.

Ella

2011-11-04T21:42:00.001-07:00

Introducing our new puppy... Ella!!! A early Christmas present for the princesses.

Emma is OBSESSED, luckily the pup seems to really like her too, which is surprising seeing how Emma carries her around and squishes the poor pup.

Off topic...Kenna has been feeling "icky" the past few days. Here she is cuddled up im mommy and daddy's bed with the "sick" blanket

Emma is in love.

Springs Preserves Haunted Harvest

2011-10-28T00:56:00.000-07:00

My lil' trick-or-treaters

Pooped out Princess

Pics

2011-10-15T09:52:00.001-07:00

Such a Pretty Girl

I could just squeeze my little Emma Bear

Pumpkin Patch on Flamingo

Haha... you would think I took this after they've been asleep for hours based on their positions but this is like 10 minutes after bedtime...they sleep like their Daddy

Popcorn and a movie

Sleepover with Anneliese...Makenna and Emma can't get enough of our sweet little niece

Dress Up

Makenna is in LOOOOVE with Disney characters, me and Brett had a hard time tearing her away from them to go get on rides

I love how when Brett actually has some time off our girls attach themselves to him, such Daddy girls

Teacups, I love the look of concern on Emma's face, I felt the same way about getting into a teacup with Brett spinning it.

Emma's Missing Tooth

2011-08-20T10:32:00.001-07:00

Sweet Emma has not been blessed in the teeth department. I always thought it was something I was doing wrong that has lead to her dental problems, but was told by her pediatrician the absolute massive doses Emma recieved when she was 15 months old for a MRSA infection are probably the culprit for her teeth not being so great (and they may lead her to be slightly shorter than if she had not had to recieve such aggressive antibiotics). So I will continue to obsess over flossing and brushing, but not beat myself up when she hits a dental bump in the road. Anyway, Emma had gotten an absess on her upper front left tooth (which had already been previously crowned) and the only option was to pull the tooth before the infection got to her permanent tooth. Not easy for a three year old to go through, or her mom. Thank goodness Brett took the day off and stayed with her through the extraction. He said she was so braved and tried super hard not to cry and held her mouth open real good through the whole thing and just squeezed his hand. Her trying to be so brave kind of makes my heart break more than if she had just screamed the whole time. Anyway, it's over and done with and Emma likes using her hole to squirt water out of in the tub and stick straws and food through it. Plus the tooth fairy visited our house for the first time! The pic above are the girls with their tooth fairy prize, Emma was so sweet she even shared her prize with Kenna. LOVE THEM!

Yup the tooth fairy leaves money in plastic baggies, and anyone who knows our tooth fairy knows she is a bit of a germ freak and there was no way she was putting filthy money on something Emma puts her face on...gross to even think about

Sweet smile

Ok this is just a random pic of Emma eating Cream cheese straight out of the tub, she does this all the time and it grosses me out, but she goes through about a tub a week, as long as she likes it

We are beyond happy that Matt & Debbi and our super cute nieces and nephew have moved back to Vegas! We love them all so much and are so excited to have them close! YAY!!!!!!

Fourth of July / Disneyland/ Birthdays

2011-07-06T09:40:00.000-07:00

Fourth of July at Grandma and Grandpa Scott'sSparklers

Fireman Makenna

Sourpuss Emma

Sisters...love it

Emma crying, I still think she's uber cute even when she's crying

Love this little girl!

Every time we go over to Grnadma and Grandpa Scott's the girls insist someone drag them around the yard in this wheel barrow, this time Grandpa was a good sport and gave them countless rides around the yard

Emma's turn

Instead of a recital in ballet/tap class each girl does an individual show, where they get up and perform a planned dance. Makenna's dance was to Hannah Montana (of course) and she did marvelous!

Little Hannah

Emma waiting for Kenna to perform

They are all so cute together

Because we were in Disneyland on Makenna's birthday we got home late and there was no way I was going to start making her birthday cake at 10 at night so we let Kenny pick out one at the grocery store, she didn't mind as long as she got her chocolate cake

Kenna's birthday at home with Daddy

So sad leaving Disneyland

Mickey's toon town Fair, the girls LOVED this part of the park

The birthday girl in Goofy's chair

My little pumpkin in a pumpkin

If you go to Disney with my Dad then expect to stop for ice cream at least once a day, our girls are the freaks of our family picking out strawberry bars and cookie sandwiches instead of chocolate covered mickey ears.

Oh, Iloved seeing emma with Woody. Emma LOVES toy story so I was so excited she got to meet Woody. I also love that Woody is holding Emma's cup for her so she could hug him.

Pretty girl

Sweet baby

Kenna and her Grandma

Emma eating ice cream. After I took this picture we got in line for the Buzz lightyear ride while Emma finished her ice cream, people were stopping to watch her make a mess out of herself with her chocolate covered mickey ears, one family though she was so cute they even took pictures of my messy, chocolate covered baby.

The girls Birthday party, SO happy Grandma and Grandpa got to be here for the girls birthdays

Emma and Anneliesse playing in the squirting turtles

Kenna and Emmett, love these two together

The princess pinata smashed open, this was my favorite part of their party, watching the kids try to hit the pinata, Gabe was smart enough to grab ahold of the rope to smash it open for everyone

Daddy and his littlest princess

Emma and her Ariel cake

Ripping open gifts

I just love these two so stinkin' much!!!!!

Sweet Girls

2011-06-04T12:17:00.000-07:00

This is Kenna's "Blueberry face" I don't know why she calls it that but she does and when ever she makes this face it just cracks me up, so of course this is her go to face for when she's in trouble.

Now that Emma is potty trained I was putting away the few diapers left in her diaper bag and when I came back to put the bag away this is what I found, silly little muffin.

Obsessed. That's what Makenna and Emma are with their cousin Anneliesse. From the moment she leaves until we see her next the girls ask about her constantly. Any time we get in the car they think we are going to see Anneliesse and any time we get home they rush through the door hoping to find her. I am so grateful our girls have found such a good friend in our sweet niece, they are seriously the CUTEST together, love it, and I love them:)

Easter & More

2011-04-26T10:31:00.000-07:00

The girls Easter Baskets

Dyeing Eggs

Aunt Claire's and Uncle Jason's Easter Party. We had so much fun, the girls were in love with the baby bunny, and the Easter bunny even came!

I was super bad at getting lots of pics this Easter, I think I was just too busy enjoying everything to dig out the camera, but I am glad I got these two together. Makenna and Anneliese are not just friends because they are cousins but these two have a special bond, they really super enjoy being together and are just so sweet together, true BFFs!

Our little wierdo

Emma passed out at the dinner table. She is starting to out grow her naps, but still has some off days where she falls asllep in the oddest places.

I don't care that she's goona be five soon, Kenna will always be my little baby, love that sweet face

Since Daddy's been laid off Emma has been super glued to him. She seriously won't even let me get her out of her car seat if Daddy is there to do it, such a little stinker, but i got to admit they make a pretty cute duo.

Haha, poor girl was told not to horse around with her cup of goldfish in her hands, but she did it anyway and they spilled all over, here she is cleaning them up, love it.

The 2 Little Princesses

2011-04-16T14:06:00.000-07:00

Makenna got stickers at the store, when we got home I told her she was not allowed to stick them on the furniture or walls, so she stuck them on her sister.

Whenever I cook or bake the girls hover around me trying to help, and who can resist these little faces, not me.

Silly Little Emma

I took the girls to the portrait studio to get their pics done for Eatsre, but Emma threw such a fit the photographer told us it would be better if we came back at another time. Instead of going back there, this time I took the girls to their favorite park to do pics, because I knew I could bribe them with playing for a while if they did good, and it worked.

SO in LOVE with these two dolls.

The face of trouble

Sweetness

DisneyLand!!!

2011-03-25T11:31:00.001-07:00

Hidden Mickeys. So usually when we go to Disney Brett and I have these silly competitions like who can touch the most stuff you are not suppose to touch on the rides, this time we added finding hidden mickeys. Brett was really stertching to make some of his "finds" count as mickeys, but this mickey he found in California Adventure is pretty good. Brett took a picture of a bunch of the hidden mickeys we found and is planning on turning them into virtual geocaches....oh and Uncle Jamie how did you know about the planet one??? Still trying to figure that out

Emma couldn't even see over the steering wheel, but that didn't deter her at all from driving. Brett said every time he touch the steering wheel to try and help her out she flipped. Feisty baby.

Donald Ducks boat in Toon town

This was the first time we took the girls where they were big enough to go on some of the big kids rides (Emma still is no where close to the 40" required for most of the really cool rides thoug...dang). We took the girls on the Matterhorn, Makenna was scared and emma just screamed WHEEEEEEE the whole time.

BOO!!! For Rain

Yay!!!! For Cotton Candy!

Little Mermaid Carousel in California Adventure.

Tiki Room

Brett trying to get Makenna to smile first thing in the morning....not an easy thing to do

Love this action pic of Brett getting into the Astro Orbiter

We are SUPER happy Aunt Debbi and the kids got to meet up with us. They were like having our own personal DisneyLand tour guides.

This is the girls and mine tea cup a.k.a. the tea cup that does not go warp speed with Brett spinning it. During the ride Amara was trying so hard to spin the tea cup and she did NOT want my help, seriously cute!

Brett, Aunt Debbi, Koben and Emma's tea cup. Just watching them spin that fast makes me nauseous. Poor Debbi was still feeling the effects of riding the tea cups with Brett for like a half an hour after we got off the ride.

Where Emma belongs...caged:)

Emma was being feisty in some of the lines and tried to kick, punch and fight other kids in line several times......trouble

Aww....love these girls and I love how much they love each other!!! They are just too sweet together.

Pulling the sword from the stone

Emma's turn

Dumbo

Makenna had no idea we were going to DisneyLand, and she has been asking to go for forever now. We told her we were going for a walk to a park. The night before we left she was like "Sure are packing alot of stuff for a walk". The whole 4 hour ride there she kept saying when are we going to start walking??? We told her where we were just before getting on the tram, and at first she was confused, but once she say the pics of Goofy, Donald ,and Mickey on the tram her and Emma both started to flip out, they were SO excited...priceless

We had such a good time in Disney and now (BIG BIG THANKS to Debbbi) we have Annual passes and plan to go back REALLY soon.!!!

Movie Night

2011-03-12T16:22:00.000-08:00

Brett has been working way too many hours lately and Makenna is seriously missing her Daddy. Most nights she goes to sleep before he gets home from work and she always tells me to make sure to wait up for her daddy to make sure he gets home okay, and to have him kiss her a hundred times when he gets home. She calls Brett alot at work and her favorite question for him is "when you get home tonite can we cuddle up and watch a movie together?". Well,last week Brett actually got some time off and Makenna got her wish of cuddling up on the couch and watching a moive with her Daddy, only after about 5 minutes she passed out...sweet girl.

My Love Bugs

2011-02-16T17:16:00.001-08:00

Valentine's Day

Pics for Grandma

2011-02-11T22:36:00.000-08:00

After 4 years of living with the princesses, I know Grandma (and Papa) are seriously missing them. Here mom:

Kenny passed out.

When Brett gets home from work i make him a snack if he wants, here is what the girls made for him while i was cooking him some real food, they were very proud of themselves

Emma asleep in the time out chair

One of Emma's Creations

Beautiful Girl

Kenna Holding little Prince William, LOVE him

Emma helpingme with the laundry

And yet another one of Emma's creation

WE MISS YOU GRANDMA AND PAPA, CAN'T WAIT TO SEE YOU....SOON!

HalloWeen

2010-11-07T07:21:00.000-08:00

Makenna with her haul.

Emma trying to steal "nana's" breakables.

Ready for trick-or-treating

I love Halloween, and I LOVE, LOVE how much the girls love Halloween. This year Halloween was especially fun, the girls totally got the holiday this year and were counting down the whole month of October. Our Halloween was spent going to our town's costume contest and parade with Aunt Stasia, Cheito, Baby Sophia, Grandma and Grandpa. The contest is always lots of fun and the kids got all hopped up on sugar and donuts there. After the town thing we headed back to Stasia's mom's (the girls call her nana) house, where the kids ran around like crazy people, and there were LOTS of other kids there. The kids ran around outside and everyone loaded up on dinner before taking ALL the kids out for trick or treating. Emma was hilarious trick-or-treating. Every time someone would put candy in her pail, she would shine her flahslight in her pail and check out what she got. Plus, Emma was the littlest one actively trick-or-treating in our group, so while all the other kids raced up to the doors Emma was lagging behind, running her short, chubby legs off yelling tik-o-tweet while holding out her bucket, wish i could have video taped it, it was so stinkin' cute. Half way through Emma pooped out on us, Stasia tried to take her out of the stroller to go to a house and Emma just said "All Done tik-o-tweet", again so cute!! Makenna was funny too, her and Cheito were so overly excited to go trick-or-treating that when they got to people's doors they would SCREAM "trick-or-treat" like 50 times as loud as they possibly could. Makenna also thinks you can trick-or-treat whenever you feel like it. Since Halloween has been over Makenna keeps asking if we can go again, and does not understand why it's not an everyday activity.

A Little Bit About Our Fall

2010-10-27T12:02:00.000-07:00

Blues Clues Pumpkin, Emma is absolutely amazed by the glowing pumpkin.

Makenna is such a big girl this year, previous years she painted a pumpkin while Daddy carved one, but this year (although Daddy did do most of the work) Kenna helped out with the carving.

Love this picture.

Cheito is Makenna's best friend. They are ridicously cute together. I love how they can play for hours and never fight.

My little monkey in her favorite monkey pjs

My best friend is going to school to become a teacher. She really wants to be a art teacher for grade school children. This semester she has to do a case study on pre kindergarten children and how they learn. Makenna is her project for the semester. Stasia worked on a project with Kenna
on colors and textures, here's the picture Kenna made. When Stasia wrote up her report after working with Makenna, Makenna way ahead of where most children her age are, knew it ;)

Makenna and Aunt Stasia working on their project. Emma wanted in on the project so bad.

Every year Stasia and I wake up real early on the second Saturday of October and head out
to the Orchard near our house to take the kids pumpkin picking. We try and go early because we always wind up spending hours there doing all the different activites and the place gets CRAZY busy about noon. Here's Emma picking out a pumpkin

Makenna and her gourd.

It felt like the kids got so big this year. I remember taking Makenna and she was barely bigger than the pumkins, now she can pull the wagon all by herself.

So they had a poster with all differnt Halloween items to paint on the kid's faces. Emma sits down and the man asked her which item she wanted I told him to just do a pumpkin but before he could start Emma grab his hand and told him she wanted a blue flower (which wasn't even a choice), gotta love a girl who knows what she wants.

Makenna and Cheito had no problem getting their faces in the right places, but check out Frankenstein and you can see Emma trying her hardest to peek out.

Quick Pics

2010-09-16T17:42:00.000-07:00

Emma new craze of the moment is that she will only wear boots.

Brett and I took the girls apple picking and I spaced on bringing the camera with us, but I did however get this shot of my princesses making apple crisp.

My Princesses

2010-08-14T18:58:00.000-07:00

Poor little Emma just had her top four front teeth crowned, we are just so thankful she did not have to have them pulled. She's been a champ through it though....mommy and daddy not so much, glad to have it over with and done, hope she feels all better soon.

My Favorite Place in the World

2010-08-09T07:42:00.001-07:00

The girl's sitting on the seawall in town

My grandparent's house from the beach

Where else can you find a beach like this with absolutly no one else on it?

My grandparent's house from the harbor.

Scituate, Massachusetts. I have two favorite places that i could just spend the rest of my lfe happily at, one is Disney World and the other is Scitaute. Scituate is a small fishing town about 45 minutes outside of Boston. Qunitessentailly a small New England fishing town. It's where my Dad spent most of his time growing up, and where my grandparents lived my whole life until they passed away about 5 years ago. At one point all of Scituate was owned by my Dad's family, the MacDonald's and I still have lots of second and third cousins there. My grandparent's owned the best house, it's sits on a private beach on one side and across the street in the harbor. Unfortunately after my grandparents passed away my Dad's family sold the house, but I have been wanting to take Brett and the girls here since we moved back to New York. Unfortunately, Brett couldn't go, but the girls and I took my mom for her birthday last week. It was the first time the girls have ever seen the ocean. I still am holding out hope that I can get Brett here before we move back to Vegas. I know he would love it. Anyway, I just wanted to post some pics.

Just A Few Pics Of Our Cuties

2010-07-21T09:01:00.000-07:00

Making faces, encouraged by Daddy.

I was trying to get a picture of how sweet Brett and Makenna were playing together, but Brett has taught Makenna to cover her face when I break out the camera. This is so cute, the other day was Brett's day off and Emma was SO happy to have her Daddy home, but then he had to go to a doctor's appointment by himself! After he left Emma grabbed this stool and was looking out in to the garage whining for here Daddy. Such a Daddy's girl.

Grandpa helping the girls with their megablocks

Kenna posing.

Squishy little girl.

This is a Long one....But lots of Pics

2010-07-05T12:23:00.000-07:00

This is the fourth of July : Makenna and Cheito relaxing together just before going out to watch fireworks

Emma crying....is it mean that i take pictures of her crying? I just think sometimes she is just too cute to help right away

Makenna's birthday pile o' presents

On Makenna';s birthday we went to the [park and met up with her bestest buddies Cheito and Aurora. We had a picnic and the kids ran around like crazy. Makenna loved it!

Makenna is obsessed with Hannah Montana...here is the birthday cake i made her with her idol on it

On the sunday in between the Emma and Makenna's birthdays we had a big party at our house. Here is makenna showing me her blue tongue....their birthday cake was blue by request of both birthday girls...if it were up to me it would have been pink

Makenna is obsessed with Baby Sophia...

Emma is scared of birthday cakes (not a fan of the whole candle thing) so at their party i made emma a special cupcake just for her to have, and this girls does LOVE cupcakes

Makenna put this birthday hat on Baby Sophia. Makenna will decorate anything or anyone who sits still long enough

Emma on her birthday

Emma's Brobee cake

Emma totally knew what to do with her pile o' presents

On their birthdays we do all the things the girls love. Emma loves being naked, watching tv and pizza, so naturally this is her birthday dinner

Emma also loves ice cream

For Emma's birthday my mom and i took both girls to get manicures. Makenna goes every other week with grandma and gets her nails done so she was pro at this, but this was the first time Emma got her nails done

and she loved it!

I love Makenna's belly hanging out

Emma love dressing up. I really like this mix of pirate hat and heels

Makenna started taking tae kwon do this summer. She's still taking dance too, and dance remains her favorite much to her daddy's dismay

but man she looks cute in her little outfit

Brett and i took the girls up to Lake George for a couple of days. It was such a nice trip

Our hotel looked out onto the lake and had their own private beach on the lake. The girls loved this patio in our room

At night on the private beach at our hotel

cute kid

Seriously cute kids

Emma loves this cat. His name is Strummer and he is huge, he's got to be over 20 lbs. Emma literally sits on him and rides him all the time and the cat totally lets her, even more the cat absolutely loves Makenna

Ready for tpool

We took the kids up to six flags great escape. Here is makenna, cheito and aurora on their favorite ride.

and on the train

They had a bunch of these cute playhouses for the kids to play in

Makenna dna aurora with cinderella

I think this is hilarious. Makenna really sleeps with these masks over her eyes, only during the day when she takes naps (yes i am lucky enough that she still naps) because, and i quote" the afternoon light bothers my eyes"

When the fair was in town my parents and i took the girls. Makenna loved all the cheesy games

Makenna throwing darts. I thought this was going to be a really bad idea but she was really good at it and popped a balloon each time

emma and grandpa at the fair

only makenna could talk grandma into getting on these swings

Emma in her protective gear

Makenna in her protective gear

Like i said the emma loves pizza. The girls love making pizza for dinner. I love emma's face in this picture, she makes this face all the time when she is concentrating

We also took the girls to their first Yankees game which they both loved

Makenna was super psyched to get cotton candy at the game

In front of the stadium

love this face

We took the kids on a picnic at Vanderbilt mansion. this is the only pic i got. Brett kept our kids plus my friends kids entertained while we chatted and passed around the baby, i love Brett for all the little things he does like this

Emma passed out on her daddy

Brett and i took the girls on a hbike up Mohonk mountain to mohonk lake. Really it was 7 miles of me and brett pushing the girls in the stroller up a mountain. it was fun but needless to say we are gonna wait until the girls can walk the whole way before we atke them on a hike like that again. Anyway, here's emma in the car after the hike.

It was super beautiful on top of the mountain. We were so high up the birds of prey were hunting just a few feet above us. It was awesome to watch the hawks and eagles hunt so close by

On top of the mountain on the lake their is this...Mohonk mountain house, this is only half of it! It's huge, really old and so beautiful

Here's the other half

Here is mohonk lake. there are HUGE fish is this lake, the girls loved it

There are also a bunch of rocking chairs surrounding the lake, very nice

Emma's first haircut

Makenna loves putting together puzzles.

Easter

2010-04-15T11:07:00.000-07:00

I LOVE how excited Makenna is for ALL the holidays now, it's just SO much fun now that she is a bit older, she gets super excited.

We could not convince Emma to color eggs with us, pretty shocking considering how much she loves to color.

Makenna "reading" to Emma.

From Winter right into Summer

2010-04-08T09:21:00.001-07:00

90 degrees yesterday and over 80 for the 4th straight day in NY......yay!

March

2010-03-31T19:39:00.000-07:00

Emma was confused by the warm weather and sun, here she is trying to play with her sled.

Kenna showing off her new hair cut.

Makenna and her best buddy.

Baby Sophia

Proud new mom.

Our town has all sorts of great family activites. Last weekend was the annual Easter egg hunt in town. The Easter bunny was there, along with baby chicks, rabbits, goats, lambs, alligators, turtles, plus after the kids each found at least 8 eggs they can trade in their eggs for a goody bag.

After all the hundreds we spend on toys these carboard boxes are big hits, they double as cars, houses and swimming pools.

Here's Emma putting on her own sunblock lotion, so independent.

Little Miss Emma all dressed up with her evening bag.

Kenna posing.

Hugs.

Makenna and Brett play the Wii for hours, Brett says Makenna's getting pretty good at it.

Oreo face.

Here are just a few of the trees brought down in our yard by the big snowstorm. These are not small trees, and it was like this all over our area, everyone's yards looked like this and the streets were blocked, crazy.

How can you not just want to squeeze this kid, man i love her.

Makenna plating her seeds. We are hoping for a nice vegetable garden this year.

Emma working on the computer.

Ready for dance class.

My Dad redid both bathrooms upstairs, this is the girls last bath in thier old bathroom.

Emma got Makenna's old tap shoes and she LOVES them, whenever itake them off her she cries "dap doos"

Emma hard at work on her "puzzles"

Emma's favorite person is Daddy. She loves her Mommoy and knows i'm the pushover, but she is a total Daddy's girl.

March has been a busy & fun month for us. March started out with us getting over 3 feet of snow in under 48 hours on March 2nd & 3rd. Hundreds of thousands of people in our area were out of power for a week or more, luckily we never lost power, just cable for about 3 days. It was crazy, we couldn't even take Emma out in the snow because it was almost over her head. We took Makenna out but she couldn't walk as the snow was up past her hips. Brett, Makenna and I stood in the backyard while it was still snowing and all you could hear were the trees snapping all around us from the weight of the snow. So, we went from this massive snow storm and the snowiest winter since they've been keeping records to one of the warmest springs we've had in a while. We've already had several days over 70 here and the forecast for the next several days is mid to high 70's and maybe reaching 80. This will be the first Easter since Makenna was born that we will not be wearing Jackets for our Easter egg hunt this year! Exciting! Brett is still looking for a job but is thrilled to be driving again! It so cute to watch him drive he has a smile on his face that he just can't wipe off, it's like a kid on Christmas, we are so excited and proud of him and ALL he's accomplished. We are still unsure of wheater or not we'll be moving May, June, July or in like 2 more years....it's all still totally up in the air. Ick. On a happier note we are SUPER happy my VERY best friend in the whole world gave birth March 29th to baby Sophia. Makenna is absolutely in love with Sophia (as are we all), she was born at 7 lbs. 12 oz. and is just so sweet and pretty. Brett and I have been totally loving holding Sophia and loving on her, I always forget just how little newborns are, man I wish they would stay that way for longer. Our family has also gotten in geocaching, for those who don't know.....geocaching is like a high tech scavenger hunt...google it...it's fun.

?

2010-03-14T20:32:00.000-07:00

We really need to get Emma off the bottle but she WILL NOT take a cup. At least by this age Makenna was taking a cup during most of the day, but Emma absolutely refuses to even look at a cup. One day we were out running errands and I only bought Emma a cup with us thinking if Emma got thirsty enough and only had a cup handy she would have to take it, so wrong, she just screamed he lungs out until we got home....bad idea, won't ever do it again. Emma gave up her binkies so easily that i thought the bottle would be easy too, wrong again. Any one have any ideas what to do with a kid who won't let go of her bottle?

I Think It's Funny....

2010-03-10T09:04:00.001-08:00

That Emma's Favorite word (and action) is "PUSH"

Makenna saw a commercial for a toy she wants then turned to Brett and I and said "Maybe you guys can buy that on EBay for me"

Makenna is mildly obsessed with playing the Wii, seriously cute.

Emma was supposeto give Daddy a "head butt" (of course Brett encourages this) and instead poked him in the eye, Brett wound up at the doctor's and is on antbiotics for the nasty cut Emma put on his eyeball

Emma Head Butts, really cute, but hurts when you're not expecting it

Makenna's pet fish died (well over a week ago) , we never told her, just got rid of the body and bowl and she has not even asked about it.

When Emma cries she always says "I'm sad"

Makenna's potty buddy is Emma, she will not sit on the potty by herself so Makenna makes Emma come with her and Emma will stay with Makenns until she's done.

Emma loves doing crosswords, she puts on grandma's glasses, takes grandma's puzzle book and will sit there for a good hour "doing puzzles" ever so serious.

Makenna HATES cold weather and particularly the snow, we have literally had to force her to go outside this winter, and play in the snow. Thank god it's warming up, FINALLY!

I am SO in love with....

2010-03-08T19:06:00.001-08:00

Excuse the smudges on Kenner's face we were playing with the chalkboard.

News About Our Move...

2010-03-01T08:31:00.000-08:00

Getting ready to move for us has been sort of bitter sweet. We are SUPER excited to go back to Vegas, leave the snow and icky weather behind and be closer to Brett's family, but we are sad to leave all the family and friends and the life we've been living for the past 3 years behind. However, we thought we had it all firgured out and were hoping to be moving later this month. Well, as most of our close friends and family know we were waiting on just a few key things to get taken care of before we could leave NY, and we found out today that they would definitely not be taken care of by the end of this month and we have had to push back our moving date all the way to July. At first Brett and I were bummed (we had psyched ourselves up for the move and the drive), but we know that all things happen for a reason, and there is a good reason we will be spending some extra time in NY. On the bright side we are happy to be spending some extra time with the grandparents, and hope we can help them get their house ready to sell. We are also excited that spring is coming soon (but not soon enough) as spring in NY is one of my absolute favorite things. I love seeing the grounds go from being snow covered to the tulips blooming and the trees getting back their leaves and being able to go outside all day. So hopefully, pushing back our move date 13 weeks will give us time to prepare more for our move and enjoy NY a little longer.

The 3 Great Loves Of My Life

2010-02-25T19:15:00.001-08:00

and here's some more pics to enjoy.....

"Helping" Grandpa open his birthday presents, mind you the girls helped me wrap these presents the night before, and were so excited to see what was in them .

Emma playing hide and seek.

Playing with my camera last night......

Emma's Sick :(

2010-02-21T21:29:00.000-08:00

Emma is seriously taking years off my life. I was woke up this morning by Brett telling me "Emma can't breathe we have to take her to the emergency room....now". Brett is not anywhere near the neurotic parent i am so if Brett feels like Emma needs to go to the emergency room i know she's in bad condition. Thanks to my awesome parents who will drop any and everything for their kids and grandkids, they took Makenna, for the second day in a row, and Brett, Emma and I were on our way to the ER in under 10 minutes. Soon as Emma got in the car and the cold air her breathing got better. Long story short, she's got a bad case of croup. The doctor's at the ER gave her a steriod shot and breathing treatment, and i think she's feeling better, although she still sounds pretty terrible. Makenna only had a pretty mild case of croup once and i've never had it so dealing with a serious case for the first time is pretty scary. We are hoping and praying that Emma gets better ASAP, and this clod stops getting passed around our family.
On a lighter note, we are starting to get packed up for our big move to Vegas. When we moved back to NY from Vegas we only had my car and Brett's car packed with stuff, how is it that in 3 years we have accumulated SO much stuff? Crazy. It gives me headache to think about boxing it all up, but slowly and surely it's getting done.
Brett has taken up a pretty cool hobby. He started making knives from scratch. He's done a couple and they are so cool. He has made some handles out of dear antlers. He made me a beautiful knife out of cedar he found in our backyard. He even makes the blades by hand, he gets steel blanks and shapes and sharpens them into knives. I think these will be great peices to hand down to our children and grand children, very cool.
And one last thing...is anybody else's kids obsessed with these zhu zhu pets? They are Makenna's new passion.

Some new pics

2010-01-29T14:20:00.000-08:00

Makenna is not allowed to tattle on her sister or she gets a time out. The other day Daddy was tattling on mommy, so Makenna put him in a time out. This is Daddy sitting in his time out. Checkout Makenna keeping an eye on him in the background, she was not allowing any funny business while he was in time out.

Makenna goes to the beauty salon every other week with my mom to get her nails manicured. The other night Makenna and Emma decided to open a beauty salon of their own in our living room, guess who was their client.

When asked Emma denied having the blue stamp in her mouth.

Emma is such a thrifty little baby. Here she is going through the weekly food flyer with her pen, obviously circling the best sales.

PICS...AND OUR MOVING DATE!!!

2010-01-22T17:58:00.000-08:00

Makenna Posing.

Makenna is all potty traines (FINALLY!!!!) and has given up her binky completelt and has......gotten her ears peirced!!

I love, love, love Emma in pigtails!

Makenna sleding, both girls, loved it this year.

Shot in the head with a nerf dart

New Year's eve

christmas morning

Christmas Eve in their new christmas pjs, they were so excited with their pj's they thought that was their only gift and they couldn't have been happier. Sweet girls

Emma loves wearing this bathing suit of makenna's

And wearing makenna's pull up, she can put these on herself over her clothes

This is how we spend our saturday nights Brett and I took Makenna to NYC to see the Rockettes before christmas. She loved it. Here she is asleep on Daddy on the train ride back home.

Picking out a sweet in grand central

Chech out those ballons behind Brett, doesn't he look like Mickey mouse? This is dinner in Rockefeller Center

Seriously, how cute are they?

So, Brett has gotten laid off from work again which is the perfect kick in the butt we need to get moving back to Vegas! We figure instead of look for a new job we are just gonna pack up and go! We have to wait to get just a few things ironed out, but we reserved the moving van today and they are coming to get our stuff on March 24th so all our stuff and us will be arriving in Vegas sometime April 1st. Yay! Finally!

Tagged by Claire

2010-01-13T12:30:00.000-08:00

A-Age: 27: (
B-Bed size: Queen
C-Chore you hate:Washing sippy cups and bottles
D- Dog's name: Oh, no dog, but i am extremely jealous of Daniel's new pug
E- Essential start your day item: Toothbrush, i can't function until i brush my teeth
F- Favorite color: Pink
G- Gold or Silver?: Silver
H- Height: 5'10"
I- I am....: I am one of the most streesed out/nervous person you will ever meet.
J-Job: Mom/Wife
K-Kids: Makenna and Emma
L- Living arrangements: Live in a house with brett, makenna, emma, my mom and dad, and one of the best backyards ever
M- Mom's name: Debby
N- Nickname: Mandicelli
O-Overnight hospital stay other than birth: Nope
P- Pet Peeves: procrastination, and whining
Q- Quote from a movie:
R- Right orleft handed?; Right
S- Siblings: In age order, Geri, Kitty, Jamie and Josh
T- Time you wake up: Whenever Makenna gets up which has been about 11am lately, i LOVE that our kids sleep in!
U- Unique thing about your car: I can drive my car around all day with me and the girls in it, but as soon as Brett gets in the car he steams up all the windows, i don't know why, but this NEVER fails, he always steams up the car, what is up with that?
V- Vegetables you hate: Brocoli rabe
W- Ways you run late: Underestimating how long it takes my kids to get ready, Makenna has to pick ouy various toys to take with her and lately she won't leave the house until she puts lip gloss on and washes her hands, this process takes FOREVER!!!
X- X-rays you've had; Ankle, wrist, knee, chest
Y- Yummy food you make: I make the absolute best white chocloate cheesecake ever
Z- Zoo favorite- The drive through safari at six flags in new jersey, if you feed the girrafes out of your window, they stick their tongues into your car.

Fall Fun

2009-10-22T20:25:00.001-07:00

Getting There...

2009-10-21T08:09:00.000-07:00

I must start off this post by saying i am so excited how Emma's bum has started to clear up that i wish i could take a picture of it and post it. I have never been so proud of how someone's bum looks as i am of Emma's cute little tush. So, as you can tell Emma's bum, although it is still swollen and still has a few open sores on it, is drastically improved. Makenna's bum has all but cleared up and her dosage of antibiotics has been dropped. We got the culture back and it was indeed MRSA that Emma had, but of course, she had an unusaually difficult strand that didn't react to the regular antibiotics used to treat MRSA and hence she is still on these super antibiotics. Emma still has to go see the surgeon tomorrow but we are expecting him not to want to do surgery seeing how much improved her infection has gotten on the antibiotics. We saw the doctor yesterday, who is still not as enthusiastic as i am about the rash clearing, because she still feels like the infection can come back or mutate and get even stronger, plus she is not pleased that Emma still has sores and swelling and still wants to see her back in the office. The doctor also, already wrote a presricption to extend Emma's antibiotics past 10 days. So, for now we are bleaching/disinfecting ANYTHING that may possibly carry the MRSA virus on it and throwing out what we can't disinfect or bleach and we have to give Emma and Makeena their antibiotics every 8 hours until the infection is completely gone, but like i said it is getting better and we are SO looking forward to hopefully NEVER having to deal with this again. I told Emma after the heart murmur, and all the worry she's caused me over this she is NEVER allowed to get even so much as a cold again!

Update on Emma's hospital stay :(

2009-10-17T11:22:00.000-07:00

Ok, so for those who don't know, poor little Emma has had a rough time lately. It started last Monday, Makenna got sick with a stomach bug and Emma developed a weird hard lump on her bum. Tuesday, Brett and i took both girls to the doctor, Makenna was feeling better, but Emma's lump had grown. We were told both girls had impetego ( a weird rash) on their bums, and the doctor scheduled a recheck for Thursday. In the meantime, Emma got SUPER sick, throwing up, high fever (even with ibuprofen), by the time we got to the doctor's thursday she was a little better but still a mess. The doctor was pleased to see Makenna's rash improved, but when she looked at Emma and her lump she told us we needed to go to the hospital. Emma was admitted right away. The goo coming out of her lump was cultured (we are still awaiting those results). Emma saw a surgeon who was considering surgery to lance the absess and clean it out, but the surgeon wanted to hold off on surgery as the anesthesia would be harsh for such a small baby (Emma is now down to 26 lbs 7 oz, she's lost over 4 lbs. in a couple months!!). So, long story short Emma recieved 24 hrs of IV and injection antibiotics and after 20 hrs. of not having a fever she was sent home last night. Like i said they are still waiting on the results of the culture, but they are assuming and treating Emma for MARSA which is a super strong staph infection that is highly resistant to any form of medication. The doctors have put both Emma and Makenna on these super strong oral antibiotics 3 times a day. Emma goes back to see the surgeon at his office thursday morning who will then decide if Emma's lump is getting better with just antibiotics or if she will need surgery to clean it out. In the mean time we are all parying that Emma stays well, if she gets any sort of fever, or throwing up again or if her absess starts to ooze again she will have to go back to the hospital (which after being used as a pincushion there she REALLY hated it there). So, for all those who have been calling and texting thank you for your concern and we really appreciate all the prayers and well wishing.

Pics

2009-10-06T14:02:00.000-07:00

Aunt Lynn went skydiving sunday for her 60th b-day then came over for cake and to celebrate!

Makenna's best friend "peanut" is with us at least one day a week now, while his mom goes to school, they have SO much fun together.

Makenna making cookies.

We CANNOT get Emma to keep her clothes on, she LOVES, LOVES being naked, and even more so since she discovered her nipples, too funny!

Uncle Jamie stopped by for a quick visit while he was in NY.

APPLE PICKING

More Pics Of Our Cuties

2009-09-15T17:35:00.000-07:00

Makenna's Favortie new toy is this "makeup " compact. Note:This DOES NOT wash out of her clothes! Bad purchase by mommy.

Makenna takes boxes (in this case an altoids tin and a travel soap case) puts them in her hair and calls them hair boxes. She is completely convinced this looks awesome!

Who can resist this face?

Lazy Bums

2009-09-14T07:26:00.000-07:00

Makenna and Emma love playing in their room. Here's some pics of them goofing around in there the other day. Emma loves being a lazy bum in bed with her stuffed animals i just couldn't resists snapping some pics. Enjoy.

Pics of Some Cute Kids

2009-09-01T19:04:00.001-07:00

End Of summer

2009-08-30T08:04:00.000-07:00

The leaves are already starting to turn and fall off the trees here in NY, and the forecast highs for this week are mid to upper 70s. Summers coming to an end (so sad). Not that we've had much of a summer here. It was only really warm for like two weeks here. Hopefully, a cold summer means a warm winter. The big new is our lives currently is that Makenna is officailly potty trained! Seems like I have been cramming potty training down her throat for about a year with little to no results, I tried everything everyone suggested and Makenna just wasn't getting it. Then, last Thursday Makenna actually asked me if she could wear her big girl underpants and she's been potty trained since. So glad to have that behind us. Also, Emma is starting to folllow simple commands. If you tell her to go lie down she will, and if you ask her to go get you something she will. I LOVE when she does stuff like that it's just so cute to see her trying to help and i love that she understands us. She does this really cute walk when she is doindg a task, she swings her little arms really hard and fast, that's how we know she means business. Yesterday, the girls and I had a yard sale, to get rid of some of their baby toys to make room for new ones Santa will bring, I can't believe we are already thinking about Christmas!

Grandma and Grandpa Scott Visit and Palmyra

2009-08-09T20:12:00.000-07:00

We are so glad that we had a chance to spend this past week with Grandma and Grandpa Scott (Brett's parents). Makenna and Emma LOVED seeing their grandparents. Since they have left Makenna has been asking me each day when they are coming over. Makenna loves anyone who loves (and pays any sort of attention to) her, so she really enjoyed playing games with them. Even Emma, who is super duper slow to warm up to anyone, let Grandma and Grandpa hold her so I was really impressed. You know someone is a kid person when Emma lets them hold her.
The most exciting thing we did with Brett's parents (and maybe even all summer) was to go to Palmyra. I am really just starting to learn alot about The Book of Mormon so this trip really gave me alot of insight and strengthened my testimony alot. For Brett, he said it was really inspiring to be able to put a picture and an actual feeling to all the stories he has read and learned about his whole life. The first place we visited was Joseph Smith's Farm. When Brett and I talked about it later, both of our favorite places on the trip were here. Brett really enjoyed the sacred grove (and so did Emma who wanted to, and i think did, sit on EVERY bench in the sacred grove, which anyone who has been there can tell you is alot). Brett thought it was much more peaceful and serene than he had invisioned it. My favorite place was upstairs in the Smith's Family house where Joseph saw the angel Moroni. Standing in that room you could really imagine how everything happened and it just has a undescribable feeling for me. Our next stop was the Hill Cumorah, which I did not know was going to be so steep! (Thank you so much to Keith who pushed sleeping Emma's stroller up the top of the hill, I really thought I could do it myself but gave up after only about a qurater of the way.) I think this was Makenna's favorite spot. She really liked the golden statue of Moroni there as well as the HUGE grass lawn to wrestle around with Daddy on. Our last sightseeing stop for the day was the Bookstore where the Book of Mormon was first published and sold. I really liked this place as the floor boards were the same ones that Joseph Smith walked on, and the had some really neat stuff there, like one of the Books of Mormon from the first printing. However, Makenna and Emma started to fall apart here and by the middle of the tour I had taken Makenna aside and she just ran and ran in circles around me until Emma wandered over and then the two of them started doing their ear peircing screeching. It was at that point we left the tour early and decided to let the girls go run off some of their energy back at the hotel. The next day we went back to walk through the sacred grove again, back to the hill Cumorah and walked around the grounds of the temple. Then it was back into the car for the 5 hour ride home, which both girls did awesome on, so proud. It was truly an inspring and spiritually moving trip and we feel so blessed to have been able to share the experience with Grandma and Grandpa Scott. And yes, i have lots and lots of pics i just need to get Brett to help me post them, which we hope will be soon :)

Best Present Ever!

2009-07-08T08:26:00.000-07:00

I admit I am a pretty hard person to shop for. I am not into electronincss or dvds and beside for the gorgeous diamond earrings I recieved for Mother's day from Brett and the girls, jewlery is not my thing either. However, Makenna gave me the best birthday present ever! I was giving Makenna and Emma a bath like I do pretty much every night, and I took Makenna out of her bath wrapped her up in her towel and while I was taking Emma out I could her Makenna saying something that was just music to my ears. I turned around and asked Makenna to repeat what she just said and she bowed her head, crossed her arms, closed her eyes and said softly "Heavenly Father Thank you for my mommy. Amen". Now that's enough to bring this mom to tears. After me coaxing her she said it once more. Now I need to say that Makenna barely ever sits still for family prayer and I have NEVER heard her pray on her own before so this was just the best gift from her that I could possibly imagine!

Sisters

2009-06-30T17:24:00.000-07:00

Yesterday Emma was playing with one of Makenna's birthday presents and Makenna was actually trying to nicely tell her sister that she wanted it when Emma bit her! Today Makenna had her yearly physical and Emma had her one year well baby check up and while Emma was getting her shots Makenna came over to hold her sisters hand when Emma bit her again! Just now Emma fell asleep in my arms and I laid her down on her fold out Dora couch in the living room and Makenna came up and kicked Emma! Guess she's got to learn what goes around comes around. These two are gonna be a handful.

Makenna is 3!!!

2009-06-28T21:07:00.000-07:00

Happy Birthday Makenna!! Makenna has been waiting ALL month for her birthday and I am so excited for this birthday for her. It is really her first birthday where we have a whole day planned full of all of Makenna's favortie including the park, cake , balloons, Mc Donald's, sleeping in the tent with Daddy, Chuckee Cheese and some of her favorite people Aunt Stasia, Cheyo and Cheito!! Makenna also had a birthday party on Sunday that was alot of fun and trying to keep up with Makenna and Emma at the party wore me out! So, I can't even begin to list of all Makenna's accomplishments this year but she's gotten to be even more of a charater than she ever was, and i just have to share the following quotes.

Makenna: "Fella!"
Grandma: "Makenna the cat's name is Bella not Fella."
Makenna: "oh ok. Fella!"
Grandma: " No. Makenna look at my lips B-E-L-L-A"
Makenna: "no. You look at my lips F-E-L-L-A"
needless to say the cat is now called Fella.

Today at Makenna's Birthday party my cousin and his girlfriend were leaving...
Me: "Makenna, say good bye to your cousin."
Makenna: (playing with her other cousin) "Bye"
Me: "no. Makenna stop what you're doing, look up and say goodbye to your cousin."
Makenna: (Stops looks straight up in the sky)"Bye. Mommy was that better?"

I Love this girl more than words can say, she is a constant light and source of laughter.....Happy Birthday to my little Stinkerbelle

Happy 1st Birthday Emma!!

2009-06-25T05:48:00.000-07:00

At 8:39 this morning it just happened that I glanced up at the clock and that is the time Emma was born at. I cannot believe my sweet little baby is one already. The first year zooms by so fast and so many changes take place in the first year. When I was looking at the clock this morning I was instantly reminded of the sweet little, helpless newborn Emma was just a year ago. Now Emma is still the sweetest, most peaceful little baby who loves to cause a little bit of trouble every now and then. Emma has started walking (again, but with more caution this time) but prefers to crawl when she needs to get somewhere fast. I love the way she walks, it looks like each step takes so much effort, and she doesn't really walk so much as stomp her chubby legs around. She also is a climber, she climbs up EVERYTHING, her favorite being stools we leave around for Makenna to use and chairs. Emma can drink successsfully out of a sippy cup and her absolute favorite foods are fruit and cookies. I would have to say that Makenna is Emma absoute favorite person and she loves to bother her big sister to get a reaction from her, but she also loves to follow Makenna around and even when Makenna is playing way rough or being a little bit mean to her sister Emma just sits there and smiles because she loves any time she gets with her sister. Lately, Emma has developed bad stranger anxiety and if we are out somewhere new she clings to me and gets this horrified look on her face should someone new come too close to her, I have to say I sort of enjoy her "mommy complex" as i know it's just a stage and won't last long. Emma turning 1 today is sort of bittersweet. I am sort of happy to have the first year behind us, I must admit I did not realize how much work having a newborn and a 2 year old would be, and it's sort of nice now that I don't have to hold and carry Emma everywhere and she can entertain herself now a bit. However at the same time I am sad that she's getting bigger and is losing her "baby" look more and more each day. I am so looking forward to this year. I am looking forward to emma talking more and more and just how much more interactive and her own little person she will become this coming year. Happy birthday my sweet little Emma-bear!!

First "Camp Out"

2009-06-23T19:11:00.000-07:00

It is after 10 pm and Brett and Makenna have just headed out for Makenna's first " camp out". Brett got a tent for Father's Day and Makenna has been bugging him nonstop since Sunday to go sleep outside in the tent. Poor Brett. Makenna has him so wrapped around her little finger. Not only is today one of the hottest and most humid days we've had so far this year, but Brett does not go to sleep until about 3 or 4 in the morning so I know he is going to be sitting in the dark for a while tonite. When you add the bugs and the fact that I can already forsee Makenna waking up at daybreak, I feel bad for Brett (who works so hard all week and really enjoys his rest on his days off). The things we endure for our kids. I only hope Makenna knows how much her daddy loves her to be doing this with her, and how lucky she is to have such a caring, loving daddy. I know I am grateful to Brett for being the one to volunteer to sleep outside with Makenna, as Emma and I will be snug in our comfy beds in our air conditioned room with TV. We love you, Brett/Daddy.

2009-06-04T17:12:00.000-07:00

Well, I know it's been two weeks since we got back from Disney World

but I'm still new to the whole blogging thing and since this is only the second time I've posted and the first time I've posted pics, hopefully it won't look like a 3rd grader put this together. This is Jason, Claire, Mandy, Makenna and Emma sitting in front of Cinderellas castle waiting for the fireworks.

Makenna and Anneleise were too cute together and weren't afraid to show they loved each other.

I think this is when I first realized how much of a terror Emma can be when she wants to. We had spent all day running around so I took Emmas sandals off to give her feet a rest and she started kicking the back of Makennas seat and her head, laughing when Makenna cried about it. She spent a fair amount of time pulling Makennas hair and kicking her so we finally put Makenna in the back even though she couldn't see as much.

I got used to this view by the end of our vacation. This is one of those moments when Emma was picking on Makenna and I had to stick my head in the side of the stroller to break it up. EMMA STOP TEASING YOUR SISTER. MAKENNA STOP BEING A TATTLE TALE. I thought they would be older before I had to say that for the first time.

It rained quite a bit when we were there so we ran around in ponchos.

Checking out their butts in the mirror.

They found this fountain and didn't wasted any time.

Animal Kingdom

These are two moments of terror. Makenna behind the wheel at the Grand Prix and Emma with us in Teacups. Poor kids.

We had so much fun and thnk you so much to Jason, Claire and Anneliese for flying out from Vegas. Thank you so much to Uncle Jaime for driving up to see us, and much love and many hanks to Debbie for taking Noah to Disney World.

Dentist, Potty Training and That Dang Binky

2009-06-03T08:04:00.000-07:00

Yesterday Emma had her first dentist appointment (Makenna also went to see the dentist and happy to report no cavaties and even happier to say no crying!). She did so great and only protested a bit at the end. She has her two bottom teeth and 4 teeth breaking through on the top. I am so anxious for her to get more teeth. Emma has a terrible gag reflex and is having a horrible time with table food so I'm hoping more teeth will mean she can chew up her food better and won't have such a rough time.
This week has been a big one for Makenna too. Besides going to see Dentist Michelle yesterday she is back at potty training and as of yesterday is working on giving up her binky. It was difficult for Makenna to give up her bottle a few months back and she still asks for one every now and then so I know the binky is going to be even tougher, but besides two breakdowns yesterday and one this morning she is doing okay with it. The potty trainging is not going so well. Makenna has a complete aversion to the potty and I've tried EVERY trick in the book. The other day when we were at the store I asked Makenna if she wanted to get a toy that she could only play with while she sat on the potty and she told me she didn't need a new toy that bad, for as much as Makenna LOVES getting new "prizes" this is not a good sign. But i will keep at the potty trainging and hopefully something will click with her soon. Because of all the "Big Girl" changes Makenna is going through now, Brett and I let her get a fish (something she's wanted forever, but we always told her she had to wait until she was old enough to feed and take care of it herself). Makenna is so proud of herself when she feeds her fishy, it's so great to see her have a sense of accomplishment for all she's trying to conquer right now. I can't belive in about 3 weeks we are going to have a 1 year-old and a 3 year old. We are so proud of them.

We're Back!

2009-05-24T15:44:00.000-07:00

Sad but true. We are back in New York and already missing Disney, although we all bought home colds with us so maybe it was time to come home. Our immune systems just couldn't keep up with Disney hours. We had a blast and as soon as we can figure out how to upload pics from our new camera onto our computer we will post some pics ( I have to admit there are some pretty dang cute ones).

Off We Go

2009-05-11T06:18:00.000-07:00

We are so excited to be leaving tomorrow to go to Florida. Tomorrow Brett, the girls and I are flying to go see my Grandma in Florida. We are going to spend the day with the girls great grandma and drive up to Orlando tomorrow night. Then we are going to spend the next 8 days in Disney World!!! We are SO excited and this vacation is even more special because Makenna is getting old enough to really have fun at Disney. She knows her disney characters and watches movies all the time so I think she is really going to flip over everything. I hope we figure out how to post pics once we get back because I'm sure we'll have some gems.

Funny, but not Acceptable

2009-05-05T07:40:00.000-07:00

So I always get on Brett about watching his language around the girls, because sometimes his "kitchen" mouth follows him home from the restaurant. Myself, I have never really cursed much in my life so I never really thought I had any bad language to erase from my everyday speech until the other day. Last weekend the air conditioner in our living room broke. My dad bought a new one and was bringing it in through the front door when Makenna, sweet in her pink silk nightgown, marches up and ask grandpa "Are you bringing more crap into this house?". Something I would definitly say. She went on to use the word crap, correctly, for the next week or so and it still creeps into my otherwise sweet baby's language. I have got to stop using that word, and watch more carefully what I say around the girls. So, I guess two-year olds really do listen to EVERYTHING you say.

A Sigh of Relief

2009-04-30T14:27:00.001-07:00

Today I took Makenna to see Dr. Delgado (the hernia specialist) and I have never wanted to hug a doctor so much. He felt Makenna's hernia and told me it was very small and was pushed back in (which her doctor did yesterday) and that he sees absolutely no reason for surgery. He said that umbilical hernias, such as Makenna's, close spontaneously between the ages of 4 to 5 (not what her pediatrician told me). When I told her about how Makenna was experiencing pain and holding her tummy, he told me that he is sure she does have pain when the hernia is popped out but that is just part of having a hernia and will go away when it closes. I told her that she never had pain before and he said that she probably did but she is older now and can pinpoint right where the pain is coming from and is old enough to tell us about it. Also, he said the warmer weather laeds to more activity which means her hernia is going pop out more and give her a bit more problems. Still no surgery for my baby!! I am so excited and unbelievably relieved. Dr. Delgado did say he would like to see her hernia popped out and just to bring her by next time it does so, but in all he sees no reason to worry and that her hernia is tiny compared to most and should just cause her mild discomfort that will go away once we push the hernia back in. I am one happy mommy, I gave her "lump" so many kisses.

Here we go Again...

2009-04-29T12:31:00.000-07:00

Makenna has been complaining on and off about stomach pains for the past 3 or 4 days. I didn't think much of it as she hasn't been sick or acted sick, but last night she was curled up holding her belly right where her hernia is, then it dawned on me, this kid needs to get to the doctor. We went and she pushed Makenna's hernia back in and showed me how to do it also, but she wants the hernia gone. Seems most children who are born with umbilical hernias, like Makenna was, usually are closed up or pretty close to it before they turn 3. Makenna will be 3 in 2 months and hers is still pretty big, so we are going to see the same spacialist who did surgery on Brett's hernia tomorrow. We are hoping that the surgery can be put off until we get back from Florida, but we will have to see what the specialist says. It kills me to think of such a young kid(especially my baby) going through surgery where she will have to be put out, even worse I am dreading her waking up and them not letting me be there right when she wakes up. So this will be on my mind until we get all the details sorted out and even more so until her hernia is just a memory and hopefully a little scar.

Our little Chunk-a-monk

2009-04-24T06:18:00.000-07:00

Emma had her first well baby doctor visit yesterday since Feburary. The doctor could not believe how much Emma is cooing and "talking" now or how well she can use her pincer finger and thumb to pick up small objects, but I think the doctor was really shocked when she weighed our little chunk-a-monk and found that she was 28 lbs!! The doctor wants us to cut back Emma's formula intake and replace 4 of her bottles a day with heavily watered down juice. Poor girl is already on her first diet. Really, Brett and I agree with the doctor, that although Emma is incredibly cute as this little round faced, blue-eyed, blond hair chubby baby her weight may not be so cute in 2 years or so, so we are doing what we must to get it under control now. But man, I hope she doesn't lose her chunky thighs, I just LOVE them. The doctor thinks Emma will slim down once she is walking full time. Although she can walk,and even took a few steps on her own for the doctor, her walking has stalled. she no longer is obsessed with walking and holds on to me or Brett for dear life when we try to let go of her. The doctor is unsure whether this stall is due to her nasty fall, or if her weight is too much for her legs. My poor baby. Makenna was super duper chunky before she started walking too, so hopefully it is that once Emma starts to walk she will slim down. Every time I take Emma to the doctor it seems like I leave with something new to worry about and obsess over. Last time I took her they told me her head hadn't grown in 2 months and if it stalled growth they would have to check into some surgery, that in the worst case scenario, would involve drilling a hole into the skull to allow her head to grow properly, thankfully her head has grown over an inch this time. Whew. So, the rest of the appointment went well. She is 29 inches long and is hitting all her milestones and is advanced in her speech, and fine and gross motor skills. The doctor also said Emma is one of the happiest and cutest babies she ever seen, that always brings a smile to my face when people say that and I happen to agree.

Lately We've Been....

2009-04-08T18:48:00.000-07:00

Enjoying nicer weather! So, yes it was flurrying out again today, but it didn't stick and basically the weather is finally starting to feel more spring like here in New York. Lately it's been consistently about 60 degrees out, and after a long winter people in NY treat 60 degree weather like it's summertime, and our family is happy to see birds again and hear crickets too. All of Makenna's "outside" toys are back out, her sandbox is full and she has even sweet talked Papa into filling up her water table for her(which she sat in the yesterday while I was bringing groceries in the house). The girls and I try to either get to the park or spend most of the day out in the yard when the weather permits. Emma is loving being outside! It's so funny to watch her feel the grass for the first time or play in the sandbox or even to see her face when she sees worms. Makenna's favorite place to be is at the park. She is always the loudest kid there, but she amazes me at how quickly she makes a bunch of friends each time we go there (ok I have to add that every child Makenna comes in contact with she renames them Koben, she has been doing this ever since we came back from Vegas after Thanksgiving. So when ever we are at the park she will come over and introduce me to her friends who are all named Koben according to her. I just had to add this for Debbi because I swear she does this with EVERY child she has met in the past 5 months and I think it's just too funny.) Emma is still working on walking and has walked unassisted across our whole living room! About a week or so ago she took a spill and hit her face and had a big old black and blue across the bridge or her nose. It looked frightening and I took her to the doctor for it who assured me that thankfully Emma has no cartilidge in her nose yet and that she was just fine. Since then Brett is the only one who lets Emma walk unassisted, i will ABSOLUTELY not let go of her when she is walking, but I will admit that she is getting progressively better and more independent. She has also started to crawl. She doesn't crawl like a normal baby though, she does this army crawl on her belly which works well for her and is pretty cute to watch too. Makenna is getting so skinny that I can't keep clothes up on her and Emma is having the opposite problem. Poor little Emma is already in size 24 months and has even out grown some of them. She's not especially long for her age (she's only in the 70th percentile in height) but she is our little roly poly. Her pants all hang down past her feet and yet are snug across her sweet little belly. She is seriously so cute and chubby I have got to get some pics on here. As for Brett, he is now the Executive chef at a local restaurant called Mojo grill (www.mojogrill.net). He's back to working long hours but his boss is extremely nice and the food is upscale, so he is pretty content there. We are just looking forward to even nicer weather to head our way and for the pool to be open!

Our Amazing Two Year Old

2009-03-15T13:59:00.000-07:00

So I know I blog alot about Emma's accomplishments and I just wanted to take a minute to write about Makenna and what an amazing person she is growing up to be. Lately Makenna has gone from being very uninterested in Emma to being just the best big sister I have ever seen a two year old be capable of. She loves to hold Emma's hand and help her walk and she loves even more to stand Emma up and put her in a bear hug and "dance" with her. She is the first one to race to Emma when she lets out a cry and is very concerned with how her little sister is feeling. She is the only person who can get Emma to crack up just by looking at her. Now that Brett is back to work full time, Makenna helps me out with everything from bringing me diapers for Emma to scrubbing her little sister down in the tub. Emma has starting eating these biter cookies (which most moms know make an absolute mess) and Makenna who has a bit of OCD when it comes to messes will follow her sister around when she is eating them, wipe in hand, cleaning ANYTHING that Emma even comes close to, I have got to get this on video. I cannot accurately describe how funny this is and the disgusted look on Makenna's face when she does this is too priceless not to capture. More than being a great big sister Makenna is becoming more of a little kid now and less of a toddler. Even though she hates seeing messes Makenna does not mind making them. She LOVES jumping in mud puddles and playing outside ( I seriously think she would live outside if I would let her). I don't know where she gets her outgoing personality from (Brett and I are both very much introverts) but she will go up to ANYONE and start playing with them. This is fine when she's out on the playground but it's too funny when she'll go up to other little kids in the store and start randomly hugging them. This has seriously happened more than once and sometimes it scares the other little kids, but I cannot help but laugh and try to politely pull Makenna away. One of Makenna's biggest accomplishments lately is that she pretty much has down her ABC's and is now working on numbers. The other day we were in the car and Makenna was counting her bingo chips and I listened to her count flawlessly to 20. I was so impressed with her. Not to belittle the fact that Emma's walking at 8 months but it only took Makenna a year to learn to walk but it's taken her over 2 years to learn how to count correctly, by herslef, all the way to 20 and I am just SO proud of her and I am so blessed to be her mommy.

Emma's First Steps!!!

2009-02-28T08:08:00.000-08:00

Last night Brett (whos' been working with Emma on trying to walk for less than a week now)was playing with Emma and she took her first steps!! At first she only took 2 steps but she did it like 15 times after that and the most consecutive steps she took was 6 steps in a row! Emma just turned 8 months last Wednesday and we think she is a superhero for being able to take a few steps already! We are unbelievably proud. I broke out the video camera and we got some good footage of her walking all woobly. What's even cuter is that whenever Brett tried to stop getting her to walk she threw a fit, so she really seems to love her new found mobility. My ever sweet Makenna was cheering Emma on (literally, I mean she broke out her pompoms and was shouting "Go Emma, Go Emma, You can do it!") and every time Emma took a spill Makenna would rush over to her with hugs and to make sure she's ok. So, we just wanted to share our amazement and happiness with everyone and I will continue to bug Brett to post some pics of the girls soon and try to see if we can get the video of her on here too.

Emma is Officially a Sitter!!

2009-01-03T21:32:00.000-08:00

Ok so I know I definitely need to post a pic of this but I am so excited that I had to just get on here and share my sweet Emma's accomplishment. The other day I was worrying about why Emma doesn't sit up yet (Makenna sat up at 5 months) and my dad was telling me it's because she's never put down (it's true Brett and I actually fight over who gets to hold her more). So, I set my sweet little Emma down and right on the first try she just sat there!!! She can sit up pretty well although she still flops over every now and then, but for most part Emma is sitting up (and she has pretty good posture I might add)! I will try and get pics up for everyone to see.

Vegas Trip Pictures

2008-12-27T20:31:00.000-08:00

BEST Friends.

Emma's Blessing.

Makenna wrestling around with her boy cousins. She now refers to Deanna's boys as "My boys" and she has started to call her cousins Katie and Eric, who live in NY, Koben. She REALLY misses them.

Brett and Makenna with our newest nephew, Emmett.

Okay so I took this pic once we were back in NY but Makenna fell asleep in Emma's bouncer and i just couldn't resist.

Again back in NY decorating the tree with Daddy.

We caught our nephew Caleb rocking out on the baby piano. Sorry Caleb, but this is too funny not to post.

Victory atfer going through the children's maze at a Christmas village in Vegas.

Okay Sorry there are so many pictures, but Brett and I have the absolute cutest nieces and nephews in the whole universe and we just adore each one of them. We are so grateful for the time we spent with Brett's family in Vegas. Now we have to start working on the Christmas pics.

December update

2008-12-23T12:20:00.000-08:00

So I haven't posted in a while because our camrea and computer are not cooperating but i figured it's time i got on here and posted an update on our little family anyway. Thanksgiving was spent at Brett's parents house in Vegas (and it was so nice and warm in Vegas). Thanksgiving is becoming one of my favorite holidays because it's the only time of the year when Brett's WHOLE family gets together. Makenna is getting older and absolutely LOVED playing with all her cousins in Vegas. She still asks to go to Grandma Scott's house and see her cousins, she had just the best time with them. Brett and I just love seeing her play with her cousinss too. Emma got to meet her cousin Emmet (who is all of 5 days older than her) while we were in Vegas too. I have the cutest pictures from Vegas and it just kills me not to be able to post them yet. When we got back from Vegas we found out Brett was laid off from his job, so we've been job hunting a bit since. He's suppose to start at a new job this Friday but it's only part time, so our search will continue. Emma recently had her 6 month check up ( a bit early she won't officially be six months until Christmas) and she is currently sitting at 19 lbs. 2 oz. and is 27 and 1/2 inches long. How can it be that she is already a half a year old and so big? I can't believe it. She continues to just be the happiest baby I've ever met and is just sweet as can be. Emma has recently discovered that it's pretty funny when Makenna cries, so now when Makenna starts crying Emma starts laughing. Just today i took the girls to go see Santa and Makenna is crying in the picture and Emma is just as happy as can be. Who knew sibling rivalry would start so early? Makenna is super excited for Santa to come tomorrow. She asked Santa for a Diego doll for her and a Dora doll for her Daddy. Also, we've had LOTS of snow here in NY this week. Makenna and her Daddy have been out sleigh riding and tried to build a snow man. Emma also went out in the snow, but I worry about her getting too cold and as soon as her cheeks got rosy we bought her right back inside. Hopefully I can get pictures posted from Christmas soon, but until then we would like to wish all who read this a very happy holiday!

Pictures

2008-11-19T17:49:00.000-08:00

Daddy is so sad Emma's mohawk is getting long that he is training it to still stand up.

A rare photo of Brett up at 7 am on his way to his hernia surgery.

Makenna is way into tea parties. If you sit with her and have a tea party you will be her best friend.

Emma's first meal.

I have to point out Makenna in the corner of this picture. She was being so dramatic because Emma was sitting in her chair.

Doesn't it look like Boots is waving?

Brett did not know I was snapping this picture until after I took it. The girls have him so wrapped around their fingers. Do you notice his pillowcase is pink?

Chowing down after trick-or-treating.

She fell asleep after trick-or-treating on our way home, we stopped by to see daddy at work and when Makenna woke up at daddy's work and saw him staring at her, her first words were trick-or-treat. She cracks me up.

Ready to go home. Makenna gave up walking after about an hour of trick-or-treating. I was surprised she lasted that long.

Dora and Boots.

My sweet little pumpkin. She slept through her first trick-or-treating experience. Big thanks to Grandma for taking care of Emma while I hung on tight to Makenna.

If Emma uses it, Makenna will find a way to get back into it too.

Wubbzy pumpkin.

I jusat love love love Emma's eyes.

Makenna was obsessed with this pumpkin and wanted it lit up ALL the time.

She LOVES to paint. She's pretty good about not making an absolute huge mess with it.

Emma's Doctor Appointment

2008-11-19T09:45:00.000-08:00

Emma had her appointment with the pediatric cardiologist on Tuesday and I am thrilled to report that she is just fine. She has what is called an innocent murmur, which is just the sound of her blood flow changing when she is excited or over stimulated. The doctor says she will grow out of it and she doesn't need to be watched or come back at all. Yay! Apparently most children have an innocent murmur at some point it just depends on who is listening to their heart and when. Some people can hear it and others can't. We are SO relieved and our family is extremely grateful for everyone's concern and prayers for Emma.

My Long Overdue Tag

2008-10-30T09:18:00.000-07:00

Well this is my first time blogging but since Daniel tagged me a few weeks ago I decided it was time to start. I've been procrastinating like usual, but since Osama Bin Laden made the list before I did, i hoped no one would mind if I took my time. Our little family is doing well and we're all looking forward to spending some time together in a few weeks.

8 Favorite Shows

Heroes

Burn Notice

Sons of Anarchy

Cold Case

Man vs Wild

Survivor: Gabon (mandy's going to

give me a hard time about that)

Wow! Wow! Wubbzy

Anything that doesn't have Dora in it

8 Favorite Restaurants

La Stazione

Jackalope BBQ

Panda Express

Sonic

Arby's

Mon ami Gabi

Bradley Ogden's

Rocco's Pizzeria

8 Things I Did Yesterday

Spent some time with my famiy

Wrestled with Makenna and Emma

Carved another pumpkin (wubbzy died)

Got Makennas hair cut

Relaxed

Caught up on my shows

8 Things I Look Forward To

Meeting Emmett

Living In Las Vegas

Being able to type without Mandy reading

over my shoulder

A winter without icy roads

Having a few weeks off

Showing Colby my sweet scar, though

I'm sure he'll be over it way before then

Spending time with my family for Thanksgiving

Emmas first words

8 Favorite Things About Fall

Colder Weather (I don't mind hot humid weather

but it's nice when it cools down)

Halloween

Thanksgiving

Fall foliage

New shows on TV

Carving pumpkins

Christmas Shopping

8 Things On My Wish List

A nice home in Vegas

A good job

A little Brett Jr. (that won't be his name though)

A Blue-Ray player

To win the lottery

Plasma TV

Mandy to stop reading over my shoulder

A happy healthy family

8 People I Tag

Mom and Dad (when they start their Blog)

John McCain

Larry

Curly

Moe

Shep

Makenna

Emma

Ugh!

2008-10-23T10:02:00.000-07:00

Makenna loves putting "together" the tupperware.

I really like the way this Barbie cake came out.

Emma has started playing with toys.

Relaxing.

Pretty Blue Eyes.

She sits in here alot. Daddy does not approve of this.

Look how big she's getting!

Daddy didn't kn0w I was snapping this picture. I caught him being a big cuddly bear with his girls.

Fudge at 9 am.

I know the sun is in her face. Poor kid.

Sleepover with cousin Noah.

This is the first cake Makenna ever decorated or helped with. Usually she just dances around the kitchen while i cook or bake but this time she helped. She wanted to write everyone in the house name on the cake and cover it with orange sugar.

I think they look alike.

Ugh! So I took Makenna and Emma to the doctor's yesterday, and it was not a fun trip at all! Which is sad considering how excited I was to see how big Emma got. Well, I will probably never look forward to taking the girls to the doctor's again! First off, Makenna has been battling a yeast infection for about three weeks now and has been to the doctor's once a week for it since it started. Finally, the doctor gave her an oral medicine for it that is suppose to be super strong so we are praying it helps. She gets these rashes all the time, I could just cry for her when I see how uncomfortable she is. Doctor says some kids are just real prone to them and to keep pushing the potty training (which Makenna is currently rebelling against). Also, since Makenna has been at the doctor's so often the doctor keeps checking her ears and she has had fluid in her ears every time we go, but she has also had three cold recently too. So, next month Makenna has to go back and have her ears checked. If there's still fluid then she needs to go see an ear, nose and throat specialist about having tubes put in. Ugh! This is when my stomach started to tie itself into knots. I know tubes are quite common, but I hate the thought of her being put out for the surgery. Ugh! Next was Emma's turn. Most moms know when the doctor spends alot of time doing any one thing on your child it's not a good sign. So you could imagine how anxious I was when the doctor spent about what seemed like eternity listening to Emma's heart. When the doctor finally told me that she thinks Emma will have to go see a pediatric cardiologist I just burst out into tears. The doctor thinks poor little Emma may have a heart murmur. She's not quite sure that she does, but she doesn't like that way her heart sounds. The doctor says she confident that if it is a murmur it is most likely the type that will close on it's own in time, and is not that uncommon in infants. Nonetheless, I am a nervous wreck about it and will be until Emma goes to see the specialist on November 18th. I cannot believe we have to wait three weeks! Ugh! I have been sick to my stomach since going to the doctor's yesterday. Good news is Emma is 16 lbs. 2 ozs. and 25 inches long, and the doctor says if it was anything serious she would not be growing so well. Still, I will not be reassured until the specialist says there is nothing to worry about.

Okay, so I haven't posted in a long time, and things are not all bad here. I took the girls for their halloween pictures on Monday and they turned out so cute. As soon as they come back I will try and post them. Emma rolled over for the first time on Tuesday! She rolled from her tummy to her back twice in a row! She has also done it a bunch of times since. I know I am suppose to be happy that she is rolling, but I really want to keep her little and am not in any rush for her to grow up at all. I LOVE having a newborn in the house again and I could keep Emma this age for a very long time. I took Makenna nd Emma pumpkin picking a while back too. We also took their cousin Noah and went with my friend and her little boy so we all had LOTS of fun. I can't believe we spent over 3 hours there! Makenna had to pick up EVERY pumkin she passed and it took her forever to find two that she liked enough to take home. She is such a perfectionist just like her dad.

2008-09-28T12:01:00.000-07:00

Notice Emma sleeping in the swing? That girl can sleep through anything!

Happy Birthday Uncle Josh! Thanks for bringing Noah down to spend some time with us.

Digging for worms with grandma, noah and uncle Josh. Makenna would not touch the worms.

The girls LOVE when daddy has the day off.

Pardon our mess, but the house usually is a mess 5 minutes after Makenna wakes up. We call her our " one woman party".

Watching the last game played at Yankee stadium.

I don't know if you can tell, but her eyes are steel blue.

So Makenna has officially started potty training! So far she has gone both number one and number two in her potty, but I don't think she understands why she is suppose to go in the potty instead of her diaper now. Everytime she does go in her potty she cries afterwards because she thinks she messed up and wasn't suppose to go in there. I feel so bad and try to explain to her that she did a good job, but she's still not connecting the two yet. I have a treasure bag full of "prizes" for her and she gets to pick one out every time she goes in her potty so I'm hoping that helps her understand that she is doing a good job. Since Makenna is in potty boot camp I try and not take her too far away from home (where she can roam freely with no diaper) so we've been stuck at the house for a couple of days now. It's really not that bad though because the weather is cooling off in New York now so it's great outside weather. On Saturday Makenna took the day off from potty trainging while her cousin, Noah, and uncle Josh came to visit. Makenna absolutely LOVES both Noah and her unlce Josh, so it was a real treat for her. Emma enjoyed watching the two older kids play and just seems like she cannot wait until she can play too. That reminds me, Emma has started scooting! Emma has this mirror with a purple bird on it that she just loves, and when she has her daily tummy time Emma has started to scoot across her blanket to get to the birdie! She just turned 3 months, so I am way impressed by her determination. Emma favorite past time is to sit up and watch Makenna do absolutely anything and she has been taking notes. I just adore seeing those two girls together, and as Emma gets older and is starting to get a real personality of her own, Makenna just likes to play and enage with Emma all that much more. I LOVE being able to watch their bond as sisters form and grow and hope they are always incredibly close. Also, After being on/off, on/off Brett's hernia surgery is back on again. He has an official date of November 12th for the surgery, so we'll see if it actually happens. The insurance company has already started giving us problems about it, so we just hope everything goes as planned. Brett and I have also put in an offer on a condo in Vegas and are praying and hoping we get that also. If anyone has any potty training tricks I would really appreciate hearing about them, thanks.

2008-09-19T17:26:00.001-07:00

I was tagged by Claire and Aubri, so here it goes:

What was I doing 10 years ago?

1.Working at Pizza Village
2. Spending lots of time with my first niece, Amber.
3.Going to high school. 10th grade to be exact.
4.Going to lots of punk rock shows.
5.Hanging out with the 'p' because I love you crew.

What are 5 things on my "to do" list today?

1. Little gym with Makenna.
2.Watch a movie with Brett.
3.Grocery shopping.
4.Laundry
5. Playing outside with the girls.

What are my 5 favorite snacks?

1. Pretzels
2. Popcorn
3. Rice pudding
4. Beef jerky
5. Chocolate

What 5 things would I do if I was a millionaire:

1. Buy a house.
2. Buy new cars.
3. Pay off my parents house
4. College tuition for Makenna and Emma
5. Take all the Scotts and MacDonalds on the Disney cruise.

5 Places I've Lived:

1. Hopewell Jct, NY
2. San Francisco, CA
3. Las Vegas, NV
That's it. I haven't moved alot in my life. I don't really like living in new places I don't know.

5 jobs I've had:

1. Line cook at Roy's in Las Vegas.
2.Front desk clerk at a hotel.
3. Managed Deli delight in Vegas.
4. General Manager at Pizza Village.
5. Extern at Ponzu in San Francisco.

5 People I tag:

I don't even know 5 people who have blogs (how lame am I?), but I do tag Debbi, Deanna and Stasia.

2008-09-18T18:02:00.000-07:00

Sorry the pictures are sort of all over the place but our camera got all screwed up and put our pictures in all sorts of random order. Most of the pictures are from when we went apple picking last week. Makenna loves going to this farm. They have all kinds of animals and a huge playground and all sorts of stuff for the kids. On weekends they have a corn maze they open up with a fort in the middle of it and hay rides and candy apples and such. Last year Makenna was too little to enjoy this, but we definitly plan on going back during one weekend this year to pick our pumpkin. You don't see too many pictures of Emma while we were apple picking, but she was there, she spent the whole time sound asleep in the front carrier. There are a couple of pictures of Brett climbing an old oak tree and I am so glad on got pictures of that. I really wish I had my video camera to capture this though, it was seriously one of the funniest things I have ever seen in my life. The whole incident was even made funnier by Makenna saying over and over to him in her most worried voice"Daddy get DOWN!". Too funny. Before we went apple picking we took Makenna to the party store to pick out her halloween costume, and of course she picked out a Dora costume. Niether me or Brett were too excited to dress her up as Dora (I wanted her to pick the pumpkin fairy costume they had since Emma is going to be a pumpkin) but Makenna is getting old enough to make some of her own choices now (how sad) so we try and let her choose when she can. She likes making her own decisions and it really makes her feel proud. Anyway, I'm sure I'll post lots of pictures of both girls in their costumes. Emma had a well baby doctor appointment this Wednesday. Her head, weight, and height are all in the 95th percentile. She now weighs 14 lbs. 6 oz. and is 23 and 1/2 inches. Obviously Emma is a big baby for her age, since she was born weighing 9 lbs. 13 oz. and the doctor said she probably won't slow down in her growth until she is in her second year. Then she should be about the same weight and height as kids who were born weighing a "normal" birth weight. Poor girl already has the doctors on her about her weight. She is such a sweet little baby that she didn't even cry for her first shot! Also, she laughed for the first time the other day. Not a little baby giggle, but a real belly laugh where she had to gasp for air and everything. She just melts my heart. I call her my zen baby, because whenever I hold her I instantly feel relaxed and peaceful. Makenna's new obsession is playdoh. The girl can play with the stuff for hours on end. She has such patience and concentration. I love her for that. What special little girls.

Brett's Legacy

2008-09-08T14:16:00.000-07:00

Just wanted to let everyone know that Brett will not be having his hernia surgery after all. We went to see the surgeon Thursday and he said that surgery was uneccesary unless the hernia either got bigger or started hurting him. I am a little weary of this because the first surgeon we saw in the hospital told us it definitely needed to be done. Also, I think it's better to do the surgery now rather than wait until it becomes a problem and we wind up back in the hospital again. I've got to find out how you go about getting a second opinion. Anyway, I took Makenna and Emma to the doctor on Thursday also (as we all have colds and I am neurotic when it comes to our kids being ill) and we found out that Makenna also has a umbilical hernia (plus a double ear infection, poor kid!)! The docor assured me that it did not require surgery and was really quite common in young children and if it does not heal on it's own before she turns 5 then she will have to go see a surgeon about it. So for right now Brett and Makenna have matching "lumps" on their bellies. It's pretty funny that both of their hernias are in the same spot right at the top of their belly buttons. Makenna laughs like crazy when her daddy kisses on her "lump".

Lots of Pictures!

2008-09-03T09:28:00.000-07:00

Just wanted to share some pictures of our princesses. We're sad the summer is winding down here in New York now and we're trying to get in every last dip in the pool we can, but the leaves are starting to change and fall is inevitable. Brett hasn't scheduled his hernia surgery yet. He has a doctor appointment again this Thursday so hopefully they will have scheduled his surgery then. Emma has outgrown most of her 0-3 month clothes (how sad!). Initially I thought Emma was going to be our laidback, quiet and peaceful child, but lately she has learned how to coo and "baby" talk and that girl is loud! She loves to sit on her blankets and coo real loud for a long time and just laugh. Saturday Makenna's best friend, Cheito, came over for a play date and Emma could not get enough of watching her sister and Cheito play together. You could tell Emma REALLY wanted to get up out of her bouncy chair and join the fun. Emma went to the doctor about a week ago and she weighed 13 Lbs. 9oz. That means she gained over a pound and a half in just a little over three weeks! Emma goes back to the doctor for her two month checkup tommorow and I am really intrested to see how big she has gotten. Makenna has also grown a ton this summer. She started the summer out wearing 18-24 month clothes and a size 4 or 5 shoe and now I can barely get some of her 3T clothes on her and I just bought her new sneakers that were a size 7 1/2. I really wish I could freeze time and keep our girls the way they are now for at least a couple more years.

Brett Needs Surgery!!

2008-08-20T22:25:00.000-07:00

It's been a really long day and it's late so I'm gonna make this short and sweet. For a couple of days now Brett has had a nasty cough and discovered a lump on his stomach on Friday. He tried to get a appointment with the doctor last week but the earliest appointment he could get was for today at 10:30am. So off we went to his appointment which we thought would result in a prescription for some cough medicine and antibiotics, boy were we wrong.
The doctor diagonsed Brett's lump as an umbilical hernia and thought his cough may be pnuemonia. The doctor couldn't get Brett's hernia to go back in and couldn't get hold of a specialist to look at it, so she sent us to the hospital for a chest x-ray and to see a surgeon about the hernia. After a long time spent at the hospital Brett has had four breathing treatments, a cat scan, and has been put on two different inhalers, steriods and antibiotics. The surgeon at the hospital wanted to operate on Brett's hernia today, but after hearing how bad his lungs are decided the surgery will have to wait until this Monday or Tuesday. The good news is that Brett's chest x-ray came back fine and they think he just has bronchitis or the flu, but they still want to wait until he is better to operate. All I can say is that I am really grateful we have good health insurance!

2008-08-17T18:27:00.000-07:00

Lately when Makenna wakes up from her nap she cries until I let her take off all her clothes and redress herself in an outfit she picks out. This is one of her latest picks.

Makenna's first time playing miniature golf.

Makenna loved the Bronx zoo. Brett's favorite picture is this one of her trying to get up close and personal with the kanagroos.

Makenna's favorite exhibit was the sea lions.

Makenna at build-a-bear.

Sorry I haven't posted in so long, but Brett is back at work full time and I have no idea how to post pictures. First things first, Brett quit his job at the Purple House. It was pretty far away and the owners were incredibly unorganized and drove Brett nuts so he got out of there. I was pretty happy he quit, I could tell he really didn't like it, and I didn't want him staying at a job just because the pay was good. With as many hours a week as he works it's better he like the place than make a little more money. Anyway, he got another job pretty quickly at a restaurant called the Stockyard. It's only 3 miles away from our house. He's the sous chef there and likes it alot more. Before Brett started at the Stockyard he took the week that his parents came to visit us off which was really nice. We took a trip to the Bronx zoo while Brett's parents were in town and it was so much fun. Even though I've lived in New York pretty much all of my life I've never been to the Bronx zoo so it was pretty amazing to get to go. Makenna really enjoyed it and Emma really enjoyed being carried in the front carrier on mommy for most of the day. Emma had her one month appointment the beginning of August and she is already 11 lbs. 15 ozs. and 23 inches long! I'm sure she's grown more than that since. It seems like that girl has a growth spurt every three days or so. She is seriously the size of a five month old. A lot of poeple keep asking me why I give her so much more formula than breastmilk and it's because I don't think anyone could produce enough milk to keep her satisfied! Emma has also started smiling and laughing alot recently. Now that her personality is alittle more evident Makenna has really started to bond with her. She loves helping out with anything that concerns Emma. She will talk to Emma for quite a while, and sing her songs and tickles her. It is just the most wonderful thing to watch the two of them together, although at times Emma seems petrified of Makenna. There has been a few instances where Makenna has tried to pick Emma up before I could get to her and you can see the fear in Emma's eyes. One of my favorite things is that when Emma has spit up while sitting in her bouncy seat, Makenna will go over and wipe her mouth for her and kiss her. She does lots of sweet stuff like that for her sister. Makenna talks tons now. I am amazed at how much her vocabulary grows each day. We really have to be careful what we say around her, because she is just like a little parrot. Just tonight she told Emma to shut up when she started to cry, something she must have picked up from Brett obviously, but still pretty dang funny coming out of two year old' s mouth.

Emma's first swim

2008-07-26T08:40:00.000-07:00

So, Emma did not care for the pool. She screamed every time she got wet. She's already a litlle diva.

Grandma's been taking Makenna inthe pool since I am not suppose to be swimming yet.

Thanks for the sunglasses and rattles Uncle Jason and Aunt Claire!

I broke out a bunch of Makenna's infant toys for Emma and decided to give her some tummy time. Well, Emma fell asleep the minute I laid her on her tummy, but Makenna had fun rediscovering all her old toys.

Makenna screams if you take her baby away from her. Poor Emma.

Pictures From This Weekend

2008-07-21T08:13:00.000-07:00

Just wanted to share some pictures of our little princesses. Don't you just want to bite them? I have to be careful with poor little Emma I could just squeeze her with those chubby little cheeks.

Brett has gone back to work

2008-07-17T09:50:00.000-07:00

So, yesterday was Brett's first day back at work and my first day alone with both kids. I admit that I was petrified that they were both going to cry all day and I would loose my mind, but I was pleasantly surprised by how easy and comfortable it was to be alone with our girls. Makenna has turned into a complete daddy's girl and had a little bit of a hard time watching him go to work but once he was out of sight she only asked for him once throughout the day. We are so blessed that both our kids seem to be just naturally well-behaved that I think we are spoiled. Brett started at a new job. He is the executive chef at an Italian restaurant called the Purple House. He seems to like the job so far, although it has only been one day. The restaurant is a brand new reataurant and today is their grand opening, so we are hoping it goes really well today. As for me, I plan on taking the girls out for little while today. This will be my first time taking both kids out by myself and I am a litlle apprehensive about it, but I know I have to do it eventually so I'd rather do it sooner rather than later. Wish me luck!