Run of the Mill

Summer is a really fun time around here.  But seriously, busy.  Our typical days go something like this:
Dad up: 5 Am - workout
Mom up: 6:30 am - drink coffee
Macie up: between 7 and 8.  I'm hoping more for  the 8, sleeping in would be fabulous!
Penelope up: between 6:30 and 8.  Usually she wakes up around 6, but if I let her talk for just a few minutes, she'll fall back asleep.  A number of times I've gone in there at 8 and I've had to actually wake her back up.
Dad goes to work around 7.  Momma tries to get a few chores done before the girls get up.  Sometimes more successfully then others.
Macie breakfast, Penelope breakfast.  8 am is the only feeding that I don't have to supplement, I have enough milk.  That is nice.  The other feedings I have to supplement with around 3-4 ounces of formula.
After breakfast for everyone I have decisions to make.  Do we venture out?  Do we do chores?  Do we excersize?  This changes day by day, and I've found that I've actually saved quite a bit of  money this summer, because I don't leave the house the way I used to.  And I'm grateful I don't have too much cabin fever.  Now, trips to Tar.get are more of a big deal, so we make that our actual outing.  So my Dave Ramsey envelopes are more full than they used to be!  Ha.
Then it's feed Penny at 11, snack for Macie around 10 or 10:30 (or not if all if she is busy playing and doesn't ask for one).  Once Penny is done eating I start thinking of lunch for Macie and I.  Usually PB&J or something like that.  Then it's play and read for Macie, Penelope plays on her 'mat' quite a bit.  And she enjoys the swing...these are all places you'll find her.  Macie goes down for a nap around 1 (depending on how much energy she's burned off in the morning, but always a nap) and gets up between 3 and 4.  No, she doesn't actually sleep the whole time, but she plays quietly in her bed, so I sometimes feel like the luckiest.mom.in.the.world.  Because after Penelope eats at 2, I can sometimes get her to take a nap, and I get 30 glorious minutes to myself in the afternoon.  And how do I spend it?  Trying to decide what to do of course.  Yesterday I did 20 minutes of the dan.cing with the stars DVD workout I bought years ago.  It was good, but my feet are sore today.
Then Macie's up, Penny eats at 5, time to make dinner.  Somewhere in there Dad gets home, we eat dinner, play a little and then bathtime, read time and Macie's in bed at 8 and Penny is eating 2nd dinner at 8.  The only bummer is that I am still mourning the time I used to have once Macie was asleep.  Put her to bed at 8, boom, rest of the night is ours.  But Penelope is a fantastic child, so I hate to complain, but that girl can take up to an HOUR to eat her milk.  And I hate to skimp on it, because she doesn't eat in the middle of the night, so I don't want her to be starving when she wakes up.  So she doesn't always go to bed until about 9:30. 
Here are some pictures for this incredibly boring post:

My little cutie!

                                  
 Reading at Bedtime

And of course, some staged fourth of july pictures.  Macie had an adorable cowgirl hat, but it was SO hard to keep in on her for pictures.  Anyone else have that problem?

So I just took pictures of her throwing the hat.  Probably not the smartest mom moment, but make lemons, right?

That's our run of the mill day.  Penelope will be 4 months on Monday (how did THAT happen!?) and Macie is 26 months.  I love these girls with all my heart, and I can't believe I get to be their momma.  What a huge blessing it is.

She's 3 Months!

 Yes, these pictures in the laundry basket is from pintrest.  I can't believe how big she already is. 

We don't have a Dr. appointment at 3 months, and at 2 months, she was 11.6 lbs, so I'm imagining somewhere about 12 1/2 pounds.  She really is a GOOD baby.  Not perfect, but really good.  Penny wakes up between 6 and 8 AM and eats at that time.  She still naps in between each feeding, but it's wonderful because she'll nap anywhere and we can be out and about and she'll just sleep in her stroller.  She eats about 2-4 ounces after I breast feed her (making me think she's getting between 3-5 ounces per feeding).  She loves the swing, and the floor mat.  AND, here's the big news, she has rolled over from her tummy to her back - 6 times!  5 times to the right and 1 time to the left.  This started the day before she turned 3 months.  She is good at smiling and babbling.  She gets startled fairly easily, and with her big sister jumping on her, occasionally she gets upset.  Penny, you are a delight and I love watching you grow.

Speaking of her big sister, I wanted to add one more picture, here is how I found Macie after her nap yesterday.  Completely out.  I'm guessing she wasn't tired when I put her down, because she apparently did some reading, some dusting, talking on the phone, etc. 

How precious are these little girls!?  My heart is very full and I love what I do.  In other news, I just found out that I get to be 60% this year at work.  What does that mean?  I start work at 6:54 and am finished at 9:58.  Um...Heck Yes!!!!!!!!!!!!  That's officially part time.  I will have other obligations and grading and planning to do, but seriously, this is Fantastic!  I can work and still be able to enjoy the girls and everything.  So I'm very thankful for this developement. 

And maybe one other reason I am feeling good this morning, is that today I get to use the mothers day gift DH got me, a trip to the spa for a massage.  And some friends' husbands did the same, so we are going to enjoy ourselves. 

I hope you all have a tremendous Wednesday!

Summertime!

 Summer is Here!  It's been tremendous.  We're busy, busy, and I'm really enjoying it.  We recently renewed our D.isneyland Passes and it may be the last time for a few years.  We'll see.  They raised the prices so that it costs a LOT to go regularly.  This year was fine, becuase both girls are still free.  But next year we'll have to buy 3 (kids 2 and under are free), and the pass we usually buy was just raised to 499.  That doesn't even let you in all the time, but as teachers, it lets you have most weekends.  So while there are cheaper options, we still find this to be the best bet for us.  But I digress...we've been going often.  It's a great way to spend a couple hours and keep Macie entertained. 
Below, Chip (or is it Dale?) said hi to Penny on her first visit.

 Then, Macie was able to say hi to Goofy.  She thinks he's pretty funny.  I personally could do without Goofy, but that's okay.  I'll get over his goofy-ness.

 For Father day, my mommy's Bible study group from church went to a woodworking factory and did a craft for him.  The picture looks great, but Penny was crying almost the whole time, and then Macie was difficult to stop from painting everywhere.  But I think the final product came out pretty good and it was fun to give her daddy this frame on Fathers day (he also got a new Bible, as most of Exodus and Leviticus fell out of his old one - which is a cool thing when your Bible is so used you have to get another one...). 

 We've also been on vacation for a few days.  We went to the Hunting.ton Beach Hyat.t.  It's a great way to vacation here in Southern California, because it's like going to a tropical resort, but without any driving or flying hassles.  (we live about 45 minutes from the beach.).  We paid extra to have a room with two rooms, and that was perfect.  macie slept on the couch and Penny slept with us.  Also, my mom stayed in a room next door (her idea) and at night Dh and I got to go to the spa, and out to drinks...it was a pretty suite set up.  But that's already come and gone.  Oh Hyatt, we'll see you next year. 

                                                                                   Here we have Penny at the nursing station in Disneyla.nd (they have a fantatistic Baby care center), just being generally cute.

                                                                                 And on Mother's Day we have Penelope dedicated at church.  It was cool, there are a tremendous amount of families with little children.  Before we had our first, it was the kind of thing that would sting my heart a little bit, so I didn't take one minute of it for granted.  We had some good friends also dedicating their children.

 Told you it was a big crowd.  And if the stage looks funny, it was on purpose.  We were doing a series called "Faith like Country" and we tried to replicate the grand ol. opry on stage.  It actually looked really good.  And just to toot God's horn a little bit, this is the same church that Dh and I got to help start just 4 years ago.  There are almost 800 people who come regularly.  Can you believe it?!  That kind of growth in 8 years is really cool.

That's just a sampling of what we've been up to.  I find it so hard to keep up with writing on this blog, but I'm faithfully reading all about you guys, and I love it.  I hope summer finds you all doing well. What are some of your favorite summer activities?

Discipline

Let's get controversial.
Actually scratch that.  I just want to know what works for your families without being mean to each other.
Here's my sitch: (that's short for situation)
Macie is 2.  Macie will be playing with something (the light switch, kicking the drivers seat in the car, a doll, anything).  I ask her to stop.  She doesn't stop, she gets time out.  I generally put her in the hallway for 2 minutes, on her bottom.  She is silent.  Just waits.  When I come and get her after 2 mintues, I try to talk to her about what happened.  She says "sorry momma".  We hug.
5 minutes later, she does something else she shouldn't do.  More Timeout.  More 'sorry momma'.
Now, obviously she doesn't understand 'sorry' fully.  But she doesn't mind time out.  Today I used a specific chair that is her size and called it the 'naughty' stool.  She loved it. 
As she was about to earn her third time out she said "Macie time out?"  I asked her, "do you like time out?" she very sweetly and innocently said "yeah, macie like-a-time out". 
Um.  Where do we go from here?  I'm not opposed to spanking, but not for something like playing with the lights.  I'm thinking that is saved for if she does something like run into the street. 
Do any of you do a marble jar?  Or a star chart?  Or happy faces?  Is she too young?
What do you do for discipline?
HELP!

2 months etc.

We had Penny's 2 month exam and everything looked great!  She's 11 lbs 6 oz, 23 inches and doing well.  It's hard to imagine that her sister was 24 1/2 inches and 13 lbs 7 oz at the same appointment.  I do think Penny will catch up, it's just that she had further to grow (starting almost a pound smaller and loosing all that weight). 
We've been getting the hang of having 2 kids around here.  Things have changed for the better for sure.  In fact, last night Penny slept from 9:30 until 4 AM (I got up and re-swaddled her) and then from 4 to 7AM.  People, are you reading that?!  She slept almost 10 hours.  And that is the 3rd time she's done that.  It's fantastic.  I feel human again.  I really forgot how bad no sleep is.  For those of you who haven't slept since 2009, I can only imagine the pain you're in. 
Typically Penny eats around 8am and I try to feed her sister around 7:30, because if I'm feeding Penny while Macie is eating on her own, my cleanup factor jumps 3-fold.  Then Macie has a snack around 10, Penny eats at 11 and Macie and I eat lunch around noon.  Macie naps from about 1-3, Penny eats at 2.  Macie has a snack around 4 (depending on what time dinner will be), Penny eats at 5, and we eat somewhere around 6.  Bathtime all around by about 7:30 and then we read to Macie while Penny is eating again at 8.  Macie to bed around 8:15 (we try for earlier...) and Penny when she's finished eating, which could be around 9. 
One of you bloggers wrote an awesome comment that I'm going to butcher, but it goes like this:
What did I do today?
1.  Got up
2.  Survived
3.  Went to sleep.

I feel like mine should be:
1. Got up
2. Fed everyone
3.  Went to sleep.

That's what we're up to.  How about you?

Debt Free

Something else that we've been doing for the past 10 months is follow Dave Ramsey's Financial Peace University.  It's a 13 week course we took last summer that tells you how to get your finances together.  There is nothing revolutionary, it's just good money advice.  Well, we had a monumental event around here last night.  We made our last student loan payment!  When we started last July, we had just over 36 thousand in student loan debt.  This was combined from my undergrad, my masters degree, Dh's undergrad and his masters degree also.  So since last summer, we were able to pay the WHOLE thing off.  Can you believe it?!
I love talking about FPU because it's just so exciting.  Dave walks you through the 'baby steps' of how to get out of debt.  The first is to have a 1000 emergency fund.  The second is to pay off all your debts, smallest to largest.  The third is a fully funded emergency fund of 3-6 months of expenses.  There's a lot more to it of course, but really, I'm just so thrilled that God has blessed us with our finances and we FINALLY paid off our debt! 
What drives me nuts is that we didn't do it sooner.  If we had started this a few years ago, there is a possibility I could've stayed home with the girls.  But God's timing is perfect and I'm just going to rest in that.  If you're sitting here thinking 'that's great for her, but I'll never get out of this debt', you're wrong.  You can!  Dave is on the radio in most areas, just go to http://www.daveramsey.com/ and look for his station.  And I am NOT being paid to write this, I just believe strongly in his principles and want to share them.
So now, we get to build our emergency fund, plan for retirement, plan for the girls college, pay off the house...and give our money to valuable causes...and enjoy the paychecks we bring home every month, instead of having them already be spent on debt.

And in other news, Penelope will be 2 months tomorrow!  Dr's appointment in the morning.  I can't wait for her stats.  I'm positive she is big like her sister (and her mom and dad, who am I kidding).  But  hoping she's healthy and looking good.  Happy Tuesday everyone!

8 Weeks

Miss Penelope you're 8 weeks old! 

 Here she is wearing a monogramed shirt we had done for her sister.  Is that the saddest '2nd' child thing you've heard of?!  Our last name starts with an M though, so I figure we'll tell her that's what it was for.  Ha.

 I know this outfit is terrible, but I love the expression she has on her face.  This was an outfit my mom saved from when I was a child.  I can't imagine that much lace!

Here is when we went to th zoo.  You can tell she was really excited.

Here are some general stats at 8 weeks:

You are out of newborn clothes and almost out of 3 month clothes!  You wear size 1 diapers.  You are a super sleeper, thank you!  You eat 5 times a day (you've been on a schedule for the past 3 weeks or so [breastmilk first for 5 min on each side and then 2 oz of formula, except 8pm when I give you 4 ounces) and once at night, generally around 4 or 5 am.  But that's still a nice night sleep you're giving me, from about 9pm until 4 am!  Once you slept from 9 until 8 am, I can't wait until that becomes regular.  When we're out late and you come home in your carseat I will leave you in there in your bedroom and you love it.  You sleep a lot longer than when we swaddle you (from which you break free pretty quickly).

I can't wait to get to know you better and get to enjoy your fun personality.  So far you fit in just perfectly. 

What else will I want to remember about you?  You smile freely.  You burp easily.  You spit up only a little at a time, but pretty regularly after each feeding. You've started cooing and your daddy loves it.

We love you Penny, you are a joy.