Happy Birthday Chloe!!!

Our little girl is 4!!! Wow!

Today was a great day for Chloe. Ruby came over to play at 9:30 and we did crafts - we made paper ring caterpillars and muffin cup butterflies. We played outside, sang silly songs and were just generally goofy. Aayla came over around 11, and all four girls (yes! 4!) played really nice until Kara's naptime at 11:30. Ruby went home at 12, and Chloe went with Aayla to her house for a cupcake tea party! Aayla's mom is a hair dresser, so she gave Chloe a pretty hairdo. They dressed up in princess dresses and did other girly things. It was a really nice treat for Chloe, and a great break for me.

I picked Chloe up from Aayla's house at 4:30 and we went to swim lessons. Of course Chloe told everyone that it was her birthday today, and that she was 4. When we were done getting changed after swim lessons, one of the pool supervisors was waiting at the front desk with balloons for Chloe. She was super excited! Then we came home, had dinner, ate cake and Chloe opened her present (a Dora toy and some new pants). Then Chloe watched an episode of Madeline, followed by me reading her two and a half books, and then about 10 minutes of goofing off with Dad.

All in all a wonderful, busy and happy day :D

(Look at those slightly sunburned cheeks!)

(Here you can see the remnants of Chloe's hairdo. We did go swimming...)

(And this is the cake I made right before swimming, and decorated in about 10 minutes between getting home and eating dinner.)

Just wanted to say things are going. We went to Abbotsford today - Emma (Paul & Greta's new baby) was baptized this morning, then we went to Mark's parents' for lunch, then dropped the girls off with my mom and went to the movie theatre to see "Scott Pilgrim vs. The World". OMG that movie was AWESOME!!!!

That's all, really :)

Swim lessons

Chloe and Kara are both enrolled in twice a week swim lessons for August. Every Tuesday and Thursday we show up at the pool just before 5, get changed and head to the pool deck. Chloe joins her teacher and two other almost-4 year olds. I take Kara to her class of 7 infants and toddlers from 6 months to almost 3 years. Don't worry, its parent participation. We have 25 minutes in the pool, and then its a crazy mad dash to line up for a change room.

We've had 5 lessons so far, and Kara is doing great. She knows to close her mouth and hold her breath when I put her underwater, and really likes being tugged around in the water. I can't really watch what Chloe is doing because I'm with Kara, but on Tuesday Chloe said "Look what I can do Mommy!" and proceeded to put her entire face under water! In just 5 short lessons I have seen Chloe's confidence in her swimming ability increase, she has become much more comfortable in water, and I've seen the increased confidence spill over into other areas too. For example, I took the girls to the park this morning, and Chloe was able to climb up the chain ladder with absolutely no help and no crying. Three weeks ago it was a struggle to get her to climb it with help.

I am SO proud of both of my girls. They amaze me, and I thank God for them often. Being a mom really is so rewarding.

Sleeping, sorta

Kara hasn't been a good sleeper since around 3 months after she was born. Waking up lots, wanting to nurse all the time, needed to be rocked or have her back rubbed to fall asleep. The past week and a bit has seen an improvement. Kara is now able to fall asleep by herself! We put both Chloe and Kara to bed at 8pm. I rub Kara's back for 2 or 3 minutes to let her know that its bed time, then say "Good night Kara" and leave their room. Only once in the last 2 weeks have I had to go back in and help her fall asleep. She is also staying asleep until around 1 am (as opposed to 10pm), and if I go in and give her a soother, she often falls back asleep until around 3am, when she wants to nurse. After this still isn't going well, with her often waking again around 5, and 6, before getting up for good around 7. So I'm not getting a lot more sleep, but its still progress, and it makes me happy :D

Birthday Bear

Chloe's birthday is coming up on August 24. Her friend Ruby's birthday was on July 30. As a gift for both of them, I took them to Build-A-Bear workshop on Thursday. They had a great time. Chloe got a pretty purple bear, and Ruby got a horse. (Though Ruby was talking the whole time we were driving there about how she really wanted a unicorn!) Chloe named her bear "Canolee" (say it like canola, but replace the a with an e), a name she came up with all by herself! They also got to choose an outfit for their friend, and a pair of shoes.

While the staff were helping us make the bear and horse, we mentioned that the trip was for the girls' birthdays, and all of a sudden they had "I'm the Birthday Bear" stickers, and they got a birthday song sung to them! Very cool, and unexpected.

Here's some pictures of our trip :)

Kara's Words

This is mostly just for us, so we can remember a small part of Kara's growing up. Her words are expanding so fast, and I wanted to take a snap-shot of her vocabulary at this point in her life. Here are most of the words she says and uses correctly (and how she says them).

baby (beey-bee)
dada
hi
bye
woah
wow
tickle (tik-uh)
more (moh)
bath (bah)
oooooh
key (keh)
no (nuh/nuu)
up (uhpuh)
uh-oh
door (dough)
mum

So many things...

The picture of Kara and me is from Canada Day. It was so cold we were wearing sweaters inside!
The picture of Mark and Chloe is from Ricky's wedding.
These two pictures are the ones that I currently have displayed on my monitors (yes, Mark and I have two monitors each). Every time Kara sees the picture of Mark and Chloe she says "Hi Dada." Its amazing.

Today we went to Abbotsford with Briana and Ruby. We went to Briana's parents' house and swam in the pool. All three girls had a BLAST! Kara displayed her normal "no fear", and Chloe was nervous-excited. By that I mean she spent a lot of time on the steps going into the pool, and would only get off the steps for a few minutes at a time; but she was laugh and smiling the whole time!

After a REALLY rough week at work, Mark is now on hiatus. That means we get at least two weeks straight of "daddy home days". I know all four of us are going to enjoy this immensely. Mark will also super enjoy sleeping in. And I might even get to sleep in once or twice!

Tomorrow we are going to Abbotsford to visit Paul & Greta, and to meet Emma. I am really looking forward to meeting and holding their new baby. Chloe is also really looking forward to seeing her cousin Ava.

Kara's Milk "Allergy?"

I guess I should start this post by saying that I was in Trail over the weekend for Coral's 30th birthday. I took Kara with me, and Mark and Chloe stayed home. I had a great time.

However...

I didn't limit what Kara ate in the way of dairy, nor what I ate. Ice cream cake, cheezies, lots of M&Ms. Super yummy, but now Kara is paying for my lack of caring. Though it turns out this was a very good test. Anyway, over the last few days Kara has slowly had rashes return to her legs, then today I noticed it on her tummy, chest and cheeks. I know she finds it itchy, and it looks horrid.

So after she went to bed today, I decided to look up milk allergies more in depth. I basically discovered that IF it is a milk allergy, its a Milk Protein Intolerance. Since its a super-delayed reaction, it is very hard to prove that she has an allergy using the normal skin/blood test that allergists employ. However, I am convinced that she is for sure allergic to milk, and will no longer give her anything with milk in it. And that means no more milk for me until I am no longer breast feeding her.

Ugh.

Congratulations & Happy Birthday

Mark's sister-in-law Greta had a baby girl earlier today. We welcome Emma Joy Nicholson to our family. Congratulations to Paul, Greta and Ava.

And we wish happy 28th birthday to our daddy and husband. We love you Mark. Thank you for everything you do for us. You make us very happy.

Cake!

So, its a week and a half late, but here goes anyway.

Last week, Uncle Lee (Mark's bro) and his kids came down from Vernon for a week. The very first day they were here, we got all of Mark's family together and had a big June/July birthday party for me (June 11), Mark (July 14), Violet (July 19) and James (July 27). Due to our food restrictions, I made the cake. And what a cake it was!



I made gluten free carrot cake, topped it with dairy free cream cheese icing, and then made rolled fondant for the turtle and flowers too!



The rest of Lee's visit was also fun. Chloe got to go to Playland with Uncle Lee, we went swimming, hung out on Canada Day (which was so cold!) and played some too.

Kara continues to try out new words, such as "car" and "jump". And "new", though it sounds like a mix between "new" and "no".

This is the last week of work for Mark before summer hiatus begins. We're looking forward to having daddy home for a few weeks, and hopefully going to the park now that it looks like summer might be here. Speaking of parks, we're off to the water park with some friends when Kara wakes up from her nap.

I am also headed to Trail with just Kara this weekend for my friend Coral's 30th birthday. Hopefully Kara doesn't hate the super long car ride too much... *fingers crossed* I'm dropping Chloe off in Abbotsford with Grandma on Thursday, and Grandma will bring Chloe home to Mark on Friday when Mark is done work. I'll be arriving home sometime late afternoon/early evening (preevening?) on Monday. It will really be nice to see Coral again.