Sisterly Love

Remember when I mentioned that January brought a new level of love between the girls and they had to share a room for awhile.  Well they actually still like each other, they will actually play together without arguing with each other for a whole two minutes at least.  

Our days are spent watching the girls play puzzles which they are very good at, talking to Adelaide's imaginary school friends and deciding on whether it is a park or river day.  Mostly our house is filled with Frozen montages which is about to push me over the edge.  If I have to hear Anna or Elsa sing one more time I might just turn into Olaf myself.  It's so bad that I catch myself singing it at work and Grant walks around saying his favorite lines too. Stop the insanity!

These photos aren’t old, it just takes until January or February to get Fall looking photos around here.

Up and Down - Hannah Goes Down

My oldest niece Hannah has done a great job of adjusting to not only the grand entrance to high school, but also to a move six hours away from home where she knew no one.  Hannah went to homecoming, football games (still has no clue what they are doing), made friends (don’t tell her I said that because we tell her she only has two) and joined the basketball team.  Trying to be the supportive family we strive to be we went to a few games this year, but unfortunately we witnessed both her best and worst game.  

Best:  good playing time, thought she was going to get a technical because she was being so aggressive and the team won.

Worst:  she went down hard, so hard she tore her ACL and had to have surgery.  

While Hannah was recovering from surgery she moved downstairs to my office which brought on mini visitors.  My little ones took the opportunity to share their Frozen obsession with Hannah including watching an extraordinary amount of youtube clips and knocking on the door asking if she wanted to build a snowman until Hannah would respond.  

The good news is she was a real champ about the whole thing and is back to her old self besides the squeaky knee brace she wears around the house.  Oh and she has moved back upstairs so she can actually sleep in on the weekends and not have to worry about waking up to Anna and Elsa.  

Little Moments

I believe the sharing of life’s little moments are a better reflection of what life is really about.  It is easy to write about grand vacations or holiday excitement, but the truth is that those little things in life that occur when you aren’t expecting it are the best.  Here are a few of the little moments that have started our new year.

There was the sleeping debacle…Adelaide and Penelope became obsessed with each other to the point that P would not sleep in her room which is just on the other side of the bathroom.  After nights of P sneaking into A’s room we decided to make a bed swap.  A’s bed would go to my mom’s house in exchange for two twin sleigh beds.  The girls were ecstatic, but unfortunately we realized that A wasn’t getting enough sleep at night and started lashing out at school so a month later we had to rearrange again.  Where the decorator side of me is having anxiety about the furniture arrangements currently happening, I am proud to report that A is doing much better at school.  

Obsession number two:  Baby Natalie.  If it were up to my girls Natalie wouldn’t get a moments rest and after visiting her house on a Sunday they thought we should go back every Sunday.  A has also been asking for a little brother, but I told her that she was out of luck with that one no matter what her grandparents think.

Though we don’t live in a place that has our childhood friends or extended family, we are fortunate to have made our own.  This group doesn’t replace all of the originals, but it does make us feel really good about those who surround us. The group started awhile ago with our little family, my parents and two other couples and as you can see from the photos it has expanded a bit over time.  We are fortunate to have a great meeting place close to our house and when the owners are friends it means you can’t leave without a little homemade limoncello.

Dinners out with family, especially when you can make "Hannah faces" and text her all night.

Oh yes, that is a single serve apple pie at Biscottis.

Dear Hannah, we want to be like you when we grow up.

I guess I should mention some moments we didn't like celebrating as well...freaking Gators.  We love you Anna and Andy, but these types of activities aren't working for us anymore.  However, we did appreciate the taco place after the game, but not until after we got through a dark alley where I'm sure Grant was thinking twice about a zombie sighting.  

Notice we were literally on the top row.

Andy may enjoy these tacos a bit too much.