Happy fourth birthday Lucy-loo!!

I can't believe Lucy is four! She has been counting down until her birthday for a long time!

I'm trying to think of how much Lucy has changed since she turned 3. She no longer is scared of bugs....she squishes and squashes them all by herself, screams at them, shoos them away. She is still all girl. She would choose a dress everyday, loves to pick her own stuff. She often gets dressed before I get out of bed in the morning. She would much rather wear her dress up high heels than any real shoes, and if we would let her wear make up....she would be all over it. She is not afraid to tell me what outfits she likes of mine, what looks good, and what shoes I should wear with what. My little fashionista.

Lucy is very sensitive to others. She is very concerned about others feelings, and is a great big sister in that way. She is always teaching Kadence, showing her how to do things, and helping her to do it herself. She has such patience. She always has a smile and a laugh. She brightens up my world.

Lucy still is very inquisitive. She tells me stories about things I would think she would know nothing about. It will be fun to see how she blossoms when school starts in the fall. She has why questions about everything, and your first answer usually doesn't give her the info that she wants/needs. She is my morning girl. She goes from fast asleep to jumping around in less than a second. Her best stories come in the morning, she always can surprise me with what she comes up with. The other day Kadence was being a little rough with me, and basically pile driving my belly. I told her she needed to be gentle with the baby. "why?" asks Kady. I responded with the baby might cry....and then Lucy said "then the baby will have even more water to swim in!"

She has a great imagination. I love to listen to her play with her barbies or bears and hear the stories she comes up with. Everywhere she goes she is "making new friends". Her is a sample conversation from this weekend:

Lucy: Hi, I'm Lucy what is your name

girl: Hannah

Lucy: Where do you live? I live at east woodmeade Court

girl: charlotte

Lucy: do you have any sisters?

girl: no

Lucy: oh, do you want to be my friend?

It's so cute to try and be a bystander....pretend I'm not around, but really wanting to hear where this is all going. This is one of many "friends" she made just over the weekend. She is so excited to come and tell us all about them later.

What a blessing God gave us just 4 short years ago. Lucy can always make me smile, put life in perspective, and leave me waiting for what is next. Love you goosey!!

Family birthday party

Yesterday day invited all of our family over to celebrate both girls May birthdays! Lucy has been so excited about this "shared" party. We decided to go with a barbie theme...and my request from Lucy was a barbie cake with a purple dress. She was so cute when I showed her the final project..."thank you mom, thank you for making her dress purple, but I don't really like the shape of her dress, next time can you make it look like Kady's?" Let's just say the inside of the purple cake was pieced and held together with tons of frosting...I had my fingers crossed that it would be standing by Sunday morning. The day ended up warm, 87 degrees. We got to break in the new deck and put some water stuff outside for the kids to enjoy. Jim and I decided for a picnic menu and served pulled pork (his spicy, mine just plain good), potato salad, fruit, veggies, and lemonade. God has given us so much, 2 beautiful girls, someone healthy on the way, and a generous family that we love so much! We really are spoiled that we can all get together so easily to make these celebrations!

Two and Four

The girls with Grandma's (Lucy was so excited to have both of them in one place)

Happy birthday to you!!!

Blowing out the candles

Enjoying the frosting off of the barbies

an ode to a rainy day

Dear rain,

Thank you for giving me a day to shower, but not have to get ready. Thanks for cancelling swimming lessons, I couldn't deal with screaming in the pool today. Thanks for giving me a day to blog, do laundry, and clean the refrigerator. Thanks for giving me an extra day to take things slow and just enjoy being with my girls. Thanks for making it such a great day for napping!

Kadence is two!!!

hamming it up for the camera
enjoying birthday cupcakes

"cheese"

Happy birthday to my sweet little girl! (her actual birthday was Tuesday May 11!)

At two Kady is starting to talk more, she says just about anything, some things are more easily understood than others. Juice and shoes sound quite similar "jews", daddy and dirty "da-dee and da-tee", blankie and babie "bank-bang". My favorite is still Loo-cee, with a definitive pause between most syllables of words. She has just started in the last month to put 2 words together and does this consistently now.

She is able to walk down the stairs standing up, get her own ice and water, play by herself, and sit in a big girl chair to eat. She really would be content doing everything that Lucy does.

Kadence's temperment has mellowed a bit. We see many smiles, that show her beautiful dimples, belly laughs, and her ability to be a jokster. The days are few and far between now that we have constant screaming, whining, clinging, and just plain unhappiness...but they still exist. She overall loves life, loves her blankie and "mumb" (thumb), baths, playing outside, especially on the swings. She loves carbs, won't eat veggies, and definately has her momma's sweet tooth.

I love this girl more than life itself. She brings such joy to my life, and warms my heart. She is the first one to greet you after a long day of work, telling you to take off your coat and giving plenty of hugs and kisses. She couldn't be any more different than her sister, which makes it so fun to love both of them so much, in so many different ways, and for so many different reasons.

Coopersville Farm Museum

Jim loves taking the girls places when I work on weekends.....
Here they met Jim's friend Ryan and his daughter Joelle.

Lucy made it seem like there was plenty to do, play with, pet, make

Lucy just tells me: "I was squeezing milk out of there"

The "petting zoo"

Notice Kady's boots, her choice.....country girl at heart

driving the tractors, it was a close race

Lucy told me she picked up a chick, and then....

"daddy put one on his head" Good self portrait Jim

Kady wasn't so sure she wanted that anywhere near her, or at least that's my narration since I'm posting. Maybe at a later time I'll see if Jim wants to post on his own adventures with the girls....that would be some great entertainment!

Traverse City 2010

As I mentioned previously we spent a weekend up in TC with our friends Scott, Erin, and their son Owen. They live up there but we decided to rent a condo together at Grand Traverse and just hang out. They guys got to golf the Bear, we swam, had a babysitter (for adults only time out), and just caught up. The girls loved being away from home. Before we headed home on Sunday we played at a park on Mission Pointe, tired the girls out so they slept most of the way home!

Swimming

Here are some of our pictures from our weekend away to Traverse City from a month ago. The girls LOVED swimming in the hotel. Especially notice Lucy...she couldn't get enough of it. Today we started another month of swimming lessons. I had to physically put her in the pool, and then the teacher had to physically hold her in the pool. Tears, screams, whines...I couldn't even bring myself to take the camera to lessons today..too torturous. Needless to say we made it through the entire lesson without leaving for 3/4 of it (with an "emergency" trip to the bathroom). So I am choosing to remind myself why we put our little water rat in swimming lessons.....because she LOVES to swim!