Wow, long time since we posted any news huh? Well, Lindsey is now 16 and Sophie is 13. . . just kidding. Lindsey had a blast at her 3rd birthday party in March (technically it was her 2nd birthday party, since her 2nd birthday was a mere gathering of close friends in Oregon - thank you Braden Family). Sophie just turned 1 and enjoyed her first cupcake. I think she beats Lindsey on messiness. Sophie and Lindsey both enjoyed opening Sophie's presents, and sometimes Sophie even gets to play with her own toys. Although she is not really close to walking independently, Sophie is climbing absolutely everywhere, including under coffee tables, up 14 stairs (and can come down them - on tummy, feet first, with little reminder cues on her form), and on chairs to allow her to be up, near the counter tops! She is a very adventurous girl. Lindsey keeps her in line by telling her "no" when playing in Luey's water dish, when pushing buttons on the remote control, or when putting dirty shoes in her mouth. Lindsey is becoming a motor mouth in the home which we are all enjoying her cute voice. She continues to impress us with becoming more expressive and "outgoing" at school as she recently raised her hand to ask to sing the Barney song at snack time. For those of you who know Lindsey, this is a great accomplishment. Lindsey is a very cautious girl when it comes to new and overwhelming settings and adjusting to school has been tough. We are working with wonderful people who are all helping us get through these growing stages. In the meantime, Lindsey loves hollering to the kids in the neighborhood and riding around on her new bike trying to catch them. One fun lesson we recently learned: When taking youngters (particularly, our cautious clan) to a carnival, never buy an $18 wrist band PLUS tickets for rides, UNTIL the child has proven she will ride the rides. OOPS! She appeared soooo willing and eager to ride them when we first arrived but when it came down to it . . . Lindsey opted out. We left the carnival with a $5 bear that Lindsey won catching 3 fish, though. That, of course, was worth it all.

walking down from slide - little too scary for now

fishing to win the bear

yeh, the bear

climbing sophie

loves hats

In late January, Lindsey, Sophie and I made a lonnnnngggg roadtrip to STL to see family and friends. It was a great visit but long drive. The girls were troopers and I filled up on caffeine. Lindsey (and Sophie) experienced a total of TWO McDonalds Play Gyms (or whatever the heck you call them). She was encouraged by some older kids to go down the slides - coming out of her shell, we are so impressed!. I brought in extra food (I guess you aren't suppose to bring in your own food when you use the McD's playrooms but we did, shhh) and also bought a cheese burger and nuggets. Lindsey ate the peanut butter and jelly sandwich I brought! Didn't want the burger or nuggets! Great kid huh! So, I just had to eat them! Sophie had her mush cereal of course.We enjoyed our playtimes with all the Grandparents and with the Bridick clan. I enjoyed spending time with prego Nikki (and Mark) - kidfree! Thanks Mom and Don. When we arrived home, our kitchen was painted beautifully and meticulously! Thank you Todd. We now have an "accent" wall in the family room too which is nice. We choose a muted blue and we think it's looks good (it's not smurf blue). Now we only have the rest of the house to finish.Sophie is not only sitting well but also commando crawling everywhere. She is a very nosey child and just keeps moving! From what I can remember, Lindsey was very content in one spot and could keep herself occupied for minutes/hours . . . whatever!  ha! As for Sophie, I guess she has figured out that she needed to kick it up a notch in order to keep up with Lins.Last weekend we went "cold turkey" with potty training for Lins. She has been using the potty as her "convenience" for the past year but not with big girl panties. She is doing extremely well. No diapers in school either and no mistakes in school either. Only 2 mistakes at home since Sunday! Keep your fingers crossed.
Oh and we had 60 degree weather last Tuesday! Yes, really! It was great looking at it from inside work. At least the girls enjoyed it with walks at school. And now, well we have 2-3 inches of snow. This morning we were shoveling . . .

Where to begin? Sophie continues to grow and smile. These past few months have been soooo great since Sophie smiles at everything and only fusses when tired or hungry. Speaking of hungry . . . she seems to be all the time. So we recently started cereal which she is not too fond of. And no, it's not helping her sleep through the night. She can go about 10 hours at max. After her first ear infection (1 month ago) and now her 2nd cold, we may start playing hardball since Mom and Dad are both exhausted. And now for the exhausted part. . . Lindsey decided last week she wanted to sleep in her toddler bed. There's no turning back now apparently but she has figured out how to get out and run around at all hours of the night. Need I say more about how tired Todd and I are? On a little different note, Lindsey continues to grow up, darn it! Some days I want to talk to her like she is 20 and other days I want to cuddle with her like she's an infant. Now that she is in her big girl bed she doesn't want her back tickled or songs sang to her before she sleeps!!! ugh! I didn't think I would actually miss doing our little "routine" but gosh darn it, I DO!!! She even shakes her finger at me and says "no song no song mommy" - maybe I just need to take some voice lessons from Barney. We are ready for Christmas and for our family to visit. Unfortunately, or fortunately, we just keep buying gifts for lindsey (just little ones of course) because we can't wait to see her open them. Oh, about the weather, right now we are pondering over the idea of buying a snow blower or just moving back to Oregon. Did you know snow belongs on mountains? Picking out a tree this year was fun, but TOO COLD and windy!! We rushed just to cut it down and it just didn't have the same "feel" as playing around with the Braden family, hunting down a tree at the tree farm in OR. And, the tree we have is soooo freakin' small . . . not too many large ones to pick from. And, there are no Noble firs out here! ugh. I think that's it, signing off for now .. . Merry Christmas and Happy 2009!

Here he is, beautiful Oliver! Congrats Keri and Paul

I just knew I was making a mistake bragging about Soph sleeping for so long the other night. She is back to her old shi-nan-agains (sp?). Waking 1-2 times per night . . . oh well. She's only weighing in at 12 lbs so I'm not hoping for any miracles with sleeping until 14 lbs . . . then I'll really start complaining about being tired! Ok. That's all for now. Guess I better get some ZZZ while she is asleep!

Notice the green ring present from sister

A few things to update since the big Bitzer/Jacob wedding. Hallie and Joe have returned from their 2 week honeymoon (yes, we're jealous) and they are now enjoying being "newly-wed". I have returned to the "out of the home" workforce. Only 2 days a week, I work as a PT at a local, 2 (now 3) physical therapist, clinic. I am enjoying being a physical therapist again; it's been a long time but nice to know I haven't forgotten everything. The girls don't seem to be holding any grudge against me except that they are completely exhausted the days after their school which causes excessive grumps and whines . . . not so bad when I get more cuddling time to help soothe their tiredness! My boss and her sister actually own the clinic I have recently joined. They are both mothers of teens and 2-3 year olds so it's nice they understand "where I am coming from" in regard to nursing and fatigue! The clinic is very very busy and I already have a full patient load which helps the days whiz by.  What else . . . Lindsey has her 2nd set of molars in (one on each bottom row) - not sure if they even bothered her much when they were breaking through??? Maybe that's why she had a few days of napping for 4 hours!!! Lindsey continues to talk more each day which is nice and quite funny to hear her converse with her animals and dolls. Sophie surprised us with her first laughs the other night. We were all (yes, all - Mom, Dad, Lins, Soph, and Luey) in the bathroom giving Lins her bath and I was playing with Sophie in front of the mirror  . . . she was laughing at herself . . . it's sooo freakin' cute. Then of course, we alll try to make her laugh more and she just didn't want to perform. Oh, and Sophie slept from 8 pm to 7am last night   -  This is HUGE. It seems to take her forever to get to sleep - she continues to EAT EAT EAT . . . but POOF, she's out!! I don't know how much she weighs (since I heard/read babies less than 14 lbs have a hard time sleeping through the night);  I am very curious but we don't own scales in this house for obvious reasons! Oh, as a rookie mom and only child, I have a quick story to share. I left Sophie on the floor while Lins was watching Barney and I ran upstairs to do something (already for got what it was), and funny thing, Sophie had moved! No, she's not rolling or crawling yet. . . just her sister pushing her aside so to make room for the teddy bear. No harm and no crying occurred so I just watched . . . I am sure more of these will follow, but Soph has to learn to put up with some of this; RIGHT?Last but not least, thanks to Grandma and Papa Bitzer, Todd and I went away for a little parental escape 2 weekends ago. We ventured north to Lake Geneva where we had lunch (that was still warm when we ate it) and walked around the cute, quaint town and lake. Then, we headed to Madison for the Buckeye vs Badger football game. We felt  like we were in college again . . . except for the fact that our conversation revolved around our kids and how I was already getting nervous about the girls attending a University of this size! (I sure hope they stick with a 2500 student university! ha). The Buckeyes won and we had a blast! Thanks for the babysitting  . . . Grammy and Papa.

Success! Aunt Hallie and Uncle Joe are official Newlyweds and off to their honeymoon!!! The wedding was spectacular and memorable. Hallie looked beautiful and was gleaming the entire night. (Joe of course was beautiful and gleaming as well!) Lindsey made it down the isle with a little help from Mom in the beginning, then she saw Dad at the end of the isle and TOOK OFF running (only to be rewarded with a big hug and candy!)(Sorry about the poor camera taking of the newlyweds, more pics will come soon)

Aunt Hallie and Uncle Joe . . . Congrats!!!!

Lindsey's flower girl dress

As Aunt Hallie and Uncle Joe's wedding approaches, we continue to prepare Lindsey for her Big Girl duties. (I don't know if this Big Girl concept (see Toddler Bed photos/story) impresses her, but we're not giving up on it yet . . . we're still going to use it for potty training too!)
So, Lindsey is going to "attempt" at being flower girl. Each time we ask LIndsey if she is excited to walk down the aisle, throw flowers, wear a pretty dress . . . she replies "YEAH" with a big grin on her face . . . unfortunately she also replies "YEAH" to the question "Do you want to eat worms?"
We are hopeful, that when Lindsey sees her 2 (twin) ring bear buddies, she will gladly escort them in a "motherly/Big Girl" fashion!
We'll keep you posted on how the event goes . . . no matter what happens with the kiddos, we know it will be a beautiful event!

Lindsey's baby sling . . . just like Mommy's

As I get a little more sleep, several fun, parent, thoughts start wondering in my mind and I just thought I would share them . . .
As Lindsey grows and learns each day, she watches our (Mom and Dad) every move (good and bad). Scary yet cute. I love the way she treats her Baby Doll (3 of them actually), burping them, feeding them, dressing/diapering them, talking to them the way we talk to Sophie, and walking them in the stroller. Yesterday, Lindsey was at the door, wanting to play outside "hi and see" (hide and seek). Sophie had yet ANOTHER spit up all over the kitchen floor. While holding Sophie (in an obviously not so great position since she continued to spit up!), I quickly tried to clean up the mess . . . Lindsey, standing next to me watching, puts her hand on my shoulder and leans in to kiss me on my cheek (I interpret this as, Thank you Mom for cleaning up all the time). I don't care why she did it, I will just treasure that moment forever!
Sophie, although she has tried our nerves the past few months, is just sooo darn cute. Everywhere we take her people don't believe she is colicky. She smiles continuously which is great since I am a photo op freak. The unfortunate thing about her great big smiles . . . you never know if they are sincere or if a huge projectile spit is going to follow! I'm getting good though, I ALWAYS have burp clothes or bibs nearby.