Fire Ants

My poor little angel baby. Yesterday, while at the park, Elia decided it would be great fun to stick her hands in a pile of dirt. She actually does this often, but this pile of dirt turned out to be a fire ant nest. I was 2 feet away from her and as soon as she shoved her hands inside the bed, I was able to catch her and wipe off her hands. At first I thought they were just regular ants because as soon as they were all off of her, she stopped crying. I took her over to the drinking fountain to rinse her hands off and thats when I saw all the little white pustule bumps. (kinda like a scratched mosquito bite) I immediately started tearing up because I thought she must be in a lot of pain! But after getting some ice from a nice lady at the park, I realized she was acting completely normal! She still wanted to play and run around. I was so relieved of that but we decided to go home anyway. She passed out all the way home and then was back to her normal self again once she woke up and we were playing again at home! I called my pediatrician, and there really isn't much you can do. I could give her Tylenol or Motrin for the pain, but she wasn't acting extra fussy. The little bumps now just look like teeny tiny whitehead zits. (sorry for that visual!) I will just keep them clean and make sure she doesn't scratch. My friend's daughter had the same thing happen and she said that at this age, they can hardly localize the pain or scratch so they are not very likely to itch. Phew!

Pictures and Words

Elia, you make a terrible mess! Thats what Gianna always says after Elia has had her turn with something.

Their new favorite reading spot while mom cooks dinner:

The popcorn is off the ceiling! Now on to sheet rock and maybe some smooth texture this weekend!

Ready for Fall!

Long sleeve shirts and jeans, here we come. I took this today right before preschool. Sharing an apple is the perfect way to bring on fall!

Check out their sweet new shoes:

Weekend was good!

We are still pretty busy with our bathroom remodel. It took about a week to strip all the wallpaper. Doing stuff yourself takes a lot longer than one would think! Its obviously very kid un-friendly to strip wallpaper, and so it can only be done during naptime and after the kiddos are in bed. Poor Elia is teething (read: poor Moe and Chris) so she is waking us up most mornings to a 4:30ish scream-fest. It seems the nights I am up late scraping are always followed by the early morning wakeup call while the nights I go to bed at a decent hour, she wakes up after 6:30. Funny how that works.

Before

After

We took a break Saturday afternoon to go to a princess party. I dressed the girls in their Sunday best and we headed over to their little friend's house. We enjoyed stories read by real princesses and ate princess cupcakes and made princess wands. Too fun.

Can you tell she is teething? Fingers jammed into her mouth all weekend long!

Stromboli!

Gianna started going to a cooking class at the Rec Center last week. Friday she made cookie brittle- basically cookies without egg so its like a flat cookie. This week, they made Stromboli. Basically, her teacher, Miss Jill, made pizza with more crust over the top. When I went to pick her up, the Stromboli was taking a while to cook, so she was reading to the kids and getting them to kiss their fingers like an Italian Grandma and then say Stromboli! It was so cute. G is such a little chef, always helping me in the kitchen and now she gets to do it with new friends!

On this day 2 years ago...

This day 2 years ago, our life turned upside down, again. We found out I was pregnant with Elia. I think after the shock wore off, my first thought was poor Gianna! How could we do this to her!

And 2 years later, Elia is exactly what Gianna needed. God, do we love her!

Brush My Teeth

That is probably going to be Elia's first sentence. She is OBSESSED! It probably has to do with the fact that she is teething (all last night she had both fingers in her mouth), or the fact that she gets to eat a little bit of the sweet toothpaste, but she loves gnawing on her tooth brush. And it helps Chris or I remember to make sure G brushes too!

Farm Field Trip

This morning we went to this farm since we have been learning about farms during preschool play-dates. I dressed them in overalls, which I thought was very fitting!

It started out with a feeding frenzy with the goats. Elia wanted to feed them but sort of freaked out when the goats started licking her hands. G wasn't too keen on them licking her hands either, so she resorted to just feeding them straight out of the cup.

Then we went on a hayride and later a barrel ride. Elia sat in the barrel seat but didn't go for the ride. All in all, I think they had a great morning!

Let the Renovation Begin!

Most of this weekend was spent preparing for our new master bedroom. We finally got all of the insurance money and found someone to help us with the tools and know-how we don't possess. We are in the process of scraping wallpaper and picking paint colors. I can't decide which one is more frustrating. Each time I look at all of the samples, I have a different favorite. We cannot decide between the bottom 4:

But the girls had their own ideas. We let them kinda go crazy and paint a part of the wall. Gianna loved it but Elia wasn't quite so sure. She tried to eat the paint a few times and then just ended up painting her legs.

I had to include this one because her sweet little face is so picture worthy. I had just told her very loudly NO because she tried to eat some more paint and well, she just didn't like that! Doesn't it just break your heart?

And my sweet G looks so grown up here. She is really becoming a little girl now. Not much baby left!

More pics of the reno will be coming!

New Favorites with Daddy

Who says you need snow to sled? Chris pulled the girls around in their "sled" Friday night. They loved every second of it!

And of course, another favorite is sitting w Daddy while watching a cartoon. Not new for Gianna, but recently Elia has caught on that she is cute too if she goes and gets her blanket and cuddles up with Papa.

Down on the Farm

This week was my week to teach the little preschoolers about farms. It was SO fun. Every time I teach it makes me a little more excited to start teaching again. Some of the fun things we did were:

Take animal cookies and roll them around in "mud" (chocolate pudding)

Make butter from whipping cream by shaking it around with a marble in a tupperware container.

Make paper bag pig puppets.

Read. I got so many books in the library, I could have just read to them the full 2 hours. I read a book called Punk Farm about a bunch of farm animal getting together and making music. We all put sunglasses on while I read it to them. So fun!

My original plan was to go back to work Fall of 2011, but it looks like I may take on a long term sub position in February. More on that later. In the meantime, I will have fun teaching these preschoolers once a month and of course my own babies at home!

So she thinks she can dance...

St. Louis in August

Our (well my) main reason for going to St. Louis was to put on a shower for Colleen. That was Saturday night, and it was sooo fun. It was St. Louis themed, so we got lots of different food from vendors in St. Louis. Colleen is the cutest bride to be ever. I took no pictures (as usual) but here is a pic of the cute invite Shannon and Megan put together.

Chris' main reason for going to StL was to see the Giants play the Cardinals. Too bad they lost both games Chris went to! He took Gianna on Sunday.

The weather was seriously amazing the week we were there. I met my friend Angela at 2 different parks with her little one, and we went to the park down the street from my house quite a few times. That is cousin Austin looking cute.

We went to the zoo on Monday. It is probably about a mile from Shannon and Tom's house. So we parked a little ways away (for free) and walked across the highway to get there. We got there around 4:30, and the attendant let us in with the warning that the zoo closes at 5! It was the perfect amount of time and there weren't that many people there so there were no crowds to push through. Elia called everything from the hippo to the elephant "dog". Pretty cute. We actually didn't get outta there until 5:30, no one told us to leave!

Elia looked at the map to tell us where to go.

One morning we went to the library I always went to as a child. They completely gutted and remodeled it recently, and it is gorgeous. They had really cute chairs too! Grandma had tons of fun reading to the girls. They have been obsessed with reading lately, especially Elia!

My mom and I and the girls went to the Central West End for a morning to get a feel for all the wedding festivities. Gianna is calling it the Wedding Contest these days. We practiced walking down the New Cathedral's aisle (that church is freaking beautiful) and got to see where the reception is and the hotel block. Colleen's wedding is going to be so hip being in that area! We took a few pictures outside the cathedral, since you aren't allowed to take them in the cathedral.

My last day there we celebrated Aunt Colleen's birthday. We spent that last day outside as much as possible. Can't wait to go back for the wedding in December!