still here

It has been awhile since we have updated the blog. A baby who was once again sick, a root canal for me (seriously the most pain I have ever been in in my entire life), and getting ready for a trip to Florida have all kept up busy the past few weeks. So during our time away from the blogging world here is what the girls have been up too...

Who knew playing under the table could be so fun?

My happy girl being silly.

Where's Kayla? Peek-a-boo! One of my favorite things Mikayla does right now, she loves to play peek-a-boo but she won't put her hands over her eyes, her little hands only make it to her mouth, it is very cute.

Hanging out on the kitchen counter.

Doing a little bowling in the hallway. Bill is getting the pins set up for Jennifer.

Jennifer hoping for a strike.

Mikayla is still getting into everything, which means we are spending lots of time picking up after her.

We just returned from a fun filled trip to visit Grammie in Florida. It was hard to leave the sun, warmth and relaxing days behind. It is back to normal tomorrow morning, kind of sad. Lots of picture of our fun trip to come...

back to normal

It has been a little over two weeks since Jennifer had her tonsils out and finally, finally I am happy to say that our house is back to normal. I hate to admit it but there were a few moments over the course of the past two weeks that I did not think we would make it through, we had some hard days. The weekend Jennifer's tonsils came out Mikayla got sick, so we had two crabby kids on our hands. Mikayla got better for a few days and then both girls got sick. Poor Jennifer was not only trying to recovery from her surgery but then she got sick on top of it. We thought for sure she was getting the flu, which we feared would dehydrate her little body in no time. So it was off to the doctor and thankfully it was not the flu but both, yes both, girls had upper respiratory junk going on. Poor Mikayla was a mess, you know its bad when the doctor walks in the room and the first thing he says after looking at your child is, "Wow she is mess." He had not even examined Mikayla yet and he already knew! Both girls were put on antibiotics, which did not boost well for Jennifer because she was already sick of taking meds all the time. After just a couple doses of meds and breathing treatments Mikayla was on the mend. Towards the middle of last week we really started seeing Jennifer come back around. On Friday, two weeks after surgery, I told Bill that we made it, we really made it through this ordeal! It wasn't easy and we thought a few times that Jennifer would end up getting an iv for fluids (we went through about four days when the poor girl won't eat anything and it seemed we were literally forcing her to take small drinks of water, not fun). I have to say that it was God's hand protecting Jennifer, from sickness that could have been much worse and from dehydration, I look back at some of the days and wonder how she made it. So today as Jennifer is at school and Mikayla is taking a nap and for the first time in two weeks our house is finally back to normal, I am thanking God for carrying this family and thanking Him for smiling, happy, giggling girls once again! And now that things are back to normal we are counting down the days until we are visiting Grammie, soaking up some sun, playing on the beach and relaxing!

tonsils out

Yesterday was a big day for Jennifer. We were up bright and early to be out the door because Jennifer was getting her tonsils out. If she was nervous she did not show it, she did amazing! Although it was kind of hard to explain to her what was going to happen. We told her that she was going to the doctor so he could make her throat feel better, for her that explanation was good enough.

Here she is waiting for them to come get her. Once they were ready she walked back to the room all by herself, what a big girl! They said she climbed up on the table and held the mask to put her to sleep, talking the whole time of course.

Watching a little tv while we wait, that always makes the time go by faster.

Jennifer had kind of a hard time waking up once everything was done, seriously it didn't even take a half hour, it was very fast, I think we gone from our house a total of three hours. I don't think Mikayla knew what to think of Jennifer when we got home.

It was very sweet though, Mikayla pulled herself up to the couch and started patting Jennifer, she was making sure her big sister was ok. Melted my heart.

While Jennifer was resting here is what Mikayla was doing, getting into trouble! This past week she has started pulling herself up to everything, which is very exciting to watch. However this includes getting into a lot more stuff.

Jennifer is doing well today. As well as can be expected. She has had a few tears, wants to eat a few things that she can't and really doesn't want to take the medicine she is suppose to but that is all small stuff and she really is a pretty tough girl. We know there may be a few rough days ahead but today was good so we will take that for now.

swimming in January

Over the weekend we meet Bill's family for some swimming fun. We met at a hotel that had a water park in it, very fun for the middle of winter! As we are on snow day number two, there is lots of new snow on the ground and the temperatures are well below freezing once again, I kind of wish we were back there swimming!

There was a walk in shower in the room, Mikayla thought it was the greatest thing ever! Especially if someone was showering and left the bathroom door open, this girl is one fast crawler! Jennifer and dad getting ready to go down the slide at the same time. Jennifer did amazing on all the slides, she thought everything was great!
Going down the big slide.
One happy girl to be swimming.



Of course we tired to get the girls to sit so we could take their picture together, as you can see, not a lot of luck on our part. Jennifer kept spraying Mikayla with water.

Mikayla was loving the water too, of course she didn't go down any of the slides but she had fun watching everyone else.
Jennifer crawling around in the water.
All of the kids together.
Another happy girl to be swimming.

Our girls had a great time, thanks papa Jim and mama Sue for a fun time together!

one last Christmas

We had one last Christmas over the weekend with my family. It was great spending the day with everyone.

Of course there were a few presents to open.

And Mikayla of course just wanted to play with the paper. She could care less that she had presents to open.

Once again the great grandparents got all the great grand kids a something Hawkeye. Mikayla got a cute little sweatshirt.

Jennifer and the boys got some pretty cool shirts. Jennifer was pretty excited because whenever Bill puts on an Iowa shirt she wants to put one on too, now she can!

The kids showing off their shirts. Seriously why is it so hard to get four kids to sit still and smile for a picture? In our case three of the four kids are pretty wound up and the fourth could really care less about any kind of picture being taken.

Giving a front and back view.

The whole family!

We ordered pizza for supper and afterwards Jennifer was walking around taking orders, it was very cute.

And to top a fun day off we got to go swimming! To this girl it was a pretty great day.

my cowgirls

Even in the cold of winter with inches of snow on the ground Jennifer wants nothing more than to ride a horse. But because it is literally freezing out and there are still inches of snow on the ground her little pony in the house will have to do.

Here is one of my cowgirls with her horses. The pink pony, that has been seen before, is just called "Pony". The horse Jennifer is holding is "Sally". J got Sally for Christmas and for the first few days after getting her that horse went everywhere that Jennifer went. It was very cute. On this day I think Jennifer was really wanting to ride so she was holding Sally and had Pony right by her side.

Then she decided to put her helmet on and go for a ride in our living room. The picture is blurry because this is an action shot of her riding Pony as fast as she can in a circle. It was very funny to watch and she got Pony going pretty fast!

Holding onto Pony's reigns.

Showing off her helmet for riding horses.

After Jennifer was done on the pony it was my other cowgirls turn. Very cute to watch her move her body to try and get the pony to rock. She was loving to get to be like her big sister!

Of course Jennifer couldn't be out done and had to get one last ride on Pony after Mikayla was done.

My smiling cowgirls, it is hard for them not to bring a smile to my face too!

kitchen help

Jennifer has loved helping in the kitchen for quite some time now but just recently Mikayla has started showing some interest in helping as well. Although I'm not so sure that her help is really all that helpful.

Here she is "cleaning" out the cupboard. We have a cupboard that has all the girls' bowls, plates, cups and our storage containers, this is sort of their cupboard to play in. However, I have found myself picking up the contents of the cupboards at least once a day for the past few weeks. I am starting to find it a little annoying I must admit, Mikayla on the other hand thinks it is kind of funny. If you look close enough at the picture you can see the big smile on her face!

Here she is surrounded by all her treasures.

When she is finished playing things end up all over the kitchen. She usually takes a few items with her to where ever she is going next.

The newest place that Mikayla has found is the dishwasher. If she sees it open she comes crawling as fast as she can, which is pretty fast. As I was putting things away the other day she decided to help out.

Taking things out that really needed to stay in.

"This looks like a great place for these to go."

Maybe in a few months my sweet helper will be a little more helpful for now I will just let her play, after all she is pretty cute even while making a mess of the kitchen!