Christmas Card 2013

 

Happy Thanksgiving!

We had a great trip to Ohio for Thanksgiving. The girls did really well in the car (thank goodness!) and we all had fun visiting with Matt's family.

It's really hard to take a nap when your sister is SO funny!

The girls loved sledding... especially Morgan!

Hope you all had a Happy Thanksgiving!

Family pics

We had some family pics taken the other day. It is beyond difficult to get the girls to sit still for pictures. And getting them both to look at the camera at the same time is impossible. Forget trying to get them both to smile. We also tried to get some outdoor photos in the park near our condo and it started raining just as we arrived to the park. And for some reason, our usually super smiley Morgan would not crack a smile. Avery smiled more than Morgan! Needless to say, I am a little worried how the pictures turned out. I was hoping to get a good Christmas card photo, but we'll see what we end up with.

Yesterday, our neighbors set up a little Christmas backdrop to take pics of their daughter. They let us plop the girls in front of it to take a few pictures, too. The whole time I was worried that our little destroyers were going to totally wreck it. And then of course, they wouldn't smile at the same time or both look at the camera. I think I should just give up on getting a good picture until they are a little older.

And this is how that photo shoot went...

This is the best one... ugh

Morgan tried to eat the confetti and wasn't a fan

And we're done

Toe fetish

One Year = Twelve Months = 365 days (really late)

I started this post like a month ago... my blog is not getting a lot of attention from me these days.

October 5th, 2013

We made it a year! :)

We were reminiscing about the first few weeks we brought Morgan and Avery home. Ah, what a crazy time... I've never been so completely exhausted in my life! We would not have been able to get through those first few weeks without the help of family, especially my mom. Just give her some Baked Cheetos and she was good to go!

Here's a little update on Morgan and Avery
(I'm using this blog as my baby book, so I'm trying to keep track of everything here to print out later - yep, I'm taking the easy way out).

Avery weighs 20 lb 10 oz (60th percentile) and is 29.5 inches tall (also 60th percentile). She has 10 teeth and is wearing 12-18 month clothes. Morgan weighs 21 lb 9 oz (70th percentile) and is 30.5 inches tall (90th percentile). Morgan also has 12 teeth and wears 12-18 month clothes. Just for comparison purposes, I weighed 23 lb 11 oz and was 31 inches tall at a year old.

Morgan started walking about a week after Avery (11 months 2 weeks). Once they started walking, they were off. They still sometimes walk like they are on a boat in a storm, but they are getting steadier by the day. They try to go SO fast. I get worried with them on the hardwood floors. If only we could put the playmat flooring throughout our whole condo! When Avery walks, she sticks her belly forward and her butt out. It's pretty funny. Morgan stands up pretty straight. Now that they are super mobile, they are into everything. We have to watch them like hawks when we go places.

So far, neither of girls say any words (and know what they mean). They say mama and dada, but they say it all the time and not just when they want one of us. They understand words we say, though. And they babble like they are saying important things. They "talk" back and forth with each other and laugh at each other. I wouldn't say they play "together" yet. They will both play with the same toy together, which a lot of times leads to wrestling each other to get that toy.

Morgan
Two words to describe Morgan: bubbly and tough! Morgan is such a happy little girl. She has the best giggle! She is outgoing and loves smiling at strangers. She is a very easy child. She eats great, plays hard and sleeps well. She is also super tough. She hardly ever cries, so when she does you know something is really wrong. When she's sick, she hardly misses a beat. Total opposite of Avery.

Morgan has a serious toe fetish. If we aren't paying attention, she will just chomp down on our toes. She did this to (unsuspecting) Grandpa D one time and he learned pretty quickly to keep his eyes open and his toes covered up! The other day, I looked over and she was biting the toes of one of her baby dolls.

Toes are not the only thing Morgan bites. She puts EVERYTHING in her mouth. I am not exaggerating. If she puts it in her hand, it goes in her mouth. She has eaten the corners off most of our books. As I mentioned a few months back, she chewed up her crib. Well, now that she's taller, she has chewed the side rails as well, down to the wood so that splinters are actually sticking out! I told all of this to the doctor and she said Morgan is just a very "oral" baby. Of course, as she was saying that, we looked over and Morgan was licking the mirror in the doctor's office.

Another goofy thing Morgan does is when we hand her a bottle, she looks at it and spins it around so the Dr. Brown's label is facing her before taking a drink. We have no idea why she does this or how it started. We just noticed one day that she kept doing it. I need to get it on video before we go to sippy cups entirely.

Both girls love watching tv, but Morgan especially. When we turn on her show, she gets so excited. She bounces up and down, marches in place, claps her hands and giggles. She even knows that when the guide appears on the screen that someone is messing with the remote and will look around to figure out who is doing it.

Avery

It's hard to sum Avery up in two words. She's still our little diva. For such a tiny thing, she packs a lot of attitude already. Our nanny refers to her as Princess Avery, which is a pretty fitting moniker. She loves attention and hates if she doesn't get her way or what she wants. She's mastered crying with no tears.

She is also a total sweetheart and loves to cuddle up on our laps to watch tv or read a book. She loves snuggling and giving hugs. She gives us her version of kisses, which is just a big slobbery mess. This is the complete opposite of Morgan, who really isn't much of a cuddly type kid.

Avery has become more shy as her sister has become more outgoing. It takes her a little while to warm up to new people or situations. Morgan has no problem with it, but Avery sits back and takes everything in first. She'll watch Morgan for a few minutes and then venture out. This is similar to how my sister and I were as kids. I was really shy and would let my sister do everything first to make sure it was ok for me to do it.

Avery is studious and loves to figure things out. She gets such a serious look on her face when she's studying how her toys work. She also is very aware of what's going on around her. If you do anything she is unsure of, she will stare you down and watch you like a hawk. Grandpa D gets the stare down quite often. :)

There's never a dull moment with these two!

No shows

My pet peeve of the day... people who book an appt to come see our condo and then don't show. Especially ones at 7PM at night, which is after the kiddos bedtime to begin with. And we have two sick kiddos that haven't been sleeping well, so making them hold off to go to bed is not ideal. To top it off, it was raining outside, so we had to take a 30+ minute walk through Dominick's waiting for no one to show up. This is the second no show (that we know of - our realtor isn't the most forthcoming with information). The other one was during the girls' nap time and we had to wake them up to get out of the house... just so no one could look at it. I'm really not sure who is at fault here... our realtor... the other people's realtor... but regardless, it's annoying.

But, we did get a little entertainment while we were out and about last night. While walking through the aisles in Dominick's, I heard what sounded like rain coming down in the next aisle. Turns out it was. A pipe had burst and water was pouring from the ceiling all over the food! It lasted for a good 5 minutes and it started seeping into the other aisles. What a mess!

Halloween Fun

On Friday, we took the girls to our office Halloween party. They had a blast! They ran up and down the hallways and all over the party room. They loved seeing so many other kids!

Morgan was a cat

And Avery was a mouse

We also went over to Erin's for a costume party on Saturday. The girls got another excuse to wear their cute costumes.

Morgan got a kick out of my hat

Little mouse Avery

Uncle Brett with cousin Nolan (and Avery scared of Grandpa)

Family pic - Matt is Waldo, but without the glasses (which didn't fit)

Two peas in a pod - they both love to get into the cabinets!

What?!?

Sabrina in her super cute chick costume

Little Elvis and Duck Dynasty

We also celebrated Grayson's 1st birthday!

Morgan the cat

Hippie Grandma and Avery

Elvis is on the move

Kayla the cheerleader

Sweet Sleepy Super Nolan - love him!

Avery checking out Nolan's diaper bag

Erin had all kinds of spooky goodies

Just chillin'

The girls get tired around 8:30 in the morning and sometimes take a little snooze if we put one of their favorite shows on TV. When I left for work the other morning, this is how I found them... both in the exact same position, sitting in their chairs watching Little Einsteins. Well, Morgan was asleep, but Avery gave me a little grin.

I'm trying to get caught back up on this blog. Seems like we've had a busy past month with things going on every weekend.

And then the girls picked up Hand Foot and Mouth, so that wasn't fun. Avery is definitely not as good at handling being sick as Morgan. Morgan barely acted sick the whole time she had HFM. Avery made it quite clear she wasn't feeling well.

We put our house on the market a few weeks ago and are hoping someone wants to buy it soon. Keeping the place perfect for showings is a pain. Plus, we've totally outgrown this condo. The girls need some space!

Pumpkin Patch

The day after the girls' birthday we decided to check out a pumpkin patch in the 'burbs. We went to Goebbert's in South Barrington. This place is huge and has a ton of fun things for kiddos to do. The girls loved checking out the pumpkins and watching all the kids running around. The weather was chilly and fall like - perfect for the new pumpkin hats Grandma Ruth knitted for the girls and their cousin Grayson!

Baby D is here!

While we were in Quincy for the Sammy Fund weekend, Baby D decided to make his entrance into the world!

Nolan Stanley Duesterhaus was born on October 13 at 4:50AM. He weighed 8 lb 2 oz and was 20 inches long. He has strawberry blond hair and blue eyes and a good set of lungs! :)

Sammy Fund Weekend

We went back to Quincy for the annual Sammy Fund weekend. We had missed last year's event because the girls had just been born. It's always a nice time and great to see so many family members in town for the event! The girls had fun playing with their cousin and second cousins.

They loved running around the practice putting green while their Dad was out golfing. The flags were just their height!

We also stopped off at a local apple orchard / pumpkin patch. The girls got to try some apple cider. No surprise, they loved it and cried when it was gone!

Morgan to Avery: "You aren't going to take that apple, are you?"

Morgan's looking, Avery is not

Avery's looking, Morgan is not