alright, spring please!

Well, here I am again.  I've tried a few times to post in the past month and just haven't felt like it when I've had time, or when I've sat down to write, I've just stared at the blank screen for a few minutes and then given up.  There just hasn't been anything really interesting enough (in my mind) to overcome the lack of motivation I have.  

But here I am today.  I've had a change of mood because I've finally figured out what my problem is, which I should have known.  SAD.  Seasonal Affective Disorder.  

I know that a ton of people deal with this and honestly, I thought that it was just an excuse or something made up when I was younger.  According to the ever informative and highly reliable (hah) Wikipedia, I learned that in many circles it really was something that people were skeptical of, but now, the DSM-IV (the all-knowing psychology Bible) now labels it as a "specifier" of regular, good old fashioned depression.  Please know that this has been a self-diagnosis and though I'm not positive that I legitimately have this, I do have many of the symptoms.  And also, according to the DSM-IV, I do meet the criteria to be diagnosed this way.  I think Jesse thinks (in the back of his mind) that I am a hypochondriac and love to diagnose myself, but when I briefly described it to him this morning he kind of had a look of "oh, that makes sense.." and kind of half-heartedly agreed by saying, "yeah, maybe."  I think the part that is most annoying right now is that I hit this same "funk" every year, and every year am caught off guard by my extreme moodiness and lack of motivation.  Duh.  The lightbulb finally clicked on the other day when Mom and I were texting and she asked about my vitamin D intake.  

All this to say: with a new mindset, extra vitamin D and a few encouraging people, I am in a much better mood but please, bring on spring.  And THIS is why our bathroom is still a wreck and half completed, though we've made some excellent progress and should be finished pretty quickly when the evenings and weekends cooperate with us.  We had some extra help with the ceiling this past week, so that was really great.  We (read: Jesse) had a general idea of what was going on, but wasn't positive, so why not call in reinforcements who have done it before?

The girls are doing great.  Lily is all kinds of two.  That's just the best answer I can give when people ask how she is doing.  Parents who've been there before give me knowing smiles and nod their heads when I tell them of something she's doing; my friends who have kids the same age laugh at my stories, but only because they know and secretly, are probably pretty glad their kid isn't the only one acting out like that; and my friends who don't have children yet offer me kind words of encouragement and just tell me how cute my girls are, which really is almost the most helpful because there are days...oh there are days.  Some of the things that Lily comes up with are hilarious.  She has never been one to really parrot what other people say constantly like some kids I've met.  She says a few words or phrases that I know I say-- like "bummer!"-- but I don't really hear my phrases coming out of her mouth too often.  The other day though, I said we were going up to the store for a few things and she said "mmm, my don't think so," which made me laugh because I know I say that.  And yes, she refers to herself as "my" now.  However, it wasn't quite as funny when Jesse told her to pick up some toys and she said "my don't think so."  That earned her some discipline before picking up.  She has also started telling me "my not baby, my name Lily!" when I refer to her as baby.  Such as, "go get your shoes, baby."  This morning on the way to work, she told me her name was Lily and then I decided I should probably try and explain middle and last names.  She thought that was great, but when I tried to get her to say our last name, she said "my too little to say that!"  I don't blame her..it's a long one!  But I was really amused.  And then she asked my name, and attempted to say "Hildebrand Mommy."  She is doing great with her vocabulary, but leave Jesse and me laughing with how she confuses the order of the words in her sentences.  Besides that, our favorite is when she tells us that she's too heavy to do something that weight doesn't apply.  Like turn on the lights in a room, where height is really more the issue. 

big helper, taking out the trash.  she grabbed the bag and got the door open then stopped to put her boots on.

Emma is cute.  Can I leave it at that?  She is chunky, happy and adorable, but a terrible sleeper.  I was telling a mom friend that I feed her (what feels like) a ton in hopes that she'll sleep a bit longer at night but all that is happening is she's not sleeping and just getting fatter.  But she's still fitting in the right size clothes, so I guess that's not too bad.  She actually was sleeping better until last week and then has been up frequently through the night again.  Partly, I'm sure, because she knows I'll come, but I also think we've hit another growth spurt and hopefully we will finally be seeing some teeth soon.  She is starting to get grumpy that she isn't eating the same thing we are, but without teeth, there is only so much I can feed her of table food.  I think we are going to have our hands full with her, even more so than we do with Lily.  Emma loves to be into everything.  I could sit Lily in a room and she would either play for a few minutes, or cry to be near me again.  Emma...I put her down and she's off.  Into the dog food, trying to get into the bathroom to splash in the toilet (don't worry, we keep the lid down and doors closed now), or trying to take all of Lily's toys (who is having a hard time sharing).  She thinks she's quite clever that she can stand and cruise, and she thinks she's a big enough girl that she doesn't need to hold onto things when she's standing.  Which isn't true, but she likes to pull herself up and let go, but then quickly falls.

see?  you can tell she is proud of herself.

I guess that's it.  The girls love each other, and I think they'll have even more fun when Lily can wrestle Emma a bit easier and Emma can defend herself without pulling hair.  Lily loves to wake Emma up in the mornings with an excited "EMMA WAKE UP!  Hiiiiiiiiii Sweetie!" and it just melts my heart when she tries to calm Emma down when she's upset.  Emma looks at Lily and always has the biggest smile for her, and I just love it.

I will update pictures soon, I am having formatting issues with that blog and every time I try and post, it crashes.  Dumb.  So we'll get those eventually.

hey check it out, I updated!

Hello friends and family.  I have so much to fill you in on.

Ok, not really.  But I figured that was as good of a hook as any.  Maybe I shouldn't have given away my secret about nothing exciting until the end of this post to make you stick around and read the whole thing..hm.  Oh well.  I will compensate for boring-ness with pictures of my kiddos.  Because yes, I am one of THOSE moms.

Nothing really has changed since my last post.  It snowed again, and I continue to be confused by the weather, but am taking it as it comes by playing outside in the snow with Lily one day, and taking both girls on a 2.5-3 mile walk down the road and back.  Details on those adventures in a minute.

Most importantly, this past weekend, Jesse and I (and the girls) went to Toledo for the baptism of our godchildren!  Woohoo!  We drove to Findlay Friday evening, spent the night with my parents and were able to see and visit them for a few hours before quickly running to see Mama and Poppy before heading on to Toledo to crash the Brennan party up north.  The timing worked out great, and we were glad to we could see my mom for a little bit so close to her having her hip replacement surgery.  She's doing great and will be back to tap dancing in no time.

In Toledo, Lily very excitedly smothered Noah and Brianna with love and did all that she could to "help" Nikki with everything baby related.  Dear Nikki and Rick, thank you for being so patient and understanding with my little crazy ball of energy.  Lily liked to "help" feed the babies and particularly enjoyed shaking the bottle ("Nikki does") and holding both babies ("TWO babies!").  Unfortunately, I was terrible about taking pictures, so Rick, please send me one or two if you have a minute so I can brag and show off?  I was kind of nervous about how my girls would do during the baptism/Mass on Sunday morning, especially since Jesse and I were supposed to do godparenting things, but Emma didn't care where she was or who was holding her-- and loved hearing herself "sing" and echo off the ceiling-- and Lily found this middle of the Mass to be the best time to root through the diaper bag and pull out a pair of her panties and parade them around our row before handing them proudly to Rick.

Candy Land did NOT go so well..but she enjoyed it anyway.  and Nikki and I learned that when you open the box, all the colors are together.  so your first 5 draws might all be purple.

The weekend was over way too fast and we had to head home on Sunday.

So, other stories.  We had a good amount of snowfall the other day, so while Emma was snoozing one afternoon after work, Lily and I bundled up and headed out to play in the snow, so I could show her how fun it is.  This outing went MUCH better than the first.

she needed her "Toon Car" (from Mickey Mouse Clubhouse)

go ahead and judge ours snowman.  Jesse did a ton and told Lily they would build a "real" snowman on the next snow, complete with arms and a scarf.  at least I got it pretty big..I made the second level too big and couldn't lift it, so I had to make it a smaller.

"look,  my crawling!"

making a snow angel.  which she thinks are called "androids."  ah, raising children in this technology age.

Tuesday was a gorgeous day, taking another afternoon off napping, I put Lily in the backpack and Emma in a stroller and off we went down the road to buy some honey from the neighbors.  That.  was. a.  workout.  Whew.  Lily may have been easier in the stroller, but Emma happily napped there and back and Lily loved looking around and pointing out different colors and shapes we saw, so I don't mind the sore back I've had the past few days.

Amazon got smart and sent us two boxes of diapers and wipes in one big box verses 3 separate boxes.  the girls loved it.

someone thinks she's pretty clever for getting in the basket all by herself.

 We have a romantic night planned for Valentine's Day, filled with sanding and priming walls for painting in our bathroom.  Special, I know.  But honestly, I think I got Jesse a card once?   Neither of us really think of today as a "holiday," and really kind of view it as a waste of time and breath.  And a good way for Hallmark to make some extra money.  But seeing as how neither of us really are card people we just move on with life.  Plus, his birthday is Sunday, so I'll make him something yummy then.  

I will hopefully be back with more posts soon... 

more snow days!

Oh, what can I tell you about today. 

Our bathroom progress is slow and steady.  I have pictures, but I probably will wait until we are finished to do a before-during-after progression for you.  So you will have to wait with baited breath.

Not much has been going on.  We have basically been snowed in this weekend, and it has been so pretty and nice.  When Jesse and I woke up to make breakfast Friday morning, I told him I would probably have to take him to work, since I was sure his truck would barely be able to back out of the driveway.  He took one look outside and said "yeah, I'm not going anywhere, do you see how deep that snow is!?"  Which I took as permission, and called my supervisors and bosses to let them know that we had too much snow out our back country roads and that the girls and I would be staying home. I really do feel that was the best decision made all day.  I wasn't feeling good anyway, so being able to stay home was so nice.  We did (slowly) leave the house yesterday for the afternoon and evening, so we did get some fresh air.  We headed to a birthday party and then dinner/games/play time for kiddos at some friend's house.  The snow had started again by the time we were leaving and has been snowing steadily all day today.  And we still haven't seen a snow plow, so heading to work tomorrow will be an adventure.  

All this snow would be perfect to take Lily out to play in.  And I might still later.  However, the last snow we got, I excitedly got Lily all dressed and ready and out we went, with Zeke happily along.  She enjoyed kicking the snow, but panicked when I laid down to make a snow angel because I got "dirty" and she hurriedly brushed the snow off when I stood up.  She also didn't like it when I threw snow at Zeke (which he loves) and kept telling me to stop and tried brushing Zeke off, too.  Who is this kid?  We later tried to take her sledding with some friends.  Needless to say, she was a stick in the mud and no fun and so neither of us really got to sled too much either.  What a bummer of a girl.  She needs to snap out of this fast.  The other evening when Jesse went out to shovel the steps, she did enjoy going out with him (and kicking snow safely without getting any on her).  All this to say, I don't have any first snowing pictures because she was a party pooper and boring.  I did, however, get a (bad) picture of a humongous woodpecker that was across our road in one of the trees.  I took them from our living room window and then told Jesse to come look.  He sent me outside to try and get some better pictures, but unfortunately, it flew off when I got closer.  That didn't matter to future-homeschooling-dad, because he told me I had to figure out what kind it was.  After I did some google-ing, I announced it to be a pileated woodpecker, which he agreed about.  

sorry about the poor quality

 Other than that, nothing too much is going on.  The weather has just been weird: snow one weekend, 70s and rain during the week, and enough snow to keep us in all weekend now.  What.  In.  The.  World.  Mom text and asked how we were all doing health-wise, and I told her that we seem to be doing better, but really, who would be able to stay healthy 100% in such nonsense?  The girls are doing well: I've started having Lily help me regularly with more than just playing the water when we do dishes, and she helps me unload the dishwasher now.  She thinks it's great, and I have her help me before she is allowed to watch an episode of Mickey Mouse, so hopefully, we are starting some good habits.  Emma is silly as ever and pulling herself up on everything, including Zeke.  She is even trying to start crusing..ugh.  Too soon.  She does also enjoy standing up when she is done with her nap, so we definitely need to lower her crib...(hint, hint, Jesse.  Put your tablet down and go do it, please).

That's it for now!  Emma just woke up (and was standing up), so I guess it's time to go do other things. Go check out the pictures I posted here.