She is 3!

Can't believe my sweet girl is 3 years old! Time has flown by but we were so excited to celebrate her big day. We decided this year, instead of having a party, we were going to spend some time at Great Wolf Lodge for her big day. We also decided that, since we were packing up for a road trip, and for us, packing up is half the battle, we were going to also visit Greg's Grandma Stella in Longview. We spent Sunday afternoon visiting with Grandma Stella. We spent the night in an appartment suite you can rent right at her retirement community. Let me just say how I was hoping that the people living beside and below us were hard of hearing. After breakfast, we headed right to Grapevine. The Great Wolf Lodge was the ultimate place to take the kiddos! What was wonderful was that everything was right there. Kid friendly restaurants, check. Entertainment, check. Starbucks? Also check. It was heavenly.

Birthday Breakfast Opening some gifts
Story time in the lobby-in our jammies!

Overheard

A few funny things that have been overheard around here:
Olivia: "I need my microphones!" (headphones)
Greg: "Hmm, I wonder what you could do to get some help to reach your headphones?"
Olivia: "I could say the magic words?"
Greg: "Yes, and what are the magic words?"
Olivia: "Abra Cadabra!"

Olivia: (wearing her flower girl dress from Lindsay and Blairs wedding)-"I'm Lindsay and your Blair." (points to Greg)
Greg: "I'm not Blair, I'm Daddy."
Olivia: "No, you're Blair. Come on Blair, let's go play in my playroom."

Olivia: "Jake! Jake! Are you awake Jake?" (yelling at brother in the middle of his nap.)

Olivia missed school the week before last because of her sinus/ allergies. She practically lost her voice, and I knew we had a big week ahead (post to follow) so I was extra careful to make sure she was 100% and well rested.

Love These Two!

A few pictures of Olivia and Jake, finally able to play together (well, kind of). Jake loves to sit in his chair and play with Olivia. He just giggles at everything that she does...it is so sweet!

Fun At School

Here are a few fun pictures from Olivia's first week of school. She has had an easy time separating from me so far, but we still aren't napping at school. We tried to build up the nap time at school, but it doesn't look like she is going to have it. She continues to be extremely headstrong, so we are trying to work on that. She has, however, come around a little bit with the potty training. She certainly knows what to do and how to do it, she just refused to try! We reached a major step yesterday when she actually said "I need to go potty." (and went!) This was music to my ears after Saturday's outing, while we were looking at an appliance showroom and I look down to find my little lady in a full squat, peeing all over the floor right in front of the general manager(apparently our pull up was faulty). I pretty much wanted to crawl into one of the display refrigerators and die right there. Alas, I sucked it up, asked for some paper towels, and thanked my lucky stars they were smart enough to install concrete floors.

We spent most of the labor day weekend relaxing and taking it easy. We were all feeling a little stuffy with all of this weather changing-fire blazing action we've got going on around here. Also, Olivia had to get her SECOND set of stiches last week, so we couldn't even swim! She was a pro getting her stiches, she didn't cry at all. I stayed home with Jake, but Greg said she was chatting up the nurses and doctors, and they actually had to ask her to quit talking so that they could finish up her stiches. 7 total...5 on the outside and 2 on the inside. It was the craziest thing, she was sitting in her chair at the dinner table across from me, and all I saw was her chair start to fall back and down she went. I couldn't see what she hit her chin on, but we are thinking somehow she hit the tile? (that is what she tells us anyway. She also will say that she is 5 years old so there really is no telling.)

First Day of School!

So proud of her backpack! (If you click on the pictures they will enlarge them to see them a little better)
She insisted that I take her picture with Perry.

Right now I am sitting on the couch, listening to the sound of peace and quiet. I can't believe that school has begun! I am selfishly excited because not only will I get some quality time with my little buddy, but I will also get some time to do all of my "chores" on Tuesday and Thursday, so that my time with Olivia will be spent playing house and having tea parties instead of folding laundry (she no longer thinks of laundry as a fun thing to do together, rather she tries to distract me into playing with her...in which case she wins and the laundry piles up!)

Olivia did great this morning at drop off. She said going in to school, "This is going to be fun!" Her teachers are super sweet and helped to make the transition easy. My only hurdle now is the naptime...I can't wait to find out how she did today!

Circus 2011

We had so much fun last year at the circus we decided to make it an annual thing! This year Grandma June was able to go with us. The show ran into our usual naptime, so by the end we were a little wild and crazy being over tired. Here are a few pictures I did take.

My Little Helpers

Today on the agenda...taking pictures of our house. We are officially on the market as of this Thursday. I'm not quite sure how this is going to work with a toddler, a baby, and a Greg, while trying to keep the house picked up and ready to be shown at a moments notice. We timed this all wrong with Olivia and her tendency to "tornado" through rooms. It is truly amazing what kind of a mess she can make in such a short amount of time ( : She continues to crack us up and amazes us with some of the things that she says. She still has her imaginary friend, Max, who she plays with, tells stories to and scolds when she feels he needs a good talking to.

Jake is sleeping great, at least two naps a day, and sleeping around 11-12 hours at night. He is so much happier now that he is getting good naps! He has enjoyed his "real" food...so far he has had bananas, oatmeal cereal, and avocado. He loves his food and gets fussy around dinner time for his dinner. He is quite possibly the messiest eater EVER! He wants to crawl so bad, but nothing yet. We go to the doctor in a week for his 6 month check, but I'm certain we have reached 20 pounds, just by the way my back and arms hurt from carrying this guy around.