My Two Year Old Girl

At Erin's two year check up she was 26 pounds 8 ounces (50th percentile) and 34-1/2" tall (75th percentile). I'm in no way ready to surrender her babyness but she continues to surprise me every day by how big she is getting. Just her vocabulary lately is amazing. And the other night in the bath out of nowhere she counted to 10! I was amazed! I absolutely love her personality. She sassy when she wants to be but most of the time she is sweetness and love. She is my snuggle baby and I'm so grateful for that, Evan really wasn't much of a snuggler.
She still doesn't mind the camera in her face so I grab it any chance I get. And on that note, the many faces of Erin. Don't mind the tomato beard, she had just gorged on no less than 10 cherry tomatoes :)

Party Time!

We decided to do a combined birthday party for the kids this year and it worked out great. Coming up with a theme for both of them was a little challenging but after watching Despicable Me about a thousand times already this summer it became clear that a Minion birthday party was the way to go.
My friend Amy made the cake and it turned out super cute!

We did a bubble station and a pinata for the kids and they all seemed to love it. Evan was eyeing the pinata all day and couldn't wait to take a swing at it. 

After numerous rounds we had to have daddy finish it off, pretty sure it was made of steel.

I made my own bubble solution and it worked out very well, and it was super easy!

1 cup water

2 tablespoons light corn syrup

4 tablespoons Dawn dishwashing liquid

The kids had a great time and so did we.

Erin is 2!

Two! No way. My beautiful girl is growing up so fast I can't believe it. She has been talking in full sentences lately and I love it so much. Her tiny voice saying "what doing mommy" just kills me!
Right now she is pretty feisty when it comes to getting her own way. You have to catch her in the right mood to change her clothes that's for sure. And tell her she can't wear her favorite shoes, look out.
She still will eat anything and loves cherry tomatoes (which she will pluck out of the garden and eat if they are even remotely red).
We've been doing a little potty training but nothing too serious yet. She's already peed on the potty twice so I think she might be a little easier to train than Evan. We'll see.
She's a pretty goofy girl and can also be very serious. I took her outside to get some photos the other night and I'll let them speak for her personality. I just adore her more and more everyday.

And these are from her actual birthday yesterday. Little known fact, she is terrified of birthday candles. Who knew?

And these are the favorite shoes by the way. 

Evan is 4!

It's really unbelievable that he is already four! He's grown up so much in just the past few months. He really is the sweetest kid. He tell me he loves me at least ten times a day, and he doesn't even want anything! I know that will change so my heart swells with every single I love you :)

He's energetic when he wants to be but he's still pretty laid back. He loves watching movies and recently I took him to see his first movie at the theater and he loved it! He did so well and sat through the whole thing. We'll definitely be making repeat trips to the theater this summer.
His favorite things right now are TMNT and Dinosaur Train.

We had a pretty relaxing birthday today. A few presents and some cake and ice cream. Evan loved all his gifts.
Here Evan is showing Erin how to use a Ninja Turtle sword.

She gave up and combed her ponies hair ;)

We let Evan pick out his cake this year and while I found it hideous, he loved it.

Happy Birthday Evan!

Sassy Pants

This girl. Oh my lands is she dramatic. Everyday she gets a little more...sassy? Strong willed? Wants what she wants when she wants it? Whatever it is it's funny at times and other times I want to pull my hair out. Her latest thing is not wanting to eat. She has been the BEST eater for 21 months and now all of a sudden she only wants yogurt smoothies and candy.
She definitely has an opinion about what shoes she wears. And which pajamas she sleeps in (Minnie or Elmo are acceptable. Flowers are not). If she doesn't want to wear a jacket she's not going to. End of story, your argument is invalid.

She is also a path of destruction. She makes the biggest messes of any child I have ever seen. Whether it be food, toys, crayons, water, anything. But I'd say with food she is the messiest. She loves to throw food. I don't know what it is but as soon as she is done she thinks it's ok to throw the leftovers on the floor. Or the walls.
Exhibit A. You may notice the food splattered on the wall.
2013-05-10 19 48 13 from Kelly Marsh on Vimeo.
But she does have her sweet moments OF COURSE.

She is pretty snuggly, especially at bedtime. And she is learning so many new words and talking so much more. Everyday with her is an adventure and I love every minute of it.
And this picture is totally inappropriate but I think it's funny. Is she trying to tell me something?

Evan's Garden

For quite a few months Evan has wanted to plant seeds and watch plants grow. Todd decided that they would do a box garden together and I thought it was a great idea. Evan had a lot of fun planting the seeds and plants. He's very interested in how things grow.

They planted tomatoes, zucchini, squash, some peppers and I think strawberries. It all sounds delicious to me!

We'll have to watch this girl around it though. She looked like she wanted run through it and trample it all. 

He was so proud when it was finished. I can't wait to see what will grow. 

My Poor Neglected Blog

So it's been about two months since I've blogged. Things have been busy! My photography business is picking up now that Spring has sprung and I feel like anytime I am at the computer I'm editing pictures of other peoples kids instead of mine. That's ok, I love that I have been getting more clients. I Still hope to some day make that my full time job.
I guess to catch up I should say we got the results back from Erin's labs. She has Ketotic hypoglycemia.
Basically we just need to watch her and make sure that she eats. Luckily this should be something she grows out of. Knock on wood she hasn't had any episodes since that morning we went to the ER so maybe it was a one time thing. Hoping so!
Todd and I are on vacation this week and took a little mini getaway to Cincinnati to Great Wolf Lodge. The kids had SO much fun. Pictures as you can imagine were a challenge, there were only a few "safe zones" and even those you had to watch out for some rogue sprays. I was able to get a few on my phone though. I thought they would have fun but I figured Evan would just stay in the little toddler area and splash around, he's never been very brave when it came to water. Boy was I wrong! He LOVED the water slides. Even the big ones mama was too chicken to go down. Oh how I wish I had a picture of his face after going down the slide for the first time. Pure joy. Erin was pretty adventurous too, no slides for her but she wasn't scared of all the water, she loved to walk all around Fort Mackenzie and play with all the different stuff. It was overall super fun and the hotel was really nice. We plan on going back next year for sure.

I think this one if when daddy brought back lunch ;) 

We also caught a Reds game while in Cincy. It was fun even though we only stayed for about half the game. The next morning we heard the game went into 13 innings and the Reds pulled out the win over the Cubs. Crazy!

It was such a great trip, two days was definitely enough at the the water park though. Todd and I were exhausted!!!