Ode to the thumb

Adi is no longer a thumb sucker.  This is a huge milestone for our big girl.  She sucked her thumb from 4 months old until nearly six years.  We tried so many different contraptions, bribing, scare tactics (not recommended!) and nothing worked.  I finally tried a product that is painted on the nail and tastes like bitter yuck if it gets in the mouth and guess what?  It WORKED!

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February is almost over!

It's the last day of February already.  I've completed my homework that was due tonight and baby girl is sleeping so I'm taking a few minutes to update the blog!

I don't remember when this took place but Adi won a ride in this Hummer stretch limo for her efforts selling cookie dough and such during a fund raiser in the fall.  The kids you see in the picture are the only ones in the entire school that got to go for the ride so it was really quite a big deal!

 

Adilyn and her classmate C (just his first initial to protect his identity) were the only Kindergarteners in the limo.  They were both a little nervous about riding with the big kids at first but once they got in there they had nothing but fun.  The kids even got to enjoy some candy while they were out and about.

 

So Adi and C.  It's funny, really, that these two got to go on this ride together.  It's pretty cool, really, that they are even friends.  You see, for the first couple of months of school Adi and C did NOT get along.  Not one bit.  As a matter of fact Adi begged me to home school her because of this little guy!  But instead of pulling her out of school and taking her away from her conflict I chose to do something else.  We prayed together.  For C.  We prayed that he and his family would be blessed.  That love and joy would fill their home.  And after some time I started hearing more stories about her fun times with C than I did about her "best friend" B!  Praise God!  Enemies became friends and I give all the credit to our magnificent God and His wonderful ways.

So we couldn't resist some playtime in the snow.  This is one of the two times Chloe has worn her cute pink winter suit.  She didn't really know what to thing about the snow...

Adi insisted on making a snow woman this time.  Hey, why not?

We got to celebrate Papa's birthday in January together with one of Nana's amazing red velvet cakes.  The BEST red velvet cake recipe ever.

So the excitement for this month is that we have begun church shopping.  It has been an extremely emotional process.  I'm finding it very challenging.  Being without a physical church over the past year and a half I've been able to enjoy the most anointed teachings and powerful worship online watching www.ibethel.tv and feeling like my life is changed a little bit each time.  But without a church community we've begun to feel a bit lonely, wanting to share in worship and fellowship with other believers that are searching for the heart of God. 

We thought we had found the church we were supposed to be at but several things happened that felt like doors closing.  The first time we visited as a family I walked just outside the doors with Chloe to get her to sleep but I could still hear the message until one of the church members closed the doors.  I couldn't hear anymore and I felt like the door had in some way been prophetically shut on me.  I walked around outside the "sanctuary" in tears.  I had been so excited to visit this church and the door was shut on me.  (Just for reference sake, they did not shut the door the following week when we went back to visit again.)  The next week we tried again.  The words of many of the worship songs point at humanity and our imperfections rather than lifting up God and that bothers us.  The pastor announced their new "building fund" and my heart sank.  We'd been through this before with our previous church and didn't want to do it again. 

 The final straw was when Adi wanted me to come with her to Sunday school so I agreed to hang out for a few minutes until she adjusted.  I watched the teacher toss a ball from one child to another in a random fashion asking each one what their favorite thing was about their week.  Adi waited patiently for her turn but the teacher never tossed the ball to her.  She turned to me and shrugged her shoulders and took the disappointment like a champ.  I wanted to holler, "You forgot about Adi!!" but I kept my mouth shut while my heart was breaking for my little girl.  Ugh.  This was why I needed to be in that room with her that morning.   Maybe I'm hyper-sensitive but I believe that all those things happened for a reason. 

So we visited another church.  One that we had heard was being influenced by the church we've been watching online.  And it shows in the teaching.  I'm struggling with the worship because I have very high standards but the teaching is awesome.  This past Sunday we prayed for people in the church and 10 people were healed from various ailments.  God is moving in this church and we are excited about that.  We may have found a home but really only time will tell.

Four Months = Solid Food for Chloe

Chloe's first attempt at solid food!  We chose avocado based on a lot of information we learned from a really helpful website: www.wholesomebabyfoods.com  I didn't make Adi's baby food because I didn't realize how easy it was to do.  I'm excited to try out recipes and learn more from the website.  For now, Chloe is only having about 1/2 tsp of mashed avocado once per day.  

 These matching sweater dresses were a gift to the girls from Cam and I for Christmas.  I got the 6-9 month size for Chloe and I'm almost wishing I would have gotten 9-12!  She's only going to be able to wear this thing a few times before she outgrows it.  These two girls are just adorable!!

At her four month well child visit Chloe was 15 pounds (75th percentile) and 26.25" (95th percentile) and her head circumference is in the 50th percentile.  My little tiny baby is growing up so fast and I love that I don't have to miss any of it by working outside the home.  What a blessing.

I currently only have two daycare kiddos which is enough for me!  More money would be nice but we're moving on to a new chapter: I'm going back to school full-time!  Crazy as it is, there's no better time than now to finish up that degree I started so fewer daytime responsibilities feels safer to start until I get used to being a full-time wife, mother, child care provider and student all at the same time.  I won't be the first woman in history to accomplish all of these things so I know it is doable.  The learning curve will likely be steep and I'll have to get better at time management but I am ready for the challenge.  So if the blog once again falls by the wayside, don't be surprised.  It's a small miracle that I've been able to bring it back up to date but I'll do my best to at least post photos once a month or so.

Christmas 2010

Santa visited our house this year and left several golden packages for our family.  Adi  even said, "how many presents is Santa giving me?" as the unwrapping seemed to go on and on... Santa went a bit overboard, as usual.  Hopefully he can tone it down a bit next year but he just gets so darn excited!!

I think the one thing that got the biggest response from Adi was the Rapunzel hair from Uncle Shane and Aunt Kris.

Wow, that's a lot of hair to keep from getting "tangled"!

One final modeling shot of the hair.

 Chloe is enjoying her new infant to toddler rocker.

 And the famous Sophie the giraffe teething toy.

Christmas isn't quite over for our family yet - we have two more Driscoll Christmas celebrations mid-January and then our holiday season will officially be over.  And then on to a busy and exciting new year :)

December

Look how big I'm getting!

Puppy lives on... encouraging Adi to suck her thumb.  Booo!

 Look how strong I am, too!  And I roll over both ways and I'm not even four months old yet.

 Adi is painting the sun catcher Christmas ornaments that were part of Grandma Marsha's 12 days of Christmas.

 It's a common sight these days: a finger, thumb or entire hand in the mouth.  Chomp chomp, it's teething time.

 Chloe is holding her daycare friend's hand.  How cute :)

 I'm gonna get you!  She loves to roll over on the poor guy but it's so darn funny.

 Adi's getting better and better at holding her baby sister.  

 And welcome to my new nephew Gavin Thomas Harney born at 32 weeks gestation.  He was only 4 pounds and 17".  But what a handsome little guy, and he's doing so well.  Should be home very soon but is hanging out in the NICU until he's strong and ready.

Thanksgiving Plus

Thanksgiving was spent with the Harney family this year.  Adilyn is way into Avatar (though she's never seen the whole film) so as you can see she is sporting blue Avatar "stripes" on her neck as she poses with her Great Grandma Harney.

 It's always fun to play with the cousins.

 Nana was pooped!

 I love this photo of Little Little and me.

 My little brother Travee.

 We ended up having Sarah McElligot do the family shots for us while Shane, Kris and Maddi were in town.  I'm glad we chose her rather than a typical studio because she will be able to photo shop Travis, Krista and family into the compilation photo after baby boy is born.  Here's the Oregon Harney family.

 This is a cute shot of the Driscoll's... cute, though I don't like the reality of my extra chin and extra weight.  Ugh, New Year resolution in the making?

 A beautiful shot of Nana & Papa.

 And I love this picture of the grandkids with Nana & Papa.

Having all of these photos is such a treat.  I can't wait until we get the full compilation photo with everyone in it.  That will be COOL!

November

Chloe tried on Adi's hair extension headband from Halloween and she looks oh so cute!

 She's just as cute as a natural baldy :)

 Adi was such a great big sister at Chloe's first well child visit.  She wanted desperately to protect Chloe from the vaccinations and even cried when Chloe cried.  It was sad, sweet, and stressful to have not just one crying girl but two.

 I love all the smiles from this little girl.  The Bumbo seat is a pretty cool tool for helping baby girl develop the muscles she needs to sit on her own.

  My niece and nephew spent a week with us while my little brother and his wife made arrangements for them to go to a preschool while sis-in-law hangs out on bed rest waiting for baby boy (child #3) to arrive safely.  The kids did a lot of dress up - they're all super heros here - because we all know that firefighters are real life super heros!

 Adilyn is getting braver about holding her sister, but Chloe prefers for Adi to talk to her face to face.  She just laughs and giggles, she loves her sissy!

 This baby is growing so fast.  I'm not sad about it yet because what it means for me is that she is sleeping better, smiling more and requiring a tad less than constant attention from me which is a relief to have a break now and again.