Almost 4

So this weekend we celebrated Sawyer's impending 4th birthday and it was a really great time I think.  We decided to try and keep it easy and had some friends over, friends who have kids that are friends with Sawyer...works well that way...plus Ann and Ted made the trip from Michigan so Sawyer had Charlie and Ben here to celebrate with her, which was fun.  We had it at home, and I think it was a good time by all.  I'm going to use pictures to tell most of this story, because I have a whole lot of pictures.

We had 12 kids in the house ranging in age from a few months to five years old.  We hired a guitar player to come for an hour to play the kids some tunes.  Their interest level tended to change every few minutes, but luckily there always seemed to be a critical mass to pay attention to the singer.

I can't say it was the most amazing kid performance I've seen, but she managed to keep their attention and get them engaged in the songs which was nice.

 Sawyer and two of her friends, Isabella and Reese all seemed to get into the dancing action.

We also broke out the new bubble machine.  The fact that half our basement is unfurnished worked in our favor for this party because there was a large area for kids to run and play.

The real hit of the night though was the glow in the dark necklaces.  I'm not sure if it was Sawyer or one of her friends, but they decided to go turn the lights out in the basement and dance with their glow in the dark necklaces.  Here's Isla hanging in the dark...

By the end of the night Sawyer was picking up all the extra necklaces her friends left at our house and had quite a collection.  This is her at the end of the night after the last of her friends left.  I put Isla to bed 1.5 hours after bedtime and she cried the whole time I was putting jammies on her because she didn't want to go to bed, girl was having too much fun.  With Sawyer, I think Mark and I both realized that she needed some down time before bed...so while everyone was gone by 9, she wasn't in bed till 10.

 In that hour, we let her open one of her presents, and she LOVED it.  She got some Disney princess outfits and insisted on trying every one on before bed.

 Smile couldn't get much bigger I don't think.

 She gave me a big hug to say thanks for her party.

 Despite the late bedtimes both girls were up at 7, which didn't make me too happy.  It was clear they were still lacking on some sleep so we played a bit, rode bikes to the playground for some time outside, came back and tried to make a dent into our many leftovers, and then got them down for some much needed long naps.  In fact, both girls needed to be woken up at 4 (we won't let them sleep later than that, otherwise there would be no back to bed).

While we never got around to pin the tail on the donkey during the party, Sawyer and Isabella played it after everyone else had left, and these two picked up with it in the morning.  The best part of it was the blindfold. All of them could cheat with this on by looking out around the nose area.  Isla was a big fan especially.

After naps Sawyer woke up with glorious curls.  Such is the life of deep sleep for her. Because her real birthday is on Tuesday, and life can be a little crazy on "school days" for us, we let her open her remaining presents.  She had done the rest from her party in the morning, so it was time for Mom and Dad's presents, and Grandma and Grandpa.

First up, Sawyer got her very first tennis racquet...recorded her for posterity should she ever become professional.  

 I love the look she gave Mark after opening it.

Meanwhile, Isla was doing her best to sway the attention away from Sawyer and tried playing some train whistle for us, but we would not be swayed.

From Grandma and Grandpa Sawyer got another dress-up outfit - Cinderella.  She went from having one dress that no longer fit to now having several which made her day.  We spent much of the day in our Disney clothes.

 She was totally hamming it up for the camera in this.  The gloves and shoes were a big hit.

And Isla finally inherited her own dress!  She was pretty darn excited.  She was loving it.  She was even a little jealous of Sawyer's gloves, so I went up and got my old ones from my wedding, and she rocked those for awhile.  She loved them!  They were ridiculously big and made her look like Edward Scissorhands but she didn't care a bit.

As I mentioned we spent a good amount of time playing in our dress up clothes, and our glow in the dark necklaces from the night before.  I wish I looked this good when I was doing dishes.

 But...all good things must come to an end, and so after dinner we celebrated with round 2 of the cupcakes before baths and bed.  This is how Isla eats cupcakes these days...

And one last one of the birthday girl.  I didn't get one of us singing to her on Saturday, so when she gets another cupcake on Tuesday and one last round of "Happy Birthday" we'll snap a few more.

All in all, I'd say it was a good weekend, with lots of family, friends, and good food.  I definitely earned my nap today, that's for sure.  Now we've set our sights on celebrating Sawyer's actual birthday Tuesday - she gets a little party at school...and Grandma and Grandpa coming on Friday for the weekend!

A Few More Pics

Checked out my phone when Mark sent me a pic from Six Flags, and thought I'd add a little more to my update.

The girls on the boats!

Riding and ringing the bell...I'm pretty sure I have a picture of me and Katie circa 1985 in a picture like this.

A super fun surprise while Mark was out of town was I got a call from our neighbor saying Senora Moya, another neighbor who is a Mexican grandmother that lives with her kids/grandkids on our street made us dinner!  We were at a block party a couple weeks ago and she heard me say i like stuffed peppers and specifically chile rellenos.  So she made that - one with cheese and one with beef, as well as mexican rice and no joke it was amazing.  It was a perfect surprise.  I brought her tupperware back on Sunday with a little flowering plant, and turns out she made us dinner again this week!  This time we got tamales and homemade chile salsa...really hot salsa.  I can't say I've ever been a tamale person, but these were multiple kinds - pork and chorizo, cheese and potato maybe?  I have no idea, but it's so nice to come home and not have to cook but still have a homemade meal.  A pic of my dinner that night...

And wouldn't you know our fire wood order came in while Mark was out of town.  We were due for rain so I didn't want to keep it outside in a giant pile so I hurried home from work, stacked it, and picked up the girls a bit late that day.  Here is the results of my work.  Certainly this should have earned me wife of the month....

Feels Like Fall

Well a little hiatus there...I got lazy.  We have been enjoying the last bits of summer and warm weather but think we're officially into fall here in Chicago.  The girls are now fully wearing pants and long sleeves to school, and I've broken out the coats.  We have been busy bees lately - Mark was gone most of last week for work so Tueday through Friday night it was just me and my ladies.  Because they were pretty good all week on Friday I agreed they deserved a treat.  Their pick was 7-11 for a slurpee and some candy.  Actually every day we drive by there on the way home and they ask for a slurpee, however I finally caved.  I buy them one to share, and they eat maybe 1/4 of it before it goes in the freezer and then gets thrown out the following day.  But such is life.  They also get to pick out a candy of their choice.  Isla LOVES Reese's cups and Sawyer somehow convinced me she needed one too, plus something else.  It got them all sorts of wound up on Friday afternoon...

And pretty covered in chocolate - Isla anyway.  They were in a posing mood. 

You'd think Mark would want to stay home on Saturday after a week away but we had a full day planned for him.  We headed off to Six Flags on Saturday morning because my company had rented the whole place out and then were going to a birthday party for our friend Sammy.  The girls didn't really know what to expect with Six Flags, but we started with the merry go round, which Sawyer loved but Isla was less sure.  She would not sit on an animal but did sit with Mark on a bench while Sawyer and I rode the horses.  Next, on to the kid section.  They had a surprisingly good amount of rides Isla could go on.  So we did cars, airplanes, balloons, a magic bus and the hit of the day for Isla was the boats.  I'll have to get the picture from Mark to upload but Sawyer and Isla rode alone and just rang the bell or used their steering wheel and smiled the whole time.  Sawyer also wanted to go on the roller coaster.  It was a kid one, but not a super small kid one.  It moved pretty fast, had some relatively big drops, and you definitely got sideways on it, though thankfully only went one time around.  She asked to go on, and so Mark took her, and she loved it.  She tells us it was her favorite ride.  I thought she'd be terrified but seems our girl is growing up. 

We ended up leaving mid afternoon in the hopes the kids would nap in the car on the way to the party.  Not so much - they were ridiculously hyper.  We eventually went to a park and the beach in Evanston before the party because they were wide awake.  Surprisingly they did great at the party, and I only got a few tears from Isla when we told her it was time to go home.  I put her jammies on, plopped her in the car, and she fell asleep within about 90 seconds (no joke).  I can't say I remember when she's ever stayed up for 13 hours straight especially with so much activity, but girl doesn't like to miss a party apparently.

Sunday was then left to laundry, groceries, and all the other random stuff we put off during the week.  Girls were pretty goofy and we got some funny pictures of them wearing and playing in Mark's hats.

What can I say, she loves this hat...

And now it's already time for the weekend again, which is great.  We're having a little mini party for Sawyer's birthday tomorrow.  I think she's pretty excited to turn 4.  She gets the party tomorrow with some of our friends that have kids and some cousins, she gets a party at daycare on Tuesday and then I'm thinking maybe we'll take her out to dinner or something on Tuesday as well.  Should make her sufficiently feel special.  I'm sure I'll have some good pictures to post on Sunday of the party.

But till then, here's a picture from Delaware that my sister Katie took.  I love it, so thought I'd share.

Project #1...Complete

A view into that project...

So a week or so ago, Mark and I created a list of all the home improvement ideas and to-do's we have had bouncing around in our heads.  I went a step further and started to assign them to myself by month.  What can I say, it's the project manager in me coming out.  So each month, I have a specific room I need to focus on.  Sometimes it's small (like September) and others it'll be much larger, but I am hoping it'll all even itself out. 

For September we targeted the playroom.  As most of you have never been to my house, you will not know that we have a playroom right off our family room, and while I had decorated the large wall that you can see with some vinyl wall decals of trees, there was another huge empty wall that was kind of bothering me.  So I came up with this idea to buy a big map of the US so Sawyer (and Isla once she's a little older) can see all the places we're travelling to.  She has a book about the States already and loves to try and recognize the shapes and location of them.  Educational and decorative seemed like the right way to go, so I ordered a big old US map, and a slightly smaller World map...because one day I hope to be able to take them abroad.  What's great is I bought push pins so that we can show locations I've been to, Mark has been to, or the kids have been to.  It was really timely because with recent trips to Michigan, Baltimore, and Delaware we had some things to talk about.  Plus, there are several others Sawyer remembers..

Anyway, so the plan for the playroom was to get the maps, and then I had to figure out how to hang them.  Enter Mark's idea for giant cork boards.  We got some big ones to accommodate, and it took some serious skills to get them hanging.  I was drilling, hammering, screwing, measuring. But...I think the result was worth it...

It also requires some rearranging of the playroom because I also bought some hooks to hang dress-up clothes.  Right now Sawyer has one Sleeping Beauty dress, but is getting dress up clothes for her birthday.  She's hung up some play purses in the meantime, but I'm all prepared for our incoming princess dresses to have a spot in our organized playroom.

Needless to say, I was able to check off the main September task.  Add to that, I ordered the firewood for the winter and so getting new tires for the car is squarely on Mark as far as I'm concerned.  Now I need to check what's on tap for October.  I'm pretty sure it's selecting paint colors for the bathroom and potentially the master.  

As for the rest of our weekend, relatively uneventful.  Mark went out for happy hour so it was just me and the girls on Friday night.  I decided to treat them to some McDonalds and a movie night.  They got into their jammies as soon as we got home, settled up against some big pillows on the blanket and watched the Princess and the Frog.  Sometime after this photo was taken I also brought out the popcorn which is a huge hit in our house.

Isla catches me every time I go to take her picture and poses.  

Mark and I got a babysitter Saturday so we could get Sawyer's birthday presents and some stuff for her party.  It is lovely shopping and enjoying a meal with no children.  Sunday we walked into town to check out the art fair, but no purchases made.  The rest of the day was pretty uneventful, filled with watching football and tennis.  Sawyer tried to avoid taking a nap, but was so tired she threw a fit when I refused to walk into the dining room to take a piece of paper off the table for her (because she didn't want to touch it?) and promptly fell asleep on the floor in front of us.  Mark eventually gave her a blanket and she slept like this for about two hours.

She then woke up with glorious curly hair - Sawyer has the best bed head I know.  If she wasn't such a cuddle bug after her I might snap more pictures of it.

Doesn't Feel Like Summer is Over...

Well not to me anyway.  This weekend was hot here in Chicago - we've been in the 90's actually for the last few days.  Every now and then I think I'm ready for Fall, and then it is nice, and we eat dinner outside and I start to think we should move to a warmer weather location to have this all year round.  

At any rate, we spent much of the week and weekend getting back into the swing of things at home.  

Mark and I both worked from home Wednesday because we took the girls to their first ever dentist appointments.  Sawyer has accompanied Mark and I when we've gone to see my Aunt, but never an official cleaning.  Since we've been paying for dental insurance for her and Isla now since birth it seemed appropriate to finally get our money's worth...that and I've decided it's finally time we get a local dentist.  Because we have two VERY skeptical girls I found a pediatric dentist in the hopes it would make the experience more fun, and potentially easy on me.  I will say it started out a bit rough - after picking up the girls at daycare early and needing to wake both up from their naps I remembered I didn't bring a diaper or wipes with me for Isla.  I quickly grabbed a diaper from her stash at daycare and THANK GOD.  We got to the dentist and immediately I noticed she pooped.  And Isla is a bit of a stealth pooper, Sawyer we always knew when she was going.  Isla sometimes goes off on her own, but she could also do it right in front of you and you may never know...such as that day.  So I quickly take her to the bathroom and am using wet paper towels to clean her, while she's laying on the bathroom floor using my purse as a pillow because there's no changing table.  But I digress, what's really important are the appointments.  However, after waking Isla up from her nap, changing her diaper when she absolutely didn't want it, and then taking her into a room with the big chair she was not having it and just burst into tears.  She does this thing where she grabs your shoulder to direct you where she wants to go and she was clawing me to leave the room.  Thankfully the doctor came in pretty much right away and we knelt Isla on my knees while she quick got in there for a look.  Despite the incredibly odd sequence her teeth came in, I'm happy to report she has everything she should right now, and though she's got a little plaque around the gums because she prefers to brush her teeth by herself she's good to go.  Meanwhile, Sawyer was such a big girl.  She sat in the chair perfectly and allowed them to brush, clean, floss, and even take xrays.  While she had next to no plaque she has taken to brushing her teeth 2-3 times a day.  I'm thankful because it seems both of their mouths resemble Mark's perfect teeth vs. my very not-so perfect teeth...at least right now.

So long story long, we had some major grand plans this weekend but it ended up being more low key.  We headed downtown on Saturday so Mark could check in on a problem at the condo, and also get the lease signed for another year (WOOHOO!).  While that happened I took the girls to one of Sawyer's favorite parks from back in the day.  Sadly, she doesn't really remember much from her first two years living in the city.  We had to point out our condo to her..even the El running behind it didn't seem to register.  Oh well.

Our view from the playground...While Mark and I see these buildings when we go to work, it makes me a little sad they aren't instantly recognizable to Sawyer and Isla yet.

 Action shot from the see-saw

 And on the other end....

 We played in the sandbox...

 And of course spent time on the swings...

After stopping off at a new burger joint by the condo we headed home to relax and watch tennis.  Was really nice.  However, I'm leaving out one very big thing - on Saturday we officially took Isla's binky away.  She is ~21 months, the same time Sawyer got it taken away.  She's struggling a bit more than Sawyer did but that's reinforcing to me why we need to get it over with now.  Her first nap ended short, I think because she couldn't soothe herself back to sleep, and instead she woke up crying for me and proceeded to cry for the hour after begging for her binky.  She kind of goes in spurts begging for it now....though certainly hasn't forgotten about it yet.  Tonight she cried hard for 10 minutes before I went in to calm her down, and then probably cried another 5 after I left before she fell asleep.  I am hoping by next weekend it will be a distant memory.

Because of the binky issue, Isla began stirring at 5:30am on Sunday, and was fully up and crying at 6am, so much that she woke up the entire house.  So an early start to our day.  I did accomplish a big thing on the list that day - got to the outlets to get Sawyer some more fall clothes.  I needed to do a big trip vs. the few random things I've picked up thus far, so I headed out alone early and am pretty proud of myself.  I was laser focused and only went in the 5-6 stores I wanted for Sawyer and aside from shoes and coats got her enough to last us through Christmas.  Who knew our girl would grow so much this summer...  So after that we also went over to our neighbor's house for a bbq.  Seems a bunch of us on the street were all planning a low key weekend so it worked out everyone was around, and it was nice for us to actually spend more time and meet more of them.  I think it also helped Sawyer come out of her shell a bit around some of the kids.  There is a girl right across the street that is her age, but Sawyer clams up around her for some reason...Hopefully that will change for the better as they get older.

And today, not much to say.  Sawyer and I hit up the pool for the last day of the year.  It was packed, but allowed us to get a little sun-kissed for our last official weekend of the summer.  A few other random pics from the weekend -

Just love the random faces this girl makes

Though once she realizes you are taking a picture she usually breaks into a smile and says Cheese

And just before bed, Sawyer and Daddy did a puzzle, and were really proud of their work

Isla hanging in the window well during our lunch out today....This girl refuses to sit down while she eats, and climbs everything!

 A snap from last weekend of Sawyer, Lydia and Elsie in their dress-up clothes. Sawyer was a big fan!

Somebody got in trouble for hitting her mommy and wasn't happy when she was introduced to time out

And my favorite of the weekend - Sawyer's performance of one of her cheers.  I have watched this too many times to count and it still makes me smile.