Caroline and Ellie can often be a tough crowd. Blake and I have pulled out some of our best material to make these girls laugh, and most of the time, we get nothin.
Sometimes, we'll catch them in the perfect mood, and they will give up that belly laugh. I had catch it on video, since it doesn't happen all the time...yet. I'm still convinced that when they realize how hilarious we actually are, belly laughs will soon become a common occurrence.
Note: Blake did his same "hilarious" sneeze the next day, and the girls didn't even give him a snicker.
Caroline is the firstborn...by one minute. Does that count? Not sure.
She is determined, curious, observant, busy, on the move, and gives you the biggest smile that stretches from ear to ear.
When she's not feeling like taking a nap....she is NOT going to take a nap. Lately, she's been standing up in her crib, facing the door waiting for me to come rescue her and while she's waiting, she bites the top of her crib. When I come get her, she has flecks of white paint from the crib on her cheeks.
I think there's a negative connotation about eating paint chips as a kid.
The other day, she woke up early from her morning nap and greeted me with her huge smile and bouncing legs as I scooped her up. Ellie was still passed out, so I had some one on one time with Caroline, which is a rare thing that I always treasure. After awhile, I put her in the swing hoping she might fall back to sleep.
About 20 minutes later, this is what I saw.... her sweet little self, sitting contentedly, listening to the music and sucking on her pacifier.
There's just something about this that melts my heart. I was just watching her wondering what she's going to be like in a year from now and even when she grows up. I sat there praying for her....praying that she would come to know the Lord at a young age, that she would find a life-long best friend in her sister and that she would be confident in who she is in the Lord.
My family gave me video monitors for us to keep an eye on the girls. I never thought a monitor (audio or visual) was necessary in our house because of how open and compact our house is, but Blake and I cannot get enough of the video monitor. We keep it in our living room, and these days, we get so much entertainment out of it.
Ellie can now pull herself up, and she and Caroline have started to babble and laugh at each other when they are in their cribs.
We loved witnessing this last night through the monitor. Although, the monitor might not necessarily produce any safety value for us, the entertainment value is priceless. We keep thinking of how funny it's going to be when they get a little older.
Ellie is at the bottom of the screen and Caroline at the top.
There is nothing like cute thighs hanging out of a skin-tight swimsuit....especially when that swimsuit has ruffles on the bottom and polka dots....and comes in the size "12 months".
Ellie grabbing Caroline's hat
We have been going to the pool on most days after Blake gets home from work. The infamous hours between 5-7pm, leave me looking forward to getting out of the house and trying to distract the girls from their otherwise end-of-the-day-fussiness. Besides doing errands with mostly staying in the airconditioning, going to the pool is about the only hanging outdoors we have been doing lately. And for that, I love going to the pool.
When they're not so tired, they usually love the pool. The love to splash and watch the other kids swim.
Caroline and Ellie have razorblades for fingernails, and the tedious chore of cutting them is my least favorite thing I do for them. The girls do not like for me to cut their nails and they fight me every step of the way. Both of them. They thrash around, pull their hands away, and after an hour of wrestling these little 16 pounders to free their fingers, I give up with maybe only a couple nails clipped between the two of them.
On the other hand, when Blake cuts their fingernails, they sit there like angels.
With Ellie
They let him just cut away without making a noise...
With Caroline
....or trying to pull their hands away....
....or crawl out of his lap.
Ellie
Blake says that it's because the girls know when Daddy means business.
Caroline
Hmmm. Maybe it's the way that they sink in this lap and they can't easily move, or maybe because he is strong....or maybe because they really do know when Daddy means business.
Either way, it's sweet, and I'm happy for Blake to be on fingernail duty.
Caroline and Ellie are both crawling all over the house. Usually they are each in their own little world playing, talking to themselves and motoring around. However, we do see glimpses of these two interacting and "playing" together!
It happened 2 days ago, and I'm still so disgusted that it makes my skin crawl every time I think about it.
Here's what happened (to quote our favorite OCD detective, Adrian Monk):
Scene of the crime: Between the couch and the wall. An innocent place to play that happens to be the girls favorite place to bang toys on the tile, wall, baseboards and air conditioning vent.
I was in our study paying some bills and going through our mail while watching the girls play where I could see them. They crawled over behind the couch where they always go and I could hear them banging their toys and laughing. Knowing that there's nothing over there for them to get into trouble, I let them hang out for a minute or two while I finished up. They were content and seemed happy to just stay where they were and play.
A couple minutes later, I walk over there to check on them. They are sitting next to 3 unattached cockroach legs on the floor with huge smiles on their faces. I immediately start to get nervous because I'm not seeing a body of this cockroach, and at second glance, I see a large brown spot of drool on the floor.
I pick up Caroline and see something brown in her mouth, and then I notice half of the 4th roach leg on her chin. A second look at Ellie and I see the other half of the leg on Ellie's arm, and at this point, I'm almost hyperventilating. I take Caroline to the kitchen sink and do a half-hearted swipe of her mouth trying to get out whatever is in there, afraid of what was going to come out. My skin was crawling. I took a deep breath, mustered up the courage to do a second mouth swipe, stuck my index finger way in her mouth and flung a HUGE Texas cockroach fully in tact minus it's legs and one wing out of her mouth and into the sink.
Thankfully, it was dead. But still. G-ROSS! How she got that whole thing in her mouth, I still don't know. Ellie probably helped her. HA!
These two. I should probably just brace myself for all the things these girls will discover together.
Caroline has started pulling herself up, and she tries to pull up on everything. The first couple of times she did it in her crib, she got stuck and couldn't get herself back down.
This is what I'd find when I'd go in and rescue her from screaming her head off with the "I'm scared" kind of cry.
Of course, naive me, thought that if I just put her back down again, she'd realize that she shouldn't do that again and she'd just go to sleep.
Obviously not.
I wish I had a picture of what Ellie was doing in her crib during all this. She was sitting up looking at her sister and "half-crying" just to chime in.
Ellie is taking cues from her sister and starting to try herself. I don't think she's far behind.
Our trip to Breckenridge was only a month ago, and I am wishing that we were back there right now.
We keep looking at the temperatures there, and compared to how hot it is here right now....well, it's probably better for me to just not think about it....
It was such a great vacation that I keep going back to these pictures, but what also amazes me is how much the girls have changed in a month.
Ellie sucking her left thumb and Caroline sucking her right
During that trip, the girls were not mobile at all, not very vocal and in general just not quite as interactive as they are now. They look so little to me.
I can't wait until our next "Snyder" family vacation. Hint hint Lauren and Nathan...
....and you too Rick!
I'm already looking forward to the next extended family reunion. Not sure when it will be, but we'll be there!
Mom and Aunt Catherine holding the twins at the wedding
Uncle Jim, Aunt Linda and Jim - we all shared a house together and had a wonderful time!
Enjoying being a Grandmom!
The newest Great Aunt Virginia (my Mom's sister). I have one, and now my babies have one. That's special to me.
This is how I feel like we spend a better part of each day. The entire process of getting their food ready, feeding them and cleaning them up takes awhile. They love eating though and there's nothing that keeps them occupied like the trusty 'ole Cheerio!
Ellie has a habit of taking off her bib....every single time. She has done this since the beginning, and it happens with all accessories we try with her including hats and hairbows. I turned around yesterday to see Caroline swinging Ellie's bib around...both seemingly very proud of themselves.
We're still feeding the girls blended up baby food supplemented with more and more things for them to feed themselves on their tray....carrots, lima beans, bananas, peaches, avocado, etc. No matter what we give them, though, their personal favorite by a long shot are Cheerios.
Almost everyday with are either skyping with my parents or Blake's parents. It's not the same has having them here, but when you live either a 3 hour (Bakersfield) or a 35 hour (Perth) plane ride away, it's the best we can do.
Caroline and Ellie are into the computer as I'm sure all babies are. Just like our cell phones...anything they're not supposed to have becomes their fixation and their favorite toy when we're not paying attention.
Even though they like the computer, though, we really think that they recognize their grandparents on the screen. It's cute. They smile and wave their arms when the familiar faces and voices appear.
Sharlene singing "Itsy Bitsy Spider" to the girls
I like to complain to Blake about how modern technology, although convenient, is often a distraction. (I know, I'm annoying!). Skype, however, is one of those things that I warmingly embrace. My kids get to grow up seeing their grandparents everyday....well, sort of.
We love you and miss you....Yiggie, Pa, Grandmom and Grandpop! See you later today on the computer.
