performance every day. She knows that she has an audience at all times and she knows how to make us laugh even if it's the stifled-we-shouldn't-be-laughing-at-this kind. And there is always a moment in the middle of us disciplining her that she says the sweetest thing that just catches you so off guard. It makes you wonder what you were yelling at this little angel for in the first place. It's a trap! They know they are getting in trouble for something that they did wrong so they figure if they sweeten you up that you will forget. I'm up on your little game!

Despite all the times where you just want to pull-your-hair-out-change-your-name-move-into-a-hole there are just as many times where you look at her calmly playing with her little brother and actually sharing her toys. And you think, this is what it is all about, these moments that just out weigh anything else that happens and in a moment of weakness you want to keep popping out these little miracles. But you remember the times where you are on your hands and knees scrubbing the hot pink nail polish off the tile floor, watching only as it makes larger pink circles. Yes, remember those times so you know that you don't want to have another one just yet.

Our Angel

11 Month's {Benjamin}

How crazy is it that in just one short month Benjamin will be celebrating his 1st birthday?

Didn't this just happen?

When did we get here?

This has been a big month for the little man. He can walk now, on Valentine's Day he started walking and hasn't stopped yet. Still a little wobbly but the cutest little wobbler I have ever seen. I do have a video that I need to get up here so watch for that).

He has begun to sleep through the night almost every night now. I think we are on the slow down between teething and growth spurts that were keeping him waking about 3 times a night for a while. Speaking of teeth he did sprout a new one on February 17, another bottom one. We are getting so close to real food that I think he is getting as many teeth as he can to prepare.

As we get ever closer to the BIG ONE, we have been giving him some big people food. He has enjoyed rice, chicken, banana, lunch meat, any kind of bread, green beans, and mashed potatoes. Benjamin would rather eat off of our plate then his own food now. We are also working on cutting down his bottle intake which seems to be going pretty good so far. His morning bottle is pretty much gone now, he starts his day with fruits and oatmeal. Once he turns one he will have milk with breakfast instead. Last night he ate so much with dinner (6ozs of Chicken Noodle Dinner, 2oz of fruit, and a yogurt) that he only had 2ozs of formula before he was out.

This boy is the epitome of schedule, he wakes at the same time every day now (around 6:30-7am) and goes straight into the carseat on week mornings. He gets his breakfast within the first hour of waking up and then it's play time until around 10-10:30 when he takes between a 1-2 hour nap. Once he wakes up its time to get dressed, have lunch and more play time. By 2:30-3 he is ready for his afternoon nap which is about 2 hours. Then its home from Mommom's on a week night, dinner at 6pm, baths at 7ish, and then he is ready for a bottle and night-night time.