Bathtime fun!

During bath today, the girls had a great time together! It was too cute, so I decided to take some pictures.

The girls are so much fun right now...they spend tons of time playing together and trying to communicate with eachother. Mike had the girls at work with him for pep band tonight while I worked. I had to pick them up late. Mike almost always puts Ruby down to bed and I put Elsie down, but when he is working late I put them both down. It used to be a challenge, but lately Ruby has been so wonderful. Tonight she said, "Mom, I want to put myself down to bed", I was so excited to hear this. I told her she could, but she qualified it by saying that she was going to watch a movie first and then go to bed. It was already so late...so I gave her a bag of books from the library and told her to go read them on her bed. She was so excited and went straight there and started pulling them out. I saw that she had made a mess of her bookshelf, so I told her she had to put all the books back on the shelf and then she could read. While I was putting Elsie to bed in the next room, I could hear her busily putting them away and telling herself the stories. It is so fun to listen to her read to herself. When Elsie was asleep, I went into her room to find it all nice and tidy, as she sat on the bed reading. So wonderful!

Silly Elsie

Elsie has been doing the silliest things lately...I just have to get them on here!

Today I caught her trying to feed her new teddy bear water, she was putting the bear's face into the water and saying, "Eat! Eat!" Later this evening, she was dragging a toy caterpillar around and did the same thing. She put the face near the water and said the same thing.

She has also been climbing up on the cupboards below the bathroom sink and grabbing the knobs with her toes. She turns the faucet on and puts her hands under the water and says, "Hands!" Anytime we leave the door open, I always go back in and find her in the same position on the sink. Little stinker!

I found her inside the play kitchen sink area, with the sink removed and her head out the other day. Mike has found her in the same place several times lately as well.

I noticed today that Elsie loves to put things together or inside something and then take them apart over and over. During church I distracted her with some stacking o's and some cubes that she could take a apart and put together. Later in the day, Ruby was using color wonder markers and they were in a plastic baggy. She sat there for a long time taking them out and putting them back in again.

Ruby has been such a sweetie lately. She has been looking out for her little sister and just doing so well with obeying us and getting along with her peers. We went to couples night out at church on Friday, when we returned she said that she watched out for Elsie and when she cried she would go out and make sure everything was okay. They both did great, by the way, the whole time we were gone. Elsie got a bit sad at the end right before we picked her up, otherwise they had fun. We had them both go into the smaller kiddos room and they both had a good time together. Ruby asked if they could always been in that room while we are away. So glad it worked out so well.

We ate at Waddell's Pub up on South Hill today, so yummy! The girls even enjoyed it! They had a hummus platter that was so good and the girls always love hummus for dipping! They both are little eatters right now, I can hardly keep up with the amount of food they want to eat. It amazes me!

New words

Elsie is loving the sounds and names of animals right now, especially a cat! She walks around the house saying, "Wee-ow! Wee-ow!" She also loves to say monkey and carry her little monkey around or find a picture of one in her board books. SO funny!

She is full of expressions and phrases right now, so hard to keep up with all of them! Most are fairly clear to understand. Her favorite statement is "I want Mom!" or "I want Dad!", mainly when one or the other of us is in the another room or not nearby. She loves to have all of us together, and gets sad when we are apart. It is so funny how she will be sitting with me and look over at Mike, and say "I want Daddy!" and head over to his lap. She will sit there for a few moments and snuggle with him and then look at him and say "I want Mommy!" and head over to my lap. She will go back and forth between us over and over.

She spends endless hours playing with Ruby now, it is so fun to see them becoming little friends with eachother. Yesterday, we went to the mall play area for a bit. Ruby was protective of Elsie the whole time and would take her down the slide and check in on her while they were playing. So neat to see!

Lately we have been spending lots of time with the dogs since they have to be indoors so much. Henry is super gentle with them and so relaxed now, since we adopted our Hank. He wears him out and I also think that Henry is in the stage of his life where he has calmed down. Both girls love to put the doggies to sleep, Hank is too much of a puppy to cooperate but Henry just settles right in and enjoys all the attention. They love to pet them gently and walk them on the leashes we have. Thankful to have our pets to keep us company and entertain the girls!

New tooth coming in...

I noticed that Elsie has a new tooth coming in yesterday. It is the one to the right of her two middle teeth on the bottom! She still has one molar that it taking a long time to come in in the upper left part of her mouth!

New Bears Christmas!

Great Grandma sent the girls new bears...they are super cute and soft! They love them! Thank you so much Grandma Hunt!

RIP Morris

Our kitty of 8 years went to heaven today :( He has been sick for a long time and we decided to take him to the vet about a week ago to get checked out. The bloodtests came back normal, but the xrays showed that he had a disease in his lower intestines. He was really sick and had actually lost half a pound in one week. He was getting really skinny, he used to be super big. He was vomitting everyday and sometimes more than once a day in the end.

In 2002, he appeared at our doorstep in Vancouver, Washington. He would rub up against us and was so sweet, we couldn't understand how he could be a stray. Mike put a box with a blanket out for him to crawl into at night and he immediately took to it. He started sleeping there every night. Mike started putting food our for him to eat each day and we took him the vet and even named him. At the time, we thought he was a girl because he was so big and looked pregnant, we even gave him a girl name Sedora. We were shocked when the vet told us it was a boy, just a very big male cat. We then started taking him into our home. Sarah, our other kitty was super jealous. She had been our only cat for nearly 7 years already. We had to have them both declawed so they wouldn't hurt eachother. They eventually became the best of friends. Sarah and Morris were total opposites...she was grouchy and he was playful and sweet. He would get onto her back and hold her there for awhile, this was really the only thing that irritated her. She passed away last summer and we never found her. We had put them outside for a brief time frame, Morris started meowing at the door over and over because he was so upset that she was gone. She was doing the same thing as Morris before she passed. He loved being pet by my girls and by us. He would always snuggle with Elsie and Ruby everyday in one way or another. The first thing Elsie did every morning was wake up and go look for her "Mor Mor" and pet him. Ruby would do the same, but oftentimes she would actually lay beside him and put a blanket around the two of them. She would pet him and he would just love it.

Elsie doesn't realize he is gone, she is too young. Ruby was very upset today when we talked with her about it. She cried several times and said she would miss petting him. They both had been with him since they were born.

Mike came home with an angel kitty pin and we placed it on an ornament of a black kitty. Each year when we get the ornaments out, we will remember our loving kitty. We will miss you so much Morris, you were a huge part of our family. Hope you are playing with Sarah in heaven right now.

Lentil Soup and Dr Seuss

OMG...Elsie is so into eatting with me right now. She always wants to move over to my lap and eat from my bowl or plate. Yesterday she ate nearly all of my stew and today she ate a ton of my ham and lentil soup. So excited that she is eatting more right now and willing to try the food I am eatting. She is usually so picky!

Ruby is totally into making signs right now...she makes them almost everyday. She also loves to act like she is Santa and pulling reindeer around the house. Silly girl.

Tonight Mike and Ruby were being silly...they took a foofy scarf and put each end on their heads. It looked like a creature off of Dr Seuss. So they put it on the same way when she was getting into bed and read a Dr. Seuss book together! It was really cute and she loved it!