Spring Visits

We finally got in some family visit times! First Aunt Julie came out with Kurt and Ridge. Phillies fans! Ridge brought out some of his old books and wanted to read one of them to Max, it was so cute.

Stuck in there was a Harrisburg Senators baseball game. The kids loved it. We made it about an hour till they ran out of french fries Nate told Max he would get and Aliyah had some issues keeping her hands to herself:)

Then Aunt Ellie, Uncle Josh, Emma and Luke (aka Yoot) came to visit!

Grandma's birthday cake. Max loves to sing!

Mothers Day at the Whitaker Center, the kids had a blast.

They had an awesome water table with a little seat for babies to sit in. Of course my water babies loved it and the big kids were happy to get to play in the 5 and under room with their little cousins!

11 months

This is what most of the pictures are, she likes to give George lovin! Really glad we only have one more of these to do.

I can't believe its almost a year! I still think of her as my new baby but she's becoming such a big girl now. She's doing great. She is mostly over the mommy phase and I don't have to hold her ALL the time anymore!
She is sleeping better than ever. She goes down between 8-8:20pm and sleeps till almost 7am most days. She nurses then and plays in her crib while I get my shower. She eats all her meals at normal times with us now so that makes it easier for timing. She takes a bottle around 9:30am and then takes her morning nap (anywhere from 45 mins to 2 hours). Then she gets another bottle before her afternoon nap at 2pm. She sleeps anywhere from 1-2 1/2 hours (somewhat depends on how long the am nap is). We did drop the late afternoon bottle and now we just have a snack and some juice and then have dinner between 5:30-6pm like the rest of us. She nurses again before bed. She's much more flexible with her sleeping and eating. Max needed to be right on or he got miserable. She is getting good at having some crib time, she wakes up much easier than Max (and mom and dad) but is still content to be in there a little while before calling for mama. (Max needs a good 15 mins in his crib before anyone goes in to get him up after he wakes up, thank goodness for video monitors!)
She has all kinds of tricks. She is much louder than Max ever was. She whines a lot through her meals which is really annoying. She prefers to just eat foods she can pick up herself but obviously at 11 months and 2 teeth this is rather limited (and she doesn't like soft foods like fruit pieces unless they're in her mesh bag) so we force the baby food in and then she gets her sticks, teething biscuits and puffs and mesh bag with fruit in it.
She is also on the move! She can climb the steps so we have to watch that. She creeps along the furniture and even occasionally stands on her own. She still doesn't say anything other than mama and dada but she sometimes likes to repeat animal noises (especially pig). She loves to clap and can give a low five.
She is still all smiles and just loves attention!

Max is doing great. Except for not being able to leave his sister alone I really can't complain too much about the 2's. We get the normal argue at first with everything and an often melt down around bed time (not cause he doesn't want to bed, just upset about something) but with discipline, grace, diversion and a lot of patience we work through it. I know I'm hesitant to let him grow up but he's doing a great job at it! He recently moved out of the high chair and into his "big boy chair" which is just a booster up to the table. I know he was old for the high chair but its just SO much easier. The other 3 big things we need to focus on this summer are moving out of the crib, potty training and getting rid of the paci (which is ONLY for sleeping but still...). It makes me sad to think about but excited to see the little boy he's turning in to. He's getting very good with manors which is very rewarding for parents. He loves to play with his friends (really just more with their toys at this point!) and is just a really happy chill kid. His vocabulary just expands every day and he says stuff that I have no idea where it came from (luckily all ok so far!).
Him and Aliyah can still be so cute together but it seems to be a constant struggle for him to understand that just because she's mobile now, she is still a baby and we can't push her around. But they both amuse each other to no end!

We're so just feel so blessed for our family God has given us and like to cherish every moment of it!

Easter

Happy Easter!!! As Max will explain, Easter is "Jesus died for our sins". What a beautiful day to celebrate our Lord and Savior sacrificing himself so those who believe can live with Him forever! We had a wonderful day. I was even lucky enough that Max actually fit into his 18 month outfit from last year. There are many advantages to small children! It was finally a beautiful warm sunny day. It was too wet to do an egg hunt outside so the Easter Bunny hid the eggs Max had colored inside the living room. And then then he left some with Grandpa and Grandma Diana which she brought to hide on the front porch. My mom came over also and we had a nice dinner and a great afternoon!

Since we eat lunch right away when we get home from church, this was easier than totally changing them first!

Construction Boy!

I almost forgot one of the cutest pictures of the year. Lowes has a workshop for kids. Nate and Max have been there a few times when its been going on and got stuff to bring home but there wasn't ever room for them so we finally remembered to register him and he had his first one the other week. Of course he always likes going there and seeing Grandma too!

Mom-mom's 87th Birthday and Easter Eggs

Nice to know good genes run in the family. Mom-mom celebrated her 87th birthday last weekend so of course when you live that long you deserve a party right?:)
She is now living in a really nice assisted living home and its been a lot of work for the family to be cleaning up and packing up the house which is a life time of memories to my mom and siblings.
This was supposed to be a family trip in, however we realized Max had mold in his room so Nate decided to stay home and take out his carpets, clean the floor and put some new area rugs in there. As it turned out it rained horribly all day long so the kids and I actually got stranded in there so we wouldn't have to drive home in the rain. Lets just say I was very happy to be home the next day, take a shower, put in clean clothes and take a nap (I had Max in bed with me which generally doesn't leave a lot of sleep for the other person!)
The party was really nice, lots of family and some friends from her church. The kids had a blast showing off and getting lots of attention.

We figured Max was finally old enough to color some eggs. He was very excited. I don't think he gets the whole eggs breaking thing but besides that he did a good job and had fun.

Aliyah 10 months

Double digits in months!!! And what a month it has been for Aliyah. My sweet quite little angel has turned into a total wild child! She is officially on the move and that is an understatement. She is EVERYWHERE and into everything!! Its funny how different kids are because Max was not very content just sitting and playing and I remember being anxious for him to start crawling and once he did he was much happier being able to get to the toys he wanted to sit and play. Aliyah was perfectly content sitting and playing with whatever I gave her but now that she can move she never sits and plays. She just goes around throwing things and making a HUGE mess. She is like a human tornado:) We had finally gotten to the point where Max could clean up his own toys so we didn't have to as much but now its a constant thing in our house. She can also easily pull herself up and she creeps along furniture. She did get her two bottom middle teeth and I don't see anything else coming in yet. She did pretty good with them so it wasn't bad. She's a great eater and loves to try new things. She especially likes her fruit in the net eating bags. She is still on the same eating/nursing/bottle schedule as she has been. She does take her morning bottle around 10am now and goes down for her nap so we're definitely down to the 2 nap thing. I swear sometimes Max sleeps more in his one nap than she does some days in two but she's good with them and does them in the crib for the most part and has even gotten to the point where she'll play in there when she wakes up for a little. (I know I've been fortunate with Max that he always, and still does, like to have some time in his crib before he gets up so he never cried when he woke or anything). She still eats her dinner later, I guess I should move it more to our schedule but she still takes a bottle around 4:30am and we usually eat about 5:45pm. She always gets a snack, fruit or a teething biscuit or something while we eat so that holds her over. She is still nursing well the few times she does so I'm happy about that because by 10 months Max had no time for it anymore. They're still playing nicely half the time. Max tends to get a bit bossy but its a learning process. I knew this would happen once she was into his stuff so we try to compromise. 10 month shots didn't go so well.... someone doesn't EVER sit still anymore! And she loves to love on George!

I've been meaning to get bath shots for a while. They're so cute in the tub together and have recently had these splash fests!

I should update on Max too since he will soon be 30 months old! (easy to remember they're almost exactly 20 months apart). He is just so much fun. He loves to play and is good at playing by himself. He's getting such an imagination making his cars be different people and making them or his animals talk to each other. He loves to sing songs and is a good eater. We're still working on the potty training. He sits on the potty a lot and goes often but is rarely to the point yet where he tells us BEFORE he has to go. He is starting to catch it RIGHT after so hopefully we'll get there. Once it get warm out again we'll try the underwear thing. It just really didn't work when we did it in January cause he literally didn't care when he got wet and it was just too cold to go long without pants!

Kris & Wendy visit in March

In March we got another visit from Kris and Wendy. Since they bought a town house they had to come out to get the rest of the stuff they had stored and took advantage of some furniture (and tractor) they were trying to get rid of at my grandmother's. Despite the cool dreary weather we had a great visit! Made sure to get a family shot in. I need to crop it or something....

Visit to mom-mom Paul's. Max with his aunts!

Play time!

Friday we went to the State Museum. It was surprisingly a really neat place. They had a whole new dino exhibit which Max loves.

And they have the Curiosity Connection which is like a big play room. Max had a blast!

He picked food and made sure all the animals got fed.

And then left them some in case they got hungry later:)

Bed time stories

My mom promised him she would make these ice cream cookie things when Kris and Wendy came so he was SO excited when we got them out!