Visitors

Terry and Sam were home to visit this past weekend and Terry ran in the Columbus half marathon.  You can see his results here.  I didn't take the girls down to see him because it was really early and cold.  For a few seconds I debated on going myself, but then came to my senses and determined that if he could get out of bed and run 13 miles, I could get out of bed and watch.  So I did.  Here we are after the race.

Terry hadn't seen Maggie since she was born and this is the first time Sam has seen her.  She's changed a bit since then.  Izzy loves her Uncle Terry and talks about him all the time.  So when she actually gets to see him, she is all over him.  When he isn't around, she is always "talking" to Uncle Terry on her various phones.  She will still talk about the trip we made almost a year ago when we went to visit him in Maryland.  She has a brain like a steel trap!  Unfortunately, I didn't get to spend a whole lot of time with Terry and Sam, but I'm glad they got to see the girls and we all had a few meals and laughs together.

Nothing much "new" is happening.  Maggie is finding her voice and will scream with the best of them.  The best is when Izzy is using her "out" voice and Maggie mimics it.  I'll have to try and get that one on video.  Maggie is doing pretty well with rice cereal so this weekend we are going to test her out on peas or green beans.  Nothing too sweet to start with, but this girl needs some food!  As evidenced by this picture, she doesn't get enough to eat ;) She is still sleeping well during the night but only taking 45 minute naps during the day. That makes it really really hard to get anything done around the house.  Currently the landing at the top of our stairs looks like something exploded.  There are bags and baskets of clothes that need to be put away.  Cycle out the summer and put away the fall/winter things.  For Maggie, this means putting away ALL 3-6 month clothes and replacing with 6-9.  She is growing so fast she may not be able to wear all of Izzy and Laney's old stuff.  Here's hoping she slows down a bit soon!

Just for fun, here is Izzy wearing the same Brown's outfit that Maggie has on.  Izzy is probably around 4 months old here.  Even though Izzy is about a month younger than Maggie in this picture, this outfit probably would have fit on her for another 2 or 3 months.  The differences between these 2 girls, from my perspective, are many.  From their hair to their personalities, these are 2 very different girls.  Maybe that will work to our advantage when they are teenagers!

Treak or Treat is a week from today.  Staying true to our traditions, we have yet to get Izzy (and now Maggie) a costume.  Izzy says she wants to be a fairy which is what she was last year.  I think we'll hit up JoAnn's this weekend.  They are sure to have their halloween things on sale.

Rumor has it tht Uncle Sam is taking Aunt Sam on another trip next month.  Please pray for her as she defends our freedoms that some people take for granted.  Also pray for my brother that he can stay sane (and fed) while she is gone.

p.s. - please ignore any type-o's.  this thing won't let me do spell check!

5 months old

Maggie is 5 months old today.  It feels like she has been here all along, but then again it feels like just yesterday we brought her home.  We are getting pretty good at the 2 child household, but it is still a challenge.  Like right now, with Luke out of town, the kids are taken care of, but if you were to come to my house you would find it a mess.  Miss Maggie can't stand to be put down or left alone for too long, so that rules out doing a load of laundry.  I would never willingly want to be a single parent, that's for sure!

This past weekend we traveled to Cleveland for my Aunt Betty's 80th birthday.  Izzy was very excited because a long car ride means she gets to watch movies.  She watched Aladdin, Tinkerbell, and the road trip staple of Alice in Wonderland.  Maggie is fairly good in the car on the way to the destination, but the trip home is usually a screaming/crying fest.  This time was much better.  She slept most of the way home and when she was awake, she too was watching Alice in Wonderland.

The party was great.  We got to catch up with some of my younger cousins that I haven't seen for a while and celebrate my Aunt's birthday.  She was totally surprised and truely happy to see us there.  She turned 80, but was telling everyone she was 65.  She looked great and I'm so glad we were there.

Both of the girls were good at the party.  It was outside and a bit cold, but Izzy didn't seem to mind.  The place we were at had a play ground so she was usually pretty successful at suckering somone in to taking her over there to play.  Maggie had a bit of a tough time.  She can only stand to be held for so long and then she just wants some "me" time.  She lit up the shelter house with her smiles and everyone wanted to get their chance of holding her but she wasn't having it.  She seemed most happy when I would truck her back to the car to change her diaper.  She was away from the craziness of all the people and got to lay down for a few minutes.

Yesterday, Luke left for a 3 day conference in DC.  It didn't take Izzy very long to state "I miss my Daddy," but when he called later in the evening, she didn't want to talk to him because Aunt Carin was there.  Nothing much got done at the house yesterday, but we had a good day and we all can't wait for Daddy to get home.  Chester decided to take a quick jog outside when Mandy came to visit.  I opened the door and he took off.  No collar.  Just a brown blur out the front door.  I got in the car to track him down, but I had no idea how I would get him in the car if I was even able to find him.  I wasn't gone for long before Carin called to tell me the Chester came home on his own and was actually scratching at the front door to be let back in.  I guess my plan of letting them out the front door when I've had enough of them won't work now, since they can both remember where they live.  DARN IT!

Finally

I'm finally going to get serious about this and start posting updates for everyone who cares.  Because as I see it, if you don't care, you wouldn't be here... right? Right.  Ok, moving on.

Izzy has started preschool and loves it, at least we think she does.  There are 8 children in her class, 2 girls, 6 boys.  It's hard to get her to talk about school, like what they did or what she learned.  Mostly she will say "We played and played."  I haven't noticed a big change in her since she started.  I did notice yesterday that she brought a toy (and all the accessories) up from the play room and when she was done with it, actually took it back downstairs.  I don't know if she put it away once she got it down there, but at least she took it down there.  Izzy loves having a little sister.  She sings to her and talks to her and shares her toys.  I'm very surprised there haven't been any major melt downs over Maggie having one of her toys or Maggie taking over the high chair.  We have moved Izzy to a booster seat at the "big" table and she does wonderful with that.  Now to just get her to eat.  She eats about as much as a baby bird some days.

Maggie is getting over her first official cold.  She had some trouble sleeping this past Friday night and then we started to really notice it Saturday night.  I stayed home with her and Izzy on Monday, and by that point we all had it.  The past few nights she has been back to sleeping through the night in her crib, so that's good... for all of us!  Maggie is a bit high maintenance, so we spend a lot of our time holding her or walking the floor with her to keep her happy.  Since this cold hit her, she is even more high maintenance and our arms and backs are sore from the walking and bouncing and sitting and standing we have to do with her to make her happy.  She gets easily frustrated with her toys and will start to cry when she can't get it in her mouth just the way she wants!  I wonder where she gets that from.....  She is babbling and sitting up straighter and straighter every day, with some support from us, of course.  She rolls 3/4 of the way over and then gets mad at the bottom arm and cries and goes back to her back.  She'll figure it out soon though. 

Nothing new to report other than the growing kids!  Since we are officially in October it's time to start thinking about the holidays coming up.  We will kick off the Holiday season with Luke's birthday on the 13th.