Gabriella 2 and a half

Weight
27lbs

Clothing Size
2T pants and 3T, 4T shirts

Diaper Size
Size 4 but only at night :)

Feeding
You eat a lot of different foods but still have your favorites.  Hot Dogs,  yogurt, chicken,  peas,  Graham crackers,  goldfish,  and cereal.

Sleep Schedule
You sleep from 7:30 until 6 most nights.  You take 2 hour naps at daycare but not at home.

Milestones
You are 95% potty trained
Becoming more independent
Doing really well in class. 
You can count to go 13 in English and 15 in Spanish
You knows all her colors in Spanish, English and sign language

Olivia 3 months

Weight
Around 13lbs maybe more

Clothing Size
3 to 6 months

Diaper Size
Up and Up & Pampers size 1 and sometimes size 

Feeding
Mama's milk all the way.You are nursing every 2 to 3 hours and taking bottles every 3 hours at daycare

Sleep Schedule
You are wake up around 6:30 when we get up. You take about 3 20-40 minute naps at school. And go down for the night at 10 and sleep until 4 or 5am. Which mama really appreciates. 

Milestones
You started daycare 2v weeks ago and are doing great there.  

Your teachers love you and your sister loves that you are at school with her.  Mama misses you but it's a nice break
You have a boyfriend at daycare named Charlie,  you guys were holding hands on Valentines Day.
You are starting to roll over
You are talking a lot more now
You are sucking your thumb a lot of the time now 

You move around in your crib at night 

You can grab your blanket and pull it up over your face and are starting to grab and hold things more and more

Wordless Wednesday

Thanks to Heidi at Fossil Island Photography for these beautiful pictures

Multitasking

As a parent I always be my multitasking would come in handy, but I seriously didn't realize how much it would until I had two kids.  All those parents with 2 or more kids know exactly what I am taking about. As a nursing mom is even more so, especially lately. Now that Olivia is going to daycare is even worse. How do mothers do it? I try to be there for both of them at the same time and is so hard. Like tonight I am upstairs nursing Olivia and Gabby is playing, Mike had just left to grocery shop and all of a sudden Gabby had to go potty. So of I go still nursing Olivia and getting Gabby on the potty. At bedtime I was nursing Olivia because apparently that's all age wants to do tonight is nurse.  I am reading a story to Gabby and letting her cuddle with me all at the same time.

I seriously don't know one, how single parents do it.  My hats off to you.  And two how patents with 2+kids under the age of 4 do this either. I mean you do what you have to do and at times one or both scream and some for you. But patenting is truly amazing to me.

And as I sign off I am being reminded of this again because Gabby is whining over the monitor that she doesn't want to go to bed.

Mama Support

There are days as I a mom that I seriously don't know how I do it. I don't know how I will get through the day. On days like those I tend to look outward for support. A few weeks I had one of those days and a dear friend of mine (you  know who you are) helped me get through this tough time.

I was up in the middle of the night, having changed the 6th diaper on Liv in 2 hours - Yep you heard that right, she decided she didn't want those diapers on her bottom and filled them all and got crabby when they were full. I had been up almost every  hour with either Liv or Gabby and I was just tired. Tired of motherhood and tired of life....but you just keep going right?

Well thank goodness for modern technology. While I was nursing Liv I emailed her and she emailed me back when she was up with her little one. This is what she said and it helped me so much I wanted to share it.

So here is my friends wise response to me falling apart one night:

"You are feeling the horrible struggle of moms of our generation. The expectation for us to be perfect moms, have perfect careers, perfect wives, perfect party planners, perfect bakers, perfect chefs, perfect on everything on bloody Pinterest. (F off Pinterest!) keep up with family and your Facebook and friends. OMG the expectation on us is more extreme than ever before. And it's disgusting. We are only human and really our greatest gift to share is love. So all the other expectations are dumb. And just pave our ways to the nut house. I'm not Martha f'ing Stewart. I'm just me and that is the best I can ever be.

The reason you chose to have babies and alter your utopia is because you knew you had an immense amount of love to share.

Did we realize the true balance and strain and expectations that would come with the decision to love, no. We could never have imagined the struggles we would have or the amazing high.

I can't say it will ever get better but on my hardest days when I feel the most lost and crabby I choose to see it this way, even though he is screaming in my face and I'm so tired I want to scream, one day I will cry not because I'm tired and just want him to fall asleep but because I miss him needing me.

Like right now I'm up feeding him. I am so tired I could fall asleep while I do it and I know you are too. But stop when you feel that way, spend a moment looking right at Liv or Gabby and admire this one beautiful moment that they need you more than anything or anyone in the world. You, Jess, are the most important person in the world to them. Let that love and hope roll over you both for a moment. Really soak it in. Then yawn and try to survive the zombie apocalypse that we mothers call life."

So this post is to all those mama's out there and dads that are up in the middle of the night with their sweet little ones and so over tired they can barely stand. I truly believe this is why our babies/kids are so darn adorable, because if they weren't we would eat them and go back to sleep. It's times like these when their little smiles or cute sayings go along way.

Here is my support for all you parents out there reading this! We need to support each other to make it through the tough years...although with two girls I have a feeling these are the easy years and the teenage ones will be tough - so talk to me in 10 years.

Back to Work

Well I am back to work. I have actually been back to work full time for a few weeks already. But Olivia has been home so it's not like I haven't been able to see her whenever I want. But today at 10 weeks Mike and I dropped off our little one to be watched by strangers. I handled it better than I thought but it was still hard. I cried a little after leaving her even though she was smiling when I left. I am more worried about her sleeping. They can't swaddle her like we do at home so she is a bit of a flailer with her arms, which then wakes her up.  So hopefully she will sleep. I guess if she doesn't then maybe she will sleep longer over night.

With gabby I had no idea really what to expect but here I have expectations of how things will work, how things will go, but it's also new because it's a new place. So we will just see how things work out and how she does.

They say it's harder on the parents and it truly is. I am sure she is smiling away and having a blast with her teachers and the other kids there. Gabbys teacher said she would bring Gabby to visit her baby sister.

How many hours until I can pick her up?