Hannah and Abby's Opposites

Sometimes I think I could write a book titled, "Hannah and Abby's Little Book of Opposites."  Their personalities are so very different in how they approach things.  For instance: Hannah gets sad, weepy and whiny when she gets overly tired, Abby gets feisty, and mischievous and mean...you can imagine the combination of friendliness these two make when they are over-tired at the same time.  You usually don't have to talk Abby into trying something at least once (when it comes to food), Hannah you HAVE to talk about it...and talk about it...and talk about it...
Speaking of talking about it....Hannah has to talk about it...all of it.  Abby figures if needed we can chat about it later but for now I'm just going to do it and get it over with.
Abby goes for it, no fear, Hannah will go for it after she sees that someone else has attempted it and hasn't died or has done it successfully.
When Abby gets in trouble she can't handle Mama being upset with her.  If she gets asked to take some time to herself to remind her how she should be acting she seems to feel it means she might not be loved, so she will immediately after coming out calmer say, "Mom...I love you so much."  In the hopes she gets a hug and kiss from you.  Hannah, if she gets in trouble with us just gets frustrated and starts in with the eye rolls...but if something happens to Hannah and she feels genuine sorrow or we are out amongst loved ones, there is literally no punishment you could give to Hannah that is worse than what she is doing to herself internally.  She will hyperventilate, she feels that bad, and it takes her a long time to calm down.  She'll be embarrassed that she _________________(fill in the blank) and will beat herself up so bad, there is honestly nothing you could say that could make her feel worse. 
I need to brag on Hannah for a bit.  So often things are harder with her.  She fights tooth and nail over certain things and there have been nights I have agonized over how to get her to understand________(fill in the blank).  But Hannah is one of the sweetest, most wonderful hearted, caring people I know.  She is always so worried about how a person is feeling or doing when something has happened.  She has a knack for knowing when someone needs more love.  If you mean something to Hannah, you REALLY mean something to her.  She won't forget you or who you are, and she will be constantly thinking of ways to do things for you.  She is always so willing to help out when she sees there's a need or that no one else is helping.  She connects so well with anyone.  You could be 5 months or 50 and she still finds a way to meet you where you are at and have a great conversation with you and make you feel loved.  As tough as she is, she is smart, she is loving.  And I wouldn't have her any other way.  :) 
I was thinking the other day, how very proud I am of both girls.  They are such marvelous little people!!  I have such a blast with them!  It is so awesome to have people approach me and tell me how fun and great they think the girls are and how they love to be around them.  I am very blessed indeed. :)

Sprouts

 I love, LOVE how you plant a garden, scatter some seeds, and wait.  And while you're waiting you get nervous...will they actually grow!?  And then all of a sudden one day like magic there they are!  Green and beautiful, poking through the dirt and then you can breathe a sigh of relief and know...you will in fact have green things growing in that large patch of brown out yonder.  I do love me some gardens. :)

Life Things

These two love each other so much. :)

* Abby has started telling Hannah, "You Bossy Hannah!" It's really hard not to laugh at this...she's right...it's that first kid bossy syndrome. It's still funny. :)

*I think it's funny Abby knows and can say words like gnochhi.  It's really cute when she says something like, "Hannah, eat your gnochhi!"

*Abby tries to say most words she hears.  If she tries to say it and it doesn't come out right she sighs and says, "Me no say this word."  If you help break it down and repeat it she'll get it and keep using it.

* We will randomly be sitting around and Abby will lean over and give Hannah a hug or kiss or say, "Hannah...I love you. You beautiful." Then Hannah will say it back to her...melts my heart.

*The other day Abby was doing her usual trying to con anything candy, mint or gum related from me until I finally had to laugh and told her she was a very persistent little thing.  She looks at me and says, "What this persistent?" Ha!  After explaining it meant she just kept on trying she just giggled.

Reading Together :)

*I don't even know how to adequately explain how Hannah has stepped up in logic and mind.  She is hilarious.  But without intending to.  She always saying things in all seriousness that just crack you up!

*Both girls have hit a total growth spurt lately, Hannah is getting so TALL and Abby too...also Abby is in a size 9 shoe now!  This means she's only 2 shoe sizes behind Hannah!

*Both girls are so sweet and loving when they see anyone hurting.

*Hannah is ALWAYS willing to help.  If it's a mess she didn't make and we try to get Abby to pick it up, Hannah will immediately help out because, she says, it will go much faster if she helps.  She is always right there setting the table without being asked, and ready to clear the table etc...When I jokingly said to her the other day,  "May you always be this willing to help."  She just laughed, rolled her eyes and said, "Oh Mom." Ha!

One of her people. :)

* Hannah's coloring and drawing when she really focuses has been so good!  She loves to color and draw.

Being a silly goose.  Pretending to sleep while waiting for the cake to bake.

Garden Day!

Today is garden day and the girls (and I!) have had a blast out in the dirt getting things accomplished.  They have been so excited to help.  Yesterday, Adam came straight home from work, went and got the tiller and then tilled it all up for me so that it would be ready for this week.  I appreciate that so much because he had a busy day at work...a day that is normally his day off and he took time out to do this.  So today's happiness has been planting our seeds!!! 

Happy Mother's Day

I hope when my kiddos are all grown, they can all look back and smile, I hope they can laugh at the many silly times there were to be had, I hope they can roll their eyes when they think of all the lessons I constantly tried pouding in their heads (and that stuck against all their fighting!!), I hope they can remember fondly all the times we did things as a family, all the times we got to spend time together, I hope they can count on each other as friends, I hope they can know that even though I made mistakes I loved them fiercely, I hope they always know I was and am proud of them, I hope they never doubted that I believed in them and what they could accomplish, and I hope they grow to enjoy being around me and hanging out with me as much as I genuinely love and enjoy being around my own two moms.  My mom and Adam's mom are such incredible forces of love in my life and I so look forward to seeing them and getting the opportunity to spend time with them, I hope I have that in my kids.  I am so thankful for the relationship both mother's have with my own children now, and for the love and support they pour out on a regular basis.  That is the ultimate in motherhood I think...for your children to go on to do their own things and genuinely want to come back to you because they value you as a person. 
Happy Mother's Day to all the beautiful Mama's I know...there are so many...and we are all so different which is what makes us so awesome. :)

A man loves his sweetheart the most, his wife the best, but his mother the longest. 

~Irish Proverb

Dear Friends

I'm always amazed...and I shouldn't be, at how sometimes God answers an unspoken prayer or almost immediately fills a need or eases a hurt.  This is not always the case, but today what I needed most happened.  In the grand scheme of things I realize there is lots at work and play today and I take that all into consideration...one of those things being that I am pregnant and I think yesterday and today were just emotional days.  It started halfway through yesterday and carried over into my today, which made me mad...because it is after all Mother's Day and it's beautiful outside and my mother-in-law is here visiting which is always so great, and we got to celebrate my beautiful sister being a mama yesterday and I got to see my mom and be around her...so it annoyed me that I was so very down.  But...something took hold and I just couldn't get past it.  Normally I can brush it off or tell myself to stop being so weird and today it wasn't happening...today instead it left me in tears, several times.  Which...I don't do.  I mean I get teary and misty when something tugs at my heart or when I'm so proud of someone or over things like that...but just to break down and cry in front of people I don't do and in fact HATE doing...and today I did.  Many times.  Which made me even more irritated.  And like I say I realize there is more going on here...and I believe a lot of it is just the kind of day I'm having + hormones.  But I am SO, SO thankful for the people I came in contact with today and for the friends God has placed in my life that were there to lift me up...even though it made me cry even more!  (In a good way though!  Sorry about that!)  ...For the support and encouragement I got today and for the outpouring of love that I guess I just really needed today and received....for the hugs, and for the love from my husband and his great hugs that are always just what I need....I just feel so blessed that there were people there that didn't mind scraping me up and helping me back to a happier place.  I think we all just really need that sometimes. 

In everyone's life, at some time, our inner fire goes out. It is then burst into flame by an encounter with another human being. We should all be thankful for those people who rekindle the inner spirit. ~Albert Schweitzer

When we honestly ask ourselves which person in our lives mean the most to us, we often find that it is those who, instead of giving advice, solutions, or cures, have chosen rather to share our pain and touch our wounds with a warm and tender hand. The friend who can be silent with us in a moment of despair or confusion, who can stay with us in an hour of grief and bereavement, who can tolerate not knowing, not curing, not healing and face with us the reality of our powerlessness, that is a friend who cares. ~Henri Nouwen

The Girls

I have not been really great about updates on the girls and life on here lately.  I always think of things I should add but then time gets away from me and next thing I know a week has passed. :)  Of late, Abby has been potty trained!  She is now wearing big girl undies and staying mostly dry at night and naps.  It took her 3 days to get the hang of it...I was completely dreading it and she did awesome.  Clearly she was ready.  Because it took MUCH longer than that with Hannah.  At this point there is nothing Abby does not or cannot say or at the very least try to say.  She follows Hannah every where.  :)  Which of course drives Hannah crazy some of the time but I think Hannah also enjoys havin a little shadow buddy. 
Soon, we are setting up bunkbeds for the girls and they are both really excited about sleeping in the same room together...they've been trying for months to get me to just let them sleep in the same room. 
Abby has always been rather charming.  She just has a radiance about her when she smiles and is so happy a good chunk of the time.  She is of course still 2 and still checking things out in life, like how far CAN I push things?? ...For instance, today I made the girls a snack and told them I was jumping in the shower quickly.  Abby decided the one apple I gave her was not enough and so, she grabbed a mini chair which was enough to boost her onto the counter to where she could reach both an apple and the knives in the butcher block!!  THANKFULLY I was getting out of the shower as Hannah came to tell me what was unfolding and caught her just in time. 
Abby can be found in pajamas most usually...and not for lack of clothing or putting her in regular clothes, she's just mastered the art of getting things on and off several months ago and now our days are filled with wardrobe changes...including a few of her favorite pairs of pajamas.

We removed the baby locks months ago after I realized that Abby could get into them and was putting them back in place herself after working her way into a certain cabinet.  So much for that!  She's very loving and snuggly and is insistent I (Mama) am her buddy.  She'll eventually admit that others are her buddies as well, but it's obvious she prefers Mama more than anyone. 

Hannah is growing up altogether too fast.  She's so ready to be a big sister again, and I know given her personality and how much she loves to help, and herd, and smother her younger sister she's going to be a tremendous help with new baby come fall.  She is so kind.  Her heart holds so much love and care for people, and she somehow has this wisdom on just what people need to hear and have at a certain time when they are struggling.  Which is an awesome trait to have.  We have dear friends, who just lost a mother/mother-in-law, and I hadn't yet told Hannah the mom had died.  But somehow without me even telling her she sensed that our friend needed extra love and dished that out willingly.  Later when I told her what happened, she got tears in her eyes and asked if we could pray for all of them.  She's so sensitive to what people need.  We've decided not to place her in kindergarten come fall.  She originally was begging to go, but about the time we would have needed to be testing her so she could be enrolled she decided she really wasn't ready, and would rather stay home. :)  I think this was a good and wise choice on all our parts.  And next year we'll address whether she tries out regular school, or a homeschooling program.  we're just going to take it a little at a time and base it on where she's at when.

Praying over our Children

While browsing Pinterest the other day I found this awesome idea.  The idea was to pick certain scriptures for each individual child and pray them over your child for a certain amount of time.  I found this to be beautiful AND in perfect timing.  I say prayers each night with the girls as the go to sleep and also when things are happening in their lives I like to pray over them, but sometimes I feel like the words I come up with are all the same and not  near adequate enough.  Not that God takes into account a more poetic or Scripture based prayer more than another, but prayer is so very powerful and  when coupled with scriptures I believe an even larger force to be reckoned with!  This book:Praying the Scriptures for your Children, By: Jodie Berndt was listed as an idea to get started and I am loving it!  Well, I already finished it, but it's a book I will be reading over and over for inspiration and as the kids face different things in their lives.
The book is broken down by different areas in life and includes things like, using scripture to pray for your child's relationships, for their well-being, for their health, for their teachers in school, for their relationship with siblings, etc...
It is a beautifully, well written book with personal stories from the author and those she knows, that drives home the power we have as Mother's to pray over our children.  I love knowing that this covers my children in a very specific and tailored way, and at the same time I am committing to memory these beautiful verses.

“Don’t pray when you feel like it. Have an appointment with the Lord and keep it. A man is powerful on his knees.”~ Corrie ten Boom

Orange Creamsicle Cookies

I found these cookies about a week ago on Pinterest and I made them to send off to a friend and some to keep.  The kiddos and husband LOVED them.  I've now made them twice in less than a week because the Hubs requested them for a work party.  Here is the recipe and the original site I got these and the picture from: Yummy Orange Creamsicle Cookies!  These cookies are very easy to make and seriously light and yummy.  They'd make a great summer cookie with some iced tea or a fun summer drink.  They are also super yummy with Orange Cream Sherbert. :)

 

Need:

 * 2 1/2 Cups of Flour

* 3/4 teaspoon baking soda

*1/2 teaspoon salt

* 2 sticks butter

*1/2 Cup white sugar

*1/2 Cup firmly packed brown sugar

* 1 large egg

* I teaspoon vanilla extract

*2 Tablespoons of orange zest (about 2 oranges worth)

*2 Cups white chocolate chips

Preheat Oven to 375

Do:

 In a small bowl combine the flour, baking soda and salt. Set aside.

 

In a large bowl cream the butter and sugars together until light and creamy.

Beat in the egg, and vanilla until smooth.

Gradually add in the flour mix.

Stir in the orange zest and the white chocolate chips.

Drop onto rounded teaspoons on cookie sheet.

Do not flatten cookies, this will dry them out.

Bake 8-10 minutes or until golden brown around the edges. Do not over cook.

Cool on cookie sheets for several minutes before transferring to cooling racks.