A Great Day

Because Dan's "weekends" run Sunday through Tuesday, we are able to spend a lot of quality time as a family without the usual crowds that most people deal with on their days off. So this "weekend" we took Ellie and Kate to the Seattle Aquarium. We had a great time with the girls; both are at such great stages of learning. Ellie is making a lot of connections between world/self/books and Kate is discovering everything for the first time. I am enjoying my daughters immensely (apart from that whole fish fry and poopy diaper episode I posted earlier!) and love watching the world unfold through their eyes. We were able to get some really great pictures from our day (and a few more from Ellie's swim lessons and our time at home earlier in the weekend). I had a hard time narrowing it down to a few so there are many pictures here. I hope you enjoy them!

At home on Sunday... my beautiful Kate Elizabeth

Sweet, loving, and lovely Ellie Marie

Today at Seattle Aquarium

I love this picture. The girls are fascinated! And I love how each one is trying to point something out to share with Daddy.

Oh Kate. You crack me up. While Daddy thought Kate was enjoying the scuba diver show, she was instead making this particular silly face to me...over and over again. :)

Daddy's arms (and heart) are full!

love it

Really? Could they be any cuter? Ahhhh! I love em!

Me and my girls

You know you live in Seattle when...

Finally, in the car on the way home. Both girls passed out but I love this picture of Ellie because she is still holding her sea otter postcard from the aquarium. She fell asleep looking at it. :) What a great day!

And lastly, I thought I would share a photo of me and my wonderful husband. People often ask me what it's like to be married to a cop. I don't know how to answer that question but perhaps this photo will at the very least give you a good idea of what it's like to be married to Dan. :)

Motherhood...Unedited.

Motherhood is bliss...most of the time. I had a doozy of a night last night. After spending a great afternoon/evening at Nana and Papa's house in Federal Way, I loaded the girls into the truck and headed home. The girls had a very long day with lots of excitement and little of our normal routine so I thought for sure they would pass out on the way home and I would get some quiet time to myself. Oh the fool I am! No sooner had we got onto the freeway when suddenly Kate completely blows out her diaper. I mean OUT her diaper. Through her clothes. On the car seat. Everywhere. To make matters worse, we were completely stuck in the middle of Friday-before-spring-break traffic... in a hailstorm! Armed with a meager 10-count travel wipes supply, no way was I going to pull over and try to clean things (and Kate) up. So we just drove on. Imagine if you will, a claustrophobic mommy in a muggy car with the pungent smells of baby crap and...lucky me...leftover fried fish from dinner at Nana and Papa's...wafting through the air. Ellie and I seriously gagged the whole way home (over a half hour drive) while Kate happily applauded her accomplishment. As soon as we got home I had to obviously put Kate straight into the bathtub but this did not go well either. First, we were about an hour and a half past Kate's bedtime and Ellie was next. Jaxie had been home by herself all day and let me know she wanted attention (and dinner) by quite literally sprinting through the house, running into doors, and barking. All the commotion upset Ellie who now was in meltdown mode crying because Jaxie had stepped on her foot, knocked her over, and was scaring her. Where was Kate? Oh yeah, screaming and trying to climb out of the tub because the sight of her poop in the tub freaked her out. So I had to pull her out of the tub and calm her down (in my lap, now half covered with remaining poopy butt) while Ellie was clinging to me crying, "Mommy! Kate is getting all your time and you aren't spending any with me!" Ah, motherhood. Eventually, I got both girls clean, in pj's, and to bed. I snuggled and cuddled Ellie until she felt "filled up with love" and was able to fall asleep. Then I started a load of poopy laundry, scrubbed the bathtub, and then went out to the truck and cleaned that up too. It's nights like that one that make me think being a mom is the absolute toughest job in the world. Still, I wouldn't trade it for any other in the world. :)

Our Kids

Today was "Twisted Tuesday" at Ellie's school and the kids were supposed to dress silly. Of course, Ellie's first idea was to wear her panties on her head! Shocker! Ellie looks for ANY reason to make funny moments about underwear. Instead, we opted for this ensemble:

Kate however, did not need a reason to be silly. She just went ahead and did it:

Not sure if you can tell but Kate has a gap between her two top teeth which Dan and I think is about the cutest thing ever. :)

And here is Kate getting into a drawer of "once neatly organized" kid dishes. Add that to sucking on a plug, eating a shoe, escaping up the stairs (SERIOUSLY SCARY FAST BABY), hitting her head on pretty much everything, unrolling the toilet paper, eating a packet of instant oatmeal (yes, IN the packet) and you get a good sense of life with this adorable 11 month old. :)

A good welt from hitting her head on something. 5 minutes later, she did the same thing on the other side. Sigh.

Silly Ellie home from school. I actually LOVE her hair like this. :)

Doing homework before bed. She LOVES to do homework and I love that she loves it! :)

Overall a very fun, busy, and typical day in the McDonald home!

11 Months

Our sweet Kate Elizabeth. Our Baby is 11 months old today. I cannot believe it. I am trying to hold on to every minute with my girls but of course, life goes on and takes time with it. Motherhood truly is bittersweet. Each new discovery or accomplishment we cheer Kate on with great excitement and yet a quiet part of me mourns the little distance Kate has grown further away from me. Case in point, today Kate learned to officially stand by herself, not holding on to anything. I turned around and there she was, arms frozen in mid air, her little legs straight as boards and her little hips rocking back and forth to steady her balance. She just looked at me like, "I'm doing something. Something great. I don't know what it is but I know everything feels changed." She was scared and proud and so was I. Proud that my baby didn't need me and scared for the same reason. And I'm finding the life of a mother is just the sum of those kind of moments. The being needed and the not being needed and the sweetness and sadness that wraps around both. For now, I am finding joy in the sweetness that is Kate. Our little bug who loves the excitement of climbing our stairs, the softness of her lovey bunny and the sound of Ellie's laugh. She is SO sweet and SO beautiful and we are SO blessed. Happy day Kate!

grumpy

Super Savings!

Today was another great day for saving money! I am really under our weekly grocery budget so I might just treat myself to some new clothes! :) Let me tell you, I get such a thrill when I find really good bargains! :) Here's what I got today:

Safeway Total $2.97!!!!! Woot Woot!

Then at Top Foods I scored 4 boxes cereal, 8 Old Orchard frozen juices (we are big smoothie fans in our house so these will be perfect for that), and 2 Yoplait Smoothie packs for a grand total of $4.92! I don't have a picture of that one because I put everything in the freezer already. I spent less than $8 on everything from both stores! WAHOO!