Tuesday, October 21, 2014

Bye Bye O'Connor's!

Some of our best friends took an assignment in Singapore for a few years, so we had the summer of goodbyes with them. They have triplets in Ben's grade and their whole family have become very good friends to our family, so this was hard news for us to hear that they were leaving. Luckily we had the summer to spend time together. Before they embarked on their adventure, we had a small BBQ at our house to say "Good Luck" and see you soon!
The kids brought their PJ's and watched a movie once it started getting late.  Ellie forgot her PJ's and luckily Abbey had just received two pairs of the same PJ's for her birthday - one in a size too big for her!  So she shared those with Ellie and they looked cute.
Ben and Michael playing with Matthew.
All the kids.
Time to settle in for movie night while the adults sit outside on the porch and talk.
We really miss them, but we have been keeping in touch.  We look forward to their visit next summer though and will keep writing letters and video calling until then :)

Monday, October 20, 2014

6 Months!

Matthew turned 6 months in July too. Since it is now October as I write this, I had to go back to his baby book to see what he was up to around 6 months (luckily, I have been good about his baby book each month)! Matthew loves food - he eats everything we have given him to try and seems to like it all. He sleeps well and is finally in a consistent sleeping pattern with his naps. He loves his exersaucer toy and he really likes watching Belle. He smiles whenever he sees her. He loves when she licks him too, which I try to discourage, but the kid spits up a lot and Belle seems to want to clean that right up for him - gross, I know! He is such a happy baby and really easy going. I have no complaints about anything - he's fantastic!

Growth wise, Matthew weighed in at 16 pounds, 12 ounces and was 25 3/8 inches long, which put him in the 30% for weight and 5% for height!  The boy likes to eat!  



Abbey Birthday Continued

I know, it has been so long since I have posted and so much has happened that I need to catch up on. I promise you, blogging is always on my to-do list, it just falls to the bottom a lot of times unfortunately. But I am going to catch up - so much to catch up on! But I also want to do it right and tell about things that happened, not just post a bunch of pictures. So it will take me some time. But, picking up where we left off, let's go back to Abbey's birthday. Her actual birthday was spent in Florida attending Grand-Patch's funeral. She was a champ about it. So when we got home, we decided to celebrate again and have her birthday dinner. She requested spaghetti and cauliflower for dinner and then picked out a cookie cake for dessert.

We told both girls that for their birthdays this year we would take them down to the American Girl store and have breakfast there.  So, we went the next weekend and the girls were so excited.  Abbey was so excited the night before going - her and Saige got all ready for bed together :)
The next morning, both girls grabbed their dolls and were ready to go!

It took a while to get ready because Abbey wanted to look just like Saige, so we had to do Saige's hair too.
So cute!
Since it was a birthday treat for the girls, we decided the whole family would go down and do it together.  Here we are downtown walking to the store - you can see how excited Matthew is!
I will say that going for breakfast was perfect.  We got to the store early and there was barely anyone in there, which was nice because we really got to walk around and see everything before we ate.  That worked out well because by the time we came out of breakfast, the store was crowded.
The breakfast was adorable.  They had seats for the dolls and little cups and saucers for the dolls that we got to take home.  And the breakfast was delicious too.


The boys had a great time too.  They had  a little box on the table of conversation starter questions and Ben enjoyed those.  His favorite question was, "Would you rather have 10 siblings or no siblings?"  He immediately answered 10 (so did Juliette, but Abbey said no siblings - ha!).  And since then, Ben has been asking when the next baby will come because we have to get to 10...ummm...not likely buddy :)
Abbey and Saige next to the Saige doll showcase in the store.
It was a really cute morning.  I really enjoyed it and can't wait to take the girls back again some time!

The girls really liked it.
Did I say how much I enjoyed it??
Since it was part of their birthday treat, we got them each an outfit for their doll.  They were very happy little girls.
And very well placed next to the American Girl store was the Lego store.  So since Ben was being such a great sport about going, we stopped in and let him pick out something small from the Lego store.

It was a great morning.  And that was the end of Abbey's birthday celebration and the start of Juliette's birthday celebration!  

Now on to Abbey's growth stats...She was 46 inches tall and 48 pounds, which put her in the 65% for height and 70% for weight.  Abbey is so hard to describe sometimes.  She is ultra shy, yet wants to be the leader of her group.  But first, she has to get comfortable and then she will take over!  She can get anxious about new situations and she is extremely strong willed when she wants to be.  Yet she is also a sweetheart and is helpful and wants to make people happy.  If someone is crying, she is usually the first to try to make it better.  She is sensitive and that has caused some drama, but really she just wants to feel included.  She tries to act older and does such a good job that sometimes I forget how little she still is and maybe sometimes I expect too much from her.  She is an amazing girl and I love watching her grow and settle into her own little person.  She loves her siblings (despite saying she would rather have 0 than 10!) and she really loves being a little Mommy to Matthew.  She is incredibly good with little ones.  Happy Birthday Sweet Abbey!!