Wednesday, August 19, 2009
Monday, April 20, 2009
26 Weeks

P.S. This ultrasound profile is almost identical to Maddy's profile ultrasound from 20weeks. From the tip up of her little nose, little lips, to the forhead curve, they are literally identical. I wonder if this means she will favor daddy just like her big sister. Guess we will find out in July.
Wednesday, April 01, 2009
Happy Spring and Happy Easter


Thursday, March 05, 2009
It's a ...

Another sweet girl to love! We are so excited. I can't believe I am going to be a mommy to three little girls!
Saturday, January 31, 2009
Pictures of My Blessings
Morgan and Maddy on Christmas Eve
Morgan gets in bed to wait on Santa!

Maddy ready for Santa, but not as thrilled with going to bed.
Here is a picture of my 9 week ultrasound. I am 14 weeks now.

Friday, January 30, 2009
One Year and Three Months Later ...
Maddy and Morgan are doing phenomenally. They are sweet, caring, silly, full of energy girls. Their personalities couldn't be any more different at this point.
Maddy is reserved and shy around others. But at home she lets it all out and is full of energy and movement. She is sometimes bossy and whiny and her favorite statement as of late is "It's Miiinnne" or "It's My Turn". She is the perfect little "mama" to her dolls and to Morgan, whom she still refers to as "baby". She is extremely attentive to her sister as long as Morgan doesn't have a cool toy or gadget in her hand. She is very loving and giving, although it is definately on her terms. She is studious and loves to learn. She has a wonderful attention span for a three year old.
Morgan is wild and outgoing, both in good ways. She is the life of a party and she loves everyone. She is extremely empathetic to how others around her feel and is very giving of herself and her things if it will make us or her sister happy. She is not demanding or whiny but is sneaky and stubborn. She loves to pretend. She loves dress up and playing house and playing with her barbies. She keeps me on my toes and needs lots of supervision as she often find herself being mischevious if left alone for long periods of time. The things she comes up with almost always take my breath away. I never know what she is going to say or do next.
The girls graduated out of therapy in July of last year and have been doing great. They are growing and changing all the time. Maddy weighs 31lbs now and Morgan is around 28lbs. They are beautiful little girls. Morgan was prescribed glasses in December and she is so cute in her Spongebob "Pensants", her pronunciation of "Princess", glasses. They are so adorable on her - that is when we can get her to keep them on. She also has two cavities we are having filled in February :(. These are some of the tiny remnants of their early arrival, but all in all I think we came away amazingly blessed.
Speaking of blessings... The girls are most excited right now about a new baby coming later this year. Yep, we're pregnant again. We weren't planning for this at all. We were surprised (surprised is an understatment really). But we are extremely excited about baby #3. We don't know the sex of the new baby yet but will probably first week of March.
Everyone polled is saying they think it is a boy, but I wonder if it isn't another girl. I really don't care as long as it is healthy! I just don't want another 1 lb. baby. It is such a hard road to go down. We do know that this pregnancy is just one baby. I have had three ultrasounds so far and we are confident that only one is there this time. My doctors are very optimistic that this will be a much easier and healthier pregnancy. I am keeping my fingers crossed.
So far my only problems this go round have been the anxiety and stress of "what if's" I do great for the first two weeks after my prenatal appt., then I stress out and worry over every little thing the two weeks before my next appt. It is like high highs when everything is all right and low lows when I feel a muscle pull or other strange sensation and start to worry until I hear all is well again. It is a battle of wills and I am trying really hard to be relaxed and optimistic too. I want to enjoy this pregnancy as it will surely be my last!
Well I hope someone out there still checks in on us every once in a while, although it has been so long that I sort of doubt anyone does. But part of writing this blog, or most of writing this blog was just for my own memories and "getting it out".
Tuesday, October 02, 2007
I know, I know ...

Maddy at the zoo on Saturday.


Morgan at the museum on Saturday

Thursday, July 05, 2007
Wednesday, May 09, 2007
Lazy Summer? Days ...
I haven't had much time to blog these last few months as the girls literally keep me on my feet all day. I wouldn't even be on here today if I hadn't placated them for a few minutes with a Disney movie. But I wanted to share some recent pics of them and update everyone with what we've been up to. Hope to hear from you all soon! Enjoy.
Maddy and Morgan have their first pudding pops! Yummy!
Maddy plays with her sand and water table. This is the coolest toy. They love it and it keeps their attention endlessly.
This is the newest outdoor toy we purchased. We went to the March of Dimes WalkAmerica a couple of weeks ago and Maddy went crazy over the moon walk. This bouncy thing was only $24.00 at an outlet store here. I had to get it for them.




Wednesday, May 02, 2007
4 Free to A Good Home
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We call this one "Princess". I am pretty sure she is a girl. She is probably the friendliest of the group and the most fearless. She is very playful and loves to be nuzzled. She is the only one who has consistently come up to us when we go looking for the four. She is mostly black, brown, and white as you can see but she has this one little patch of gold hair on the right side of her head and it looks like a crown so that is why we have called her princess. Of course no matter which kitty you pick you can name them yourselves. None of them know their names yet. :)
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This next one we have been calling "Smokey". He is gray and peach and has a white belly. I have looked at his "parts" and though teeny tiny at this point I am pretty sure he is a he. I could be wrong because I am no vet but I am pretty sure he is a he. The peach color is really pretty and unique. We thought he was going to be off white but when you get up close it is almost a pink off white color and I love the little patch of peach on his nose and paw. He is really cute and very friendly. He doesn't just run up to us but he is comfortable playing on the front porch while I sit there and watch him and when I picked him up he snuggled in to me. Smokey seen here with "Mama"
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This is "Tabby" She is almost identical to princess when you first glance at her but when she steps back from you you can see all these cute stripes under her fur. She is the most obvious mixture of "Mama" stray cat and our pet cat "Kitty". Both of these calico looking cats I have been told are girls. My best friend said that she remembers from biology class that if they have more than three colors they are always a female. I am pretty sure she is female too, just from looking for myself :) She is friendly and very playful but a little more shy than princess. She will let me hold her for a really long time though if I want to and I love that about her.

Our last kitty and most shy is "Boo". We call him that because he is the most fearful of the pack. He has been held and will come out and play around us but if you move too fast or lean towards him he will jump back or hide under something. I tried to tell for sure if he was a he but he is too furry to see anything and because he is so shy it is hard to get enough time with him turn him over and look around. I am going with him being a he because of a few reasons. His face is a little wider than the others and he looks really different from the two girls. He is completely all black. And if I had to pick one as my favorite looking it would be him. He is so cute and fluffy and because he is so shy I just want to snuggle him more, plus I just think it would be so cool to have an all black cat.


So these are the four. I think they are somewhere between seven and eight weeks old. I am guessing closer to seven. The are still little bitty even though some of these zoomed in pictures make them look bigger.
They are free to any good home on a first to come get them basis. I can probably deliver them to you if you live or work close by me. They seem to be really healthy. They eat plenty and they are growing appropriately. I haven't noticed anything unusual with any of them. I think they would make great inside or outside cats.
I am really hoping some of you will consider taking one of them. I am doing my best to find them each a great family but if I can't I will probably turn them over to the Bartlett Animal Shelter sometime in the next couple of weeks. I am hoping to avoid that if at all possible, but I can't keep six cats, and a dog, a fish, plus two kids, it is just too much for me to take on long term. I love my two kids. I am fairly fond of my dog and cat. I have decided to keep "mama" if I can catch her and get her fixed (soon) so that just leaves the kittens and the fish. Anybody want a fish?
Email me at mandygal2004ATaolDOTcom for more info as needed.
5/9/07----UPDATE----------------------------
"Princess" and "Tabby" are now in a loving home together. A family with two sweet girls and a baby boy adopted them this past Saturday. I am sure they will all be happy together.
Tuesday, April 03, 2007
Cute Pics and the Easter Bunny





Tuesday, March 20, 2007
The Sweetest Thing
So this weekend dad came over to the house and brought with him two gift bags chocked full of surprises for the girls. They had a blast opening it and playing with all the goodies inside. Morgan love love loved the sunglasses and is still bringing them to me over and over today to put on her. Maddy really like the purses she and Morgan got and has kind of claimed them as both hers. They got these really pretty faint pink butterfly sequin purses I put up for Easter day. I think it will go great with their dresses. Everything they got was so cute. My favorite toys were these little bubble squeezy blowers shaped like Peeps candies. You stick the blower in the bubble solution and squeeze the peep and little micro bubbles go everywhere. We had a lot of fun with that one in therapy today.
To Evelyn, Nina, Tammy(April), Jamie, and Norma:
Thank you so much for all the wonderfully cute gifts for the girls. They had a blast playing with them all. What you did for them and for my dad was just the sweetest thing ever. Thanks for thinking of us and for being such a good friend to him these last few years! Thanks for all the prayers you have sent our way since their early arrival. May God bless you all. Please feel free to comment on my blog anytime or to shoot me an email for updates. I look forward to talking to you all again.
Mandy




Monday, February 26, 2007
Raising Funds for March of Dimes
If you are in town and would like to come, please shoot me an email or leave me a comment on here. I can then get you directions and details. Tickets are $10.00 a plate and kids eat free. We could really use the support.
We also have a website set up through the March of Dimes WalkAmerica.com to raise online funds. If you would like to make a donation please see the link on the right side of the screen or click this link: Maddy and Morgan's MOD website We are so thankful to have family and friends who support us.
We are so thankful to the March of Dimes for their hard work and continuous efforts to prevent premature birth and birth defects. We believe because of this organization our doctors had the equipment and the knowledge to save our sweet girls. We hope with all of our support and others like us, we can make a difference in the lives of tiny babies born in the future. Maybe they won't have to suffer as much as our girls did; and maybe their parents won't have to worry about NEC and other conditions preemies develop now, but doctor's don't yet know why. March of Dimes mission is "Saving Babies Together" and we just hope to be a small part of that.
Thanks for all of your help, we couldn't ask for better friends and family! You have always been supportive when we needed you most and we can't tell you how much that means to us!
Love,
Mandy and William
Maddy and Morgan
Monday, February 19, 2007
Watch Your Mouth, A Random Thought, and Hot Wheels!!!
Maddy and Morgan are repeating everything now. This weekend the we were all over at my mom's house and Poppy said "doo do" as Morgan was walking through the room. Morgan repeated the word "doo do" and kept walking. I know this isn't a bad word but we thought it was hilarious. Poppy was using this word in place of another common bad word and boy are we glad he did, because it wouldn't have been so funny to hear my 19 mo. old saying curse words while strolling through the living room.
This afternoon I turned on the t.v. for the first time all day, just mostly to have some noise. I didn't pay attention to the channel until later when I heard Dr. Phil coming on. I went in the kitchen and got busy and out of the living room I hear "bleep" this and "bleep" that. Really it was bleeps, not real words. They were sensoring whatever the people on the show were saying. The people were arguing and it was almost constant strings of that "bleep" noise. I wanted to go turn it off or onto cartoons but was too busy to break away from what I was in the middle of. A little while later I realized the noise had stopped ... completely. As in there was complete silence coming from the living room. I finally went in to see what was going on, only to find Maddy walking around with the remote control and the t.v. was off. I guess she got tired of the trash talking bleeping noise and decided to just turn it off. That's my girl!
Why do my kids always wait until I have just changed their diapers to poop? Don't they know how expensive Huggies x2 are these days :)
Yesterday was a gorgeous day outside and so we took the girls out to play in the yard. Here they are playing on the new wheels daddy got them for Valentine's Day!




Friday, February 02, 2007
Finally it Snows!
Then yesterday afternoon I went shopping and as soon as I got across town, William called me from work to tell me to head back home as soon as possible because it was snowing like crazy and he didn't want me out with the girls in traffic. So I tried to hurry my shopping and in the process made a rooky mistake of taking that third eye off the girls. I looked over at the basket just in time to see Maddy diving over the side of the shopping cart head first into the floor. Everyone freaked out, me included. I picked her up and tried to calm her down but she was crying so hard that her face was too red for me to figure out what was wrong, if anything. After being escorted back to the store's breakroom and getting her calmed down we realized it was just a slight bruise on her forehead and she was fine. She was back to herself relatively fast and I was relieved. I felt, of course, like a horrible mother, but then I remembered how when I was little my grandmother let me sit on the bottom of a shopping cart and I put my hands on the floor and she ran over my fingers with the wheels of the shopping cart. So I know these things happen and I am done beating myself up over it. I am just thanking God that it all ended well and my baby is okay. I will not however be letting my babies sit in the back of one of those little shopping carts again. Learned that lesson!
I got the kids in the car and headed back home. It wasn't snowing where I was. It wasn't snowing on the way home and the roads weren't even wet. The weatherman came on the radio and said the temperature was 35 degrees. I of course thought William was crazy for having rushed me before, but I think he saw snow falling for a few minutes and worried it might not stop and then the roads would get bad. It didn't matter anyway, after the incident with Maddy I wasn't going anywhere after that store except home. I was glad to get home and back to the safety of my little house.
When we headed to bed last night. The weatherman on the news said it might snow but probably would just be rain, so I was shocked when William woke me up early this morning and told me to look outside. Everything here was covered in snow. It was so pretty. We got the girls up and opened their windows so they could see it too. Then we got them bundled up and headed out to play for a few minutes before it started to melt. They were mesmerized by it, especially Morgan. Maddy was excited too, but she has the sniffles and was content to mostly just stay next to William. I did manage to get a few great pictures of them playing in it so I will try to post those today, as well as one of them playing in it last year.

Maddy looks around.
Morgan loves it!
February 11, 2006
One Year Ago. I can't believe how little they were.