Julietisms

Here are a few things overheard at our house these days:

Me: "You need to get into your carseat. We are going to the library!"

Juliet (mad about getting into her carseat): "Mommy, I don't like you! Go to work!"

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Juliet (in her crib at nap time): "Mommy, I having problems! Mommy, I having problems!"

Me: "Juliet, what is wrong?"

Juliet: "I having problems. There are MONSTERS in my crib!"

Well, I guess that is a problem!

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Juliet: "Mommy, I love you so much. As much as an alligator!"

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The Pug (and nanny Megan)

Megan comes over to our house on Mondays to watch the girls while I go to work. Megan loves to take the girls outside, read books, and talk about her pug named Agnes. Juliet was particularly fascinated by Agnes and has named many of her stuffed animals Agnes (or Aggie) as well. Before Megan left for a month-long internship in Mexico, she brought Agnes to our house for a little visit. The girls walked Agnes around the house and had a great time with her!

A reminder of not so long ago....

I would be remiss in not posting a few of our outdoor adventures this winter. We had a lot of snow this winter that stayed for a long time. The girls could only handle about a 1/2 hour in the snow before their gloves were so wet that they were freezing. So, we would come inside for some yummy hot chocolate and get toasty warm again. Hopefully, all of that is behind us. Today it was 50 degrees, and there is no snow on the ground. We love Spring!

Sisters

These two sisters love each other so much. They love spending time together and playing together. They share a room. If they have been separated for any length of time, they will run and give each other big hugs. Because they spend a lot of time together, they also have little fights quite often.

Today, Sophia was bugged that Juliet was not giving her what she perceived as enough room on the couch. Sophia chose to remedy this situation by kicking her legs at Juliet, which resulted in an immediate consequence. I then talked (okay, lectured) to Sophia about the importance of being kind to her sister.

I said, "Sophia, you will never regret being kind to your little sister. You need to be gentle with her because she is so little."

Sophia then immediately turned to Juliet and started chanting in a whisper, "grow..grow..grow.."

I laughed so hard, and both of girls soon joined in.

Happy 2nd and 37th Birthdays!

It is birthday party craziness around here at the end of January! Adam and Juliet were both born on January 29th. Adam thinks it is fantastic that he and Juliet share the same birthday. He feels like that fact alone will bond them together forever!

It is still hard to believe that Ms. Juliet is now two. I think that two-year olds are great. We can see Juliet's personality really blossoming. She loves her sister most of all, her little doggie Woofie, drawing, saying her ABC's, snuggling, reading books, and watching "Wonder Pets."

She says the funniest things. The other day she was brushing my hair and I asked her if it looked pretty. She responded, "No. Not yet."

She is also pretty easy-going. I know that this is hard to believe, but she potty-trained herself. Since she has been about one she has been asking to use the potty. (She saw big sis doing it, so she wanted to do it, too). Two weeks ago, we decided it was ridiculous that we were continuing to have her wear diapers because she always told us when she had to go potty. And, just like that, Juliet was potty trained---all on her own!

We had a little family party on the 29th with cake and pizza. The next night, we went to Pepitos for dinner with the Heffelbowers and came back to our house for cake and presents. We are hoping for another great year!

Yummy chocolate cake!

Actually, really, really yummy chocolate cake!

We gave Juliet a new book for her present.


The birthday Heffelbowers and Sophia. (Juliet sneaking more cake!)

Party #2 and cake #2. Homemade white cake with pink butter creme frosting.

My little ballerina is so, so adorable!

Partying with the Heff's.

Juliet loved opening her presents.

Merry Christmas!

We celebrated Christmas Eve at Adam's parents house. Despite the blizzard, we made it there! The food, company, and presents were worth the drive. Also, the Heffelbowers are famous for their practical joke gifts. Adam gave his brother Scott a nicely wrapped box filled with 10 little cards that were "Good for one free hug." Adam later gave Scott his real present. Scott and Jeremy both brought little boxes of edible bugs. Juliet was so curious about them, and even licked one (video to follow soon). As a non-gag, but really great gift, Scott gave Jeremy an assortment of fancy cheeses. One cheese was $60 per pound! Some of the cheeses were good, but others smelled so terrible we could not eat them.

Today, we woke up in the morning with the blizzard continuing. After the kids opened the presents from their stockings, we put on our snow gear and made a wonderful snow-man! After Juliet's nap, we headed over to Great Grandpa Quenten's (aka Ahcoon's) house for another party. It was a wonderful Christmas.

There is just no room for a Christmas tree in our little house. So, Santa leaves presents in the Christmas stockings. These stockings were presents from great grandma and grandpa Frigo.

Opening presents in our jammies.

Homemade gingerbread cookies (which taste nothing like the store-bought kind).


The "snow king."

Our radiator serves as a coat rack during the winter months. Everything gets so dry and toasty!

Holiday Switching

Ever since we had kids, we "switch" holidays every year between our parents. This year, thanksgiving was in Green Bay with my parents, and Christmas will be in White Bear Lake with Adam's family. The next year, it will be the opposite. So far, it has worked really well.

We had a great time over thanksgiving. Katie was there, along with her fiance Darin, and his two twin daughters, Mya and Madison. Sophia and Juliet thought Mya and Madison were great. They played make believe games for hours. When they got tired of that, they would snuggle on the couch and watch a movie or coerce Adam into playing video games with them.

My parents also came into town a few weekends ago to celebrate Christmas with us. The girls loved their new penguin jammies and other gifts from Grandma and Grandpa.

Grandma, Grandpa, and the girls in their matching penguin jammies at the "Mulloy" Christmas.

Hanging out and playing game boy at Thanksgiving.

Mya, Madison, & Sophia snuggled together.


The girls decided to eat thanksgiving dinner together at the little table, even though there was room for them at the big table.

Juliet is ready to eat!

Cutie Pie

This picture is not staged. On very rare occasions, Juliet asks to have a book in her crib at nap time. Typically, she sleeps with her stuffed animals "Woofie" and "Baa-bie" and her blanket. She must have fallen asleep reading the book, and I could not resist taking a picture!

After several tries, I finally got Juliet to give me a cute smile (rather than a silly one).

Today, the girls and I went to "Once Upon A Child" to find a few "new" toys for the car-ride to Green Bay this weekend. We did not find too many toys, but the girls discovered the ball pit that they have there. It is a very small ball pit created by half-walls built into a small square and filled with balls. The girls played in there for an hour, and I had to drag them out of there. (Yes, I know that the ball pit was probably H1N1 hot-zone central, but how could I deny them that fun????).

I also found some adorable dresses for Christmas. The girls insisted on wearing them all afternoon, pretending to be princesses. They spent hours twirling around the house and fluffing their fancy gowns. It was a good day.

Moments Like These...

I was making dinner in the kitchen and peeked around the corner to see what the girls were up to. I had heard Sophia reading books out-loud. She loves to pretend to be the "teacher" and face the book outward. Usually, her "students" are her stuffed animals or her mommy and daddy. Today, however, I saw this sweet scene of Sophia telling Juliet the book while she quietly listened. Moments like these I wish I could bottle-up forever.

"Big Smile for Mommy"

I told Juliet that I wanted"a big smile" and this is what the goof-ball gave me! She cracks me up! Sometimes, we will be hanging-out and Juliet will get-up and put on the "Juliettie Show." She dances, runs, pretends to fall, walks backwards, and performs a whole variety of other entertainment. Sophia thinks it's fantastic and will frequently pee her pants because she is laughing so hard.

HAPPY HALLOWEEN

Pre Trick-or-Treating Bath

All dressed-up as Princess Snow White (notice the bluebird perched on her shoulder)

Little Princess Juliet (who did not particularly enjoy dressing up)

Trick-or-Treating with Mommy and the neighborhood kids

Post Trick-or-Treating loot

Chatty Ms. Juliet

Juliet has become very chatty. She is learning new words every day. Her most used word is "Gee-a" for Sophia. She can also say her teacher's name "Mom-ii" (Mollie). She can say her own name perfectly. A few other favorites are backpack, scary, hungry, milk, woof-woof, draw, tv, out, sit, mine, me and many more. We sometimes cannot understand some words. For example, "scary" and "carry" sound nearly identical, which causes some confusion. We are loving our little talkative girl!

New Friends

These are just a few random photos over the summer. Aren't the girls darling????

The past few weeks with pre-school have had their ups and downs. Juliet still screams every time that I drop her off, but quickly recovers. (Teacher Mollie texts me when Juliet stops crying, which is usually before I reach the car).

Sophia has had a hard time with transitions during the day. Teacher Laurie tells me that she gets upset when her friend, Veda, leaves at 12:30, and again when Sophia has to go into the Chameleons room at the end of the day on Thursdays (Sophia is a Platypus).

I had the brilliant idea to get Sophia a darling little stuffed animal deer for her transition to the Chameleons. So far, it is has worked.

Sophia talks about her new friend, Veda, a lot. They both go to school only on Tuesdays and Thursdays. One of their games is to hide rocks in the playground one day, and then go on a treasure hunt to find them the next day. Sophia talks about Veda's special little animal friend that is similar to Bunny Bun. However, Sophia also told me that Veda sometimes tells her that she needs some alone time; and Sophia has said that she likes to follow Veda around. This got me a little worried about whether Sophia's friendship with Veda was entirely mutual.

My fears were all laid to rest today. Sophia has been sick with croup (yuck!) this week and has not been to school. Today, however, we dropped Juliet off for school in the morning. That's when we saw Veda's mom. Sophia said, "Mommy, mommy, mommy! That Veda's mommy!" I said, "Hi, Veda's mommy." Veda's mommy said that Veda had been so sad Sophia had not been at school on Tuesday. Veda's mom said that she was considering extending Veda's day so that she and Sophia could spend more time together!

As for Juliet, she loves her teacher, and says her name often. Drop offs are still rough, but hopefully they will get better. I am sure that there will be more pre-school stories as we continue on this new adventure.

Calvin and Sophia

Adam has been reading "Calvin and Hobbes" at night with Sophia. As everyone knows, Calvin does some crazy things. Last night, they read about how Calvin locked the babysitter out of the house.

Flash forward to this afternoon. My neighbor (Mya) and her kids were over, and we were all playing nicely in the background. Suddenly, the three oldest (Jude, Chloe and Sophia) ran to the front yard. We hear a door slam. Then, dead silence. Mya and I waited a minute or two. Then I went to the front yard to find them. They were not there. I tried the front door. Locked. I went to the back door. Locked.

Luckily, Mya and I are both good-natured, but we were mad. We rang the doorbell, yelled through the window, promised treats, and then made threats, but no one would open the door. Finally, Mya must have threatened the right thing and Jude (7) came down stairs and unlocked the door.

The kids thought it was hilarious. They were hiding in the closet upstairs. Mya and I made the kids sit on the patio furniture. The kids had TWO moms reprimanding them. Sophia told me, "Mommy, nothing bad happened. There wasn't a fire in the house or anything." Oy Vey!

A Lot of "Firsts" Today

We had a lot of "firsts" today. Sophia and Juliet started pre-school this morning. Until now, we have had a nanny coming to our house to watch our girls while I worked two or three days per week. We have been so lucky that we had two great nannies this past year. But, nanny Katie moved to Seattle, and nanny Megan went back to school this fall. So, we decided to have the girls start preschool this fall.

They are attending Fraser school two days per week. Fraser is a pre-school that specializes in putting regularly developing kids with kids with special needs, particularly autism. It is a great program for my kids because they receive the benefits of some of the special services for the kids with special needs, such as music therapy, high teacher-child ratios, and awesome indoor and outdoor "large muscle" playgrounds. Plus, a lot of the neighborhood kids go there as well.

Even though we knew Fraser was a great program, I was still nervous about sending the girls off into the world. But, I should not have been worried. They did great! We started-off doing just a 1/2 day.

Sophia was a bit nervous when she walked into her room, but quickly put her backpack down and sat at a table and started drawing. I kissed her goodbye, and she was fine. I, however, was choking back tears and could hardly say goodbye.

Next, we went to Juliet's room where they were heading outside. I walked outside with the teachers and kids. Juliet loves playing outside, so this was fortunate. As expected, when I was telling Juliet goodbye, she was hysterical. It was so hard to leave. Teacher Mollie said that I should call her room in an hour to see how Juliet was doing. I did call, and Juliet was doing great!

When I went to Fraser to pick-up Juliet after lunch, they were playing in the indoor playground. At first, I could not find Juliet. Finally, I looked inside the play structure and there she was having the time of her life. She told me over and over, "Weee!!!! Weeee!!!!" I asked if she wanted to come out, and she shook her head no. I started to walk to get her backpack and things and then she started calling for me and finally did come out. Mollie said Juliet had a terrific day!

We then picked-up Sophia. Sophia had just finished eating and was reading a book with the teacher. She ran to me and gave me a hug. We grabbed her backpack, and as we were leaving a few little girls waived and said, "Bye, Sophia!" It was so sweet. I got very little information from Sophia about her day, but she said that she "loves" preschool. Yay!

Sophia and her "my little pony" backpack ready for her first day of school.


Juliet and her "hello kitty" backpack. But, she was more interested in taking the camera from me.

Then, this afternoon, the girls got haircuts. Neither one likes getting their hair washed and Juliet still absolutely refuses to let me do anything with hair. Thus, we keep their hair as simple as possible. Sophia got a nice chin-length bob. Juliet got her first haircut! Juliet's hair had grown into a curly mullet that covered her eyes. It was time for the first haircut. She handled it great! She loved eating her sucker and watching cartoons. The same hair dresser that cut Sophia's first hair cut (Delores) also gave Juliet her first hairdo.

"No big deal. Just getting my haircut."

"Look at my pretty eyes without my hair in my face!"

"So pretty."

Pictures from Florida

We made it home from Florida with our gazillion bags of luggage, pack 'n' play, and stroller! Sanibel was beautiful, and it was wonderful to spend a whole week together as a family. But, it is always nice to come home, too.

Playing in the kiddie pool. This is where Sophia learned to dunk her whole head and swim a few feet under water. This is also the pool where Juliet picked-up a drowning bee, and got strung, which she still talks about---when she sees a bee she looks at her hand and says "Ow."

One of the "pelican trees," where the birds liked to relax.

Our condo.

Juliet enjoying a snack on the porch.

Sophia goofing around with daddy on the porch.