We've got the upstairs just about put together aside from hanging anything on the walls, we will do that eventually. The downstairs is a complete mess where we put everything else and said we'd put it away later and yesterday was later. Cody and Ellie were downstairs and Cody needed something so he called up to me. Ellie being funny started shouting " Jayme" in her two year old lingo. We both were just about rolling on the floor laughing. She cracks us up. It almost makes me sad that she doesn't call me mama or mommy, just a straight up mom. She's even got the teenage version down where it fluctuates and sounds like she's annoyed when she calls me. Crazy kid! 

Last week Ellie got her first ear infection. That was... Interesting. She wasn't all that bad, just a little bit more short tempered than normal and had a nasty cold. I left her with my mother in law for an afternoon so I could take Kate to get her shots and get some Christmas shopping done. That woman is heaven sent and not shopping with a two year old was great, I was in and out so fast. 

Kate had caught the nasty cold that Cody and Ellie have had and it is so sad to see such a tiny thing struggling so much. The other night I was up a lot and finally switched with Ellie and threw her in my bed. Last night I was afraid of a repeat and had a sleepover with Katelyn on the floor of her room. The worst part of being a parent is feeling helpless when your kids are sick. I prayed and prayed and eventually cried myself to sleep because every 5-10 minutes she would cough and wake up screaming. She finally fell asleep and only woke up occasionally. It was a miracle. 

Ellie is loving the house and having a lot more room to play in. We've been having fun going to play at the church gym with friends to let out energy and get moving. She is so funny sometimes. She is usually a very active kid and loves to play with others but the last two times we have gone she just wants to sit back and watch everyone else. She is very observant and really notices people's emotions, not only when they cry but also if they are just sad. It amazes me how concerned she gets for others and I hope that's a quality she keeps. 

Ellie is quite intelligent. We had gone to cal ranch on Saturday to look for snow boots for her and she found a stick horse that she rode around the entire time we were there. 

She threw a fit when it was time to put it back and leave. The girls and I went again yesterday morning to pick up a present for Cody and she remember right where those were. She walked straight to them and would not be coerced into leaving without one. We gave all the old men shopping a nice show of a screaming toddler with a mother frantically trying to quiet her child and tell her that she was done throwing fits. Someday I would like to record our store visits because I am sure after the fact they would be hilarious. Two year olds sure know how to keep their parents on their toes. But we sure do love this spunky and creative girl.

This crazy kid of ours turned two! I can't believe it! We had a little party for her before we moved. Just having her grandparents and cousins come was a treat enough for her. She is obsessed with pirates, so we had swords and hooks for all.

She loved having her cousins come play and thought her own ice cream cone was the coolest.

There are quite a few things that I could say about this girl. She has such a personality! She can be so outgoing and the next minute extremely shy. Most of the time she likes people and saying hi or smiling at strangers in the store. Yesterday she did something that surprised me, with a room full of kids she just stood back and watched them play and was perfectly content to be on the side lines. She is already an amazing big sister to Katelyn and loves having her sister do anything that she is doing. She talks a lot, especially since we got rid of her pacifier. She loves to dance around the living room while listening to music and gives a mischievous grin when she is doing something she knows she is not supposed to. She does silly things on purpose and laughs so loud as she's doing them, today it was walking around the house in my shoes.

I feel almost silly writing this, trying to explain miss Ellie because there are not even words to describe this girl. She is spunky and fun and sassy and frustrating and fearless and timid and everything else all at the same time. She is everything. She's obsessed with pirates and Christmas lights and playing hide and seek. She is stubborn as can be when it comes to food and lets you know that she knows the word NO. She likes to use her hands  to color and play with stickers and tickle her dads back and arms. If you are on the floor she thinks you are her personal horse and screams as she jumps on your back in excitement. She scowls when shes angry and asks for a tissue when she cries to wipe away her tears. She's a ball of personality that cannot be described in words. But we sure do love her. Every quality she possesses, her concern for others when they are crying and her constant need to let her dad know that she loves him when he is home. 

This two year old Ellenor... what did we get ourselves into with this one?!

I know if I don't write about it now I probably won't. Cody has been working so hard on getting the house ready for us to move in. We tore up all the carpet upstairs, so in the living room, hallway, 3 bedrooms, and office. We tore up the laminent in the kitchen and the dining room had carpet so that got taken up as well. Originally we were going to put tile in the entry way and not even mess with the kitchen quite yet. Looking into tile we realized that it would be a lot cheaper to do laminate hardwood floor and keep the rock in the immediate doorway. We had been discussing how it would work with replacing the carpet and having it all blend together when we eventually put in new kitchen floor. We changed plans and found out we could put flooring in the entry, kitchen and dining for about the same as tile only in the entry. 

We have been painting like crazy today and thought it was going to take all weekend. Cody's family came to te rescue! His mom watched the girls all day so that I could be there helping him. His dad and brother also came over all day to help paint and the entire upstairs is just about finished. We didn't think we would even get half way done today. 

The bathroom ended up being a lot bigger project than either of us anticipated. We thought changing the shower behind the door into a closet and putting a shower head in the tub would be a lot easier but it's taken a lot. Cody's brother came up last week and helped a lot and Cody laid the last of the tile on the floor at 2:30 am the other night. 

It's been a long and rough process but it will be so worth it in the end! We can't wait to have it finished and be moved in. 

I forgot to mention... Everything in the house was originally PINk!!!!! I mean everything! 

The hall without the cabinet doors

Almost finished bathroom! 

Living room looking towards the door 

Living room from the front closet 

Ellie "riding a horse" 

Dining room and kitchen 

Right after Cody ripped out the shower, it was at least 2 inches of cement on the bottom! 

This week we took away Ellie's pacifier for good. Cody was gone over night on Monday and that was the day I did it, big mistake on my part. It was a very long day and an even longer night. We've noticed that its been effecting her teeth lately and she just constantly wanted it. I was tired if her crying for it constantly (she was only allowed to have it for naps and bed time). She was screaming for a while so I finally made a slit in the tip and gave it back to her. She was sad and just kept saying its broke. The only nap she got that day was in the morning on the couch while watching a movie. That night she went to bed ok, I waited until she was really tired and put her in bed but she woke up screaming at midnight. We played musical beds with the two girls. Ellie was in my bed but would randomly wake up and scream that it was broken. That woke katelyn up and eventually she was wide awake and would smile everytime I tucked her back in, I threw her in Ellie's bed but Ellie didn't like that and it only brought on more screams from Ellie. I was so glad when it was finally morning. 

Without the pacifier that means no naps. At all. It's been a long week without naps. I've been turning on a movie in the afternoon for Ellie to have some quiet time and she has fallen asleep a few times. I even tried letting her take a nap in her tent but she just thought that was way too much fun to sleep. 

I was really worried about how night time would be. The first couple nights were hard just because she has always been really good about going in her room and going straight to sleep. But the past two nights she has done just that and its nice to feel like we are back to normal. 

And since I've update about our eventful week with Ellie, katelyn has a new trick up her sleeve. She is now rolling over! And she has learned how I scream, no doubt from hearing her sister do it so much. 

Cody has been working a lot on the house. We are hoping to be in before Christmas, that's my goal at least but he's doing most of the work by himself so it takes a little bit longer than anticipated. The girls are happy that it is Sunday so that they get to see their dad for a whole day and not just a quick hello or goodnight. 

I hate waiting. Absolutely hate it! And I have little patience for waiting which is probably why I’ve been forced to do so much of it lately. It feels like the past month has been spent waiting.

Waiting for the opportunity to buy a house. Waiting for the  government to open back up so we can buy a house. Waiting to close on a house. But we got the house! Now its waiting to get it all put together so we can move in. Waiting for Cody to have time to work on it. Waiting for Katelyn to get sleepy so we can go help. Waiting…

Waiting for a few hours at Lowes. At least we enjoyed looking at the Christmas decorations for a few minutes to help entertain us.


Sunday Ellie was sick and had a high fever. We spent the entire day waiting for her fever to go down and for her to start acting normal again. Thank heavens it only lasted one day, I was getting tired of the same disney movies over and over.



I've been waiting for Katelyn to roll over. She is almost there but not quite.



We've been trying to patiently wait for the November birthdays and Christmas. I am extremely excited for Christmas because I ordered some black boots but I have to wait... I've already finished shopping for the girl's and can't wait to see how excited Ellie will be.




A few other things that I've been waiting for are... to see progress of working hard to get this baby weight off, to get Katelyn moved out of our room and in with Ellie, to see family around the holidays, for Ellenor to start talking more. It seems like I keep waiting for the day when I can actually finish a to do list and not have only half the things I should get done crossed off. But despite waiting, we are trying to enjoy each day and make the most of it.

Last night we bought a Costco size bag of the good candy ( snickers, reeses, kit kat, almond joy, etc.). Between Cody and I we ate 5 pieces already out of 90. There is no way it's going to make it to Thursday! And when I say we ate 5 pieces I mean I ate 4 and Cody ate one. 

I feel like I need to write it down to hold me accountable and maybe that will help to keep me on track better. I have about 20 pounds to go to where I want to be. It's the weight I was last summer and I felt good at that weight, I am going more by how my clothes fit and how my body looked rather than exact numbers on the scale. But that's what I felt good about myself and I know it's a weight I can maintain, I just have to get there first. With Ellie I got lucky, all the weight I gained while pregnant melted away plus some pretty quickly. With Katelyn it seems that nothing I've been doing has even made a difference. So I'm writing as a way to kick my butt in gear and get rid of a few pounds by Christmas. And hopefully this will also help get me motivated because I am lacking it. 

This week I survived my first almost week by myself without Cody ( over night I mean). He headed up to Boise on Sunday night and finally came home on Thursday. It was a long week! But as soon as he returned it was as if everything was magically just as it should be. To keep Ellie in good spirits while Cody was away I did a lot of things to keep her busy and give her extra one on one time. For the most part it worked and she loved playing with play dough and different activities tht required a lot of hand eye coordination and helping me so anything and everything. This week was also warmer, in the high sixties, so we went to the park twice with friends and Ellie had a blast. She is a little too brave sometimes. She's gotten good at goi down the slide by herself to where I don't need to catch her but she was about to I down one and I had a feeling to. She came shooing down the slide head first and would have landed right on her head if I didn't stop her. Crazy girl.

I view myself as a pretty shy person at first and especially since I've been married I've just become so comfortable I don't venture out much. Lately I've been trying to do more things with other moms and be more social, so far so good. I'm hoping that it will help make winter go by faster and also so we don't go too stir crazy. 

Ellie is starting to become a lot more opinionated about what she wears. I usually give her two options and let her choose but while Cody was away I decided to pick my battles. Yes she is wearing apple pants (she's obsessed) and a princess night gown. I'm excited to see what other crazy outfits she comes up with, unless we are going out in public . And miss Katelyn is pretty much the perfect baby, as long as someone is in the room she is happy. 

Miss Katelyn is almost three months old. I honestly don't know where the time has gone. Maybe trying to keep Ellie from climbing all over her? Last night I realized that it had been a while since I rocked her to sleep. She is such a good baby and usually goes right to sleep when I put her in her crib with no problem. Last night I held her for a long time an when I put her in her crib to sleep she kept stirring. 

These girls grow way too fast. But I'm glad for the time I do have with them. Even when it's annoying that all Ellie wants to do is climb on my lap while I'm trying to find dinner ideas. Or Katelyn decides a short nap and bein held is a much better idea, I secretly love it. Yes I do get annoyed that I just want to finish the dishes or the last two things on a grocery list. But they are worth the interruption and I'm glad they are there to remind me. That they are the most important, not the cleanliness of te house or the amount of toys but them and the time we spend together.