New trick

Check out Eli's new trick!

Little man is sitting up all by himself. Well, he's sitting up for about 10 or so seconds, before this happens: 

sisterly love

Leah loves holding Elias. She asks to hold him all the time. The only problem is that she is not the gentlest of sisters. Here is a narrative of our holding Eli experience.... all in Leah's words. 

"I hold Eli on my lap!!!"

"I drop Eli!"

"Hahahahahahah!!!!!!   that's too funny!!!"

"I hold Eli again. It's okay buddy, it's okay."

christmas day

Christmas day started off pretty rough for me. After all, I had to work, and it was an awful night. I spent the first 3 hours of my shift holding manual pressure on a patient's bleeding perm-a-cath, which never did stop bleeding. It was not the preferred way to spend my Christmas Eve and the wee hours hours of the morning. But I got through it, and I slept from about 6:00 am to 9:00 am, and then we opened up presents. 

Leah found "dorge monkey" and Abby peaking out through her stocking. I know... her hair rocks. 

After she opened her stocking saw all of her candy, the only thing she wanted was more flintstone vitamin gummies. 

Eventually she got over the gummies and began to open her big presents. It was one of those thomas the tank railway set, except that it was not thomas, it was the melissa and Doug collection. Still good, though. 

I got a new camera, with which I have been taking all these pictures (I don't think that sounds right, but whatever). Leah posed happily at first.... 

and then apparently got tired of all the pictures. 

After that we packed up (this little guy helped a lot) and headed to Columbus to see Tony's parents.  

Where we opened more presents. 

They bought Leah a wagon, and it was a big it for both of them. 

Leah pulled her little buddy in the wagon, and he seemed to enjoy it. 

I got one picture of me looking at least halfway decent. 

and I don't know how or when this picture was taken. 

Leah and Eli got to hug, 

and I have no idea what was going on here.... 

And finally the day ended much like it began.

 Merry Christmas!!!!!!!

super high

Our neighbors put up an awesome swing set in our side yard a couple of months ago, and it's been great. Leah loves to play on it and she has become really good at swinging on a "big girl swing".

Whenever she swings she yells "SUPER HIGH" the whole time.

She literally swings as high as she possibly can. It's kind of scary, but so far she has been fine.

She did not, however, want me to take pictures of her..... which I did anyways.

She got over it pretty quickly, though.

friends

I truly hope that these two cuties

will be great friends growing up.

So far they seem to get along pretty well. 

Leah is pretty gentle with him, and love to hold him..... 

but sometimes she just abruptly says: "move Eli", and kinda lets him drop, and he face plants on the floor.... 

Or I'll look up and she is "helping Eli", like this: 

This gives new meaning to the phrase "love em to death." 

Beans, beans, everywhere

Old bathtub purchased from a consignment shop: 2 $

Five bags of dry beans: 8 $'s

Several different types of utensils: approx 2 $'s

Your two year old playing happily with them for more than an hour, allowing you to clean the kitchen, do laundry, vaccum, and make lunch in peace: priceless!!!!!!!!!!!!

Sidenote: this is probably not the best activity if you are a super neat freak :)

Oh the cuteness

Leah has finally started to play by herself. Yay!!!!!!!!!  The other day she asked me to "buckle Elmos" into Elias's carseat.

Yeah.... she is pretty obsessed with Elmo. She has two of them now (thanks mom!) :). She calls one of them ABC elmo (because he sings the abc's, clever), and the other she calls "regi elmo". It took me a while to figure out that she is trying to say "regular elmo."

She spent a long time giving them her paci's. Very impressive. Then, she decided that they needed to go to the doctor.

She dragged (or is it drug?) them around the house for around an hour, saying "elmos go to doctor". It was painfully cute.

Doctor's visit

This is one of my favorite quotes: "I used to be the perfect mother. Then, I had kids."

Basically, that sums up my feelings about kids and doctor/ER visits. Back when I had no children (and when Leah was just a baby), I would get sooooooo annoyed at the kids who would come into the ER and would scream and cry no matter what we did. Even getting their weight, getting their temp under the armpit, and listening to their lungs was a battle. It ticked me off to no end. I couldn't understand why these moms couldn't just control their two year old. I mean, come on! In my mind it was simple.

Well....... today was Leah's two year well check, and she pretty much screamed almost the entire time. I had no idea what to do. She looked terrified; she fought, cried, pleaded, etc. And the doctor wasn't even doing anything to her! By the end of the check up she was drenched in sweat, and was just holding onto me sobbing.

Good times!

Is this better?

So apparently, some people who will go nameless (Tony and my mom), thought that Elias looked a little girly in this picture.

I totally disagree. These are clearly boy colors, but whatever :)

However, I went ahead and made him some new ones.

Maybe these are a little more manly.

Halloween fun

We started our halloween celebration about a week ago, when we carved a pumpkin. By we, I mean Tony.

Leah helped at first, but she got tired of it pretty quickly. She did really love the end product, though. 

Yes.... It is indeed an Elmo jack-o-Lantern. The child loves Elmo right now, and without meaning to Elmo was the apparent theme of our halloween. 

We went trick or treating on Saturday night. It was tough leaving during the last few minutes of the Georgia/Florida game, but motherly love won out. 

Elias was a turtle, and Leah was..... wait for it..... 

ELMO!!!!!!!   What a surprise!

I'll tell you this much, Leah really worked for her candy. She wanted to walk by herself... she did not want to ride in the stroller, or be carried, so we trudged along from house to house, Leah dragging her pumpkin and her own "baby elmo". It took us an hour and a half to walk maybe 500 yards, and we made it to about 8 houses. 

She didn't get much candy, but that's just fine with me. 

At the end of the night, she was ridiculously sweaty and exhausted. And now, she wants to eat "pumpkin tandy" all the time, so that's fun. 

Happy Birthday!

Yesterday was Leah's birthday! I can't believe that my baby is already two, and that I have another baby.... it's crazy! It has been a wonderful two years, and I continue to love every bit of being a mother.

Happy Birthday, sweet Leah!