5 Months Old

Here's little Miss Smiley at 5 months old!

Lots of fun things this month...

Celebrating her first Halloween

Visiting her 6th state (AZ) and visiting with Grandma and Grandpa James for her 1st Thanksgiving.

All smiles, playing with Grandma

Bringing home her first art projects

A footprint pumpkin

A hand print turkey

Receiving her first Happy Gram (this is a big deal, evidenced by Madeline's excitement over this!)

This toy appears to be her new favorite

She loves playing with her toes and has succeeded in getting them into her mouth.

Cosmo loves her and will curl up next to her whenever he gets the chance.  She has taken to petting him (or more accurately, pulling his fur) and Cosmo seems to love it.

Enjoying outside time in Tucson

We've had some sleep regression issues.  She been waking multiple times each night wanting to be held and protesting as soon as we put her back in her crib.  This past Saturday, she woke up at 5:30 and would not go back to sleep...until 7AM when she wore herself out playing

As of Sunday evening, she discovered she can roll from back to tummy and now rolls all around the place until she gets stuck next to a wall or piece of furniture...she can only move to the left!  They have reported that she is very hard to contain at daycare now, as she just wants to roll all over the place.

Our Thanksgiving Week

We spent the week of Thanksgiving in Tucson with Grandma and Grandpa James.  I did a horrible job at taking pictures, but we had a great visit.  Madeline and Olivia got lots of snuggles from Grandma and Grandpa, Madeline and cousin Sarah were inseparable and Olivia enjoyed taking it all in.

We spent one morning at the Desert Museum, which was a lot of fun for Madeline. 

Digging for dinosaur bones

Olivia just drooled and enjoyed being close to mommy

She also found her sister incredibly funny!

 

Madeline had Olivia cracking up by pretending to fall over

Cactus pose

The obligatory Tucson cactus pose

I think the hummingbird exhibit was her favorite.  She loved getting up close to these little guys because they had pink heads.

We spent some time at some of the local parks...

I did a poor job of getting photos of the girls with Grandma and Grandpa, but did end up with a cute one of Olivia with each of her grandparents.

Madeline had so much fun with her big cousin.

They had a slumber party on cots in Grandma and Grandpa's room.  Every time I tried to get their picture they darted under the covers.  This is the best I could do! :)

Madeline has been requesting short hair (like Olivia's) for quite some time.  She really wanted to go for a haircut, so upon our return to Houston, Madeline got a new 'do.

Before photo of her long hair

Really excited for her haircut

She held so still...

After picture with shoulder length hair.  How can she be so grown up??

Happy Thanksgiving!!

Random 10PM Thoughts...

I'm traveling for work today, and earlier in the day I was super excited about the prospect of going to bed early and getting a full night of uninterrupted sleep. Lately, Olivia has decided that sleeping through the night is overrated and has been waking, almost like clockwork, around 4AM nightly and is having a hard time falling back asleep.  This sure makes it hard to get moving when morning rolls around!  

Well, as luck would have it, here it is, after 10:30 and I can't sleep...so much for that going to bed early part.  I keep thinking about my two little girls back home and how much I miss them, how much I love them, and how much fun they both are.  Madeline is getting so big, and it's really a joy spending time with her and having actual conversations with her.  There's so much going on in that little head.  Just yesterday as I was taking her out of her car seat she said, "Now we have two girls."  I replied that yes, mommy and daddy are super lucky to have two incredible little girls. We talked about how lucky we are that Olivia joined our family and how much fun it is having two girls. I think Madeline has really been thinking about Olivia's position in our family lately. She's told me about three times this week, "Olivia is such a good baby, I think we can keep her."  I just chuckle every time she says this because, as Brian pointed out to her, "I don't think the baby store would take her back at this point!"  

So, in this season of thankfulness, I am so thankful that Madeline is such a great big sister. I am so happy that "now we have two girls" and I can't wait to watch how they grow together and become best of friends. I love the way that Olivia watches Madeline, the way Madeline can bring out these huge smiles in Olivia, and the way that Madeline looks out for her little sister. There is a lot of love between them!  I don't know how I got so lucky to be mommy to these two amazing little people.   And, for as much as I miss them when I'm gone, I'm super thankful for a supportive husband who is a super daddy to these two little girls.  We are so very blessed!

So, with those thoughts, I'm off to bed, ... there's still hope for an uninterrupted night of sleep!