When coming up with more winter indoor activities for MOMS group, we ended up deciding to do a movie day complete with pizza delivered for lunch! The kids also brought a blanket and pillow for comfy viewing. Only us three regulars made it to Melissa's for the movie, but two more moms joined us for the pizza lunch after they were done with preschool. Chase was the only one who ended up really trying to watch the movie...why watch when they can play with their friends toys? :) Great time getting together.
Bubble princess or bubble monster...Lorelei will answer to either. :) Don't worry, Brad just used the shampoo to make her lots of bubbles. Had to make them because we knew she would just love it...and of course she did.
Elmo's World was all about frogs last night, which was a huge hit. I believe she calls them "rah" and this is her version of the frog hop. :) Hope you find it as amusing as we did.
We were very very thankful for a bit of a break from the cold weather for the weekend. Very thankful but oh how sad I am now that that is cold again when I was reminded how much we love to get outside!
Saturday I had a wonderful early morning trip to Walmart - kid free! We are hoping to make this part of our routine every couple of weeks or so...before the crowds get there with no whining, plus great father/daughter time...its great for everyone! That day Brad took Lorelei for a walk in the morning, and then we all took a walk around the pond and to our little section of Mt. Trashmore where Lorelei is always thrilled to see the dogs and people walking around or riding bikes.
We even got a chance to see a blimp while playing on the balcony!
Sunday worked out much the same with Brad taking her for a walk while I got ready for church and then the family again to Mt. Trash after nap.
She loves to hug the trees! One new project Lorelei LOVED was having a little bucket to take along for her walks to pick up rocks, pine cones, feathers, you name it. :) The little explorer always takes VERY long walks because she has to stop and inspect anything she comes across. The only way she walks with her head up and quickly is if she has a dog in her sights she is trying to get to. :)
She also loves any little hills we can find on the property...and we are happy to oblige - this girl needs to burn all the energy she can. :) Here we have her going down this hill for the second time, after scaring all the geese away the first time up. :) Good thing it isn't quite time for them to protect their eggs!
Monday we attempted to enjoy our last warmish day and get to the park, but the rain in the forecast came early so we only got to play about 5 minutes before it started sprinkling on us. :( Poor Lorelei was so excited...but we did end up going over to the Petsmart near the park with Melissa and Kira so at least she got to see the dogs getting some very fancy haircuts! She also enjoyed seeing the rats/mice (ick) running in their wheels! Hopefully very soon it will be nice enough to get out every day! Can't wait. :)
Decided to get brave and try finger painting on Friday afternoon. It was another yucky cold day and Brad had to work until 5 instead of the usual 4, so I decided it was worth the efforts to find something to do. I had gotten the info on how to make home-made finger paint just using flour, water and food coloring so knew it would be easy and safe for Lorelei to eat...which is the first thing she did of course! :) She also picked her color...which was blue. Completely innocent I'm sure, but it reminds me of her friend Kira who wants nothing but pink...because her mother hates pink...so naturally since I love pink, my daughter will probably want everything blue. ;) It actually turned out a bit teal looking and quite cute. We even added a hand print at the end. Not sure we are ready to try the real thing yet, but at least we have given it a shot for now. :)
That's right, Baby Stahl #2 will be joining us sometime mid September. Sept 14th is our due date, and I'm happy to wait until then or later so that these kids will have some time in between birthdays! :) Right now I'm ready to get past this first trimester and start feeling myself again, but know its all part of the process to add another wonderful joy to our lives. :) We can't wait to meet you little one!
Here are the "gummy bear" pictures finally scanned in. :)
Well for those of you who remember the commercial for "My Buddy" and "Kid Sister" hopefully the wonderful jingle is now running through your brain. :)
Lorelei is enjoying her babies more and more each day. As you can see in these pictures, she has concocted her own diaper arrangement, from the diapers finally brought up from the car including an old small regular diaper and swim diaper, BOTH of which are covering the baby's bottom in these pictures. :) One of her favorite things to do is say "poo" which of course means the baby is poopy. Then she drags the changing pad off her table in order to change baby's diaper. She also loves to give her baby kisses and feed it a bottle. She also thinks the baby needs to sit in her high chair, but I explain that with bottles you sit in a rocking chair to feed the baby. :) One of the neatest things is when she is putting her baby doll to sleep...she lays her down, then points or grabs me telling me to turn the fan on (naturally her sleeping ritual but who knew it was so important), then kisses the baby goodnight. So sweet!
So apparently I tell Lorelei "I'm full," (Usually she is trying to feed me some food) and I also pat my tummy while doing so...she picked up on it and now does the pat when she is full. :) This morning I think I was asking her if she wanted anymore food and all she did was pat her tummy. Then later tonight she was trying to feed me a grape and I said "you eat that one" (don't worry I had already eaten one she fed me!) and she just patted my tummy like "Ok, Mommy, you must be full." :) So cute! Also had to leave the end on with the kisses. She is so cute with that lately and when I ask her to say "bye" apparently she thinks she needs to give a kiss. :) She even was giving a kiss to the pine cone we had to say bye to on the walk Monday. :) Gotta love the sweetness.
Ugh. As most of you know winter is not our thing...and by the time we get to February, I'm ready for a trip to the Bahamas. I keep telling myself we can last only a few more weeks and then spring should hit...I hope Mother Nature agrees.
Just a few random pictures throughout our days lately...
This one is bubbles in the house. Thankfully spring has found Target already, so we are taking advantage. Great invention, a fan to blow bubbles for you...now we just need to buy some more bubble juice because we ran out after about a day. :)
Lorelei and Dad enjoying her new toy for Valentin's Day. I think Brad wants to play with it about as much as she does...we are already tempted to cut off the microphone because she is loud enough without it. ;)
Brad and Lorelei being goofy with self portraits while coloring. I think I was getting ready for church. :) What a great Dad she has! :)
We had the TV turned off and Brad and I were working on getting supper ready. Lorelei climbed on the recliner (she climbs on EVERYTHING now), got the remote, turned on the TV and sat there watching the Olympics.
A couple fun things today...Lorelei has started getting the giggles over goofy things which is a lot of fun. Today was with her "Pretty Pink Purse" book because she points to the same two fruits for me to name what they are...of course I use my exasperated voice after a bit and she thinks its hilarious. Then I also taught her butterfly kisses...big hit with giggles as well. :)
I also keep forgetting to mention something nice a lady said at the grocery store when she heard Lorelei's name. "Lorelei. I love that name. It sounds like you're singing every time you say it." ...well I'm sure there are plenty of times I say it that it doesn't sound like singing, but it was such a nice compliment nonetheless. :)
We are so loved! Thursday we celebrated Valentine's Day early when we received TWO packages! :) Guess we have some pretty amazing grandparents/parents who were thinking of us. Lorelei was shrieking with excitement when we were going to open the boxes...guess she finally realizes what a package is. :) She was clapping and so excited to see what she would get, and wow did she get some wonderful gifts! From stuffed puppies to fairy wings to clothes and a home made puppy towel! And of course an Elmo card complete with stickers made her day, as well as a dog card that makes dog sounds when she opens it!!! Can you get any better cards for this girl? :) She was thrilled with everything. We just have a few pictures but the packages were so great. Thank you, thank you thank you!!! "How Sweet It Is To Be Loved By You!"
We are so blessed to have many friends here! :) It has been a week full of them. :) Monday BethAnn, Mirinda and baby Isabelle came for the afternoon. Lorelei always loves the extra attention from grown ups and did a great job with Isabelle...well other than screaming and waking her up. ;)
Tuesday I'm not sure what we did other than BAKE. Baked sugar cookies during nap, then frosted them that night until almost midnight. We love our sugar cookies and they had to be ready for the Valentine's party we had at our apt on Wednesday. We had a great turn out...7 moms with 1-2 kids per mom...so you do the math and it was a crowded place but everyone seemed to enjoy it anyway. :) The children took turns at the table working on making a Valentine craft and everyone got to eat lots of goodies. Forgot to take any pictures during the party, but when our best buddies were still there at the end, we did get this picture and video of three of them. :)
Then Thursday is our usual library time that all our children go to. After class we headed over to Sara and Lily's for some playtime and lunch. They even have a wonderful table for the kids to sit at!
I should also mention we had our first moms night out with the three of us Wednesday night...much needed and enjoyed! Thanks to the husbands for giving us a break!
Will try and get caught up this weekend...guess this week has just been busy with less time to blog. :)
That's right, we attempted our first batch of home-made Valentine Cards! It was a relatively good experience. We did spread it out over both days this weekend as Lorelei got tired of coloring and was having fits over wanting to use the entire bottle of glitter glue. Brad was a big help as I didn't think about how much stuff I would have to glue on before giving it to Lorelei to add her own art work. She also thought it was a lot of fun to draw with marker on her hands. This was also her first time with real markers...seemed to go better than crayons so between those two she had a lot of fun. Excited to start getting into these crafts...gotta love having a girl! Now we have an idea of what to look forward to Wednesday when we have a MOMS Valentine's craft party at our place...we'll see what happens!
Lorelei is also getting very into stickers. Look closely and you will see her doll is covered in them. Other days usually Lorelei is covered but guess they had to try something new. :)
Just more info about the weekend...we got MORE snow (feeling like we live in Nebraska again!?) but thankfully it didn't really stick to the roads and is already mostly melted off. This also meant we were able to make our photo shoot that we had to reschedule from last weekend. The goal was to get some updated professional pics of Lorelei, which we got. The main reason we tried this photographer, though, was because she was having a special photo shoot with puppies! The puppies ended up a bit older so were on the larger size, larger than Lorelei! Although she LOVED seeing them of course, none of the pics really turned out with them because she was usually squinting or ducking away from getting licked in the face. Whole new appreciation for people who do movies with dogs and kids together! :) At least it made the photo shoot a little more fun for her.
Then I was able to run some errands during nap and then, last but not least, pig out on dips while watching the Super Bowl. :)
We have yet to figure out exactly why Lorelei knows this, but I guess she knows and that's whats important. :) Maybe just the day to day talking or else we can probably thank Sesame Street because neither of us had been working on it. :)
Was trying to compile a few more little tidbits but can only think of about one...actually a story from Brad just to show how she is doing great communicating...well I should say sometimes great. Lately we have had a lot of meltdowns and fits unfortunately...guess that is also her way of communicating that she is unhappy. :) Anyway...story time...
He had gotten her up for the morning and she was sitting on the living room floor and he said, "What are you doing?" and she answered "play." Then she pointed up and said "ight" (light) to tell him she wanted him to turn the light on. :) Brad's dad will especially appreciate that since he is constantly wishing Brad would turn the lights on around the house as well. :) Guess that's all for now folks!
Well its a good thing its a new month because January finished off with 488 pictures! Brad said I'm averaging over a dozen per day...yeah maybe I need therapy. ;)
Today Lorelei and Brad played on the balcony. The roads were very icy and it just seemed the ideal place to play this morning. It was much warmer out than yesterday so they both seemed to enjoy it more. I was able to get some chores done easily while they were outside for about 45 minutes again! Lorelei enjoyed playing and mostly just ate the snow. :)
"What I don't look cold enough he has to cover me up with it?"
Making a snow castle.
Warm back in the house for the rest of the day. Cheesin it to show off the Valentine outfit from Nana.
