Looking forward to April Showers...

Winter reared its ugly little head once more here in Chicago.  While we had 50s and 60 degree weather a week or so ago, made some runs outside, and made our maiden voyage of the year to the playground it didn't last long.  We woke up this week to a bit of snow on the ground and just generally very cold temps.  Boo.  It coincided with some late season colds - Isla has bronchiolitis and is now on a nebulizer three times a day and I'm pretty sure Sawyer may have it too.  At the very least she's got one nasty cold and is up coughing much of the night.  Awesome.  What I forgot to mention a week ago was that Isla had started sleeping through the night, typically till 6:30 or 7am.  This has all been thrown out the window with her cold.  The lack of sleep has made her pretty disagreeable and she's been crying inconsolably a few times. 

Otherwise, Isla is growing up before our eyes - first and foremost, she loves to watch Sawyer.  Isla will "talk" to her and just laugh.  Several times we've asked Sawyer what Isla is saying to her.  She's told us that Isla wants a beer, that Isla wants some of her cookie, and that Isla loves her.  I think I've mentioned before Sawyer's newfound love of our IPhones.  She amazes me with her ability to work it, even without us showing her.  Flipping through photos is one thing, but she also opens up games and figures out how to work them.  She's a fan of YouTube, and watches videos of Berenstein Bears, and the "Charlie bit me" video.  She now frequently reenacts it with Isla, sticking her finger in Isla's mouth and saying Isla bit me.

On Monday, Mark and I both took off of work to do random errands.  It was nice being able to just run around town together.  In addition to hitting up the outlets to get Sawyer a summer wardrobe, we went and bought a table for the playroom.  We're all pretty happy with it, including Sawyer, who spends a good amount of her time there.

As for the playroom, I think I've alluded to the fact that I had a little home project going on there - I bought vinyl appliques of trees on Etsy.  While it took much longer than I thought to assemble - there are ~300 flowers which I put on individually - I like how it turned out.  Our playroom is connected to our family room via some french doors so it's very visible from our main living area.  Rather than have a big blank wall, I thought this would give us a little decor for the room.  Next home project is the Living Room.  Mark started painting today, and furniture will be arriving in May.

When I was finished our little poser saw the camera was out and ran in to her playroom to get in a shot.

 Hanging out with Dad...watching basketball.

For some reason all pictures taken on my phone end up sideways.  I snapped a quick one of Isla in her christening gown bonnet.  If all works according to plan, Isla will be baptized over Memorial Day when we're back in Buffalo.  The family gown arrived this weekend and we just have to make sure it fits.

As for Sawyer, she continues to be a goofy girl...albeit highly dramatic.  Her daycare sends a note home every day on what she did, how she ate, etc.  The other day her note said that Sawyer was a bit emotional - HA!  When we walk in every morning the other kids run over and scream her name.  I think she's usually one of the ringleaders in the class so I think they're just excited to see her, but she's not so much a morning person because this attention first thing freaks her out every time we walk in.  The other day she ran out of the class and it took me a few minutes to get her to walk back in.  Thankfully she loves her teacher Miss Stephanie so after giving me and Isla a hug and kiss she'll go hug Miss Stephanie for a few minutes before she gets in her groove.

Two random stories about Sawyer: 

• she's learned a joke from Yo Gabba Gabba and repeats it all the time: Knock Knock, Who's There?  Interrupting Cow - MOO!  She loves this joke.
• We drive a lot more living in the suburbs and Sawyer likes to point out the color of the traffing lights to me as I drive.  She'll tell me Green means Go, Red means Stop, and Yellow means SLOOOOOW down.  That's her emphasis, not mine.  When we're stopped at a light she'll have a conversation with herself telling me she wants to go, but we can't because the light is red - we have to wait till the light changes.

This weekend she asked to be put up on the mantle.  Mark had held Isla up there and so of course her sister needed to do it as well.  Don't be alarmed, Mark is just off to the side - I cropped the photo so you can't see him.  She thought she was so funny, and now tells us that the lion is up there.

And with that we head into another week...hoping for warmer weather and improved health soon.

Happy St Patrick's Day

This week we celebrated Isla's first St Patrick's Day.  Celebrated is probably the wrong word - wearing green was pretty much all we did.  No corn beef and cabbage for us, no parade on the weekend, and no crazy day of drinking cheap green beer.  I did put on some Irish tunes while I was working to make it feel a bit festive, but that was the extent.  Knowing that it's not a guarantee Isla will come home in the outfit she left in, I took a few pictures before heading to daycare.

 She spit up on herself before we were even done with pictures...

Isla got a special t-shirt, but they didn't have any cute ones in Sawyer's size, so she just wore a green tank top, and a green coat.  She was so very excited to go show Miss Stephanie her green.

 Doesn't Sawyer look so much older now?  She's officially a big girl. 

In other news, Sawyer has been such a good girl lately.  First, she no longer hits her sister, and in general just says the funniest things to us.  I tried to remember a few:

• Sawyer learned about artists in daycare last week, and will tell us that her favorite is Michael D'Angelo, but Van Gogh is a close second.  D'Angelo is a boy's name in her class, and everytime she says it she stresses the "D".  It makes us laugh each time.
• Sawyer is constantly telling us that a lion is going to get her, and we need to hide from the lion.  Her and Mark spend a lot of time hiding next to the couch talking about lions, and tigers, and foxes.
• Sawyer loves to find the moon.  When she doesn't see it she tells use "It's ok, it's cloudy.  We'll see it tomorrow."
• Sawyer talks to Isla a lot, which is great because Isla is all smiles when she's watching Sawyer.  If Isla cries, Sawyer will run over and say "It's ok honey, it's ok, I'm here, I won't leave you."
• This weekend we saw the Easter Bunny when we were at the mall.  From the second level to the first level, Sawyer was shouting "Hi Easter Bunny".  She was loud enough for him to hear, look up, and wave.  We also saw the bunny take a break, at which point she told us "The Easter Bunny has to take a nap, he's going to go eat some carrots."  She also thought he had big ears like her, but then said, no - she didn't have big ears, she's got small ones.  She's a bit afraid of the Easter Bunny coming to our house, and says she wants to stay on the couch with Dad while the Easter Bunny hides the eggs, but then she gets so excited because she's going to FIND the eggs, and they'll have M&M's in them.

Isla continues to be our happy baby, though not quite the sleeper I'd dreamed she would be.  Though she's roughly in line with where Sawyer was at this point, I am more impatient for her to make that milestone because I know how nice it makes life.  Our girl can roll from front to back with ease now, and can pretty much do back to front as well.  She continues to love to stand - and likes to be held up this way all the time.  She will sit in her Bumbo chair but also now tries to arch her back out of it when she's ready to do something new.  Her eyes remain a beautiful blue, and the girl has more hair at close to 4 months than Sawyer had at 1 year.

We took the two girls to the park earlier this week on a 60 degree day and she had her first swing ride.  She's still a bit young, but was so small that her head was propped up by the back of the seat.  She just sort of went with the flow the whole time.  Can't wait for more, and even warmer, days to come.  I have a feeling we'll be making good use of our deck, yard, and nearby playground this year.

A favorite toy right now - Isla loves to play on her mat and reach for the toys. 

Weekend Fun

While this past week didn't hold much excitement for us - we had visitors on both Saturday and Sunday which made for a very enjoyable weekend.  On Saturday we got up and took Sawyer to get her hair cut - her 2nd ever.  It takes all of 10 minutes, and part of that is me talking to Miss Kateri about what we're going to do.  Sawyer stayed still like a statue the whole time and didn't say anything until she was allowed to pick out what barrette she could have for her hair.  At this point she perked up because she also gets to pick out a sucker.  It went so fast that we went for a drive after to explore some neighboring towns rather than just go right home.  Luckily we got word that some friends would be in the hood and wanted to come over for lunch.  So we hurried on home  so that Leo, Breanne, Isabella and Ethan could stop by and play for a bit. 

Isabella and Sawyer took a little bit to warm up with each other - sharing wasn't their number one priority.  However, they eventually got into a groove, and by the time they left she was showing Isabella her room.  So while Sawyer had started Saturday morning telling me I was her best friend, that only lasted till 2pm when Isabella became her best friend.

Sadly, Isabella got the boot as best friend today when Aimee, Jon, Reese, and Sammy came over.  When Reese left, Sawyer declared her the new best friend. Sawyer has been talking about Reese coming over for several days (we kept postponing it because she has been sick), but when she finally walked in the door Sawyer became a mute.  Not only that she became highly protective of all her toys.  The girls also eventually settled in with each other and were running around in circles, pretending to be lions and tigers, and running around in the basement.  Sammy and Isla just sort of hung out while their sisters played, but we are hoping this summer they'll be mobile and able to get in on the action.

Other than that, we did some home projects this week.  Mark almost finished painting the dining room, and got the paint for the living room.  We ordered some furniture for the living room/my office, and got some decor for the playroom.  I bought two vinyl trees that go on the wall for the playroom, and so Mark and I had a rocking Saturday night putting those up.  We have yet to put up the 300 blossoms, hence no pictures...but I'm loving it.

As for pictures, when I checked the camera this week, I only have some of Isla.  This pose should be familiar from when Sawyer was little.  Isla has an equally strong neck - maybe stronger.  She's so nosy and insists on either standing or sitting in the Bumbo so she can see what's going on.  She also may or may not have flipped over from back to tummy.  The one time I can't say for certain if Sawyer did it to her as I was cooking dinner and had my back turned, and the other, she got only 90% over so we're not officially calling it.

Isla is a very happy baby and tends to be all smiles.  However, she may be giving me the finger here.

Isla's spot every night while we eat dinner together.  This gives her perfect bird's eye view at everything.  She stares at us so intently as we eat, and sometimes just licks her lips.

And this was the view from my lap this afternoon...I usually put her down to sleep now, but she hadn't had a good nap all day and I was afraid to move her.

Rollin Over

First week of daycare for Isla, and first full week back at work for me went well.  Isla didn't sleep much the first day but seemed to adjust quickly to the noise of the other kids and was taking great naps by week's end.  She also slept through the night twice!  Went to bed around 7pm and slept until 6am.  It was awesome.  She has since not had great nights - last night she was up about 4 times. 

Sawyer has had a bad cough at night for about two weeks now, and it got a bit worse by week end.  Her note from daycare kept saying she had a "bad" cough during her nap so we ended up keeping her home on Friday.  Mark and I both worked from home as well so we could trade off watching Sawyer with taking calls and doing work.  Sawyer frequently imitates us - and here she is working on her computer with my work headset on.

For some reason this picture won't turn, but this is a close up of the headset on...

While she looks a little pitiful in her jammies here, she actually had a great day at home with us.  I think she loved having our attention all to herself (we took Isla to daycare still).  We took her out to lunch and she was chatty as could be.  Worst part of being sick is she's ended up in our bed, or with me in her bed a few nights this week and all the coughing in my face has given me a sore throat.  I'm still crossing my fingers my sore throat and Isla's sniffles don't get worse.

So while our work week went quite fast, the weekend was nice and relaxing.  I took the girls to Loyola on Saturday to visit Caroline.  We had a little visit and stayed for lunch before hopping in the car for naptime.  While we had a great time, the big event this weekend was that Isla rolled over for the first time!  She did it three times today - two for Mark, and I caught the last one.  When we lay her on her belly she is either over in about 2 seconds flat, or will not roll over at all. 

Oddly enough, happy about being on her belly...

Hanging out in the Bumpo seat.