happy valentine's day!

Meg and Katie had their much-anticipated Valentine's Day parties at preschool yesterday - as far as I could tell, the highlight was they were going to decorate and eat a cookie - and the car actually smelled sweet when they got in it! Hmm... someone must have still had frosting on their face...

They were so excited with their treasures - Meg got a helium heart-shaped balloon (couldn't get it in the picture but it is tied to her backpack) and Katie got a pencil. She carried that pencil around all day and would have slept with it if I had let her.

what meg does

Meg apparently has an irresistable urge to adorn almost everything in her path, with whatever she can find. Every time I think I've seen it all, I will turn the corner and find a new funny surprise. And then I have to take a picture of it.

Meg took Katie's clothes and dressed the rocking horse. The pants are on the head with the "ponytail" being held together by Claire's old teething ring. A doll's baby blanket is the "cape" on the back.


I asked Meg what was going on with this goose. She said it did a crime and it needed to go to jail. I think this is her version of handcuffs...with ponytail holders. Poor goose.

when a 2-year-old & 4-year-old tell each other knock-knock jokes

...this is what it sounds like:

Katie: Knock knock.
Meg: Who's there?
Katie: Banana.
Meg: Banana who?
Katie: Banana Katie!
(followed by fits of laughter)

Meg: Knock knock.
Katie: Who's there?
Meg: Radish.
Katie: Radish who?
Meg: Radish...radish carrot head!!
(followed by hysterical laughing. Note: They don't even know what a radish is.)

K: Knock knock.
M: Who's there?
K: Orange.
M: Orange who?
K: Cheese!
(followed by big belly laughs. I think they think this is the funniest one ever.)

january in our house

I thought I'd give a little update on the girls for the relatives who requested it. :) There's not a lot of exciting news to report, but that's probably a good thing.

Meg is almost 4 1/2 and is growing like a weed. (The picture below is her attempt to show how big she is.) She officially looks like a little girl to me instead of a toddler. Her arms and legs and feet and hands seem like they grew long overnight. I think Meg's favorite thing to do is talk. From the minute she wakes up to the time she goes to bed, she talks. Allllll day she is telling jokes (knock-knock jokes, which she hasn't gotten the hang of yet), singing songs, asking questions, telling stories, and sometimes just talking just to hear herself talk. Most of the time it's fun and entertaining, but sometimes I have to tell her, "I'm turning off my ears now." For the most part she's pretty happy and funny and loves to be silly.


Katie is 2 1/2 and is a sweetheart. Her favorite thing to do is ask us to read her a book. She has a lot to say but has trouble getting it out, which is a constant source of entertainment for us. She comes out with stuff all the time that makes us smile. She asked Mark the other day, "is your heart full?" Katie follows her own grammar rules (example: if it's past tense, just stick the word "did" in front of the verb. "I did eat my lunch." "I did push Claire down on the ground.") Thankfully, the tantrum phase seem to be waning and we are left with just simple bouts of frustrated screaming here and there. I am fine with that. I see improvement.


Claire is finally walking more than crawling and seems like she is in constant motion all day. She entertains herself by wandering around from room to room, finding one thing to look at and then getting distracted by the next thing. I have to be constantly aware of where she is, though, because she often gets herself in tricky situations.


Claire loves to climb, get into things (literally), and put things that are not food into her mouth, which keeps me on my toes.

I bet you just looked at what's in my refrigerator! :)

fancy nancies

With our girls, dress-up is by far their favorite pasttime. They will use almost anything to adorn themselves, each other, dolls, and inanimate objects.

I let Meg play with a sticker book during her quiet time and I found her asleep with stickers on her earlobes like they were her earrings. Next to her was a pillow elaborately swaddled with a blanket that looked like a dress. After she got up she found another target for her sticker earrings...

...and did you notice her stuffed dolphin "Dolphie" is wearing a dress??

Someone else (who finally REALLY started walking this week!!) likes to dress up, too. With Meg and Katie as her stylists, I never know what Claire is going to toddle into the room looking like.

christmas recap

We had a great Christmas! My standards were low, since last year we were very sick with the stomach bug, so when Claire had a cold this year it felt like no big deal.

We got two Christmases this year - one in Atlanta and then my parents came the next week and we had a mini-2nd Christmas with them. The more the merrier! It was fun watching the girls examine and shake and squeeze the presents.


Katie sort of "got it" this year.


Meg really "got it" this year and asked about Christmas almost every day this month. She was so happy to get the scooter she wanted! (with marker on her chin...)


Claire was happy playing with the wrapping paper and watching other people open their presents!

holiday season recap

We are only halfway through December but we've been busy! A couple of weekends ago we got our Christmas tree. Katie was sick that day and so was I, and as you can see she was pretty grouchy. (I was too, so thankfully I am not in the picture).


Last weekend Katie, Meg and I made Christmas cookies. They had so much fun! They were totally silent and engrossed in this for a long time.




It's been a long time since I've cut out cookies with cutters so I forgot the important step of making sure the dough is cold so it will keep its shape! These looked bad -verging on gross- but thankfully these weren't really meant for giving away.


Yesterday Meg and Katie's preschool had their Christmas program. I spent most of my time getting it on video so I just have a few lousy pictures. I thought it was funny how everyone in this picture is doing a different hand motion. The girls were precious and we loved watching them.


Yesterday Mark's office had a children's Christmas party and Santa came to visit! Meg told Santa she wanted princess shoes, a princess dress and a princess crown.


Katie told Santa she wanted a lollipop.