tea party anyone?

Here is the dynamic duo watching for Drew. Basically anytime I want Molly out of the kitchen while I'm cooking dinner I say "Go look out the window. Can you see daddy?". It buys me a few minutes.

Wednesday morning we were at a friends house. We got home after our usual nap time. So after eating lunch Molly was exhausted. She slept 3 hours. That's a record for her. When it was time to wake up I walked in and turned off the music and fan. She didn't move. Then I went back in 10 min later, I opened the curtains and blinds. Still no movement. Finally Gabe and I sat on her bed and started talking to her. She finally woke up at 5:10. I was really surprised she went to bed at her usual bedtime. She even slept in until a little after 8. I guess playing all morning really wore her out. I can't wait until we can play outside again!

She won't sleep with blankets, so she tucks her legs and arms under her. It cracks me up. It can't be comfortable.

I was in awe of Molly this morning. I made her french toast. It's her favorite. So she ate a whole piece. Then I opened a cereal bar to share with Gabe. The second Molly saw it she wanted some. I broke it into two not even pieces I gave her the smaller one, but she persisted on having the bigger one. To my surprise she finished that. When she saw Drew with a bowl of cereal she ran into the kitchen to get a spoon. She then mooched cereal off Drew. This all took place between 8 and 8:30. At 9 I started pureeing different fruits for Gabe. She was so excited to see pears and pineapple. So she ate a bunch of that too. Holy cow, the girl can eat.

Our biggest purchase to date

I really like the size of our car. I can fit the double stroller and all my grocery's in the trunk. I like the way our car looks and it's tinted windows. The one problem with our car is that it isn't reliable. It's great for running around town, but I'm always nervous when we're leaving town. It was my grandma's car. It's a 99 with no miles. Even though it doesn't have any miles it's old and it always needs a bunch of little repairs all the time. It's more than a little frustrating. Drew and I were looking at cars and talking about getting something else. But I didn't think getting another car would be the best option. We're planning on being in Lincoln for 5 years. I can honestly see us having more than one kid in the next five years and then we'd need something bigger. So we started looking at mini vans.

On Monday we put money down on a Nissan Quest.

This will be our new ride. Well almost, ours is white. Were picking it up Saturday. Even though it was my idea, I can't believe that I'm 25 and have a mini van. I feel way too young. But it's really nice and I'm excited. It's an 08 with 21k miles, which means it still has a warranty. Yeah! When it's freezing cold I'll be able to shut the doors as I buckle the kids in. So now we're one of "those" families. The ones with the mini vans.

UNO Hockey

One of Drew's friends has a cousin who plays on the UNO (University of Nebraska Omaha) hockey team. I guess each player gets so many tickets to every home game. So Eric (Drew's friend) got his cousin to scrounge up some other tickets so that a group of us could go. It was a good time. This was my first hockey game ever. I have to be honest, I have no idea what the rules are for hockey. I just know that you want to get the puck in the net. Drew's a big hockey fan. He had a list of things that I needed to see to make it a "real" game. There was a fight where a bunch of players got taken out, so he was happy. The game went into over time and then there was a shoot out. UNO beat Miami-Ohio, even though I don't think they should have. It was fun, Molly and Gabe would have liked it, too bad it started 5 min after Gabe's bedtime. Drew has another friend, Sarah, who has been asking to watch our kids for a while now. Gabe loved her at the Thanksgiving party. Gabe's such a flirt. I was happy to hear that they were good for her, and that Molly was really helpful. It's nice getting to go out without them on occasion, but it's so strange. I have an urge to call home all the time and check on them. I'm so used to having one if not both hanging off me all the time.

Beautiful

Today it was absolutely gorgeous outside. 60 and sunny. After naps we went for a walk to Pets Mart. (We have a huge shopping plaza behind our complex) Molly loved seeing the kitty kittys and they both, Molly and Gabe, enjoyed watching the rats. I never knew that rats could climb, but they can and it was entertaining to watching them repeatedly try to escape. Then we walked home and played outside for a bit. Yesterday was beautiful too. We went to a near by park and played with some friends that live in the area. I'm sad that it's supposed to get cold again tomorrow. I love being outside. It's great letting Molly run and burn off some energy. I can't wait for spring!

These first two pictures are random. The rest are of today.

Gabe is starting to pull himself up on things. I picked him up right before he fell into the toy basket.
In this picture Molly is rocking the furry baby behind her. I thought it was funny that she insisted on wearing her snow boots as she did it.

Molly is reading the For Rent magazine that she picked up on the way back home. She's thinking about getting her own place. We have a few big rocks that she likes to climb on, with help of course.

Gabe isn't sure what he thinks of the grass. I was so happy that he didn't try to eat it!

Molly's starting to climb on everything.

Go Cardinals!

Some of you might not know, but I'm a closet football fan. It started a few years ago when we didn't have cable. Football was the only thing on TV and Drew liked to watch it. In turn I would watch it with him. Somehow Drew endured all of my dumb questions and now I know a bit. I like to stay informed, but am by no means an expert. I do have teams that I always cheer for, for random reasons at best. Anyway I was cheering for Arizona last week, even though everyone kept saying it was a huge long shot that they could win. "blah blah blah they stink. Blah blah blah can't hold a lead. Blah blah blah" Well now my Cardinals are going to the super bowl. fingers crossed.

growing

Gabe turned 9 months yesterday. It's hard to believe that he's been out as long as he was in. He's getting so big and fast. Most of my day is filled with watching Molly trying to run away from him/protect her toys. She isn't turning out to be the best sharer. Gabe likes to corner her, he thinks it's a great game. Molly on the other hand isn't impressed. It's defiantly different having two very mobile kids. Luckily Gabe isn't as persistent as Molly is when it comes to getting into things.

Molly has also had a growth spurt. All of the sudden she can unlock the back door, get out of the pack and play, open our closets, and see what's in drawers. I'm having trouble keeping up. Last week she decided that she didn't want to nap. She'd have fun trashing the bedroom, scattering toys and cloths all over the room. Not cute at all. So I set the pack and play up again. I told her if she got out of bed I'd put her in the pack and play. So she did and I did. Then 10 min later she comes strolling into the living room with a big smile grabbed a toy and started playing. She's trouble. After repeatedly putting her back in it today she didn't try to get out. I've thought about putting her in Gabe's crib, but she'd probably hurt herself when she tried to get out of it. On the other hand if she did get hurt maybe she wouldn't try it again... what to do, what to do.

A slave to the naps

When Molly was a baby she didn't have a schedule. When she was tired I rocked her. When she was hungry she ate etc. I'd complain sometimes about how she always wanted to sleep in bed with me and Drew, but it didn't bother me too much. I mean not enough to practice any hard love. It was just the two of us all day so it didn't really matter. Then Gabe came. In the beginning it still wasn't much of an issue. Gabe was born mid April. Drew used all of his vacation (he had to use it or lose it, he knew he wasn't going back to Highland.) he had about three weeks. Then my mom came and stayed with us for a couple weeks. A couple days after my mom flew home Drew was done teaching. I should have used the summer to get Molly into a nice schedule, but I didn't. In the middle of the summer we moved and I spent a few weeks at my parents house. I wasn't really alone with both kids until Drew started Graduate school. All of the sudden no schedule was a huge problem and Gabe wasn't a newborn sleeping all day anymore. It was really hard for me when we first got to Nebraska. Drew wasn't home, Molly decided she didn't want to nap anymore and Gabe needed a lot of attention. I felt like they were crying all the time and there was nothing I could do about it. I was on the brink of losing my insanity. (I say that half joking, I was nowhere close to being one of those women you see on the news. Don't take that too literally.) That was the day I set up the pack and play gave Molly a hug, kisses and told her that she would feel better after she had a nap. I walked out of the room. She cried and I felt like a monster. Then the greatest thing happened. After crying for a couple minutes she fell asleep. After a few days there were no more tears and no more crawling into bed with Drew and me in the middle of the night. Then after a couple months there was the transition into her own big girl bed. Things were way better, but not perfect. Gabe was waking up at night. I was still so tired during the day. It's amazing what a difference getting uninterrupted sleep makes. Eventually I decided that Gabe was old enough to cry himself to sleep. That week was really hard, but I knew it would be better for all of us. Then the last big transition we moved Gabe and Molly into the same room. Now I have two happy kids and I feel like myself again...

I decided that a schedule was the key. I still have one problem. Well maybe not a problem more of a complaint. Molly and Gabe have a good routine, but when it gets thrown off they have a REALLY hard time. So the day goes something like this:
7ish they wake up (recently since it's darker longer they've been waking up closer to 8. Surprisingly that hasn't changed anything else...???...)
9:20 Gabe takes a nap
11 Gabe wakes up
12 Molly takes a nap
2 Molly wakes up/Gabe's ready for 2nd nap
3:30 Gabe wakes up
7 Gabe goes to bed for the night
7:20 Molly's in bed
The waking up and going to bed is good, it's the whole middle. Sometimes we can go out and Gabe will fall asleep in the stroller, but the whole day is filled up with napping. And somehow they never overlap. With all the sleeping you would think that I would get a 1/2 hour to myself. hmmmm. I guess in a couple months maybe Gabe will be able to push one of his naps back. As for now, well, I made the monster so that's what I get to live with.

only $5

Lets be honest being poor stinks. But that's what we are and will remain as long as Drew's in school. I can't complain because it's what we've chosen. I love staying at home with my babies. Because of our financial situation we qualify for certain government programs, we're on WIC. A friend told me that Lincoln has a great children's museum and you can get a membership for super cheap if you bring your WIC envelop with you. She said she thought it was like $5. I thought her dollar amount was probably off, but hey a discounted membership and something to do inside, out of the house in the winter sounded good to me.

We went to the children's museum for the first time with Suzie this past week. It was so much fun. My friend was right. We got a year's membership for the whole family for $5. That's less than half of what it would have cost us to go for the day. What an amazing deal. Again it stinks being poor, but if you ask/shop around there are some great deals out there. The museum is downtown and even gets you discounted parking .30 cents an hour at the garage across the street. So it will be about .90 cents every time we go. I'm excited about it. It's three floors of fun. Molly cried when it was time to leave. Hopefully I don't have a problem when I'm there alone. It will be even more fun for Gabe in a few months when he's walking.

Molly dressed as a Mercat. Against the wall where the bar is there's a slide. That was her favorite part of the tunnel area.

Molly coming for Gabe. She likes the idea of the tunnels, but she doesn't like that it's dark. It's a cute area. There are stairs that take you to tunnels on top. She went to the top once with me. I need to go with a friend who has a kid around Molly's age. She's a little chicken when it comes to doing things by herself, but I'm a little big to be crawling around with her.

Gabe trying on some of the costumes in the theater area.

Molly was ready to go for a dip.

I thought Gabe in the big chair was cute. It was the wrong time of day.

Molly checking out. She was so angry when she wasn't able to take the cart out of the shopping area. Drew took a picture of her throwing a fit. I decided to post this one instead.

Molly and Suzie.

They have a special area blocked off for kids under three. Gabe liked playing in there. It was nice not having to worry about a bigger kid knocking him over.

Watch out. Crazy lady coming through!

Just in case you're observant. A couple of these pictures were taken on a different day. We went this Tuesday for a couple hours. There are no field trips Tuesday mornings. The elementary schools are back in progress so it was empty. Molly likes other kids, but doesn't do well with too many.

Benjamin Button

I LOVE movies. I don't say it often because I think it sounds a little couch potato-ish, but it's true. A good movie is like a piece of art. It's amazing what can be accomplished with special effects a beautiful story line and good acting. Drew's mom, Suzie, has been in town. She's actually leaving tomorrow. She offered to watch the kids Friday night so Drew and I could go and see a movie. It's always nice getting out of the house without Molly and Gabe. It does take a little adjusting, I'm so used to always having them glued to my side. We went and saw The Curious Case of Benjamin Button.

I wasn't sure what I thought of it when I walked out of the theater. There were a couple of things in the movie that bothered me. There were a ton of affairs that made me sad. But overall I really liked the movie. The cinematography was beautiful. And the makeup was great. Cate Blanchett was gorgeous. I thought they did the best job ageing her. She really looked all of the ages she was supposed to be. One of my favorite movies is Big Fish. I think it's a visually stunning movie, and this one was the same. If your in the market for a beautifully made movie I'd recommend this one.