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Sunday, June 3, 2012

Zoo Fun, Baby Chicks, Chow Time and More!

 On Mother's Day, we took the twins on their first visit to the zoo!
 Lauren was excited to show her sisters all of her favorite animals.


 Lauren's best friend Sophia and her parents Andy and Rachel, joined us for the day.
 Who needs a snack at the zoo when you've got a yummy big toe?
 Lauren and Daddy on the carousel.
 We hatched chicks in my classroom again this year and I brought them home for a weekend.  Lauren called herself their "Mother Hen" and took great care of them.  I taught her how to handle them on her own and how to get them fresh food and water.  She LOVED it!  She named three of them....Ariel, Belle and Rapunzel. 




 Lauren and I took on a fun project this spring--we took care of caterpillars until they made their cocoons.  Then we got to enjoy watching them when they emerged as beautiful butterflies!


 Time to let them go free!

 The last of the three butterlies rested on Lauren's hand for a few moments before flying away.  We agreed that it was as if it was thanking her for taking such great care of them!

 This weekend, Mimi and Boppa Steighner came for a visit and to celebrate Mimi's birthday.  Here they are with their 'three angels'.
 In the past few weeks, the twins have been trying many different new foods.  Some they have liked and some, well....not so much.
 Kate was hilarious when she tried green beans for the first time.  She kept her tongue sticking out, with a spoonful of green beans on it, for a good five minutes.  She simply refused to bring it into her mouth, much less swallow it.  Ha!  Maybe she really IS my kid after all :)
 Clearly, this was "pre-green beans".
 This is what happens when Mommy takes too long to make the baby food!
Bottle-feeding time got much easier when Lauren learned how to help us.  To speed up the amount of time it takes to bottle-feed two babies at once, we feed them in their bouncy seats.  They've just about outgrown them though, so we've also begun letting them lay on boppy pillows while they drink their bottles. 

What else is new with us?  Lauren is very excited to begin 4K summer school in a few weeks.  This week marks the end of my teaching career, at least for awhile.  I plan to stay home with my girls until they are all in school and then I'll re-evaluate and possibly teach again.  I am so excited about this new path my life is taking.  Being a stay-at-home mom is something I never thought I'd be able to do.  Fortunately, Chad has come to a point in his career where we are able to make this change and I couldn't be happier!  

I'm looking forward to tomorrow.  It's my birthday and Lauren was helping Daddy bake a special treat for me tonight.  She is trying to make sure it's a surprise, so she told me they baked "brownie noodle soup jello jigglers".  Hmmm....while that does sound interesting, their treat smells unmistakingly like chocolate cake.  Ha!

Have a good week!
~Mindy  

Wednesday, May 9, 2012

6 Month Photo Shoot

How on Earth am I supposed to pick the ones I want to enlarge?  I just might have to start walpapering my house with these :)  Without further ado....here are my girls!  Enjoy!













Sunday, April 29, 2012

7 Months Old Tomorrow!

How is it possible...
 that seven months
 have gone by already?
 And guess who decided to sit all by herself on the eve of her 7 month birthday?
Katie-Bug!

Happy 7 month birthday, baby girls! 
Mommy loves you!
(Now, would you please return to sleeping through the night again?  If I keep getting up every 3 hours at night, I just might go nutso.  Thanks!)
Love,
M

Monday, April 9, 2012

The Many Expressions of Maddie-Moon!

Madison, or Maddie-Moon as we have been calling her lately, is our youngest.  I guess you could call her the baby of the family but I think Kate deserves that title as well :)  Maddie is usually a happy baby.  She loves to give you her mega-watt smile, complete with two fancy teeth on the bottom.  She spends her days cooing, grabbing her toes and charming just about everybody.  She's also the queen of making funny faces.  Here are just a few of my favorites...
Nice, Maddie.  Thanks for that!

I wonder what she's thinking here....

Can you tell that she's found her tongue and loves to show it off?  Can you also tell that I need to crop some of my photos?  Ha!  Who has time for that? 

I'm on spring break this week and am so happy to be home with my little ones.  I'm catching up on sleep, if you can call it that.  Both babies have been giving us a difficult time at night for at least the past month.  They have both been waking up very upset.  Kate has decided that she'd much rather sleep on our bedroom floor in the bouncy seat and Maddie has been talking me into nursing in the middle of the night again.  Seriously?!?!  Who needs sleep anyways?  I think they are paying us back for saying that the first 3 months with twins wasn't that bad. 

We had a nice Easter yesterday.  We were awakened early by Lauren, who was very excited to see if the Bunny had come and hidden her eggs.  She was thrilled to see that he had, so she had fun searching all over for them.  Then I made a big pancake breakfast and we took all 3 kids to church.  That was great too...until Maddie started passing gas BIG TIME in the middle of a prayer and again during the sermon.  I was laughing so hard (silently) that I nearly cried.  I'm sure she could be heard by most of the people around us.  Oh well.  What can you do?

After our busy morning, we came home and had lunch before we all enjoyed a family nap. 

I hope your Easter was wonderful!
Love,
M 

Sunday, April 1, 2012

Starring Kate!

It's important to Chad and I that the babies each be treated as unique individuals.  We try to avoid referring to them as "the twins".  Technically since they are fraternal, they're no more closely related than any two siblings are.  They simply grew inside me at the same time.  So...in the spirit of treating them as individuals, this post is all about Kate!  She's a sweetheart and has truly amazed us with her strength and determination.  She was our smallest baby at birth and has been growing by leaps and bounds!  When you hold her, she loves to grab your cheeks, give you a GIANT smile and come in for a huge, open-mouth smooch.  But be warned!  She'll quickly move her hands to yank your hair.  She's tricky like that.
 
Gotta love the double chin!

Have a good night!
Love,
M