Easter

We celebrated a cold and rainy Easter on March 31 this year. We got the girls dressed up in their spring dresses, but were forced to take pictures inside because is was 40 degrees outside. We did manage to squeeze in an egg hunt with our neighbors before the rain came.

The Easter bunny brought goodies for Lily and Marin's Easter baskets. Lily got a chocolate bunny, a new electric toothbrush (the Easter bunny likes to make sure kids' teeth get clean after eating Easter candy!), a Hello Kitty purse with bath wash and lotion and peanut butter eggs.

Marin got a stuffed monkey, new pacifiers, a container of puffs and some baby food! She was very excited!

Nine Months!

9 month sweetie

Miss Marin turned nine months old on March 21. She is just the happiest baby ever. She smiles all.the.time. Even her teachers at daycare say she's always got a smile on her cute little face. She now has EIGHT teeth--four on the top and four on the bottom. They serve her well as she's getting better at self-feeding. She likes to eat puffs, cheerios and pieces of banana. We gave her yogurt for the first time this month, which she gobbled up.

She sits up like a champ now, really only falling over when she wants to get onto her belly. She isn't doing the traditional crawl, but she is a champion army crawler. She also still relies on rolling a lot to get herself where she needs to go.

March was a very germ-y month in our house. Marin got two ear infections plus pink eye. Ethan came down with the flu and I had a bad cold that morphed into a sinus infection. Hopefully April will bring better weather and better health for us all!

At her 9-month check up, here were big girl's stats:

• Weight: 21 lbs, 13 oz. or 93rd percentile
• Height: 28 1/2" or 82nd percentile.

Lily wanted to get in on the 9-month picture action.

Giggles

Because we can never had too many videos of Marin's adorable giggle!

Eight Months

Eight months old!

Another month has gone by! Marin is eight months old now! She has become a master at getting anywhere she wants to go by rolling back and forth and pivoting around on her belly. She can sit up all by herself quite well and only falls over sometimes. Usually it's on purpose, when she pitches herself forward onto her belly because she has somewhere she wants to go.

She had her first ear infection this month. She started waking up at 5am every day, so we should have known something was up. Not sure if the two are related, but as soon as we got her antibiotics for her (double!) ear infection, she went back to sleeping until 6:30-ish.

She weighed in at 20 lbs, 9 oz at her last doctor appointment, so that's 88th percentile.

Marin got her first top tooth this month. It's not one of the middle teeth, as expected, but one of the lateral incisors.

She goes to daycare every day and seems to enjoy it. When I drop her off in the morning, she launches herself into the arms of her teacher with a big grin on her face!

Goofy Girls

Lily and Marin have way too much fun together sometimes. Lily can make Marin laugh like no one else. Marin loves her big sissy!

Snow Day

Could she be any prettier?

We got a couple of inches of snow yesterday. While not a lot, it's plenty for an excited four-year-old. Lily was thrilled to stomp around with her best dog, Willy, and make tracks in the snow.

The Return of Video

 

I am going to try to post more video of the girls, because they are too cute to miss.

This is a video of Miss M doing what she does best these days...rolling all over the place! It's a little dizzying, I warn you.

Seven Months

 

Miss M is seven months old and oh boy, how cute is she??

She's a real grabber and reaches for anything and everything sight (see photos below for exhibits A, B and C). She likes to grab hair, clothes, glasses, earrings...anything within reach.

Right before her 7-month birthday, she started talking! Ok, really just babbling, but the first thing she said was MAMA! It was more like, mamamamamamama, but I'm pretending she's saying my name. She also is fond of saying, bababababababa.

Marin's fourth tooth is about to surface. It's on the bottom and joins her other three bottom teeth. No teeth on the top yet, but I'm sure they're lurking just under the surface.

Marin's biggest accomplishment this month is learning how to sleep through the night! Hooray!

 

 

Merry Christmas!

Christmas girls!

We celebrated Christmas with the Ackermans this year. Dan and Charlotte flew out from Idaho and  on Christmas Day, Luke, Michaela and Everett came down from Baltimore for Christmas dinner and gifts.

Santa was good to both of the girls and Lily was thrilled with both her and Marin's gifts. Lily was more than ready to "help" M open her presents and try them out for her.

Marin's very own copy of Goodnight Moon

Lily got a bike from Santa and she's a natural when it comes to cruising around our street. She's taken one or two spills, mostly as a result of turning too sharply, but mostly she's kept it upright!

Lily's most favorite gift is her Dream Lite, which is a stuffed animal that projects stars and a moon on the ceiling. It's actually pretty cool!

Rosie the Dream Lite

More Christmas pictures here!

Six Months!

This happy girl is six months old! She's sitting up (with some assistance,) reaching for anything in sight, and of course, putting everything in her mouth. She has two teeth now, with more on the way. She's finally gotten the hang of eating solid foods. She's tried bananas, sweet potatos, carrots, apple sauce, peas and pears, and she's loved every one of them!

Her six-month doctor appointment told us what we already know--she's growing like a weed. Her six month stats:

Weight: 19 lbs, 7.6 oz. or 94th percentile
Height: 26 3/4 inches or 84th percentile

Harvest Time

Ethan loves to plant a garden every year, and Lily loves to be his trusty assistant. This year because of our move mid-summer we were unable to plant one at our old house, and we were a little too late to plant one at the new house. Ethan and Lily still managed to get a few seeds in the ground this fall, so we had plenty of lettuce and peas. The one "crop" that took the longest was the carrots. They finally pulled them in December. Lily is the proud owner of the shortest, fattest carrots we've ever seen!

Sad about the shorty carrot.

Just kidding!

Chomp Chomp

At five months, two weeks and five days old, Marin has her first tooth!