Houston, we have a crawler!

We knew it was just a matter of time.  Lucy has been really close for a few weeks now, and this morning she figured it out and began to crawl.  Brad and I have joked that she is super motivated because she wants to be able to escape the terrorizing hugs of her sometimes annoying big sis.  I am so glad my phone was nearby so I could capture the moment on video.  Here she is in action...

Lucy Pulling Up

Just since last week Lucy has learned quite a few new tricks.  All of a sudden she is sitting up on her own, pulling up on some things, and trying REALLY hard to crawl.  I don't think it will take her long at all before she is crawling after her big sister!

Good Intentions and a few Ellie-isms...

So I have grand plans to continue posting about our Disney trip, but have lost my steam.  Maybe someday soon I will get my act back together and finish what I started.  Until then here are a few of our favorite and recent "Ellie-isms"...

Instead of living room Ellie says "liden room" Even though she has been saying it this way for as long as she could talk it makes me smile every time.

Brad took Ellie to her first movie ever on Monday afternoon.  When they got home she told me they went to see the" Muffets"  She liked the movie, but I'm pretty sure her favorite part was the kids snack tray Brad got her consisting of lemonade, fruit snacks, and popcorn.

Today we picked up a themed bag of books from our library about community helpers and in it was a pack of, as Ellie told Brad when he got home from work, "puffets" or puppets, whatever. 

It's a good thing she's funny and cute, because it makes up for all the times I want to pull my hair out!

6 Months



Happy Food Face

Weight:14.2 pds (15%)

Height: 25in (25%)

Lucy turned 6 months old while we were at Disney last week.  She did a great job being carted all over the place with little to no frustration.  This is largely due to her "go with the flow" temperment.  She even got really good at sleeping just about anywhere, if only for 30 minutes or so.  I finally started solids with her this week and she is doing great with it so far.  Although, I think for now her favorite part is chewing on her sippy cup. 

As far as sleep goes things are getting better.  Her naps are more consistent during the day now, and we are STILL working on nighttime sleep.  I know, I'm a little embarassed to admit that she is not sleeping through the night consistently yet.  I would have not let this happen with Ellie, but since she slept like a dream it never was an an issue. It's partly my fault combined with her persistence (and loudness) at night. I fall into the thinking of it's just easier to feed her and go back to sleep, as opposed to hearing her cry for what could be an hour or so.   It seems like we get to a good place and then something always messes it up, like she starts rolling over, or she gets sick. She will take a pacifier now (at least when she wants to). Oh well, we'll get her straightened out eventually. 

In other news she is starting to sit up pretty well now on her own and is scooting/rolling around to get what she wants now.  It is so fun to see her and Ellie interacting more and more each day.  Lucy absolutely ADORES Ellie.  I love it! 



Day 2: Animal Kingdom

On day 2 of our trip we headed to Animal Kingdom. And, after our Day 1 disaster we were refreshed and ready to have some fun.  Thankfully, this was one of our favorite parks, and we enjoyed every minute of our time here!

All of the kiddos, minus Mitch & Lori's 4 boys, who arrived at the park a little later that day.

We went on this great safari, that turned out to be our favorite thing at Animal Kingdom.  This was the closest we will probably get to such amazing animals.

 Lucy was exhausted, and this is her sleeping on the VERY loud and bumpy safari.  Brad held her head still and she fell right asleep.  Needless to say Lucy learned to sleep just about anywhere during our trip.

 Lucy got a lot of love from all of her cousins all week, and she loved all the attention!

Love the smile on Ellie's face here

One of my favorite pictures of the whole trip!

Lucy loved playing with Ty's head, and he was so sweet to let her.

We stayed to see the Jingle Jungle Parade, and we had a great time

 Ellie getting a high-five from Chip, or Dale, who can really tell the difference?

Later that night we headed over to the Contemporary Resort for dinner at Chef Mickey's with all of the characters.  The food was really good, but a 7:00 dinner reservation and two over tired
little girls do not go together.  Lucy pretty much fussed the entire dinner and Ellie did okay, although she wasn't herself.

Day 1 Magic Kingdom

Our first day at Disney held great promise, we had been looking forward to this day for 6 months now, and it was finally here!  We had expectations of a glorious day spent riding rides, meeting Mickey, and just having a great time.  Unfortunately, things didn't happen as we had hoped...

To start off, we had a seriously over tired little 2 year old who woke up with her bunk mate and cousin, Ben before 6:00 that morning.

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 The we had the rain, that came down harder than we were expecting.  And then Ellie had her FIRST accident before we even got on our first ride!  Things didn't get started out on the right foot, to say the least.  We rode Dumbo, Winnie the Pooh, and the Tea Cups. Then we went to see Mickey's PhilharMagic, and It's a Small World. 

As we continued to ride each ride, Ellie seemed to become more and more miserable, and  as a result so did we.  After she had a total meltdown in line for It's a Small World, we decided enough was enough.  We were not having fun, and this was supposed to be "the happiest place on earth."  So we decided to eat lunch  with the family and head back to the house where Ellie could nap and we could regroup.  To top it all off, while we were waiting for our food, Ellie had ANOTHER accident.  UGH!  I had only brought one change of clothes, so the poor girl had to eat in wet pants. 

It turns out going home for the day was the best decision for our family.  We missed the parade that night and a lot of other fun rides, but it was just what we needed to do to keep our sanity and to keep Disney World fun, like it is supposed to be! 

Our trip to Disney

Our journey began early (5:30 am) Sunday morning with two awake girls.  One was super excited to finally be going to Disney World, and the other was just wondering what in the world was going on...

We met Tim, Anna, and the kids and headed off for Florida.  We were so thankful and relieved that all 5 kids did great on our 12 hour trip.  Stops for breakfast, lunch, and feedings for Lucy broke up the trip nicely, and thankfully, before we knew it we were in Florida.  Ellie was so excited that she only slept 15 minutes all day!  Lucy was content in her carseat, as long as she had a toy with in reach.