December 2014 - 23 months old

12-2-14 When I pick up the girls from Mary's, I ask how was your day? Lily says, “Sammeli.” (Sammy, Eli) Who did you play with? Sammeli. Any question about Mary's the answer is Sammeli! When we get home, she pretends to talk on the phone. Sammeli.

They both say a rooster says, “Cock-a-doo!” Lily finds the Grinch on the Dr. Seuss blanket and makes the Grinch face. If we watch The Grinch, they both make the Grinch face!

I love how Violet scrunches up her eyes and nose when she laughs. It’s so cute!

12-3-14 I have the sweetest, funniest girls! Violet had owls on her sockies and she would look down, say "Whooooo," look at me with a surprised face like she didn't know there were owls on her socks, and then smile her giggly, scrunchy smile! 

Lily is always the last one sitting at the table. She is sloooow like daddy and she doesn't want to get down! She'll often sit there a while with daddy even though she's done eating (or not done)!! Then, she leans her head all the way to one side to see me in the living room and says, “Hi Mama!!”

12-5-14 Violet peed on the potty!!!! We were all so excited and jumping around! All night, we said, who went pee-pee on the potty? Lily said, “Sissy!!” and Violet smiled her proud smile! She was dry when we got home this afternoon, so I sat her down. She read the special bathroom books and when she stood up, there it was! Wahoo!!!

12-6-14 Daddy's been gone for work the last 2 days, but he's coming home tonight! Yay! The girls have asked about him a few times. I’m glad it’s only a short trip.

Earlier today we went to see Santa at Jack's house. They wanted nothing to do with him! (Yesterday we saw Santa at Discovery Gateway and it took them a while to even look at him!) Jack’s parents throw a fun party. It’s too bad Ryan wasn’t there too! He has an epic playroom so they were plenty busy. At one point I looked up and saw Margaret, the girls’ dietician! She’s been a neighbor to Rusty’s family (Jack’s daddy) for years! It was great to see her and catch up. She said the girls look great and healthy! When it was time to eat, despite all the toys, the girls sat at the kiddie table and ate lunch. Of course Margaret noticed how well they ate!

That night the girls and I went to dinner with Demi and Danny at a pizza place in Sugar House. It was a lot of fun and the girls behaved and ate well. It’s nice when restaurants provide crayons and something to color on, but if not, I’m always prepared!

12-10-14 When I picked up the girls this afternoon, Mary gave them a nice compliment. She said that she loves how the girls are so good at exploring their toys, and playing with musical instruments. They’re always reading books or playing with blocks and they love the tricycle outside. It was nice to hear they play so nice and are inquisitive.

Lily dumps the blocks out of the bucket and puts it on her head. Then she comes to me and says, “Knock,” and I do and say, “Who is it?” She pushes up the bucket and says, “Lily!!!” Violet likes to play that game too! They also like us to tie blankets on their heads like old lady scarves. It’s actually pretty sweet!

12-13-14 This is going to be the last sequential date in our lifetime! Kind of neat!

We went to see Santa at Trolley Square. The line was a little long so we walked around a bit first, looking at the craft market they have there this time of year. We were upstairs looking down and we were talking about Santa and how the kids are so happy sitting on his lap. We asked if they wanted to go down and sit on his lap. They said, Yeah! When we got down there, we had to wait in a short line and we kept saying, “Look at the little girl! She’s sitting on Santa’s lap! Is she happy? (yeah) Is she crying? (no)” When it was our turn, did they want to sit on Santa’s lap? NO! They wanted to climb into his sleigh, but not sit with him! We got a few pictures standing near Santa. He said that kids don’t really like sitting on his lap at this age, until they’re 27 months. I guess he would know!!

We went to a neighbor’s birthday party later that night. Violet was protecting Lily from a boy stealing her balloon. She was whacking him with both of her balloons, and shouting, “Noooooo!” hahahaha!

12-15-14 Lily grabbed some of my yarn and said, “Come on sting (string)!” She was pulling on it and getting frustrated because it was caught and then she was just pulling on a short length of it and getting frustrated that the rest wasn’t moving! I was laughing so hard!

12-16-14 They are both starting to sing Somewhere Over the Rainbow with me. It's the sweetest thing ever! They'll sing meeee or hiiiigh. They love being rocked and sung to at bedtime now.

There are many things I want to record: reading 123 to the Zoo, reading th Elmo pet book with hidden sheep (they point to the sheep and belt out baa, baa, baa!), bath time, how quick they are going up and down the stairs, and doing their favorite puzzles.

12-19-14 They made jingle bell bracelets at Mary's today. They love them, especially Violet who put them all on one arm! They were singing Jingle Bells pretty good with me too. I guess they were practicing it all day at Mary’s!

12-20-14 They love singing!!! They sing anything with me all the time. They catch on to the last sound of the line and then sing it. Violet often hums along with her thumb in her mouth. Silly girl! They'll sing anything with me, but especially love Somewhere Over the Rainbow, Jingle Bells, Twinkle Twinkle (Lily requests that one), Doggy in the Window, Wheels on the Bus (Lily says, "Move on back!" and Violet says, "Beep, beep!"). Lily belts out “someWHEEEERE over the rainBOOOWW,” and closes her eyes and shakes her head a little. She really gets into it!

12-23-14 Lily will do something silly, like stuff her doggy in her dollhouse, then say, “Ta, mama!" (Ta da!) They are so different at breakfast. Violet eats one puff at a time and bites them in half with her front teeth first. Lily grabs a handful and stuffs them in her mouth. They love the purple berry puffs the best!

Lily wiggles from side to side when she likes something a lot. (Daddy sometimes does that too!) Sings “Happy!!” (Pharrell Williams song)

Christmas will be in its own post!

12-26-14 Since it snowed yesterday we’ve been dying to go outside! After nap we got all bundled up to go outside and play in the snow! They loved it! They ran around and Daddy built a snowman! The girls had fun with Bella and then it started to get dark. Time to go in, but no, they laid down and made snow angels! Did they really know that’s what they were doing? Probably not, but it was so cute to see them laying in the snow together, giggling!

12-27-14 Happy Birthday, Ryan! After breakfast we went to the Natural History Museum! We always start at the top and make our way down. After we left the Native Voices room, Ryan said, “There’s Ty Burrell.” He’s Phil in Modern Family and we love that show! We knew he lived in Salt Lake, but didn’t expect to ever see him. He was there with his family so we didn’t bother them at all; we just went around the museum like they were any other family. It’s funny because we pretty much went through the whole museum with them. Sometimes we were ahead of them, and sometimes they were ahead of us. At the end I thought I should ask for an autograph because I’d regret it if I didn’t! He happily signed Ryan’s ticket and told him “Happy Birthday!” We went to have a yummy lunch at Toasters and then headed home to get the girls down for nap. Ryan chose to go to Bombay House for dinner. We stopped at Nordstrom Rack on the way and Ryan found the boots he was looking for! Yay! At dinner, the girls were really good and Lily ate soooo much! She loves the veggie biryani! After I put the leftovers in the box, she got the big spoon and cleaned the rest of the sauce out of the bowl! She would have kept going if we would have let her! Overall, Daddy had a lovely 33^rd birthday! We love you!! 

12-28-14 Violet must have rolled out of bed onto the pillow and then onto the floor. When we went to bed she was all curled up on the floor. I picked her up and put her in bed. I love them in their toddler beds now. I can give them kisses when they are asleep!

Lily is still singing “Santa Comin' to Town!!!” She belts it out!!

We’ll be sad when we have to take the tree down. Probably after their birthday. The girls love the tree, and so do I. They say, “Tee on!” for us to turn on the lights, and at night they say, “Bye, tee!” Violet carefully pulls the soft bird ornaments off the tree and wears them on her wrists like bracelets.

 Santa at Trolley. This is the best we could do!

 I finished the blankets just a few days before Christmas, on the 20th!

Wow, I made these.

Cutie posing!

 Yoga babies!

Jingle bells!

First gingerbread house! They made it at Mary's house!

 

Busy coloring

 Snoopy dog!

 Violet in the snow!

 Lily in the snow!

 Helping Daddy make a snowman!

Bella kisses!

 Is that a mini snowman?

 It is a mini snowman!

 Mama's Snow Angels!

 Natural History Museum!

 Ants! (and Ty Burrell!)

 My little rock climbers!

In the Horse exhibit 

 She was so nervous about walking on the glass floor!

 Happy birthday, Daddy!

 Yummy Indian food!

 Gelato!

Cheese!!

November 2014 - 22 months old

11-1-14 When Lily hears Bella barking she says, “Bella, Poopy Bella.” Once she saw Ryan scooping in the back Bella has her new name! My dad and Mindy came over today. Lily calls him Poppy which is very cute. After they left, Violet got the hiccups. I said, “Where’d you get those hiccups, Violet?” Lily said, “Poppy.”

Violet stopped biting, which is a relief! Lily says a lot of words with the /u/ sound, like pullow and Bulla. She says, “Bulla barkin’!” They now do raspberries for the bee sound! It’s so funny!

All of their incisors are coming in! Eight new teeth all together!

11-2-14 Violet is a little ballerina! She balancing on one foot and stretching her other leg out to the side on the stairs to their slide. So precious!

11-3-14 In the morning we can hear the girls singing with each other while in their cribs waiting for Daddy. Violet loves her new coat and her new jammies! She loves putting her hands in her pockets! Lily has to have her hood on when she has her jacket or coat on. She says, “Hood, mama,” and, “Zip.” They use the Halloween baskets/bags Mary gave them as hats and they can barely see! They also put their dollies in them and carry them around.

They have grown out of their jammies and are ready for the next size: 18 months. We have lots of fleece ones from Quincy that are sooo cute! Violet wore the leopard print one that has a hood, pocket, and little cat ears. She came up to me with her hands in her pocket and said, meow!

11-4-14 Lily won't hug Ryan when he gets home until he takes off his jacket. She says, “Daddy, jacky.” If he picks her up she'll hold her arms stiff so he can't hug her. As soon as the jacket is off, he gets a big hug!

11-5-14 Violet is a great little yogi! She does a beautiful downward dog. Lily does the splits and pretty much goes all the way to the ground. Yoga babies!

11-7-14 We've been reading Dr. Seuss' The Eye Book and one page has a man on it. They always say, “Daddy!” and point to the picture, then to Ryan. It's funny because it is a picture of an old black man with a white beard!

11-8-14 Lily is so funny in the morning. Ryan gets her up and changed then she comes to our room to say hi to me. She says, “Lip,” for some chapstick, and, “Sleepy, me,” so she can pretend she’s sleeping in our bed. She won’t cuddle with me at all. I can’t even touch her without a, “NO, Mama!” She has to lay on Ryan’s pillow, too. Then Violet walks in with her hand in her pocket, hood on, and her thumb in her mouth.

Lily likes putting her blocks in a straight line. Her new favorite phrase is, “Look, mama!”

The burp cloths that were put away in a basket are now blankets for their dolls. They’re the perfect size for sleepy Elmo!

Violet is so funny at restaurants. She’s always busy watching people and smiling at them. She’s a little flirt! We had gelato after dinner at Settebello tonight. The girls were hilarious! I wish I would have been able to record it! They have wide, benches at Capo and the girls were busy getting up and down until they had a taste. Then they were on their tummies with their mouths open as wide as they could go. They reminded me of baby birds. Violet would shake a little bit too! It was so funny! Usually Lily is jabbering about something nonstop, but as soon as she swallowed her mouth was open again as wide as it would go! She didn’t make a peep!

11-10-14 Lily counts to 2! One, two!!! Tonight Violet told Lily to sit down! She did. :) It’s usually Lily doing all of the talking and telling all of us what to do!

11-12-14 I made some yummy roasted zucchini and squash to go with our pasta tonight. I hid one of each color under their noodles and sauce. We asked if they can find the yellow one or the green one. They didn’t get it at first, but then they loved it and wanted more!

11-13-14 Violet has been sitting on the potty!! At first we'd just pull down her pants, but the last few days she's had her diaper off too! No action yet, but she loves sitting on the potty and reading her special sound books!

11-15-14 Violet throws a ball really well! She loves throwing it back and forth with you. Lily is so silly. She puts her stuffed animals on her head in the car then says, turtle hat, monkey hat, or doggy hat!

11-19-14 Violet has been our little wrestler the last few days! She loves piling on top of Lily! They laugh, run to the pillows, and then either fall down next to each other or on top of each other! Lily loves to get her bag or basket and then say, “Bye! I shoppin!" They love puzzles, blocks, balls, books, dollies, and cooking in their kitchen.

11-23-14 Violet is counting to two, too! Sometimes they both count to three!

11-26-14 Violet says I love you, “Ahloo.” She likes to sit on my lap at night and help me crochet. She holds the end of the hook while I am crocheting or she'll hold the hook side and poke the other end in and out of the blanket. I was raking leaves after I picked them up from Mary's today. They loved running through the piles. Lily picked up leaves and threw them in the air. Violet sat down in the middle of the pile looking at individual leaves and then I looked over and she was laying in the leaves on her tummy! So fun!!!!

11-27-14 Thanksgiving was really fun this year! We went to my dad’s and Mindy set the table beautifully! The food was all delicious and the girls ate well and had a great time. Mindy brought construction paper and we made feather hats for the girls. They were so cute!

11-29-14 Lily proclaimed it an “Elmo Socky Day" today!! Violet woke early from nap and talked a ton, lied on her tummy playing with the doll house, chatting away!

We bought a Christmas tree today! We got it from the family from Montana that sells them at the Nibley Park Golf Course. I love our tree! It’s beautiful! We chose one that isn’t as full as most trees. I didn’t think to ask what kind it is though. It smells so good too! We turned on Christmas music and the girls danced around while we got it all set up and plugged in the lights. The girls loved it, especially Violet! They helped us put on the ornaments and were able to put on the candy canes by themselves. When we were done, we went in to watch “How the Grinch Stole Christmas” and Violet went back to look at the pretty tree again. We have the baby gates up still so they can’t go right up to it unless we lift them over it, so Violet was standing at the gate gazing at the pretty lights on the tree. So sweet! We put on the cartoon version of the Grinch and they loved it! They were so into it! We remembered putting it on last year and they couldn’t care less. Lily made the Grinchy face and Violet kept saying, “Uh-oh,” when things were going wrong. She was very concerned about Max! Violet is just like Cindy Lou-Who with her blonde hair, blue eyes, and mousy little voice. I said, “Is that Violet?” and Lily said, “Ya.” Then I asked, “Violet, is that you?” and she said, “Ya,” and smiled. They watched the whole thing and didn’t want to go to bed! Then they both wanted to look at the tree some more instead of going to bed! We are definitely in the Christmas spirit now! Tomorrow we will put up their stockings!

October 2014 - 21 months old

10-2-14 Violet loves the 1-2-3 To the Zoo book. It has a lion on the cover and a little mouse to find on each page. She roars like a lion, but it sounds like the noise you'd make for static! She wants to read it over and over again! Lily says “pillow” and “blankey” now and takes them to various places to go night-night! She lays still for about 5 seconds before she's up and moving again! She says pullow.

10-3-14 Lily yells, DADDY! When she needs him or when he walks in the other room. It's like she's singing it, DAD-DEEEE! And she’s soooo loud! haha

10-4-14 Our sweet cousin, Abi, lost her battle with cancer this morning. We are heartbroken. She will never be forgotton.

10-6-14 Violet is so funny when she's really happy. She'll get so excited that she'll shake! She has done this with her doggy in her mouth and tonight it was at The Dodo restaurant with a crayon in each hand! She's also done it when she finds a particularly great flower or leaf. It cracks me up!

10-7-14 Lily is a parrot! She copied me saying damn! Not just once, but 4 times!!!

Lily loved the Indian food tonight! She's doing really well with a spoon!

10-8-14 We can't believe how many words the girls know, especially Lily! We started writing them all down and Lily knows 115 words and Violet knows 55!! Lily is a chatter box and is ALWAYS talking. Violet knows a lot of words but doesn't say them all day long like Lily so it was harder to get a count on hers. Lily knows quite a few phrases, the funniest being “it's working" or “it's not working" and she's always touching the bottom right corner of the TV. I asked Mary if she picked it up there. Yep. If the TV remote isn't working the kids tell Mary that then she turns it on (it's up where the kids can't reach) and tells them it's working. Mary thought it was so funny that Lily picked up on that! Violet knows a lot that Lily knows plus a few that are her own words. She says elephant and the snake sound, hiss, and Julian from Olivia. Oh yeah, she also says off, as in take off my special thumb bracelet because I want to suck my thumb! Lily tries to say Hoggenmuller, the teacher in Olivia. It's pretty funny! They are learning new words every single day!!!

10-10-14 Lily is so funny with the cat ears headbands we got at Target. She puts them on her eyes like glasses and walks around! Violet is always finding the smallest fuzz or little piece of grass on the floor, picks it up with thumb and finger, then brings it to me. Thank you, Violet! She pays so much attention to details!

10-11-14 Violet got Lily's jacket for her. We said, “Lily, tell Violet thank you!" She said, “You're welcome me."

We went to The Tracy Aviary after nap. There was a little hay maze and the girls loved it! Violet tried to pick up every pumpkin in the maze. Lily ran around like a wild woman! Great fun! There were stuffed scarecrows that you can sit and pose with and the girls weren’t scared of them at all. They kept looking at their pumpkin heads with a confused look on their faces.

10-13-14 My mom watched the girls today and they had a great time! She brought the dress up bag and they got to be Hawaiian princesses today! They must have had a lot of fun because Violet was so hyper all afternoon! She was playing with Lily and kept saying Lily, Lily in her sweet voice! Lily was saying, “I got it!" when my mom was here. We went out to swing and we saw a cool bug, probably a beetle, on the slide. They were both fascinated by it!

10-17-14 Lily has been saying “Here you go" to everyone. It's so cute! Violet has been saying “Lily!" in her high, sweet voice. Sometimes it's when they're playing, sometimes it's when she's upset, usually because of Lily. Violet will walk around and sing quietly to herself. It's so sweet!

10-18-14 We went to a Halloween party at Nina's house. The girls were Elmos and everyone loved their costumes! They had a keyboard on their fireplace mantle that was the perfect height for them. Violet was in love with it! She was having so much fun and dancing to the music she was playing. She was bending her knees and bouncing around! Lily came over and liked playing the piano too!

10-20-14 I had the day off, well my last of 6 days off, and I wanted to do something special. At first I thought the park, and then I thought, “We do that all the time.” I took them to the zoo instead! It was mostly a lot of fun! We saw the lions at the perfect time. The trainers were giving them a check up on the other side of the fence. We were all in awe at the lions when they went on their hind legs! Those are some big cats! When we went over to the polar bear area, I let them out to walk a little. Lily just wanted to push the stroller! I have these great handles for them to hold on to when walking next to the stroller and Violet did a great job holding on to it and walking! It’s great because I have a hard time pushing the stroller and holding their hands. The bad part is that Lily didn’t want to get back in the stroller. She had a fit or two when we got to the hill to go see the tigers. Before we left, I wanted to take them on the train. I brought one of the carriers so I could strap one on and then hold the other sitting next to me. Violet loves the carrier so I strapped her on facing out. Lily was so upset when we didn’t make the first train. She was starting to get kind of cranky and tired. I thought we were going to miss the next train too, but there was one bench left so we got it! Lily did not want me to hold on to her at all on the train! Of course I did, but she wasn’t happy, that little stinker! Next time we’ll do the train first before they’re tired, but overall it was a fun morning and I’m glad I tried out taking them to the zoo myself!

10-21-14 Violet calls all crayons “lellow" and roars (her static lion sound) like a dinosaur. Lily is so independent. She can put her own shoes on and is really good at eating with a spoon. They are both pretty good at cleaning up and putting things away. I think we might try out the toddler rails on their beds soon.

10-25-14 We went to a pumpkin patch this morning! It was really fun! There were rows and rows of pumpkins. Violet kept saying, “Apples! Apples!” Lily walked around with a purpose like she was searching for the perfect “punkin.” Soon she was pushing the wheelbarrow. We bought two toddler sized pumpkins that the girls picked out. Mama picked a cool white pumpkin (I’ve never seen one before!), and Daddy bought a dark orange, almost red, flat pumpkin! Once the pumpkins were in the wheelbarrow, the girls had to get in to! When we left, we drove around Farmington Bay a saw a bunch of awesome birds and a few big bullfrogs. We had a very busy and fun morning. As Lily says, “Busy day!”

After nap, we put on their Elmo costumes to take some pictures outside. They are soooo adorable in their costumes! They really look like little Elmos running around. We went to Charlotte’s second birthday party and then to Kristi’s house for the India reunion party. It was so fun to see most of the people we traveled to India with! The girls were in my tummy at the time!

Violet calls every pumpkin she sees apple! There are a lot of little pumpkins around and pumpkin decorations. She points every one of them out and says, “Apple!”

10-27-14 Violet has been biting. Mostly she’s biting Lily. Let’s hope this is a short phase!

Violet loves wearing the teething necklace I used to wear when they were little. She puts it on as soon as she wakes up or as soon as we get home. It has a quick-release closure so I feel ok with her wearing it all the time. She’s a very fashionable girl!

The girls have been playing together so much lately! They make each other tea, cook in their kitchen together, throw the balls back and forth, and love stacking blocks together. It just melts my heart to see them play so sweetly together.

10-28-14 They can go up and down stairs only holding on to the railing now! We like holding their hands unless Lily says, “No help!" She's so independent! Her bottom left incisor is coming in and Violet's bottom right is coming in. We are so excited for Halloween! I’m thinking about bringing them to my school for the parade!

We decided to wait on putting up the toddler rails in their cribs. They’re not trying to get out anymore! We’ll keep the pillows on the floor around the crib though. We’ll wait on potty training too. Sometimes they seem ready, sometimes they don’t!

10-29-14 They are so funny! They pick up so much cute stuff from daycare. Now when we say, “Let’s go to the table for dinner.” They say, “Me!!” and raise their hands! They’ll do that for other things too.

10-30-14 Lily took the last step down with no hands today! She was so focused on getting where she wanted to go that she didn’t even realize she wasn’t holding on to anything! She’s also saying sentences like, “No mama, not Lily turn!” when it’s her turn for a diaper change. She’s been saying, “Book sit, book sit,” when she wants to read a book. It took us about a day to figure that one out. It sounds a lot like bullshit!

10-31-14 It’s Halloween!!! We had a super-fun day today! As Lily would say, “Busy day!” First Daddy brought the girls to my work and they stayed for the parade. I took them to Mary’s and they had a blast with their friends eating donuts and playing all day! At home, the trick-or-treaters starting coming before Daddy even got home from work. We ate some chili and then went out trick-or-treating! We went to our new neighbors first and they did great with knocking on the door. They got their candies and then wanted to go inside! They did that at the second house too and after that they got the hang of it! After the first house, Lily stopped to look in her bag. She took out the candy with a look of, “what is this?” on her face! Priceless! They had so much fun walking up the stairs, knocking on the doors, and getting their treats! Everyone loved seeing two cute little Elmos! Before we were done they both stopped on the sidewalk and started taking everything out of their bags! Once we got home, they dumped everything out of their bags and then put it in and then dumped it out again! We gave them their first sucker and they loved it!!! Their reactions were so funny! Violet was super-hyper and kept putting her sticky sucker back in her bag. Lily pretty much devoured hers and wanted another one. They are so funny! They ran to the door when the doorbell rang and greeted the trick-or-treaters. When it was bedtime, they were at the banister looking down and smiling at the trick-or-treaters. What a fun, busy day!

September 2014 - 20 months old

9-1-14 The girls are getting really good at walking up and down stairs by just holding on to the vertical railings! It's nice that I don't have to take two trips carrying them very often!

9-2-14 Violet is definitely teething, but I can't tell which teeth are coming in. She's been chewing on her fingers, has had a small appetite, and a fever. Lily might be teething too; she's a little crankier than usual. Poor things! It must really hurt!

On our nightly walk up and down the street, Lily has been stopping, turning around, and walking backwards! It's so funny! She'll go a few feet and then turn around and go forward. Now she says, walk!

9-3-14 Lily says “I la la!" for I love you!

I just found out our girls are sororal twins! "Sororal Twins" is another and more accurate term for fraternal girl twins. Sororal stemming from the Latin word “soror”, meaning “sister”, where fraternal stems from “frat”, meaning “boy” in Latin. I think it sounds nicer too!

9-5-14 Opa! We went to the Greek festival tonight! The girls ate really well! They ate chicken souvlaki right off the stick! They loved watching the dancing and would dance right along with the music. After we ate, we walked around a little and Lily wanted to help push the stroller. Suddenly, it feels different and I looked down to see Lily hanging on to the stroller, but being dragged! Luckily it was just a few steps. She wasn't crying at all! It's a good thing she didn't let go!

The girls have been saying things are "hot" and they don't want to eat them. Now we say, "Blow on it!" and they do then eat it right up! I'm glad that works!

9-10-14 They love chasing each other around the column by the living room and the front door. They giggle and smile! I love hearing them play together and laugh together!

9-12-14 Violet was talking to Lily today. I can only understand a few words, but Lily must really understand her because she kept saying, “ya."

9-15-14 Daddy was playing with the girls and Lily said, “Silly Daddy!"

We usually wash the girls together in the tub, but tonight Ryan washed Lily first. While they were upstairs, Violet was cooking me all sorts of stuff in her kitchen! She was talking up a storm and bringing me mushrooms, cabbage, apples, and a drink. It's so cute to see her walk over to the little cabinet and squat down to find her play food. Then she tries to balance it on a plate and laughs when it falls off. She bends over and grunts while she's reaching for it. When it was Violet's turn for a bath, I gave Lily two books to read in her crib. When I came back 5 minutes later, she had the Olivia book open and she had her head resting on it with The Going to Bed Book under her arm! She stood up and I read her The Going to Bed Book. It has a nice rhythm and she was rocking back and forth. Then she read her Olivia book again before she went to sleep.

They loooove books! In the car! On daddy's lap! After work with mama! At bedtime! Books! Books! Books!

9-18-14 The Happy song by Pharrel Williams came on and the girls loved it! They were dancing and singing Happyyyy. Lily kept singing happyyyy the rest of the day! (and weeks later!)

9-20-14 Violet has been saying “Ya" a lot like Lily does! Lily says “I want more!" all the time! It sounds like “ahwah more!"

9-24-14 Lily is quite the character! She can now pull a chair out and sit up at the table. She wanted her water and said wawa. Ryan said it's on the table (their little table), and she sighed ah. She got down, pushed in the big chair, got her water and took a drink, put it back on the table, back to pull out the big chair again, and then sat on it at the dining room table!

In the mornings she'll get her clothes when daddy says it's time to get dressed and then sit down in front of him and flops back! Ryan has to catch her! When it's Violet's turn, Lily kisses her head! If I'm standing in the kitchen she'll come up to me and kiss each of my legs!

Violet gets so hyper at night! It's hard to describe, but she goes a little crazy! She jabbers and climbs up her slide, and giggles like crazy!

Stairs.....oh my, they're getting fast! Up and down. If they want to go really fast, they'll snake down backwards on their t

9-25-14 My mom watched the girls again today. They had so much fun! She brought jewelry for dress up that they loved! This afternoon BOTH girls started saying “mine!" Uh-oh. Yia-yia said she didn't teach them that! Lily started saying “why" and daddy admits to teaching her that one! Violet says “book" all the time because she loves reading!!!

9-27-14 I was sitting on the couch crocheting when Violet came over to sit with me. She was happy sitting on my lap watching me work and then she grabbed my hook and dropped it between the couch cushions. I said, "Shit Violet!" and I hear it again from Lily across the room! Uh-oh, we now have a parrot on our hands. We better watch what we say! 

It was a rainy Saturday so we went to the big library downtown for some new books. I was happy because I was one of the winners for the summer reading program and won a gift card to the Natural History Museum. We went downstairs to the children's section and Violet was super excited! She started squealing in excitement to see all of those books!! It was so sweet! We read and then checked out a sack full of board books to take home. We often go to the library near us, but it was such a different experience going to the big one and riding the glass elevators. What a perfect rainy day outing!

9-28-14 We went swimming today at the rec center! The girls had a great time! They've got a nice kiddie area that's shallow and fun for the girls to play around in. There were only about 5 other people there other than the water aerobics people. Sunday morning is a great time to go to the pool! Violet loved playing in the bubble/water jet things and Lily loved being chased by Daddy and going down the hippo slide! 

Violet started saying no today! Ahhh!!! The girls were making the funniest faces at dinner tonight! I love it when they're being silly girls! Even though I thought they were teething earlier in the month, no new teeth have come in. I think I can see some getting close though. I hope when they do come in, they come in quickly. I'm sure that really hurts!

 Violet at Red Butte Garden

 Lily at Red Butte Garden

 Greek Festival!

 Yummy Souvlaki!

 Mama and her girls!

 Sharing apples

 Silly Violet!

 Cheese! What a ham!

 Sweethearts

Yia-Yia brought dress up stuff! My princesses!

Great sadness

My sweet cousin, Abi, has been battling brain cancer for over a year. Things were looking better, but then an MRI showed that the tumor was growing and spreading to other parts of her brain and her spine. After many chemo and radiation treatments, ups, downs, hopes and fears, Abi earned her angel wings this past Saturday morning. She will be greatly missed. It's hard to understand why this happens to a young girl, but I'm glad she no longer has to suffer and be in pain. That's just too much for a ten year old to bear. From Abi's diagnosis until now, I try not to, but can't help thinking of my own precious girls. I know I can't think about the "what ifs" and I need to focus on the fact that they are healthy and happy and growing. My heart aches for Abi's parents, grandmother (my great aunt), and her little sister. Even though I'm not religious, I strongly believe we will be with our loved ones after we die. As my friend said to me, "There's either nothing or there's something. If there's nothing, we won't know. If there's something, it's got to be good." I hope it's more than good for you, Abi. We miss you and love you.

Read more here and http://www.donationto.com/team-abi.