Anna's New Moon and Star Night Gown

Anna's New Moon and Star Night Gown
Originally uploaded by joyz.

Sophie looking cute

Sophie looking cute
Originally uploaded by joyz.

Smiley Anna

Smiley Anna
Originally uploaded by joyz.

Once Again, Sophie looking cute

Once Again, Sophie looking cute
Originally uploaded by joyz.

Birthday Girl

Birthday Girl
Originally uploaded by joyz.

I didn't get very many pictures from Anna's birthday party....so I need to get some from those of you who did!!

Holding Court

Holding Court
Originally uploaded by joyz.

Honey and SoSo

Honey and SoSo
Originally uploaded by joyz.

Sophie Smiles

SophieSmiles
Originally uploaded by joyz.

Anna's Thumb

Anna'sThumb
Originally uploaded by joyz.

Kissing Cousins

KissingCousins
Originally uploaded by joyz.

Annabelle and Julian

GOT EGGNOG?

Well, I was half asleep this morning when I went to the fridge to pour Anna some morning milk. Within five minutes she was asking for more...this is unusal as it usually takes her an hour to finish a cup of milk. I went to the fridge to pour her a little more and as I was putting the cap on the "milk" I realized why she was longing for more.....it was EGG NOG! I can't drink more than a few sips of egg nog without feeling sick so it'll be interesting to see how her little tummy will handle this.
HO HO HO

THE GIRLS

THE GIRLS
Originally uploaded by joyz.

I forgot to put this one on...it's one of my favorites....Sophie looks so intense =).

SophieAnna

SophieAnna
Originally uploaded by joyz.

Annainleaves

Annainleaves
Originally uploaded by joyz.

Sophana

Sophana
Originally uploaded by joyz.

Annalookingatleaf

Annalookingatleaf
Originally uploaded by joyz.

Pudge and Co.

Pudge
Originally uploaded by joyz.

Supersize Me

Supersize Me
Originally uploaded by joyz.

Stephen and I watched Supersize Me last night and I woke up with a stomach ache. Indy, if you're reading this, I have plans to watch this with you when you're here...you'll freak. This guy eats McDonalds every meal for an entire month. He has to eat everything on the menu at least once during this time and if they ask him to Supersize it, he has to say yes and eat every bite. (He threw up after his first supersized meal.) He's a really healthy guy....his girl friend is a vegan chef so he's use to eating better than the average joe. He has three doctors and a nutritionist overseeing his health throughout the month....and they are shocked at how quickly it deteriorates. His liver begins to turn to mush. He gained 10 pounds in under a week and I think it was 25 pounds in the entire month. McDonalds never appealed to me much to begin with, but now it makes me want to puke!...Since being pregnant with Annabelle, I crave the occassional fast food meal which I hadn't desired in years. I've eaten more fast food in the last three years than I did in the ten years previously. While I don't eat nearly as much junk as the average American, I think I'm ready to return to my old, more healthy ways of eating....I'm not saying I will never get a Backyard Burger again, I'm sure I will...besides they're way more "real" than McDonalds. The thing that disturbed me probably the most was the fact that people drink so much pop. Cars manufactures are having to adapt to our unhealthy habits by making the cup holders bigger. I think they said that a smal drink in America's McDonalds is equivalent to a large in France's. So much sugar...so much caffeine...so many cranky, tired and addicted people.

Sophie Rolled Over =)

Well, we knew it wouldn't be long! She rolled over and I missed it!! She was on her tummy in the living room and I was in the kitchen fixing lunch for Anna. I heard a little kerplop, looked over at Sophie and she was on her back! The other night she had almost rolled over from her back to her stomach. She was all the way on her stomach, but her shoulder was trapped under her. It's so interesting to watch her try to do it. She's so determined! Annabelle never tried to do these things...we had to force her to be physical so it's going to be different this time around...I might even have to really child proof the house! =)

These boots are made for walking....

Nana bought Annabelle some Ugg-type boots at the evil empire (not Starbucks...the other one). Anyway, I put them on her the other day and after many attempts to get her to stand on her new furry feet, she finally stood in a braced stance....frozen. Once I convinced her that she could let go of my hand and stand on her own with these big clunkers, she refused to move but stood in the middle of the living room with a terrified look on her face. She would occassionally look down and then up at me with a confused and worried look. I kept telling her it was okay and that she could walk in them, but she was not so sure this was possible. I finally did what always works, I bribed her. I filled a cup with a handful of raisins and her face immediately lit up. I thought this would make her forget about the foreign objects embracing her feet and get her running to the kitchen....but that's not Annabelle's style. My cautious child decided that the benefit of eating her version of candy was worth the risk of moving in these boots. I say "moving" because she didn't walk in them, she shuffled her way to the coveted raisins. The boots never left the ground...but she made it to her destination. She ate the raisins in the kitchen still maintaining an unsure stance. After the raisins were gone, I decided to not push the issue any more...to just kind of ignore her to see if she would ever leave her safe spot in the kitchen. It wasn't long before the boredom set in and she made her first real step in the boots and then another and then another until she was stomping through the house like she was born in those boots.....

Storytime

Storytime
Originally uploaded by joyz.

Traveling Mercies

For those of you who haven't read it, I highly recommend reading Traveling Mercies by Anne Lamott. It's basically her autobiography, her spiritual journey....I just read the Mole chapter and boy, do I relate....(in it, she describes her cancer concerns....I admit, I do have a few worrisome bumps, lumps and moles...but I guess most of you reading this (if anyone) have already given your diagnosis on all of them for me, several times...)

Anways, this book has been good for me. Stephen and I have been so disgruntled with the whole church culture, particularly in the Bible belt....we like to bitch about it, but don't seem to have many real solutions to all the problems that we see....or at least we don't have the time or energy to implement the proper "solutions". Deep down I know that any time you get a group of people together, especially ones gathered in God's name, there's going to be trouble....if we know that ahead of time, it really helps. Anyways, this book is really good for me to read because it's written by someone who can really appreciate her church....she didn't grow up in one....she chose to go to one as an adult and she chose it for its spirit and humble people, not fancy buildings and programs. She found a place to be loved and she found the courage to accept that love....and as a result she looks for opportunities to love others. That's what I need to do....

Homeschooling....

Looking back on my post about Anna's ABC's, I realize that I sound like an obnoxious mom talking about her DD on the babycenter site. Oh well, when it's your own child, it never feels like you're one of THOSE moms. Anways, I saw this article on line about how it's unhealthy to tutor toddlers. Apparently moms are putting their preschoolers in Kumon centers to get ahead for kindergarten. I don't want to be one of THOSE moms. But at the same time, I figure as long as it's fun for her and she's interested, there's no harm in learning....Speaking of, I'm 90% sure that I want to homeschool my kids...not because I want to raise them in a bubble and surround them with like-minded families, but because the education system sucks. I want to encourage a love of learning, not the boredom that comes from making a six year old sit still for seven hours a day. The fact that I want to do this surprises me, since a year ago I was pretty much convinced that homeschooling meant ensuring that your children will grow up to be awkward adults, who while being brilliant cannot find a way to interact with society in a productive manner....so therefore, their intelligence is wasted. Now after becoming friends with some former homeschoolers who are both smart and socially adept, I'm wondering if I shouldn't give it a try when the time comes. Sending Annabelle and Sophie to school just seems like such a waste. I feel like it would beat the natural curiousity out of them and create little robots who know the right information but don't care about it. I think I'll at least give it a try....and I would have to find someone else to teach science....

Sophilicious

Sophilicious
Originally uploaded by joyz.

My sweet, sweet Sophie....more later...

Annaraisin

Annaraisin
Originally uploaded by joyz.

Since I'm having a hard time finding time to journal about life with the girls, I'm going to at least try to keep new photos up...it's easier than e-mailing them to everyone...

POTTY TIME

Well, potty training has officially begun...wish us luck.

PARTY IDEAS?!?!

I would love it if you guys would help me brainstorm for party ideas for Anna's second birthday. I actually want to plan some fun stuff this year...last year was pretty simple...family, cake, presents. This year, I thought it would be fun to do a really cute cake, invite some kiddos over and maybe have some fun stuff for them to do and some cute party favors. I would love to have some input....
I'm going to try to keep it simple and not go overboard since she is only two and won't be really into the whole birthday party thing like she will be in later years....but I can't help myself because I love this kind of thing!!

ABC's & 123's

Well, I didn't know it, but apparently Annabelle can count to five!! Two of my aunts were over yesterday and Annabelle was saying her ABC's for them. They asked if she can count and I started to say "No, we haven't worked on that yet..." But then my aunt said, "One," and Annabelle looked at her and said, "Two......three," before my aunt said it!! Then later that night, she counted to five by herself!! I've been counting figures in her books with her ever since I started reading to her when she was about two months old, but hadn't really worked with her on it. I'm not sure she quite understands the concept of course, but she does hold up her fingers when doing it and tries to hold up the correct number of fingers. Since this is my journal for her I'm going to document all the other things she's learned so far, at the risk of sounding like an obnoxious mom!! She has been able to recognize and say certain colors (purple, yellow and blue) since about 19 months. Now she can recognize many other colors (pink, red, orange, green) although she cannot quite say them yet....she did say "pink" last night though and has said something that resembles "green" before. She has been able to recognize and do the sign for circles ever since she was at least 16 months. She learned star around the same time, along with moon of course...she can sign and say those. Around 20 months, she learned other shapes (square, diamond (she does the sign for this), triangle) because of that danged Leap frog doll!! She can't say those yet but she can point to them. She is working on oval, rectangle and octagon. Pretty cool, huh? These are the letters that she can say and recognize in any order (I know I'm being kind of obnoxious here, but I want to have this documented, otherwise I WILL forget these specifics!!) Okay, so these are the letter she can say and recognize, "A, B, C, D, E, F, G, I, J, O, P, S, Z" and these are the ones she recognizes, but doesn't say yet, "H, L, V," She may know more than I think....but these are ones that we've really worked on. She's still working on the whole talking thing, but she's babbling more than ever with definite words mixed in.
I'm assuming since only family reads this blog, no one will mind my little brag session! =)

Sophie Says

"So So"
Originally uploaded by joyz.

Sophie says let's elect Pudge for president!

Trick or Treat

DSCN2555
Originally uploaded by joyz.

Well, it was Anna's first time to really trick or treat, as last year she was not walking yet. She really liked being dressed up and never complained about the "get up". Sophie was also a ladybug, but somehow we didn't get any pictures of her. =( She was asleep through most of it. I promise I will get her dressed up again and get some pictures. We did get lots of video though. Stephen made a moon and stars jack-o-lantern for the girls....it was actually a pretty uneventful night!

Anna's Pumpkins

DSCN2544
Originally uploaded by joyz.

Anna enjoyed painting pumpkins to hand out while trick or treating.

In search of the blanket

Blanket
Originally uploaded by joyz.

Well, we lost Annabelle's hoyhoy today. This is her first night to sleep without her blanket since she began sleeping with it about 8 months ago. So far she's doing okay....she did toss and turn with her eyes closed, doing the sign for blanket and saying "duh, duh" while reaching out next to her in hopes of finding it. She settled on her big flannel blanket and it appears to be giving her enough comfort for now. I just hate the thought that her dirty pink blanket is just that, a worn little piece of flannel and satin, to all who have seen it today, and that the person who values it the most may never see it again =(.....it makes me sad...after all the times that I've cursed the darn thing, who would've thought!=)

Anna at the Pumpkin Patch

Anna at the Pumpkin Patch
Originally uploaded by joyz.

So we took Annabelle and Sophie to the pumpkin patch with some friends of ours and their kids. We should have known things weren't going to be as fun as we thought when our friends arrived and Annabelle freaked out because she is scared of their 3-year-old son for some reason. Any time he came near her she would cry and cling to me. I don't know what it is, but she seems to have a new fear of boys. (It'll be nice if she still has this fear at 15, but it doesn't make for very fun play dates at two.) After some attempts at getting her to "be a friend" (that's our new phrase), we decided to focus on the fun that surrounded us. We were looking forward to seeing Annabelle pick out a pumpkin, ride the little train and go down the big slide. She did enjoy looking at the pumpkins and LOOKING at the train, but when it came time to ride it, she freaked out. Stephen went with her and we thought that her screaming would subside after she realized how much fun it was to actually be riding the train that she had been watching all morning. She spent the entire ride with her head buried in Stephen's chest, whining and crying. She continued to be fussy the rest of our time there. I was determined to at least take her down the big slide one time. She seemed to be liking it until we got to the bottom where she freaked out again...On that note, we went home....but we got some great pictures out of the ordeal! =)

Hoy Hoy

What is Hoy Hoy?

Well, I THOUGHT I had dubbed the term when I was but a wee little thing...It's what I called (always through clenched teeth, mind you) my favorite stuffed toy, which happened to be a stuffed tomato (every kid needs some stuffed produce to love on). Even after the tomato was devoured by my dog, my mom made me a new one and I made sure she stuffed the remnants of the old tomato inside...so the "soul" would still be there....anyways, the dog had a liking for tomatos and proceeded to munch up the new "hoy hoy". Imagine my heartbreak when I was told that the fabric store no longer sold the pattern for stuffed tomatos (I can't imagine why...). So hoy hoy's "soul" was stuffed into my Strawberry Shortcake doll and remains there today. Hoy hoy became the name for anything in our family that was well-loved and had the scars to prove it...such as my mom's old stationwagon, my sister's one-armed doll, etc. etc. I decided to search for "hoy hoy" on google and found out that it is not MY word, but has been around for quite some time. Here's what I found:

What is Hoy Hoy?

It's an expression that was commonly used in R&B lyrics from the 1940's until about 1951. It started with Cab Calloway's record "Hoy Hoy," in 1937, and gained more fame with the platter "The Honeydripper" by Joe Liggins, which kept the #1 spot for 18 weeks in the summer of 1945. In the record, Hoy is repeated many times during the bridge. Between 1945 and 1951, hundreds of R&B records included the phrase in the lyrics, but after 1951 the expression wasn't heard much, since by then everything was changing over to doo-wop vocal groups, and the teenagers probably didn't think the expression was cool anymore. The origin of the phrase "Hoy Hoy" in black music of the 1940's in unknown, at least by us.

-This was taken from Hoyhoy.com-a site for enthusiasts of hard-rocking R&B from the years immediately before doo wop and rock 'n' roll.

Sophie Elizabeth

Sophie Elizabeth
Originally uploaded by joyz.

Annabelle Rose

Annabelle Rose
Originally uploaded by joyz.

My daughter's first love

photopg_08
Originally uploaded by joyz.

When Annabelle was about 15 months old, she was sitting on my husband's lap at the computer. She asked him to play some music by doing a sign (she's an avid baby signer =)) Anways, he asked her what she wanted to listen to, not really expecting an answer. She proceeded to pat the top of her head, which is her sign for Jon, one of our good friends. She had been listening to Johhny Cash a lot, but we didn't know that she knew really who he was. Well apparently she did...when my husband answered her request for "Jon", she got so excited and boogied down =). From that time on, she pats her head every time we get in the car, before bed, when she wakes up....it's an all-day request! I love Johnny Cash, but I have to say that too much of a good thing can get old! =) At least she's not asking for the wiggles though.

Never Say Never

twinkies2
Originally uploaded by joyz.

I always said that I would never dress my children alike, like my mother did to my sister and me...but alas, it has not even been two months with two and look how cute they look...my little twinkies! I also said I would never have a bunch of plastic toys cluttering my house...oh well...never say never.

Sisters

Anna and Sophie
Originally uploaded by joyz.

Annabelle and Sophie have no idea how much fun awaits them in the future. Dress up, tea parties, bike rides to Braums, bubble baths, summer camp, dance recitals...hair pulling, name-calling, sharing clothes and the fights that accompany that, pimples and prom dresses....but alas those days will end and they'll find that nothing compares to having a sister...to having one who understands what you want to say when you just can't find the words, who forgives you when your words are cruel, who knows you probably better than you know yourself and who loves you more than you can imagine.