An update from the last few months..

A lot has happened since I have slacked again. I have been meaning to update this blog for a long time but it always seems overwhelming and the longer you leave it, the worse it gets!

Not too much has been new. It seems like we have been doing a lot of house stuff. We just got new hard wood floors which kept us out of the house for a bit. We love them but life was a bit crazy for awhile. I also have been refinishing the staircases to match the floors which has been quite a job..I don't think I ever want to do it again!

Thankfully we have all been healthy this last month. We had a pretty tough winter with ear infections. Lauren ended up getting tubes in her ears. I noticed that her hearing was being compromised and when I brought her in she was not hearing well out of her right ear. It was really hard having two surgeries so close together. She did great until they wanted to take her back to the surgical room. She freaked out and would not let go of me. I had to walk her down to the room..it was pretty awful. Recovery was much better. She was beck on her feet in no time and didn't seem to have pain. Her hearing is beck to normal as well. She and Chloe will often play surgery and it breaks my heart that she even knows what that is at this age. Thankfully they have been minor and hopefully she won't need anymore.

Of course we are still very busy and as Chloe and Lauren get older they now seem to be little partners in crime. A few examples...yesterday after dinner Steve and I are talking in the kitchen while the girls are playing in the family room. I look over and Lauren is drawing designs on our leather couch with a Stick! Chloe also had a stick in her hand but I don't think she managed to get at the couch. You can guess she got in a lot of trouble. The day before.. Lauren and Chloe were playing in Chloe's room and I went to go check on them to find that Chloe has ink all over her clothes. I then see that they drew all over the glider. I guess we have some artist that are confused on where they can draw (even though they know they are breaking rules!) The biggest and probably most frustrating event was when Chloe knocked a 1/2+ gallon of paint down the stairs. This was the first time I cried due to being overwhelmed as a mom. We just remodeled our laundry room and I was painting the trim while Chloe was napping. She woke up early so I quick sealed the paint and put it at the top of the basement stairs to bring down later. A little while later I see Chloe going for the paint and I told her to stop. As I tell her no she gives me her naughty smile and goes to grab the paint which knocks it down the stairs. Of course the top pops off and white paint is all over 3 of my stairs and other items that were left there to be put away(one of those being luggage of Mark and Sara's!) Luckily my mom was in the area and came over so I could scrub my carpet for 1 1/2 hours. It actually came up really well and you can't tell that it even happened. I definitely learned a few thing from that experience.

Spring has been great so far. We are outdoors quite a bit and as you can guess..still loving the mud. Lots of laundry around here:) Lauren is done with school for the year so we are more flexible with our days which has been nice. We are loving walking to the park and playing outside every night.

I thought I would post a few pictures..


Finally potty trained..yeah! Lauren has been potty trained for a few months and mama is loving it. The down side is pulling over on the side of the road and lugging out a potty to prevent accidents :)



Chloe has a little bit of a paci addiction! She even gets a fix off her doll's paci


All winter long Lauren has been sleeping with hats on because her "head is cold" I'm not sure what this is all about but thank goodness it is Spring!



Chloe at Lauren's valentine party



Dress-up is becoming more popular!



We spent Easter in Michigan with Sue and Mike and the kids. We all had a great time!




Candy....another addition Lauren and Chloe have. They loved Easter!



Chloe turns 2!! She has been so much fun..and trouble:) We love you Chlo!



Every Two year old gets into make-up right?



Pops came to visit and it has been the highlight of the girls month. We spent some time at Brookfield Zoo.


Here are the new floors and a glimpse of the new laundry room that Steve tiled.

Little Chloe

Chloe has been taking off all her clothes in her crib lately(diaper and all..this makes for quite the mess). I remember when Lauren thought this was a fun game! So now she has been going to bed with her P.J.'s on backwards which seems to be working. I had to grab quick pic because I thought is was pretty cute. The other picture is of her just playing but I thought it was blog worthy:)

Whats new in 2009

The Florida Keys








Christmas 2009

I have abandoned the blog and I have had good intentions of updating but every time I thought about posting there seemed to be so much to catch up on.
We had a great Christmas in Chicago. It was quite layed back.. both Christmas Eve and day were spent with my family. It was the first Christmas in my parents new place which was fun. "Santa" came to visit (AKA Papa) which is always quite funny. As he was leaving his pillow was falling out of his suit. Lauren was all about it but Chloe was more reserved. She decided it was worth taking the risk to see him when he pulled out a gift with her name on it. She snatched the gift and ran back to me as fast as she could. Christmas morning was really cute. Our dog managed to eat the cookies left for Santa so that worked out pretty good:) They both had a lot of fun opening their gifts.
A highlight of year was that we escaped reality for a week and went to the Florida Keys with good friends Brad & Bradi and Sara & Mark. It was a great trip and it was prefect timing since it was -20 most of the days in Chicago. We ate like Kings and Queens and did a whole lot of relaxing. Thanks Brad and Bradi for being such great hosts!! Steve's sister Sue and Mike graciously watched Lauren and Chloe for the week in Michigan. I don't think the girls missed us one bit since they were busy playing with their cousins. Of course Lauren got sick while we were gone with another ear infection. She has been battling these all winter..oh for winter to disappear!

As always there is a story with the girls. I was giving Chloe some infant Tylenol for the same cold Lauren had and she was having a fit because she wanted to keep the dropper after she took the medicine. I thought..what does it matter and let her run off with it(now there is an open container of medicine on the counter). The phone rings and I am chatting away. I walk into the kitchen to find Lauren with the Tylenol in one hand and she is gulping down a cup full of medicine (a cough syrup cup). I was calm at first but then I started thinking of how dangerous the situation was and when I called the poison control I could hardly explain what had happened. I told them how much I thought she ingested and they put me on hold to do the measurements. They came back to tell me that even though she took about 15x's her dose..it is not a toxic amount. They said all I had to do was give her some water or juice and that she may throw up but there was no need to induce it. Of course little Lo acted as if nothing had ever happened and I couldn't see any effects. Needless to say this was a big eye opener on the dangers of leaving medicine on the counter! It was quite a scary moment.

No more monkey's jumping out of cribs!

Here is Chloe's new sleeping arrangement. It took her about a week to get used to it and she still has her moments when I put her in her crib but it is so nice not to worry about her jumping out. Now I can leave here in there for hours..kidding! Some of you wondered what it looked like so here it is. When she woke up from her nap I told her I was going to take a picture of her but I had to go get the camera. She laid back down and didn't move a muscle until the photo shoot was over. I thought this was cute since she is always trying to get out..I guess she thought it would be fun to pose:)

Little Trooper

If you look closely you can see Lauren loves the new mask the doctors let her keep.


Lauren is doing great recovering from her surgery. The day of Surgery she got up at 5am which was my worst fear since she couldn't eat or drink anything. She cried and begged at first, but then felt better that Steve and I weren't "allowed" to eat or drink anything. Once we got to the surgery center she loved all the toys that the nurses were giving her. She also got to play with a real stethoscope and she knew right away that she wanted bubble gum flavor on the mask to put her to sleep. The doctor then gave her a mask with the flavoring to keep. As you can guess this is now a fun addition to our doctor kit. They decided not to give her any drugs before hand since she had no anxiety. The hardest part for me is when they wheeled her away. We told her she was going on a cool ride and she asked if I was coming too. This broke my heart and put me in tears but she did fine when they wheeled her away. After surgery she had a hard time for a couple of hours, but was back to eating and drinking by the afternoon. Today she is back to normal but mainly stays on the couch. Its amazing how much better kids recover. I just had to grab her and make her sit because she was chasing Chloe! We are very thankful that everything went well and that this is behind us!

Lauren Turns 3

Lauren turned 3 on the 4Th and we had another princess party which she absolutely loved. Lauren's middle name should be party. I thought I would list some of the things that I love about Lauren and her fun age.

1. Her new thing is to say "Hey mom,should I have..." rather than just asking for what she wants. Usually it is for something that I will say no to.
2. If she notices that I got hurt(stubbed toe..) She will run over to me and kiss me several times to help it feel better.
3. Sometimes out of the blue she will say "mom, I love you"
4. She will dance on demand.
5. She notices everything.
6. When she sings she typically yells it.
7. She loves the doctors office and hasn't cried when she got her last two shots.
8. Enjoyed getting stitches.
9. Laughs so hard sometimes that you can't help but laugh along with her.
10. Says Chloe and our dog are her best friends.
11. Loves school so much I can threaten to keep her home if she is not behaving.
12. Loves bugs and anything else that a typical girl would run from.
13. She embraces new experiences and most times could care a less if I am with her.
14. When she prays at night she often prays for the animals.
15. She loves to cook.
16. She loves to hide when her dad comes home from work so he has to find her. Usually her legs are sticking out of her hiding spot.
17. Loves baths and doesn't like to have her hair combed unless she is doing it.
18. Loves giants.
19. Early bird- typically 6:15am she is ready to go.
20. Loves all her cousins.
21. Sits and reads books and rambles on and on pretending she knows what it says.
22. Can play in the car for an hour with Chloe if I let her.
23. Loves candy.
24. Can't help but open packages or other interesting things that she is not supposed to get into. When she is quiet there is trouble.
25. Has to walk next to the cart and touch most everything in the store. Today she said "MOM, look at this..isn't it beautiful!" The lady in the isle burst out laughing because she said it with such passion.
26. Most favorite thing is going to the park..she asks daily.
27. Wanted a baby shark for her birthday from her Uncle Tony(see picture above..its really a Betta) We will see how long this survives!!

Happy Birthday little Lo!!

Please pray that everything goes smoothly on Wednesday as Lauren is having surgery for hernia repair. We are blessed that this is our only issue that seems to be due to prematurity, but non the less we are not looking forward to Wednesday. I will keep you posted on her recovery which is said to be quick.