Friday, October 31, 2014

Happy 4th of July!

My 1st week back to work from maternity leave was the 4th of July so it
was a short week which was nice. We went out to Hank and Jenny's for
the afternoon and had lots of fun catching up with the Piening side of the family!
 
Grayson and Landry were best buds!
 




It wouldn't be the same if the guys weren't occupied playing
monster golf all afternoon.

We also went to Papa and Grandma's for a swim on Sunday afternoon.

And we had our 1st major in-bathtub bowel movement this weekend
as well. Daddy had to go dump it behind the house because
it was so disgusting. Such a good sport to my OCD :)

LM: 3 Months (July)***

Sweet Baby Girl, you are 3 MONTHS old already! I'm not sure we are having fun yet, but time is flying! Kidding, a lot of fun with some tough days in the middle. All worth it, though. I'm trying to be better about documenting things this time, and surprisingly your baby book is a lot more complete than your sisters. It has been fun seeing how different you are from your sister.
 
At 3 months, you:
 
Weighed 13 pounds, 13 ounces (at dr office, with clothes and diaper on)
Prefer warm milk
Hate your carseat and being laid down
Have started loving the swing
Also think the clock is funny like your Big Sister did
Wake when the thought of laying you down even crosses our mind
Wear size 2 diapers, but will probably be in 3's soon
Wear 6 month jams and mostly 6 or even 6-9 month clothes
Completed your 1st 5K in the stroller on 6/21/14
Sleep better when swaddled but usually break out of it
Graze a lot - eat 2-3 ounces on no particular schedule
Sleep anywhere from 4-8 hours in one span at night
Are getting better about going back to sleep somewhat quickly at night
Love to watch and smile at your sister
Have more rolls on your body then your sister ever has
Love to be talked to and kissed
Are extremely ticklish - laughed for the 1st time at Daddy on ___________***
Are still exclusively on breast milk
Have rolled a couple times (1st time on ___)***
Still do not like tummy time. At all.
Sleep downstairs in pack-n-play with Mommy at night
Sleep better in the complete dark
Coo a lot when talked to
Your hair is getting lighter, still have a mullet
HATE taking medicine. Total drama.
Love to be held. And held while standing. And walking while held while standing.
Are an extreme cuddler - favorite place is nuzzled in our necks
Definitely prefer to be held by Mommy & Daddy over others
LOVE bath time - you could sit in there all day!
Are very strong - nurses commented while giving you your shots!
Prefer to be held upright to look over our shoulders
Like to look at your Bug toy and anything colorful
Enjoy riding in the stroller
Tolerate all the rubs, kisses, pokes and jabs from big sister very well
Went to chiropractor faithfully for about a month which seemed to help
Still take an antacid but don't really notice much if we forget it
Had your 1st sleepover with Reynolds' on 6/9/14 for our 1st night away
 
 
We joke that you wake to the smell of food or my breast pump. It seems like it never fails - you always wake and need fed 5 minutes ago at that point. And you can guarantee that you will wake and lose your marbles just as I start pumping. Like clock work.
 
While still somewhat particular and occasionally demanding (ha), you are still overall a much easier baby than your sister was. Really, you would be good with just being held all day. I can honestly say that I have done everything I can to not spoil you with being held too much (Roo can even attest that I always lay you down to sleep, have never slept with you other than quick naps, etc) and somehow you have still managed to demand it. We are probably going to get kicked out of daycare. But at least you don't cry nonstop like your sister did for the first 4 months of her life. We have had some really rough days and nights, but nothing compared to Landry. This past month has been a lot better, and I actually credit the chiropractor for that. I didn't think it was working for the longest time, but I really think that it has helped now.
 
We really have no schedule whatsoever. If I had to give one, it would be something like: wake between 5 and 7 to eat 2-3 ounces, eventually nap for an hour, wake and eat another 2 ounces, maybe sleep another 2 hours, wake and eat an ounce and only fall asleep if we have somewhere to be and need to be awake, eat 3 ounces then sleep a good 2-3 hours in the afternoon (but only if held), wake and eat 2-3 ounces when dinner is hot on the table, bath time/pee or poop all over, eat 3 ounces and fall fast asleep from about 8-10:30, wake and eat 2-3 ounces and fall back asleep anywhere between 11 and 1 and may or may not wake sometime between 4 and 6:30. I'm looking forward to seeing what daycare can do to straight that "schedule" out!
 
Pumping this time has gone a lot better. Don't get me wrong, I still hate strongly despise every single minute of it and have to literally concentrate so I don't go crazy when doing it, but I've been producing a lot more milk so at least it is worthwhile. After about a month of agonizing pain, I went to MilkWorks and got bigger shields and that has made a huge difference (still need different size, but it's at least better). For a little over the 1st two months I was able to put about 21 ounces of milk in the freezer a day when I was pumping every 2-3 hours around the clock. I finally gave that rodeo up and talked myself into dealing with the guilt and only going every 4 hours which has now turned into ever 4-6 hours during the day and no middle of the night sessions. So it's about 4 times a day now and I am still keeping up and freezing about 6-12 ounces a day. I am so ready to be done, but am going to give it a good college try when going back to work.

LA: 19 months! (July)

Wow, time needs to sloooow down. They always said having two this close would be a blur, and truthfully it is. I remember every detail from things with Landry, but now with Toad they have all seemed to run together. My dad always said, "the days are long but the weeks fly by." Isn't that the truth?
 
At 19 months, you:
 
Weigh 20 pounds, 11 ounces (15th percentile)
Stand 32" tall (60th percentile!!!)
Head circumference is 18.5" (50th percentile)
Wear size 4 diapers
Are wearing 18-24 months clothes
LOVE to read
Started officially walking on 5/16/14 - just over 17 months
LOVE to play hide and seek/marco polo with Daddy all over the house
Sat in time out for 1st time on 6/22 for repeatedly touching Mommy's decorations
Still have only __ teeth, but have many more right at the gumline
Make messes faster than we can clean them, a true toddler tornado!
Always know exactly what you want
Are stubborn, silly, and somewhat dramatic (ha!)
Love to point and look at our wedding picture on the wall (will only say Daddy, though)
Are becoming more of a picky eater
Love to brush your teeth, and enjoy using toothpaste now!
Finished your 1st 5K on 6/21/14 (in the stroller for mommy's work)
Love to look out the back door and yell at birdies - too funny!
Are doing much better with being gentle to your sister (most of the time)
Love going to daycare every morning -You wave, blow kisses and off you go
Got your 3rd haircut on 6/17/14 - sat pretty still overall
Enjoy going to the park and for walks - you even hold Sis's hand in the stroller
Loved your 1st swim lessons at the YMCA
Ride very well in the carseat
 
You talk a LOT! You pretty much mimic everything we say, and it never gets old. You sign "more" which also means more, drink, and fruit in Landry; milk, all done (also hilarious), rarely thank you (working on that one), wave/say buh-bye, blow lots of kisses. Some things you say: uh oh, Hi Daddy, fruit, Amen, more, milk. You know what a fishy, sheep, cow, elephant, snake and bear say. We work on lots of others but you are pretty shy about them still.
 
Another cute thing you do - almost every time we drive home you start giggling at almost the exact same point on West A street. We thought it was a fluke the first several times, but have since realized that you know that we are close to being home. Not sure how you know, because you can't see out very well, but it is impressive. And adorable :)
 
You are also doing great with simple commands. Like "go get your hair brush, bring me your milk, go find your ball, bring me the sweetie pie book, etc." The other night I even said "ok let's go to bed" and you waved bye to Daddy and walked to your room right up to your crib and put your arms up to be put in your crib. Also every night after your prayers you repeat "Amen." SO sweet! 
 
We are still doing PT to work on getting up on your own (still not able to go from laying to sitting or sitting to standing). You are however doing awesome at bending over and picking things up off the floor. (You attempt to pick your sister up quite often now...eek!). You have pretty much mastered walking, and will even try to run almost every time that Daddy leaves the room...thinking you are playing marco polo (which usually it turns into).
 
You still eat ok, most of the time, but are definitely becoming more picky. You stopped eating meat as well as you used to, so now we have to camouflage it with either some ketchup or barbeque sauce which seems to be working. I'm not thrilled about that, but I guess what do ya do. You are also not as easy to feed vegetables too - it depends on your mood if you will eat or not. Mostly you would just be ok with sustaining on fruit for the rest of your life. I also made a fruit dip a couple weeks ago, and you hand me piece by piece to be dipped the second you see one of us eating it. Girl knows what's good!
 
Your favorite books are: Chicka Chicka Boom Boom, Dr. Seuss's ABC's (we both have that entire book memorized), Brown Bear Brown Bear, Bedtime Prayer Book, and My First Book of Letters. You absolutely LOVE to read. We read constantly.
 
You are also starting to interact more with Sis. You give her pat pats, rub her belly, occasionally pull her toes or poke her eyes, give lots of slobbery kisses and even bend down to see her when she is in her carseat like a total big girl. She loves to watch you, and smiles at you lots! We joke that Toad is just keeping tabs of all of the pokes and jabs you give her because she is going to be returning the favor here in a few short months. She is already almost as big as you are it seems! You even picked up one of her bottles and took it over to her and tried to feed it to her the other day. We are constantly amazed at the things you pick up on.
 
You are still a pretty good napper. At daycare you sleep 2 to 2 1/2 hours but on days when we are at home you will either take one long 3-4 hour nap or on weekends a 2-3 hour morning and 1-2 hour afternoon nap. We always feel bad that you sleep all day on weekends, but it seems like you need it after a long week of daycare!
 
Recently, you have also become very strong willed. For the most part you are an absolute sweetheart, but there are times we get glimpses of what is to come. After a warning you continued to throw food over your high chair (a nightly battle) so I gave you a small slap on your hand (instantly felt bad about doing it) and just as fast as I did it you reached right back and slapped me all while not breaking eye contact. I have never had to try so hard not to laugh. Quick little stinker! Roo had to leave the room to laugh at the situation. And you constantly want to touch my decorations in the living room. There are just a couple because it is mostly baby proofed, but I've always been a believer that you do not completely kid proof a house - and instead house proof your kid. They need to be taught to obey rules and listen to commands whether they are at your house or someone else's. So yes the candle sitting low is quite tempting (and not a huge deal if gets broke) but we are working on learning to obey and suffer consequences. Sometimes a stern "No" will suffice and you will go on your way, but more often then not you feel the need to play with it. You get a warning, and then time out becomes necessary. We decided we needed to be accountable to it once we started threatening it, so after we had told you No twice, you got sent to time out. Daddy took you back to your room and sat you on the floor and shut the door until you stopped crying (almost instantly). When he went back in to get you, you were not at the bookcase where we expected but were sitting right where he left you - rocking. Shocker. So we brought you back out, explained why you were sent in there, and let back down. You went straight back to the candle and grabbed it. So back to your room you went, this time to the crib. We are just starting to get tantrums from you so our fun is just beginning. If you have something in your hands you know you shouldn't, you all but run away from us usually putting it in your mouth in the meantime. How do we have a kid old enough that we are having to parent already??? Daycare said they haven't had any problems with you being ornery yet, but I'm afraid it won't be long. They still say you are really, really good all day everyday.
 
I'm thinking that here one of these days we need to start thinking about potty training. We have all the supplies, but you really haven't given any signs that you are ready yet. The only thing is, you poop your pants every single night during dinner, and we usually have quite a bit of notice that it's coming with lots of grunting. It will complicate our evening meals even more than they are already, but you are predicable and I'm thinking that might be a good time to start. We will see if and when that happens.
 
We are going to start the process of getting your hernia repaired. Within the next couple months we will be going up to Children's to meet with a surgeon and hope to have the surgery before the end of the year. Our pediatrician said normally they would wait another year or two before repairing it, but since we have far met our deductible this year we decided now is as good of time as any.
 
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I saw a picture awhile back of a bathroom door closed and toddler hands underneath it and the caption went something like "No matter where, they will find you." Now, I get it. I now understand why people said that every now and then it is so nice to be able to go to the bathroom or even take a shower without a toddler in the bathroom. Wouldn't change it for the world - but I no longer take being able to just go to the bathroom in quiet peace for granted :) I also understand what people meant by not taking for granted the days of eating together, being able to eat warm food, not having a screaming baby in your arms while trying to eat and feed baby simultaneously, parenting a toddler who loves nothing more than throwing food over her highchair, satisfying said toddler who incessantly says/signs "more" because she just wants more fruit, etc. It is literally a circus around these parts these days! Things can only get easier from here and one day we will be able to enjoy warm food again. But until then, we will embrace the chaos and constant messes and love on our girls. It's almost hard to remember what life was even like without them!

Monday, June 23, 2014

~ Father's Day 2014 ~

For Father's Day, Daddy wanted to spend the day out at Papa and Grandma's pool watching golf. So we loaded up the troops and went out to swim. It was a bit chilly, but Daddy and Landry were able to get in and enjoy the pool with the cousins. Here are a few pictures from the day. Both girls were worn out and hot messes (seems to be the tune these days) by about 7 so we came home to baths and an early bedtime.
 
Daddy opening his present - a black Nike rain suit for his golf bag!

Trying it on - looks good!

Having a tea party with Daddy - he plays the part so well.
Going to be an expert here soon :)

Toad just hanging out. Refusing to nap.
Little Lady loves the pool!

...and did a great job jumping in!

Just hanging with the cousins and Reed and Alyssa. Only have a few PG
pictures I could post of the twins - both were naked the majority of the time.
 
Happy Father's Day, Daddy! Thanks for all you do for your family. We love you!

LA Takes Swimming Lessons!

Several weeks ago, I sent Daddy a text asking him if he thought we should sign Landry up for swimming lessons. He agreed that it would be good, so after he was committed I then proceeded to tell him that a parent was required to be in the water with their child and since I had just had a baby a few short weeks ago, naturally he was the one for the job. I thought he would grumble a little about it, but he didn't at all and actually sounded a little excited for it. Such a good Daddy! :)
 
So I signed them both up at the Cooper YMCA and classes began in June. We had two lessons a week for three weeks. Landry wasn't quite sure what to think at first, and it probably didn't help that they had Daddy dunk her wanted them to put their face under the water on the very first day. Despite that she really did pretty well overall. From where I was sitting it looked like she was having fun, but Daddy said she whined the whole class. By the third week she was really starting to enjoy it and was relaxing enough to try to float and even kicking her legs while Daddy pulled her in the water.
 
Waiting for my first day of swim lessons to start!

Day 1: Putting face in water. Did it a couple times the first day, never again.

Day 1: Tried running away at every opportunity to jump in pool.

Day 6: Finally enjoying the pool!
Baby girl doing a great job kicking her legs!
 On the last day they had the option to go down the huge slide. Being the no-fear Daddy he is, he signed his kid up to be the test dummy. I was at the bottom ready to take photos and didn't think much of it (thinking he was going down with her). So they strapped her into the life vest and headed up the stairs. Next thing I know, out she came (alone) head first flailing arms and legs. No sooner had she came out of the slide had all of the other parents ripped off their kids' life vests and completely bailed on the idea. I'm not sure if hearing her tumble the whole way down and around the slide or coming out head first was the deciding factor but they made split second decisions and were back in the other side of the pool before she was even out of the slide I think. She cried for just a few seconds and then was over it and having fun again in the pool! Proud of our girl for being so tough!
 
Standing in line for the big slide!

This is blurry, but you can make out that she was head first and flailing
arms and legs before she went under. Poor baby!

 

Memorial Weekend Trip to Cambridge

Daddy plays in the annual Ryder Cup Tournament with his buddies every year, so this year I was ambitious and decided to load the girls up and go to Cambridge for the weekend. Papa Doc took Thursday and Friday off, so we headed out Wednesday night. Daddy rode out there with us so I only had to make the trip once by myself (thankfully) and overall both girls did pretty well.
 
Papa had the days planned for us. On Thursday, we went to McCook for lunch and then took bread and went to Barnett Park to feed the geese. I thought LA would be scared and unsure of the birds, but she wasn't at all. At one point one of the geese missed the bread and got her finger and it didn't even scare her too bad!
 






Love.
Grandpa then wanted to take LA to one of our neighbors who basically have a petting zoo that their young daughter takes care of. She has a cow, sheep, lots of chickens, a turkin, ducks, and cats.
 



You LOVED petting the baby kitties! Still working
on the gentleness part.
He had planned to set up a big bounce house for you to play in, but it rained so that canceled that part of the fun. On Friday evening we had a barbeque with Chad and Jill's families. Saturday we hung out and then went to church and dinner with Papa and Grandma. Sunday morning we loaded up and came home. It was a nice, long relaxing weekend and it meant a lot that my Dad took a couple days off to spend with myself and the girls. I think we just might make it an annual thing for us while Daddy golfs!

Lux's Dedication

"I prayed for this child, and the Lord has granted me what I asked of him. So now I give (her) to the Lord."
1 Samuel 1: 27-28

    ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~


Great Grandma Deaver was SO excited to be able to come for the weekend
and just loved every minute of being able to hold you.
Early in the week Terry called and asked if they could come to your dedication since it had rained and he couldn't be in the fields anyway. We were honored that they were willing to make the trip to celebrate with us. The girls really enjoyed seeing their cousins again!

Showing great-uncle Terry all of your books!

Kendal Jo holding Lux.

Karlie had to get her hands on Lux, too!


Sleeping like a Toad.
Sunday, May 18th, 2014 at 8:30 am.
Sheridan Lutheran Church



Great Grandma Donna loved meeting Lux for the first time.

Getting them both to smile is one thing. Getting them both to
look at the camera at the same time would be another. :o)



Pastor Eric Bostrom did the dedication ceremony at Sheridan Lutheran.


Our little family with Lux's sponsors: Reed & Alyssa, Justin & Karinne.






 
We hosted a baptismal brunch at HyVee on 40th & Old Cheney after
the service and enjoyed breakfast pizza, donuts, cake and fruit.





 





Our best attempt at a 4 generation photo.