The First Trimester - Baby #3

This go-round I didn't document much from the first trimester - so I am going to go off of memory. I did read through my last two 'first trimester posts' and found it so interesting to read how miserable I was and anything that might have worked.

I was just as horribly sick as I was with both girls - but this pregnancy so far has been just like Olivia's. Dan swears it must be a blonde ;)

One day I told Dan I really wanted pad thai. He was like, the last time we had pad thai, you were pregnant with Olivia. I search for the 'right' pad thai place - and we head over there. The minute the waiter brings over the pad thai - I tell Dan, "I can't eat even one bite of that - I will throw up." Dan goes, "same with Olivia, you wouldn't touch it when I brought it home" 

So we take the leftovers home and Dan heats them up in the microwave (green face emoji). I went on a rampage, 'I have to get out of the house, this smells so bad, we are never having pad thai again, I will never have it again in my life.' Dan goes, "same exact speech when I heated up the leftovers last time." 

For weeks, I couldn't eat a thing but clementines and English muffins. I couldn't microwave anything or cook anything. I couldn't even scoop peanut butter for Emma without throwing up. Everything, every smell, every food made me puke. Indian food is normally my favorite and everyone at work knows that I always eat Indian when they come in on Wednesdays - I was having to pretend to have lunch out with made up friends - and would sit in my car - to not give myself away. 

I've been pretty tired and heading to bed when the girls go to bed. Which means the house is a disaster, I don't get any work done, and any house projects / blogging / laundry / crafts / conversations with my husband have been non-existent. Dan has been a LIFESAVER. He has done all dishes, cooked meals (pizza delivery totally counts!), wrangled kids through bath and bed, done laundry, diaper duty, house projects, and grocery pickup for me. And he's even taken a jar of peanut butter out of my hands when I looked like I was about to cry having to get some out for Emma. 

I have only wanted fresh fruit this pregnancy - specifically berries. With Olivia, I craved salads and fresh things - with Emma I craved meat. As much as I love sugar, I really don't do well with it. I start shaking and feel like I'm going to pass out. Those preggie pop drops helped the nausea quite a bit with Emma, but this time they are way too sweet and I don't do well with them. 

As I type this I'm 15 weeks and starting to feel better. With the girls it went away at 18-20 weeks - so I think I only have a few more left. I can eat about 50% of the things I used to be able to eat, and have a few hours a day when I'm not sick. I even helped Dan with the dishes yesterday ;) 

I think this third time around, getting through the nausea is much easier because I know how much it's worth it. It's such a short time compared to your whole life - and those little babies are just so cute and worth every minute of misery. I might feel differently when they are teenagers. 

13 Weeks

13 weeks and all fancy in my "did I just workout - you'll never know" clothes.

Baby Number 3

We are so excited about our growing little family! 

Olivia's Fourth Birthday Party

Olivia wanted a princess party for her fourth birthday. She specifically asked for Cinderella, Belle, Rapunzel, Ariel, Snow White and princess Sofia. It was hard finding those specific princesses so we improvised. 

Dan took Olivia to publix, our favorite birthday cakes. They had 3 cakes on display, one wedding cake and a pink princess castle cake with Belle, Ariel, Rapunzel, and Cinderella. She HAD to have it! Figures we go to the grocery store and end up with a $50 two tier cake. But it made her day!

Matching carriage t-shirts - and Emma being Emma.

A floating Sofia balloon that was bigger than Olivia.

Shirley Temple and Moscow mule station. Along with kids champagne, parents champage, and wine. 

I typed "princess party" into Pinterest and let Olivia scroll through. She found this decorate your own crown station and spent time before the party setting it all up outside. 

She also found this confetti balloon pop. Each balloon is filled with confetti. And instead of a pinata where only one child busts it - each child gets to pop a balloon and have confetti fall. I wish we had a video of this one. It was a lot of work to put together, but a big hit!

We let the kids run around in the backyard and playroom - and they just had a blast. Olivia was too shy from the happy birthday song and all the attention to blow out her candles, so she made her friend Lorelei do it. The cutest!

Can't believe our big girl is 4! This was the most fun birthday party yet - since she was old enough to really get excited and pick out things to do. 

After the party, Emma got a glass of kids champagne. She walked it all the way to a table, pulled out a chair. Sat down. Chugged it. Slammed her cup down. Yelled "More more!" Stumbled back to the alcohol table, tripped, face planted, lost her cup, and, with her face in the ground, yelled "more more champagne!" It should have been time to cut her off, but we used the next glass to bribe her into a family picture.

Four years of pictures

She is growing up way too quickly. I can't believe how little she looks even in her 3 picture. And that baby. I barely remember that baby.

School Pictures

These are just the proofs - I ordered the digital copies, but wont get them right away. 

Olivia was super sweet: 

And then there is Emma baby. If one photo captured her personality perfectly, it is this one:

Olivia is Four!

The girl who made me a mama is four years old. She is just the best kid. She's helpful and hilarious. She picks out her own outfits and wears two different socks, but can't go to sleep if her PJs don't match. She cleans the playroom, takes her own showers, does her own laundry, and requests a cocktail at the bar. She's super sweet to her baby sister, and makes me 'keep an eye on Emma' when Olivia can't watch her for a minute. She's constantly planning parties and requesting to have her friends over: "lets build a fire and roast marshmallows and have everyone over." She would pick being surrounded by her friends than any minute of alone time. She's inquisitive and smart. She loves rainbows and unicorns, princesses and babies, pink and purple, and everything girly. But she loves adventure and ferris wheels and sports and climbing high. There is so much amazing packed into this teeny four year old - and I can't believe I get to be her second best friend (Emma is her first!). I love this little girl with all of my heart. I can't wait to see what life has in store for you, Olivia- but, please don't grow so fast. 

Sweet Emma

I don't have a whole lot to say, but I wanted to share these sweet pictures of Emma. 

First Day of School

Honestly, these pictures were taken three days after school started, but I made them change into their first day of school outfits to recreate the moment. It's better than the 'third week of school' pictures we did last year.

Olivia was so sweet and did a great job.

Emma wanted to know what her sign said.

And is like 'wtf am I supposed to be doing?'

And then Dan asked her to show us her teeth so we'd get something that looked more like a smile. 

Emma - 18 Months

Where to even begin on Emma baby. She has such a personality and is talking so much. She's at such a fun age and I'm loving every minute of it.

Height: TBD, Second Kid
Weight: 19 pounds

She says yes and no with "uh-huh" and "un-uhn" and she shakes not just her head but her whole body when she says it. The cutest! 

She's been pretty clingy these past few months, but I love it. Although its hard to do things with only one hand, I love getting to hold her sweet little self. I asked her the other day if I could kiss her cheeks all day, and she bounced her sweet self up and down and said "uh huh." Obsessed with her.

Figured out why she is clingy. She has her molars. Poor girl only has 5 front teeth, but she now has her two top molars. 

She's walking and running and almost gets both feet off the ground when jumping. She's climbing and sliding and pedaling her tricycle and just wishes she was as tall as her big sister. 

She is OBSESSED with shoes. We have to put them away in her room or she won't sleep if she can see them. She puts them on and off all day long, wears her sisters, wear dress up high heels, and squeals with delight when we pass the shoe section of stores. 

She loves nail polish and will go pick out a new color and said "paint pink?" for me to paint her nails. 

She is hysterical. Olivia was whispering at the table about a popsicle so Emma wouldn't hear, and Emma looked at us and started whispering baby gibberish like she was part of the conversation and then she started cackling. She definitely gets social cues and loves to be part of the jokes. 

She has SO many words - and always says "play" or "outside" or "shoes" to tell us what she wants to do. Those are really her 3 favorite things to do. 

She's an adventurous eater. Tonight she destroyed some sushi, chicken dumplings, tuna tacos, and some pork. But she still tries asking for a cookie for dinner. One day, it might just work. 

She loves the color pink and any time we see anything pink she says "pink!" She will tell me 'shhh' if its bed time, Olivia is pretending to fall asleep, or overall I'm just being too loud. 

I have no idea how to do kid ponytails, so I make Olivia flip her head over and I do it that way. Emma will be upside down on her head going "pony" "pony!" because she wants a ponytail too. I don't need Emma to flip her head over, but I don't have the heart to tell her she doesn't have as much hair as her sister.

Emma has to tell everyone goodnight and she used to make a kissing noise in the air at us. But now she goes around and hugs everyone and kisses their face before bed. Olivia and Emma hugging and telling each other goodnight might be my favorite part of every day. 

Emma wants so badly to be big. We have a picture of Olivia at the same age washing her hands at the sink. Emma can't even see over the sink - she's so much shorter. She follows her sister to the bathroom, pretending to go potty, and washes her hands and insists on one sip from the water fountain and walking down all stairs (by walking I mean jumping / falling and thinking its funny that I catch her each step). 

We also joke that she's a sour patch kid from those commercials. She will hit you and then hug you with the sweetest hug. Or pull her sister's hair and immediately yell "aweeee" while hugging her. 

A few other stories from a few months back: 

When Emma first said "mommy" I melted, scooped her up, and kissed her. Now she says mommy anytime she wants me to hold her. "Mama. Mama. Momeeeee." The cutest. 

She took everything very literal when first understanding what we were saying. She was holding a cup of water and spilling it. I said "hey Emma, set the cup down." She looked confused, and sat down while holding onto her cup. :) Then she had a bubble wand and was trying to blow super hard to blow the big bubbles. I said "Emma wave the wand" - she looked confused again, and with the wand in her left hand she waved at me with her right. 

We still call her boopers, boop scoops, and cheeks. 

Emma baby - we just love your sweet and funny personality. You are so much fun - and incredibly cute at this age. I hope you never get bigger. I love your adventurous side, that you are up for anything, your stubborn little self, and your heart that is so much bigger than your teeny size. You are the best little sister, our favorite toddler and I couldn't love your sweet self (and those cheeks!) any more!

Destin 2017 part two

We are back from the beach and life is back to normal and we're so sad. We contemplated quitting our jobs and moving to the beach. My favorite place on earth. And it was such a great time with the girls with no work and being able to spend so much time with them. 

Next year we need to finagle 2 weeks off. 

Most of the sister pictures. Thanks Emma!

Sharing a Room on Vacation

Olivia will be 4 in October and Emma is 18 months. Olivia has been begging for Emma to sleep in her room basically since she was born. And Emma has been loving Olivia's room recently. We have let them share a room at my parent's lake house - which was hit or miss. Mostly, we worried that Emma's crying would wake O up. 

The first night in Atlanta the girls shared a room and Emma cried on and off the good part of 5 hours. Olivia never woke up, and never heard her. Our fears were unfounded - haha.

So we let them share a room at the beach. This has been hysterical. I'm sure no one is sleeping - but we are all enjoying it.

The first night they giggled a bit, went right to sleep, and in the morning we woke up to more giggles. We came in to find Olivia in Emma's pack and play with her.

The second night we had to ask them to pipe down a few times, and in the morning I found Olivia laying on the foot of the bed, and Emma standing at the edge of her crib both watching Doc McStuffins. Olivia said she had found the remote and turned the tv on for them.

Night 3 Olivia looks at us and says, "Mama, if you hear Emma crying, don't worry, I've got her." SO SWEET - until we realized she didn't want us to come in. 

We heard tons of giggles, a few crashes, saw Olivia sneak out one step, and then sneak right back in, closing the door like she had been caught. I came in to find the TV on, the lights on, and Emma running back and forth with the loud patter of bare feet across the room like a wild alpaca that had gotten loose. She was squealing with delight. I asked Olivia how Emma got out and Olivia said, "I scooted her crib right next to my bed, and then I learned her how to get out." We were DYING laughing. 

After settling them again, and threatening them some, it was pretty quiet until we heard Emma: "ut oh" "ut oh" "mom-eee" "mom-eee" "ut oh". Went in to find Olivia sound asleep, and Emma with 4 pillows piled on her in her crib. Dan set up the go-pro in there before sneaking out to watch some of the madness. Olivia got up, unplugged the go-pro and went straight to sleep.

These girls are up super early and just laughing! We joke that Emma wakes Olivia up and goes "You wanna build a snowman sandcastle?"

These kiddos are too much. I love how much they love each other - even if they aren't getting a ton of sleep on vacation. Maybe, just maybe, they'll be ready to share a room one day.