Ready for Summer

I am now very busy that Evelyn gets around well. May 20th she started crawling up on her knees, then while we were at the beach for Memorial Day she started pulling up that Sunday. Now she pulls up everywhere and gets into EVERYTHING! She doesn't think anything about crawing into the next room by herself. She has also learned which cabinets in the family room have toys and she helps herself. She likes Lilly's toys better than hers, so we have to be carefull with anything small or paper. (I did find where she managed to eat a small sticker once.) While at the beach she tried avacado again she ate a good bit of it. In the middle of the night she woke up and threw up everywhere. I was worried she had some sort of stomach bug, but she had no fever and as soon as she got all the avacado out she was fine. I of course looked it up online and apparently it is common to have and intolerance to avacado and bananas. I was nervous to let her try bananas again, but she did this week and sure enough. She threw them back up. She had her 9 month check up today and her Dr. said to just try them again in a couple of months. She weighed in at 17 lbs. 5 ozs (29%), was 27.25 in. long (46%), and her head was 43cm (29%) No shots today, but she did have to get a toe prick. She did not even cry! She had to have it pricked twice to get enough blood. She just barely flinched the second time. Lilly was more upset about it.

My whole family was at the beach for Memorial Day weekend. Lilly enjoyed playing with her cousins, especially on the beach and in the pool. She looked so grown up running down the beach. Evelyn was most interested in eating the sand, but she enjoyed the water, too. Brendan was on vacation for the whole week so we stayed until Wednesday. Tuesday we took a quick trip to Savannah and had a late lunch at Paula Deen's restaurant, The Lady and Sons. We got the buffet so we could try different things and everything we had was delicious! Lilly really liked the baked chicken and the mac n cheese (which was fabulous!) We spent the rest of the week enjoying the pool in our neighborhood and out on the lake in the boat. We are loving the warm weather to enjoy the water. I just hope I can keep Lilly busy enough so she doesn't get board and end up driving me crazy. Today we went to the riverwalk and I took them on a run before Evelyn's appointment, then as promised we had a picnic at the zoo picnic area, then into the zoo. She got to ride the ponies and everything. I ended up having to carry her (while pushing Evelyn in the stroller) all the way back to the car. Needless to say she is now napping. I guess I did a good job keeping her busy! Brendan is thinking about taking her camping tonight.

Lilly and I also talked about Father's Day coming up and she has decided we need to make "Doughnuts for Dad" since that is what they had at preschool. I was hoping for something a little more simple, like pancakes, but it was her choice. I just hope they turn out well.

I have decided to start training for the Savannah rock n roll marathon in November. I have to run with the jogging stroller during the week so that is a challenge, but I am up to 3 miles pushing them and 4 miles (although I could do more) by myself. I am going to wait a few weeks to sign up just to make sure training is going well.

Evelyn at 8 months and a loss

Evelyn turned 8 months Monday. She is still such a happy sweet girl, but she has gotten a little spoiled. She is definitely a Mama's girl and wants to be held a lot. She has been teething and her first bottom tooth broke through last Thursday (right before turning 8 months old) and the second popped through a few days later. She has been getting up at night and is really hard to get back to bed. I was hoping to avoid this with her, but it looks like she is going to have to CIO soon. She has moved on from rolling from place to place to scooting. She starts of crawling, but then lays down to scoot. I guess whatever works best for her works for me. She has been waving for a while, but she just started clapping or "patty-caking" today. I noticed her trying yesterday, although Brendan thought I was crazy, but now she claps when I ask her to patty cake. She is growing so fast.
Evelyn at 8 months:


Lilly had her first dance recital on Mother's Day. I was REALLY nervous after watching the rehearsals, but she did pretty well during the recital. There was one point during the tap dance that she was more worried about where her "spot" was than dancing, but she got back on track. It was adorable to watch and a wonderful Mother's day treat. Lilly also helped Brendan make chocolate chip pancakes and brought them to me in bed. She also picked out a Pandora bracelet and the charms all by herself. It was a starter Mother's day kit with the Mom charm and 2 spacers, and she chose a running shoe charm, a heart with pink crystals (b/c she told the lady at the store my favorite color is pink), a little girl, and a little dog that looks like Isabelle. She is so sweet. Everyday is an adventure with her. You never know what she is going to say or do, but she has such a good heart. She also did a kids mud run today which was more like a mini obstacle course today. She loved walking through the mud and getting muddy, but had no interesting the obstacles.
Lilly after her recital:

At the mud run:

The girls with their Daddy at the zoo:


This week has been a rough week. This weekend I noticed that Harley's (our lab)breathing was more labored. Brendan had noticed that he was sometimes noisier when breathing about a month and a half ago, but figured it was some sort of allergen in the air or just getting old. He turned 11 April 26th. Brendan finally decided to take him the the vet Monday because I was really concerned about him. He was diagnosed with Laryngeal Paralysis which is related to poly-neuropathy. We were debating on whether or not he needed the surgery that does not fix, but helps the problem. It is about a $2,000 surgery that has side effects we were concerned with. If the dog eats to fast, drinks to fast, or throws up they have a high chance of getting aspiration pneumonia. Harley has always been a food vacuum and has a tendency to throw up so we were of course concerned the surgery would bring more problems for him. Tuesday morning he had an episode after Brendan took him out to potty. He couldn't breathe and panicked. He finally collapsed and we were able to keep him calm and he finally was able to catch his breath. It was the scariest thing I have every seen. We both thought we were losing him right then. So, we decided on surgery for the next morning because we couldn't go through that again. After speaking with the specialist we left him at the animal hospital for surgery. She ran more preliminary X-rays and noticed he appeared to have an enlarged esophagus and wanted to recheck it in a few days before doing the surgery. She called back about 45 minutes later because he had another episode like we witnessed Tuesday morning and she was very concerned that he was also dealing with a more serious neurological problem. Brendan was unable to talk on the phone so I talked to the neurologist and she very thoroughly explained everything to me and we were faced with a very hard decision. We could run some more tests to verify what she already suspected he had and it would take 10 days to get results back. They cost over $500 and it was just confirming something with the poly-neuropothy. There is no cure for the problem. She also told me that after getting the tests back if we did go ahead with the original surgery she could almost guarantee he would be in and out of the hospital with aspiration pneumonia due to the enlarged esophagus which causes regurgitation. We knew that was not a life for him and did not even think he could make it for the test results to come back because of the episodes he'd already had. At the hospital they were able to get him air after it, but at home we would be helpless. Since Harley was Brendan's baby he had to make the hard decision to let him go. It was very hard, but at least this way he went peacefully instead of during a panicky episode where he would suffocate. Brendan still is struggling with the decision. Lilly had a hard time initially, but I think she has come to terms with it. She still talks about him everyday, but doesn't get upset. She sees him peeking out from the clouds while we are outside and knows he is in heaven looking out for her.

Here is Harley with the girls last weekend. It is the last picture taken of him.

Easter through April

This year we had a wonderful Easter. The Easter the easter bunny was good to the girls. We then went to church to celebrate our risen Savior. Evelyn had a runny nose so she went into the worship service with us. She was really good until she wanted to play so I had to walk off to the side (we were already in the balcony) and she was good for the remainder of the service. Afterwards we had Easter lunch at my parents with my sister's family.

the cousins


with my parents


our family


Evelyn went to her first Carolina baseball game

April 8th we celebrated Brendan's 32nd Birthday. Lilly helped me make him a homemade chocolate cake with chocolate cream cheese icing. "We"(Lilly and I) have been cooking a lot more because I have been trying to cut out processed food and avoid GMOs when possible. We took the girls to Disney on Ice, "Dare to Dream" Evelyn slept through most of it, but Lilly loved it. She says when she grows up she is going to be a princess and skate at Disney on Ice. Evelyn was 7 months old on the 14th

Evelyn at 7 months


About 2 weeks ago she slept through the night for the FIRST time! It was 8 hours, but she has only slept 7 hours at the most since. She has also started rolling around to get where she wants. She will prop herself up on her arms to turn, then rolls. She does a little scooting, but not much. This is new for us because Lilly just took off crawling without rolling around too much. She is such a little sweet heart. She has been trying new foods. So far she loves her baby oatmeal, peas, pears, apples, and tolerates carrots. She does not like sweet potatoes, bananas (except when I made frozen banana "ice cream", and avocados.

Lilly has still been enjoying dance and is looking forward to her recital on Mother's day. She is really good at being my helper when she wants to be, but other times she likes to try my patience. She loves to write her name on EVERYTHING now. She has gotten really good at her first name. She can write her last name (or most anything else) beneath where it is already written. She sang at her preschool church a few weeks ago and did a great job. She wasn't a bit shy and was really looking forward to going up in front of everyone. I hope she will do just as well at her dance recital.

We took a trip to the beach, but the weather was a little cool. We did enjoy the Soft Shell Crab Festival in Port Royal. Lilly also got to pick strawberries for the first time on St. Helena Island. Then We picked more at a farm in Prosperity, SC with my Mom and Grandparents. We picked about 11 lbs worth! I froze most of them. We are still enjoying some of them fresh and I made strawberry preserves for the first time. I made my Mom some strawberry cupcakes with strawberry buttercream icing for her Birthday. We had her and my sister's family over to our house to celebrate since my Dad had already agreed to take a group out fishing for the weekend. We have had a very busy month and are looking forward to Summer!
Here are 2 last pictures of the girls enjoying outside:

Still here!

I know it has been a REALLY long time since I have posted, but we are still here and doing well! Evelyn will be 6 months old this week! It has been such a joy to watch her grow. She has always been such a sweet and happy baby and other than one cold after another (thanks to her big sister Lilly)she has been very healthy. She constantly smiles and lights up our lives. I love watching the bond between Lilly and Evelyn that is already starting to form. Evelyn's face lights up when she sees Lilly and Lilly makes sure that no one is going to "keep her sister" (even Noma-my Mom).


Evelyn's dedication Sunday

Lilly turned 3 December 28th and is a very independant little girl. She had her 3 year check up at the beginning of January and the Dr. went ahead and did Evelyn's 4 month check up (10 days early). Lilly weighed in at 28 lbs (40th percentile) and was 36.75in. tall (43rd percentile). So she is just a little on the small side. Evelyn weighed in at 12lbs. 12ozs (50th percentile) and was 24.75in. long (90th percentile). I don't remember the exact head measurement and I am too lazy? to go find the paper, but it was 50th percentile. She has more than doubled her birth weight. Lilly didn't have any shots. Just the flumist a finger prick, but she cried more after the prick than Evelyn did from all 3 shots. Lilly's cholesterol levels came back on the high side of normal, but since it wasn't a fasting read or a draw from her arm there is no way to know the breakdown of good vs. bad. The only diet change we have really had to make is cutting way back on cheese. Lilly loves cheese so this was a challenge to start with, but she has gotten used to it now. The doctor was not really concerned, but said she would look at the numbers next year to make sure they are the same or lower.

since I am so far behind on posts I will just post some highlights from the holidays. Lilly's favorite Christmas gift was a Disney princess scooter and she wanted the bike for her Birthday. She is good at riding both, but the scooter is usually her favorite to ride.

Lilly was Belle for Halloween. Evelyn just wore her bear baby jacket.


I their turkey day outfits and mathing owl hats.

CHRISTMAS



Lilly's 3rd Birthday and party at the Children's marionette theatre.


On her Birthday she got a Krispy Kreme snowman doughnut for breakfast, then a trip to Edventure and the regular museum. Lunch at Chipoltle (her favorite place to eat). Then bike riding time and finished off with dinner at California Dreaming with Grandma and Grandpa and a cupcake from Cupcake.



First Gamecock basketball game. Lilly fell asleep a few minutes into it, but Evelyn enjoyed looking around.



Evelyn's first trip to the beach on a warm weekend in January.




Lilly got her first haircut.



Lilly's first time at tap/ballet class


Evelyn sitting up well and first time eating real food



Lilly ready to plant a vegetable garden