Turning a corner

We've now (thankfully) turned a corner and Penny is all better, just in time for a growth spurt!

We've made it through the first REAL cold with Penny (because the first illness was way worse than just a cold) and it was a doozy for sure. It made me think back to when Emma would have colds, which was quite often when she started daycare, and she would really just have congestion and feel crummy for a few days and then be back to normal. No fever, no real cough. Penny, on the other hand, full on hardcore cough, fever, and general misery. I'm praying hard that she doesn't get more with the frequency that her big sister did :/

Penny is growing and changing so much too! She's now mastered the art of rolling from her belly to her back at night. Not so much when you actually want her to though. This has resulted in several nights of waking up at midnight to roll her back over because she can't do it herself. In addition to the rolling over, she also will push herself into a corner of her crib and get stuck, which results in another wake up in the middle of the night to pull her back down to the middle of the crib. I know all of this will pass soon once she learns how to move around with more purpose. At that point, I'll be sad that she's growing too fast! It's a vicious cycle...

She's trying so hard to sit up by herself too! This girl has no time to slow down! She'll try and lunge right out of your arms if you're not careful. I wouldn't be surprised if she starts crawling in the next month and starts walking by the time she's 1! She does have a big sister to keep up with of course! ;)


Speaking of big sister, Emma is cracking us all up these days. She has such a big personality for such a tiny girl, but I wouldn't want it any other way. She definitely has her moments of diva-ness. Everything she does is 100%, no slowing down, including the sass. I cringe when I think about how much worse this will get when she hits the teenage years, but I feel blessed that God has confidence that I can do this girl-mom thing (and twice!).

Emma has also turned her own corner when it comes to food. For the last year, she's been SUPER picky about meats and has only eaten hot dogs. She turns her nose up at chicken, beef, pork and fish. It's been a challenge because I always cook some kind of meat for dinner so she ends up eating a hot dog, grilled cheese or PB&J. Lately, she's been branching out more and will eat just about anything (as long as it's on Rory's or my plate lol), and that includes meat! I know that the pickiness is more of an age thing, so I'm glad that this stage is ending! She was such a great eater before!

In other news, my inner teenage girl excitement has come out this weekend...I got the SUV that I've always wanted! I've been trying to fight the "mom car" phase that I will inevitably enter soon (kicking and screaming) by first getting the Traverse (which was a compromise for me - not a car, not quite an SUV but definitely not a van) and then trying to hold Rory back from diving headlong into getting a van. Granted, on our trip to Rhode Island, we had a brand new Dogde Caravan that we rented and, admittedly, it was pretty sweet. It had all the bells and whistles on it - massive amounts of room, a DVD system for the kiddos, key-fob ignition, automatic door opener from the key-fob, etc. As much as I liked all of the features and how smooth and easy it drove, I couldn't get past the fact that it was a VAN! We always had vans when I was growing up and I always hated them. I promised myself that I would be the SUV mom - not the van mom. Nothing against other awesome van moms. Some people can rock vans like no other, but I'm not one of those moms. Rory and I had been talking for a while about how we really needed to get a more reliable vehicle. The Traverse has been a good car, but it always seemed to be one breath away from something else breaking on it. I was always nervous that with all the noises coming from it, it was going to break down at any second and leave me and the girls stranded on the side of the road. Rory shared this fear with me also. Full disclosure - we've had the thing checked out multiple times but nothing was ever found to be seriously wrong with it. There were just so many little things starting to go wrong with it that there was no way that something else wasn't wrong. So we made the bold decision to start casually looking for deals on other, more reliable vehicles. I was looking at another crossover vehicle at a dealership here in Gardendale that had been sitting in their lot for a while. I was starting to second guess about just going ahead and getting a van, and then it happened - I saw the most beautiful Toyota 4Runner online and sent Rory the info. It was a fantastic price for the year model and the mileage (2011 with 94K) so we decided to go take a look at it. The rest is history :)


This is all MINE!

I never could articulate just what kind of car I was looking for to Rory, but this is exactly it! I wanted an SUV that actually looked like an SUV but wasn't a behemoth like a Yukon or Suburban. Most "SUVs" now are being converted to the crossover look, which is cool, but I wanted an SUV that looked like an actual SUV. If you've known me for any amount of time, you know that my dream car back in the day was a Toyota Tacoma. I've always loved trucks and SUVs! There's nothing wrong with a car, but it's just been a dream of mine to have a 4Runner :) and now I have one! Dream no more! It's also got third row seating so I can still maintain the "mom car" status of loads of room for soccer and softball practices but have the look that make all the college 20-somethings jealous ;) Emma already approves and has told me that she's going to drive it when she gets big enough to drive (I'm not looking forward to that day). 

So now with the cool mom car taken care of, we're back to throwing money at our savings account to get a house! The saving never ends. We've been beyond blessed that my parents have allowed us to take care of their house while they're living and working in Georgia, but there's just something about living in the house that you grew up in...We (or more I) am ready to have my own house again, but all in good time. We don't want to live too far into the American dream ;)

We're down to just over a week before I go on my first girls trip (sans kids) to NYC! I'm so excited! We've already decided we're going to see Phantom of the Opera on Broadway and I'm beside myself with excitement! I've seen a few plays here in Birmingham, but this is the REAL Broadway! It would be even better if Gerard Butler decided to reprise his role of the Phantom for just one night while we're there ;)

I hope everyone has been enjoying the large, bright orb that has decided to give the rain a break! The weather has been super nice lately, but I know that rain is never far away. Everyone enjoy the rest of your week!

God bless!

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