We Are The Dinosaurs

Emma has been marching like a dinosaur ever since our music class at the Y last Thursday. We found the song on youtube to play while we are down in Fl- so she is a bit distracted by the laptop during her performance.

Florida, Florida, Here We Come....again!

While Felix is out in CA working hard with the Women's team, Emma & I are back in FL celebrating Passover with the family.
We took a bus to the airport, and Emma was in heaven! I was quite nervous without a carseat, but after reading online about charter travel, it seemed safe.

and she was having the time of her life!

We arrived after 10pm after a long, hot, stuffy flight, got right to bed and left the next afternoon for our drive to Orlando & Gainesville.
We met up with Grandma, Mileidy & Alexsa for some dinner and fun at Chuck E Cheese, and Emma really enjoyed herself in the kid section. I think her favorite part was actually putting the tokens in the slots.....more so than actually riding on the rides!

We got right back in the car and continued our drive to Gainesville, arriving after 9pm. Although Audrey was sleeping, we got to see beautiful little 3 week old Amelia and Emma got to play with Audrey's toys for a few minutes before heading to bed herself.
The next morning, the two girls got reacquainted and had a BLAST together! Just look at the love in their eyes!

Emma actually sat there while Audrey did her hair......what 2 year old would let you do this?!!!

and....sharing some bad habits. Not sure who taught who, but they liked making each other laugh by spitting in their hands. Gross. Then Emma entertained Audrey by doing belly flops onto the air mattress- definitely a little ham!

The one time that I didn't bring the video monitor.... and Emma gets herself into trouble! I put her down for her much needed afternoon nap, and she went in without making a peep....a few hours later she was up and I went in to get her out and found this:

- she had taken everything within her reach off the dresser and put it in the crib!

How lucky could we be? We read in the paper that morning that there was a kids craft fair going on, and the weather couldn't have been any better. It was such perfect timing for our one day we had to visit and the kids had so much fun. There was painting, and music, and balloon animals- great day to put her in her new fancy dress! (good thing the paint was washable!)




We were able to squeeze in a quick visit with Gina & Sable before our long & rainy drive home. How adorable is little Sable! I can't believe how big she got, and such a cutie with her little braids. She was so sweet with Emma and even held her ice cream cone for her when Emma was trying to climb up onto the chair at TCBY. I thought it was very sweet.

The drive home was less than pleasant! It was really raining hard, and I guess I am not used to that Florida rain anymore. I was wishing Felix was with us to take over, among the many other reasons I wished Felix was with us :). But Emma was a trooper, never whined, slept for 2 hours, announced to the long line at the rest stop bathroom that she had a "doodies in her diaper", and even thoroughly entertained herself the rest of the ride. I wasn't joking about the stickers........

Getting Ready for our Trip!

Call it what you want.... I am trying to scratch more items off our 'to do' list before this baby is born! And with another trip to FL just 1 day away, I wanted to make sure I came back home with a few less items to tackle.
So, while Emma napped (and then, I am the worst mother ever, but even when she was awake and being ignored by me) I was able to paint the windows, baseboards, and trim in the dining room, paint the trim and closet in the laundry room, paint the trim in the playroom, and even replace 2 doorknobs! Quite a bit to knock out in one day, but I am so glad I did. And I realized I spend way too much time thinking about how difficult a project is going to be instead of just going ahead and trying to do it. Changing doorknobs is one of the easiest things I have ever done!




Emma is WAY into stickers lately. We find stickers EVERYWHERE. One afternoon I went in the bathroom to wash my face and found a sticker stuck to the bottom of my ear. I am hoping she snuck that on me AFTER we finished our errands that morning! Her favorite is sticking them on her cheeks or belly.


Loving dancing to Daddy's ipod in his new speaker docking station.

No More Monkeys!

She told me she wanted her binky...which she gets at naptime. Then she said she wanted to "go snoozy in mommy's bed". And this is what it turned out to be. (sorry, you'll have to tilt your head).

Can you guess which book we have been reading lately before bedtime?
She is now peacefully sleeping in her crib, where she belongs!

Back In Action!

New Camera!!!!!! I couldn't be happier!!!
Emma & I went shopping for our new little toy this morning and we have been playing with it all afternoon. This camera is awesome, takes great pictures inside our house and out, and we can't wait to do lots of fun things with it.


Somersault!


So fun to be outside. When we pull up the driveway in the car Emma thinks we are automatically going to be playing outside since it is so nice out. She says "yeay, rake the leaves". Hah! She just runs around playing while I do all the work!



I got her a new easel so she could use her chalk inside the house. She discovered other uses for it as well this afternoon......here she is singing 'twinkle twinkle little star' inside.


Do I even have to narrate this photo? "JILL! Stop taking pictures of our every move!"


Bunny Hop


This is one of my favorites. I REALLY wanted a camera that would take pictures and blur the background....but that feature cost about 5x more than I wanted to spend on a camera. However, this one can be set to do a pretty close job! Next up, I will find some editing software that will make it even better!



"oh Daddy, your kisses just melt my heart"

Sweet Ending to a Sour Day

Yesterday I was sick. I had been feeling yucky for about 2 weeks, and Sunday night it hit hard. Turns out I just have a little bronchitis that we are treating with some antibiotics so I should be good as new soon! Thankfully Felix was off on Monday and took care of Emma while I stayed in bed. He made all of us scrambled eggs for breakfast, and mine were served in bed along with some warm hot chocolate.

Felix played with Emma all morning, read books, sang songs, danced, built towers, and even managed to load/unload the dishwasher and do laundry. By 11am I was up taking a shower and we all headed out to the grocery store together. I appreciated the help, and being that there wasn't even 1 loaf of bread in the house, it was a chore that needed to get done.

In under an hour (record time for my grocery shopping w/Emma!!) we got home, Felix fed Emma lunch and I put her down to nap, then napped myself for the next 3 hours. I finally got up and dragged myself out of the house at 5:30 to go teach.

When I got home, Felix had already fed Emma dinner and had our dinner simmering on the stove. We both put Emma to bed, sat on the couch...and here is the best part.....

Felix said "man! tomorrow when I go to work is going to be like having a day off!".

Ahhhhhh....... no words have ever made me happier. I know as soon as he said it he realized I wouldn't let him live it down, but it is just so nice that he got to experience a day in my shoes. Although both of us have fun, it is tough and makes for a long day sometimes! The only difference is that usually I save all the dishes & laundry for him to do when he gets home from work :)

Thank Goodness!!!

This morning at 8:30am I made myself a delicious little fruit smoothie with oranges, bananas, & blueberries expecting it to last me until lunchtime. As I drove to the JCC to teach, Emma munched on her waffle and I drank my smoothie.
By the time I picked her up from Felix at 10:30am and headed to our playdate, I was starving. I considered stopping at the ol' DD for a bagel sandwich but decided against it since I have been really trying to pound down the fruits and veggies lately.
By 12:30pm Emma & I were home eating lunch. I was still starving after I finished my plate.

I decided to check the blog (my life record!) to see when this never-ending hunger struck during my pregnancy with Emma, and sure enough.... 24 weeks- click here to see ! And how random, because just as I did about 2 years ago......we had PB&J for lunch today (but strawberries instead of bananas for a side)!! Phew! Now if only I had recorded when this hunger attack had ended!!!!

No More Camera

Well, we are officially "without" camera! The camera lense won't function properly, I've even given it a day to chill out and try to cooperate, but it has had enough.

Loving the excuse to go buy a new awesome one, hating the fact that I can't take pictures until we get one :)

Anyways, Emma had her first mommy & me class at the YMCA today, and we absolutely loved it! I transferred her out of the gymnastics class we were originally in. I was very unhappy with the instructor, there were only 2 other kids in there, and it was real gymnastics equipment- which was very intimidating to her. Plus, I'm not sure if I mentioned that last week in class Emma was scared to go on the rope swing and when the teacher said "don't worry, I have you tight"... she DROPPED her! I was holding onto Emma as well so I caught her, but I was a bit surprised! However- being that I might want to pick up teaching some aerobics classes there one day, I made sure not to complain and just nicely asked to be moved to another class (for a $10 fee!!).
This class we went to today was fantastic. It was all colorful soft fun equipment, the teacher had a ton of energy, started off with a welcome song and an activity song, then we had some free play with all the awesome toys, then parachute time and more songs. Emma was smiling and giggling and participating in everything having the time of her life.
And that makes me happy.

On another note, this baby boy of ours inside my belly is a moving machine! He moves ALL THE TIME especially punching me in my bladder. Yesterday in step aerobics class I had to leave THREE times to go to the bathroom (not that I am complaining.... gives me time to catch my breath!), but the nighttime sleep routine has been interrupted more than I would like! And we are only 24 weeks in little guy.... you better slow down!