Lucy turns 2!

Lucy turned two on November 16th, which was our last full day in Florida.  Let's just say that birthday #2 was a million times better than birthday #1.  Not only did she sort of get what was going on and that the day was about her, but she wasn't sick and didn't have reflux.  We blew up 30 pink and purple balloons the night before, so that when she woke up in the morning, it would be fun for her and the kids to play with.  Then later on in the day, we did the presents, singing, and cake.  We just love our Lucy so much and are so happy to have her spunky, fun, stubborn personality in our little family.  Here's a little bit about Lucy at age two:

Height: forgot, but somewhere between 75th and 90th percentile
Weight: 27 pounds, 50th percentile (this was quite a jump from like the 25th or wherever she was before!)

• Started sleeping like a champ shortly after Claire was born- 12 straight hours through the night without me having to go in at all.  She was decent before that, but she has never been so consistent as she has the last couple months.  It's amazing.
• Still a good eater, but definitely getting a little more picky and always wants "deet" (treats)... like mother like daughter.  Getting her to drink is like pulling teeth.  I've constantly got a sippy cup with me to try and get her to drink more.  Her favorite foods are pasta, cheese, veggies dipped in ranch, lots of fruit, fruit snacks, etc.
• Loves riding bikes (little tricycles and such) and being outside.  Always wants to be outside.  She also has made good friends with all of the little neighbor kids, and gets so excited to play with them when she sees someone else out as well.
• Lucy also likes to go to story time at the library.  She is familiar with and loves the songs we sing there and dances/jumps around and gets so into it.
• She is doing so much better with being around other people!  Thanks goodness.  She will let other people hold her and she will play with and around other people.  She's still very attached though and refuses to go to nursery by herself or be left with someone.
• Lucy has tons of personality and makes the funniest faces and always has a ton of expression. 
• Loves to lay down on the couch snuggled up to me while we read books, especially in the evenings.
• Always wants to "drive" the car.  She loves to just sit in the driver's seat and steer the wheel and look around.  I don't love her doing this, but when I need to make a call to someone or get something done, I just sit in the passenger seat (while the car is off, of course) and do what I need to do.
• Holy tantrums and meltdowns.  Enough said.  Good thing she's cute and has some pretty funny/cute moments in between.  The whole time-out concept has really started to sink in more and is helping.
• Favorite part of the day is probably when dad gets home.  As soon as she hears the garage door open, she hits the ground running to the back door and knocks on the door until Ryan enters.
• Going to the store with her is a battle.  She hates riding in the shopping cart and just wants to walk next to me, but as soon as I let her do that, she's running around/away from me, knocking things off shelves and basically wreaking havoc in the store.
• Has a bunch of words she says, but she doesn't ever make two-word sentences, which the doctor has said needs to improve by mid-January or we will need to do some sort of speech therapy.
• Lucy loves shoes.  She walks around all day in my or Ryan's shoes and will go from pair to pair until she's tried them all on and goes and looks in the mirror at herself.

Well, that's about all I can remember right now, but I'm sure I will be coming back to add more things.  I just want to be able to remember exactly how she was at this point when she gets older.  Also, I like to go back and compare what Lucy and Claire did at certain ages... it helps me to remember what to expect.

These pictures crack me up.  Here she is fist pumping for her birthday.

 And now she's clapping for herself.

 So much excitement that she has to stand up and run to me while clapping.

 Still clapping...

Pure happiness right here:

 Minnie Mouse shoes that light up when she walks.  Favorite gift right there.

 Pretending to take a bite out of the cake.  Where does she learn this stuff from?

I love how at the end of this video she yells "more!"

Disney World

As I mentioned, Ryan's work meetings were at Disney World.  They did cool things like had dinner at a private spot at the Epcot center, right next to the lake and firework show.  Mars also got them a park hopper pass for one of the days and they could go with coworkers or do their own thing.  So, we joined Ryan and went to Magic Kingdom for the day.  We were also able to meet some of his coworkers and his new manager while we were there too.  I'll be honest that I was a little worried about taking a five-week-old baby, but she did so great.  I was also surprised at how many rides we could take both Lucy and Claire on! The lines were super short the whole day, the weather was fantastic, and everyone was happy and had fun.  Another bonus was that the park was decorated for Christmas already! It all felt so magical and made me want to go home and watch every Disney movie again. :)  

 Lucy was a little shy when first meeting the princesses.

 Cinderella was so cute and sweet with the girls.  This was her showing Lucy her gloves that her fairy godmother made her. :)

 We happened to see a show in the middle of the say at the castle that had all of the Disney characters in it- princesses, Mickey and Minnie, etc.

We put the kids in PJ's, got some chick fil a for dinner, and headed home.  These two girls were friends for a minute during that time. :)

Cousin time in Florida

Ryan had some more meeting for work and this time they were in Orlando at Disney World.  Mars often picks good locations for meetings, and this time did not disappoint!  Seeing that I had a baby about 5 weeks prior, I didn't want to be left at home by myself with an almost-2-year-old and a newborn, so we decided to drive down and spend some time at Marc and Michelle's.  We got there Friday night, November 8th, and drove home on the 17th.  While Ryan went down to Orlando for his meetings for a few days, I stayed up at the Rasmussen's and then we all went down and met Ryan in Orlando for a day at Disney World.  It was a blast and I'm so glad we ended up going (I was tempted not to go since Claire's reflux was struggling and a 14 hour car ride sounded like torture, but it worked out great)!  Lucy had so much fun with her cousins and we both loved that having other people around for company and distractions.

Lucy was really upset because she wanted to be holding my hand, so Jackson volunteered since he was right next to her and she was completely satisfied again. (Nevermind the fact that we are in the car and Jackson is on the floor... we didn't go far).

 One night we watched Monster's University and the little girlies grabbed some dolls and snuggled up.  I loved it, for the short while it lasted.

The first Saturday we were there, we went up to the University of Florida's campus (Marc's school) to check out the pre-game tailgating and festivities, especially because it was their homecoming game.  Right before we were about to leave, a nice lady came up and just gave us two free tickets!  Ryan and Marc took the opportunity to go check it out, and Michelle and I headed back home with the kids.  We were glad they got to go since Marc goes to the school and hasn't been to a game yet, and Ryan loves college football.

On Veteran's Day, we went to a local park that was having a big celebration.  There were three different helicopters there, lot's of military people, skydivers with flags and colored smoke, and a presentation (that we didn't stay for because the kids wouldn't have lasted.)  It was really cool to actually have something to go celebrate the holiday.  The only downfall was that we had to park around a bunch of fire ant hills.  I looked down and my feet/flip flops were covered in fire ants! They were all Bennett's pants and all in our car. It was crazy.  But luckily I only got two bites and we were able to kill the rest that got in.

Another fun activity we did while in Florida was searching for shark teeth.  We heard that there was a stream where you could go sifting through it and find a bunch of super old shark teeth that were really tiny.  We actually did find shark teeth... and Marc even found 2 or 3 big ones too (forgot to get a pic of those).  It was a fun, different thing to do and the kids loved getting into the water.  

This is Lucy laughing, not screaming, fyi.

Claire spent the whole excursion like this.  Such a little snuggle bug.

That same day, we were outside at the Rasmussen's house and everyone was looking around for lizards.  They found one (apparently not too hard to find) and he got a nice grip on Marc's finger!  I'm not a fan of lizards in general but ever since I found a huge one on my pillow in my hotel in Africa and then wasn't able to catch/find it before going to bed, I have nightmares about them.

We also went to the mall real quick and Ryan and I just laughed the whole time at how much Lucy likes to shop.  That girl loves going through clothing stores and will literally run from rack to rack pushing the hangers aside, one by one, and picking up the things she likes and putting back the ones she doesn't.  This trip, she even took her shoes off and carried things with her back and forth through the store.  She totally ignored me and Ryan and just shopped and got really mad if we tried to help her/stop her/put her shoes back on.  It was so funny.

She shopped and then immediately dropped in the car on the way home. :)

So, as you can see, we didn't have any fun in Florida.... ;)