Baby Lola

Today we got to meet the newest member of our family... Lola Sue Schumacher.  She was born to Andy and Lacey on February 22nd, weighing in at an impressive 9 lbs, 12 oz!!!  She is just perfect, with the most adorable cheeks I've ever seen!!

Claire holding her baby cousin.

So sweet!  Claire nicknamed her Lola Bear!

Added bonus - we got to see Nana and Papa!

We got Georgie sunglasses to match Claire's. 

Two little divas!

Welcome, sweet Lola.. and congrats Andy and Lacey!

Halfway to One!

Where does the time go?!  Our sweet Emmy Lou is 6 months old!!  It goes so. much. faster. the second time around.  It feels like she was born yesterday!

I love seeing her little personality develop.  Emma's most favorite thing in life seems to be her big sister Claire.  She can't get enough!  Claire can make her laugh like no one else can... it's just the most precious thing to see the girls start to interact with each other. 

She's eating lots of solid food now - bananas, pears, green beans, avocado, peas, sweet potato, and applesauce.  She usually makes strange faces the first time I feed her a new food and many times won't eat it much the first time.  She usually does better the second time I give it to her.  Very unlike Claire, who I think was born without taste buds!  Claire never acted fazed by a new taste.  Fun to see how God made them similar and different! 

I love my jumperoo and have figured out how to make it work!



6 months old!

I'm getting this sitting up thing figured out.

I love to smile and laugh, especially at my big sissy!

I'm looking forward to her sixth month appt in a couple weeks (minus the shots) to see how much she's grown.  Lovin' my time with my sweet baby, who is already half way to a year old! 

Official

So, now we're officially an American family... we got ourselves a minivan!  I've never been one of those people who claims they'll never drive a minivan.  On the contrary, I've always anxiously awaited the day that we'd get to have one.  They are just so roomy and comfortable! 

We found an amazing deal we just couldn't pass up, so we traded in our Jeep, which we've somehow managed to cram the four of us into for the past six months, and drove home in style!  We got almost an even trade... we only had to pay a little extra for a WAAAAY better ride. 

Not only does it have tons more space, but it has lots of fun extras like automatic closing doors and even a DVD player!  We are so thankful!  Family road trips, here we come!!

Happy Valentine's Day!

We had a fun Valentine's day at our house!  It started with a special breakfast and some gifts for the girls.  My mom always got us a little something on Valentine's Day and that always has stuck with me.  Even if it was something small, I used to love coming downstairs on Valentine's Day and seeing a pretty present waiting for me.  That's something I want to continue with our girls because it always made me feel so loved! :) 

Even though Justin took me on a surprise date night out (complete with sending me for a manicure beforehand!) on Friday night, he cooked us a delicious dinner of scallops, gourmet veggies, and wine for dinner.  Gotta love a man who can cook! 

What a perfect day with the people I love!

Our day started with pink heart-shaped pancakes and strawberry milk... super healthy, I  know! :)

Claire showing off her new glasses from Mommy and chocolates from Daddy

Emma got a new sippy cup!

Doesn't this look like a paparazzi photo??

Thanks for our matching Valentine's outfits, Grammy!

Sisterly love

Girly girls

These pictures were too cute not to share.  Claire and her friend Lucy were so cute yesterday, dressing up in princess dresses and doing each other's hair.  Love it!!

Paci Update

So, things on the paci front are going well.  The first few days were bad but I think she's officially kicked the addiction.  She hasn't asked for her paci since Monday and, although she doesn't go to sleep quite as easily as she did before, I'd say we're well on our way.  When I say the first few days were bad I mean like having--five-accidents-on-purpose-because-she-was-so-mad bad.  And like sticking-her-finger-down-her-throat-to-try-and-make-herself-throw-up bad.  I'm so not kidding!  Can you believe a 2-year-old would do something like that?  Well, believe it!  Mine did!  Things were so bad on Monday.  She wanted that paci back and was so mad that I wouldn't give it to her.  She was throwing fits all afternoon so I would put her in her room and tell her she needed to take a break until her heart was happy.  She would just instantly pee on the floor in her room and scream, "I HAD AN ACCIDENT!!!"  Or one time when I put her in there she screamed out, "I'M GONNA HAVE AN ACCIDENT!!!"  And she did.  Totally on purpose.  Then when I would try to talk to her (as calmly as I possibly could, despite how angry I was!), she kept trying to stick her finger down her throat and gag herself.  I don't even know how she knows how to do that.  Or why she would want to.  Let's just say this situation brought to light my sweet daughter's sinful nature.  It was not one of my favorite days in my mothering life.  It's amazing how God uses our children to shape and mold us though.  I constantly had to stop and pray for patience on Monday.  I am not a patient person.  I'm just not.  And cleaning up pee over and over and over again was really wearing on the little amount of patience I have.  God really just impressed on my heart how much I need Him and His strength as I mother because on my own, I just don't have it.

 So, I guess you could say it was a big week for both of us.  Claire finally kicked her paci habit and I got some serious reminders from the Lord that I just simply cannot do this mama thing unless I'm seeking Him daily and begging for help from the Almighty One.   

Operation: No more paci

Today was the day.  The day I've dreaded. The day we had to get rid of Claire's paci. I've been dreading this day for a long time, as Claire has had a love affair with her paci from day one.  A little after she turned one, we limited paci time to naps and bedtime only, but now that she's two, we decided it was time to be done with it once and for all... especially since she started to chew through them about a month ago.  One by one we've been throwing them away when she chews them.  She has had one beloved paci left (her Bella paci, as she called it... yes, my child named her pacis... we went through circle paci, birdie paci, kitty paci, herky paci, and now the beloved bella paci named after her friend Isabella) for a few weeks now.  I noticed that there was the teeniest tiniest little slit in it a few days ago and realized that it was time to take action.

 So, knowing it was going to be painful, we tried to make it as fun as possible.  After church today, we wrote a letter to the Paci Fairy and asked her to take Claire's paci in exchange for a gift.  We talked about how the Paci Fairy could fix Claire's broken paci and bring it to a new baby who needs it.  Claire liked that idea and decided that baby Evy needs it.  So we asked the Paci Fairy to bring it to baby Evy in Africa (who is hardly a baby anymore and doesn't even use a paci....).
 

Claire took a few final sucks....

And we put the letter and her paci in a basket.

Then it was naptime....  Let's just say I HAVE NEVER heard Claire scream like that in. her. life.  We did everything we could think of to try to calm her down and when we realized nothing was going to work, we just said goodnight and left her.  The screaming lasted 30 minutes and then she fell asleep (after both wetting the bed and throwing up from crying so hard!!).  She only slept about 30 minutes instead of her usual 2 hours, but at least she slept.  That's success in my book! 

When she got up from her nap, we told her the Paci Fairy had come to visit.  She left Claire a letter and a brand new baby!

Claire was thrilled!

The true test will be bedtime and I know the next few nights will not be great, but at least we are on our way!  I admit, it's a little sad for me, knowing that my little girl is growing up so fast.  This was one of the last things about Claire that made her still seem like a baby to me.  *Sigh* 

Blizzard of 2011

We woke up to quite the storm on Wednesday morning!  I think the snow total was around 13-15 inches.  Crazy!!  We have the tiniest driveway and it still took Justin 2 and 1/2 hours to shovel it.  Our neighbor even came over to help with his snow blower.  It was just nuts!!

Although I'm not a fan of cold and snow, I must admit that it was all pretty exciting!

Somewhere in there is our street.  It was hard to tell the difference between driveway, yard, and street.

The side of our neighbor's house

Justin digging us out!

Holy blizzard batman!

Claire had a front row seat watching Daddy shovel!

Pretty girl!

Claire is really into activities, as she calls them, lately!  Here was our snowy day activity.. playing with rice, warm and cozy inside!

Need a good laugh?

Make sure your volume is up! 

This is what happens...

... when mama talks on the  phone instead of supervising....