Bunkbeds

All three shelves of this bookshelf are usually packed with children's books.  Last weekend, Emily and Hannah decided they wanted to "play bunkbeds."  At first when they told me what they were wanting to play I told them no.  It takes awhile to get all the books back on the shelves, plus they could fall, but then I changed my mind.  

Claire had fun playing with them, but didn't get the memo that she was supposed to be "sleeping" in her "bed."  Thankfully she had the bottom bunk.:)  

I love their imagination and that they want to play together.  :)

Claire's First Step

Claire took her first step on Thursday, January 22nd.  We were sooooo proud of our girl!!  That was just a few days ago, but she's already taken 4 steps in a row now.  My baby will be walking all over this house in no time.  

This was a 1 year portrait we had taken of her at Portrait Innovations last weekend.  Sweet thing!  

Just in the last few days she's started saying even more words.  It's a fun stage when they are learning new words every day!  She now says "no-no." I would venture to say that it is her new favorite word.  I was trying to get her to drink a little bit more from her sippy cup before I laid her down for a nap earlier today and she pushed it away and said "no-no" while shaking her head. Ha!  Well alrightly then.:)  It is honestly just so cute. Not as cute when Emily or Hannah tell me "No" to something I ask them to do, so I'll enjoy this cute stage while I can.:)  

If you say "Claire, where is the ball?", she'll crawl across the room to go get it and say "ball" over and over.  

This afternoon Bert told her he needed to change her diaper and asked her to go find her diapers.  She crawled all the way across the living room straight to the diaper/wipes basket.  But then when he sat down to change it she tried to crawl away.  Just wanted him to know she knew where they were.  It's just a little crazy to me to see how much she understands and I love love having her communicate with us.  So fun!  

When Emily and Hannah are coloring a picture on the playroom floor she will often crawl over and plop down right in the middle of the coloring book so that they can't color.  I'm pretty positive she knows that it irritates them.  Ha!:)  

She is slowly but surely getting better at drinking from a sippy cup.  I still have to offer it to her a million times a day and stay pretty focused to make sure she is getting enough liquids but we are getting there!!  

We just love you so much Claire Bear!  You are so much fun!!  And couldn't be any more cuddly or cute.  We love you!! 

2014 Through Emily's Camera

Emily got the camera in the picture below for Christmas 2013.  She's loved this camera all year and I can't tell you how many times she's said "let me run get my camera so I can take a picture." It has been such a fun first "real" camera!  

I knew that you could upload the pictures from the camera to a computer, but we just hadn't ever done it.  The camera was full (about 1300 pictures) and she kept asking her Daddy to "fix it"  so the other day he uploaded all the pictures onto his computer.  She thought it was sooooo much fun to see all the pictures she had taken all year and Bert and I were very impressed with her photography skills in some of these photos. 

Some of these are a little blurry, or not the best quality, but we loved them.  

Through the eyes of a 4 year old....

Mimi and Mama giving Claire a bath...C was just a few weeks old.  

Daddy giving Hannah a bath. 

Claire was one of her favorite subjects!  

Emily and her good friend Shaelynn

Emily took a great picture of my friend Dawnielle (Shaelynn's mom)!  We love our weekly playdates with their family!  

Selfie in the car. :)

Hannah with her bunny and thumb...she might not be smiling, but this is one happy girl!  

She took this from the playroom of me doing something in the kitchen.  

Artsy shot.  

She asked us often to "make a silly face."  

Cousin Jacob!  

There are sooooo many more, but these were a few of my favorites!  Great job Em!  

Warmer Days

We've had several days over the last week that have been in the upper 50's or lower 60's!!  After the first couple weeks of January we were so excited to see the slightly warmer temps and sunshine!  We couldn't stay out for too long each time (b/c it was still chilly for my three babies), but we took at least one trip outside each day!!  Ahhhh, I love love love sunshine!!!  

The girls got to ride their scooters outside, instead of inside the house where I keep having to tell them to "slow down....look out for your sister....slow down."  

Just love these sweet cheeks.  

I was trying to hold her and she would wiggle out of my arms so that she could get down and crawl on the pavement.  She also kept trying to crawl over onto the grass, but since it was wet we had to tell her no to that.  She decided she would take what she could get and happily crawled all around the patio.  

All three love to swing!  Emily is getting really good at pumping her legs so that she can swing herself.  Hannah is sooooo much more stable on the big girl swing than she was last summer!  

Happy, happy!  

They had fun riding their riding toy together for a few minutes.  

We also set up an obstacle course, kicked the ball back and forth, and took a walk around the neighborhood.  We've had a fun few days playing outside some! 

Although there are some things I like about it, winter is my least favorite season.  I don't like all the sicknesses that come along with winter and being stuck inside and bundling the kids up every time we go out the door is quite time consuming.   BUT I do like one good snow and I love that we have seasons!  I think it would be boring if it just stayed the same temp all year round.  And I love hot chocolate!  I think in my ideal world winter would be cut in half or maybe to a third.:)  I know it is going to get cold again, but maybe this time we'll get some white stuff along with the frigid temps.  Happy January everyone!!:)  

Wordless Wednesday

Claire - 1 year Update

Claire had a great 1 year check up!  She weighed 21 lbs, 12 oz and was in the 63rd percentile for her weight.  She was 27.8 inches long and was in the 13th percentile for her height.  The doctor wasn't concerned at all about her being in the 13th percentile for her height.  She said she's grown an inch since her last check-up and she's sure she'll have a height growth spurt soon.  I hope she does, but we think she's perfect either way.  :)

Claire's Favorites at 1 year:
Food:  Bananas, yogurt, peas, carrots, puffs, cheese, mandarin oranges, etc.
Activities: Playing in Hannah's pink chair, playing in their play kitchen, putting things in her mouth, pushing things around the house, swinging
Words she can say:  Mama, Dada, bye bye, hey, night night ("nigh, nigh")

Sleeping Habits at 1 year:
-Takes 2 naps a day.  Sleeps about an hour in the morning and an hour and a half in the afternoon.
-She has started fussing/playing for awhile before she falls asleep for her morning nap.  Hope she's not about the give that nap up!
-She sleeps 11-12 hours at night....almost never wakes up in the middle of the night.
-She sleeps with her "lovie" (bear) and a sound machine that sounds like rain
-She doesn't use a sleep sack any more because she had gotten so mobile in her crib.

Things I Treasure about our 1 year old:
-She loves to be tickled and she has the sweetest little laugh.
-She is often content to watch her sisters.
-She likes to do her own thing.  She'll crawl into the play room and just start playing by herself.
-She doesn't particularly want to sit still for me to read to her.  She will sometimes, but not for long.
-She is doing a great job drinking water out of a sippy cup.  She's never had juice and I plan on keeping it that way for a while longer.
-I've been offering her whole milk but so far she pretty much just plays with the sippy cup instead of drinking it.  Hopefully she'll acquire a taste for that soon!
-She's getting a bottle at night, but I'm planning on dropping it within the next few days.  She'll only be getting liquids out of sippy cups.
-She often says "boommmm" when she falls to her bottom from standing up (which is often).
-She hasn't taken a step yet, but she is so close.  She will stand up without holding onto anything for minutes at a time.  When we reach our hands out to try to get her to take a step towards us she thinks about it (you can see her thinking), and then drops to her knees and crawls to us.
-I think of my three, Claire gives me the hardest time about putting her in the carseat.  She fusses more often than not, but not for long.  Once she sees she's getting strapped in whether she likes it or not she calms down.  Her protest is noted though.:)
-She's recently started following me into rooms when I leave one room to go to another.  She's always so proud when she finds me.  Cutie.
-Claire gets soooo excited when her Daddy gets home from work.  She grins from ear to ear and crawls straight to him.
-She loves bath time.  She's loved bath time almost from the beginning, but now she gets to take a bath with her sisters which makes it even better.
-I think she looks alot like Emily at this age.
-She loves her lovie.  It's so sweet.  We can say "Where's your lovie, Claire" and she'll stop whatever she is doing to start looking for it.  Then she'll crawl across the room to get it.
-She likes to stand up in the seat of her new toy car.  I don't like this because I'm afraid she is going to fall out on her head.
-She usually gets her feelings hurt when I tell her "no-no" to something.  She will often get mad and start crying.  Her mad/sad face includes her poking her bottom lip out really far.  It's adorable.
-She's a very good eater.  I can't think of anything she's turned away.
-She's started purposefully snuggling with Bert and me when we pick her up sometimes.  She will lay her head on our shoulder and snuggle up and I promise it absolutely melts my heart.  I usually just hold my breath and keep rocking/swaying because I want her to stay put for as long as she will.
-Claire loves to pull on her ears.  She does it all the time.  At first it worried me that she was getting an ear infection, but she's had several check-ups since this habit started and her ears are always perfectly clear.
-She's not a fan of bows and will pull one out as soon as she realizes it is in her hair.
-She likes to dance...it's really more of a bounce/head bob. If someone else starts dancing, she will try to copy them by turning her head from side to side. Little cutie.
-She tries to copy what we're saying, especially when we are handing a toy back and forth with her. She'll say her version of "thank you" each time. Her grandmothers were very impressed at her birthday party with this!:)

Claire is growing up right before our eyes! It's hard to believe that she's more of a toddler now than the tiny baby girl we brought home from the hospital just twelve months ago! But we are so thankful to God for her--for her growth and her health and all the joy that she brings into each of our lives!

Claire's 1st Birthday Party

We had Claire's first birthday party on January 3rd.  We had a fun time with family celebrating our girl's first year!!  

Smash cake...

We also had yummy pizza from Papa John's!  

This isn't the best picture, but we printed out and hung up her monthly pictures from her first year.  We actually left these up for about 2 weeks because I liked looking at them so much!  

Present time!  

She was very interested in the paper.  :)

I just loved her expression in the picture below.  Don't you just want to eat her up?!

Her big sisters and cousin Jacob were very big helpers in opening her presents.  

They also loved pushing her all over the house in her new car!  The new car has been a big hit (for all the kiddos)!  

Watts family photo!  

Carrie snapped the picture below when we weren't looking but I liked it because Bert and I were just looking at our babies.  These three bring us so much joy and we are so thankful to be their parents.  

Claire really enjoyed her first time eating cake!  At first, she just stuck a finger in the cake and then inspected the icing.  She was pretty serious through out the entire process.:)  

And then she grabbed a handful and inspected that...

At this point she had destroyed half the cake and still hadn't put one bit of it even close to her mouth. 

So I decided I would help her out....

She was a fan!  Look at her eye brows in the picture below....she had that mouth opened WIDE!  Trying to get a big bite!!:)  

After an outfit change, she got to have some real food (healthier food) and some play time with her Daddy!  

Group photo of Claire's party!  

Claire, we all love you so much!!  We had so much fun celebrating the gift that you are to our family!!