Little Easter Bunnies

Happy Easter! Alleluia, Christ is Risen! We had a wonderful weekend packed with lots of family time. Here are just a couple sweet pictures from the celebration.


Can you believe how much they've grown since last Easter?


My big girl loved hunting eggs.

Last year's excitement

Leo had a great time too, and spent most of the egg hunt just eating all the goodies!

Little chubby bunny:)

The Easter Bunny visited Nana and Grandaddy's house too!


Candy!!


Sister love (Lauren we love you too!)

This girl could swing all. day. long.

Hope you all had a very blessed Easter too!

Love at First Sight

Although a pregnancy can be a very long 280 days, there are a couple days of peak excitement. The day you take the positive pregnancy test is awesome, regardless of whether you *know* already. We took our test around the first week of January. I was feeling totally and completely exhausted, and thought to myself that if I wasn't pregnant, then I was probably dying. So when Eli walked through the door at 5:30 and I was laying on the couch with the kids bouncing off the walls, he turned right around and headed to CVS. The test takes about 2 minutes to show the results. I excitedly held the stick and walked to Eli when all of a sudden Emily grabbed the test right out of my hand. I was so grouchy and snapped at her--she crumbled, needing attention, knowing something important was going on. As I pulled the stick out of her hands, we could see those 8 letters. PREGNANT. All 4 of us hugged and jumped up and down and went a little nuts. The kids had no idea what was going on, but they were happy nonetheless. At that very instant, we knew our lives were going to change. We knew there is no better gift than a new child. We knew that I was now carrying a tiny little soul made from scratch by God.

The next exciting day came at 7 weeks...the first ultrasound. I asked my mom to watch the kids after coming home from school. I was paranoid that she knew, as it was a rarity for her to babysit on a weekday. Sitting in the waiting room was nerve racking. What if there's something wrong? What if they can't find a heartbeat?? What if it's twins??? But then I saw him (or her). A tiny little body that really looked more like a sea horse. The technician didn't have to tell me about the flicker on the screen--I knew it was a heartbeat: a strong one. A life. A beautiful blessing. Absolute love at first sight. We wanted to literally shout from the rooftops! We couldn't wait to share the great news with family, friends, the checkout girl at HEB, the teller at the bank...anyone with ears. Valentine's Day rolled around and Emily began work on her cards. Talk about a huge production! Glitter can keep this kid busy for a.long.time. She glued a brother-sister picture to the front and the sonogram to the inside. Here's her cute announcement to my mom.



The most recent excitement was our 20 week ultrasound. Since Leo was a high risk pregnancy, I had an ultrasound each week and slowly saw him grow. I was blown away by how big this baby has gotten! It feels like the past 13 weeks have just FLEW by. Our little love nugget has fingers...and toes...and long legs...and sucks his thumb...and punched the sonogram probe each time the technician pushed my tummy...and is about 1 lb. 10 oz! That's more than our tiny Emily weighed her first week of life! He was super wiggly and we couldn't get a good still shot or a profile pic, but we still love him. Here's his (and when I say "his", I really mean or "her") most recent picture. To the left is a head shot and the right are his 2 tiny feet. Hopefully he can bake another 20 weeks and get nice and chubby :)

Top 10 Things about FIESTA!

We had a phenomenal time at the Battle of Flowers Parade!!
1. Costumes



2. Balloons


3. Moon Bounce


4. Cotton Candy

5. Face Painting

6. Ice Cream

7. Family Time



8. Marching Bands and Horses



9. Cool Cars


10. Real Princesses

Confessions and Fears

I have a confession to make. I'm a control freak.

I totally admit, I'm a bit hormonal and tend to deal with my stress and anxiety of change by wanting to control everything. By nature, I'm one of those awesome organize freaks--you know, the type to have routines and lists and spend time cleaning out the junk drawer because it makes me feel calm.

Along came God in my ear telling me to loosen up a bit and let Him take control. Easier said then done, right? I felt that God *did* have control, and I was just being the best version of myself for Him. Well fear not. God sent me a clear sign that I was wrong and in actuality I didn't have full trust in Him. That beautiful little sign was sent to us on August 11, 2007. She came in a tiny 2 lb bundle called Emily. She was born 13 weeks due to my water randomly breaking, and none of the doctors could tell why. Not much I could control in that situation. I couldn't even hold Emily for an entire week. This was not what I had planned and organized for my first few days as a new mom! Slowly I learned to let go and embrace God's strenghtening love and His grace.



However, there comes days like today when I just want to do things according to MY plan. Since I have gestational diabetes, it's crucial that I stick to a strict diet calling for 2 egg whites, skim milk, and a small carb every morning. Gross. I didn't feel hungry, so I felt proud of myself for forcing down cheerios and milk. I promised myself to eat those eggs at snack time. So there I was washing dishes at the sink with Leo whining at my feet. I was making a plan for the day; organizing my chores and listing out the most proficient way to spend our time. All of a sudden I saw stars. I've fainted twice already this pregnancy and I knew immediately what was going to happen. I quickly reached over to a bowl of clementines and desperately tried to peel that sucker to inhale it. I was too weak and stumbled to the kitchen table and fell straight onto the chair, faintly hearing Leo crying in the background. When I came to, I realized, sweet! I'm actually ok! I didn't crack my head open! I'm still alive!! Emily is singing to herself in the playroom and blissfully unaware of something that would have traumatized her for the entire day! Awesome--Leo's only crying because he wants my clementine!

But then came the horror: what would have happened if I *did* break my neck and needed emergency care?? How would anyone know to come get me?! What would my kids be doing?! My phone is password protected and all the doors are child locked and bolted all day. The organizer person in me needs a plan, and I just don't have one. Emily is still too young to really even understand what constitutes an emergency. So that's when I realized that I would just have to work with what I've got and hand the stress over to God. Please pray that our guardian angels will protect us! As for now, I need to remember to put all my trust in God.

Weekend Roundup

Cuties


Bike rides with Daddy


Emily took this picture right before getting whacked in the face with monkey.


My little ladybug is getting so big!


Meeting Daddy for lunch after the zoo!


Almost 2 and still eating paint.


A working man's worst nightmare: forgetting the pants.

The Holy Rollers

Leo has been picking up lots of new words lately. I thought most of them were only comprehensible to me, but apparently Emily can understand him too. Yesterday on our way home from mass, I heard the very first conversation between brother and sister. It went like this:

Leo: "Bye bye Je-dus! Bye bye Mawee"
Emily: "Yes Leo! Bye Mary and Jesus! Leo, did you see what was on Mary's dress?"
Leo: "taws!!!"
Emily: "Yes Leo! Stars!

I was beaming in the front seat. I was thinking, finally! All of these years of daily mass is finally paying off. They must love Mary so much to have been looking closely enough to notice her dress. Emily will tell him just exactly what those stars symbolize. My kids are genius! She'll tell him about Juan Diego, and how her mommy and daddy went to visit to see the REAL tilma! They'll be so faithful!

The conversation continued:
Emily: "You see, Leo, Our blessed mother Mary loves shopping. She gets in her car, and goes to buy lots and lots of outfits so she can show off to her other family."
Leo: "Yeah!"

Womp Womp. I tried to give Emily a little lesson on materialism, but she could care less. Oh well, God always sends me a dose of humility right when I need it most:)



Our Lady of Guadalupe, pray for us!

The newest obsession

What is it about the most hazardous things that make them so darn fun?

Toilets? Yay! Power drills? Yippee! Outlets? Hooray!



Balloons: super-fun-but-super-dangerous.

Who knew two preschoolers could have such a ridiculously great time. Over the weekend the kids each got a balloon from a little friend's birthday party. They squealed and ran around like chickens with their heads cut off, as if these were the last balloons on the face of the planet. That was fun to watch. Pure joy.

Once we got home, they were still excited. And that's when they began the "drag your chairs around the house to retrieve the balloon which flew away" game.



About 4 hours later, mean 'ol mom ended the beloved game when things got a little out of hand.



Emily pouted quite a bit before deciding it appropriate to use the balloon string tied around Leo's precious little neck as a leash.

Mommy soon decided that the balloons needed a little rest and the kids could color picture of balloons instead. This did not go over as well as I would have liked:) I think I know what they'll be getting for their birthdays this year.

Disclaimer: No adorable rascals were hurt during this fun-fest.

It's time to dust off the ol' blog

Well there's really nothing that compares to the "nesting" hormones of pregnancy to kick you into action on all things procrastinated since the birth of your last child. Hence the newly found inspiration to revive the blog. I'm pretty sure that I mentioned Leo all but maybe twice, and here he's about to turn two in a couple months. You've just got to know this happy kid!



And cheers to Emily's very overactive creative brain that yeilds silly little thoughts that just make my day. I'm sure you'll here a lot of these stories. Tonight after crawling out of bed for the 5th time, she said to me "Mommy when I used to be a daddy buck, I was pregnant with cute little quails. And then I washed a skunk at the beach and he was stinky, so I built a cantilever so I wouldn't have to smell him."



I'm telling you, I just can't make this stuff up. And also, I had to look up cantilevers to see if they even existed. I always knew my kids would be smarter than me--I just didn't know it would happen when my kid was only 3!