Hawaii Trip

Last Saturday morning, we got back from our fantastic Hawaii trip with the Volk family. We were there a week and definitely were not ready to come back! Although, I was ready to have my own bed back and not share a room with the kids :) Well, Finley slept in the bathroom, but you get the idea, ha! More on her sleeping in the bathroom in a bit.

Here is how the trip went:

Flight there: Anyone that had been talking to me prior to our trip knew that I was pretty nervous about our 8.5 hour flight there. I mean, I have a hard time being on a flight more than 4 hours, so I knew a 10 month old and 3 year old would go a little crazy. However, they did amazing! Finley took a couple naps, ate a lot of snacks and flirted with everyone around her. Cole played on the iPad most of the time but we also walked around the airplane some. The pilot even walked around a bit and said Hi to people and Cole, who is really into Spiderman right now, spider-web'd the pilot :)
The last hour was super long but we were just so happy to finally be in Maui!
Here are a few pics from the flight. They are from my phone so horrible quality.

Finley doing her "sooooo big"

Cole getting annoyed that Finley kept touching his iPad

We are finally there: Once we got to our hotel, we had to quickly get things unpacked, try to freshen up a bit and get the kids ready for bed (because, it was 11:30pm back home and they were pretty tired). After we did all that, we were so excited to meet up with our good friends from college, Jackie and Kelsey. They moved to Hawaii a few years ago and we were just so thrilled that it worked out to see them. Ryan and Rachel, me and Nick and Jackie and Kelsey went to dinner that night and it was so fun to catch up with them. We sure do miss them!

Here are a few fun things that happened while we were there. First off, here is the view from our room, amazing right! We couldn't have asked for a better room, right on the corner, pool and ocean view. The best part was sleeping with the door open and hearing the ocean during the night, loved it! I mentioned Finley sleeping in the bathroom. Yeah, she is not the heaviest sleeper around so anytime anyone makes any movements, she is awake. So, we put her pack n play in the bathroom and it worked great! Problem solved!

Our first morning, of course the kids were WIDE awake at 5am (that whole 5 hr time change thing). Luckily my parents are early risers so we went and got coffee and walked along the beach. This was Cole and Finley's first time so it was fun to see their reaction. Cole was a little timid of the ocean at first but quickly warmed up to it.

However, Cole is not a huge fan of being "dirty" so having that sand all over him was a little stressful for him...ha! Totally his father's son!
This is Papa and Mimi trying to get Cole to play in the sand....

And Cole freaking out because he has sand stuck to his feet. Again, after the first day, he got over it and eventually loved playing at the beach.

Most of the days we spent by the amazing hotel pool, playing with the kids. They had a really cool pirate ship for the little kids, all this green space to run around in and the beach all right there.

One of the nights we went to a Luau a few hotels down. It was a gorgeous walk down there, but of course my feet aren't quite conditioned for sandals so my feet were not happy with me by the time we got there, oops!
The Luau was so fun, the kids had a blast, even Finley was going crazy with the music! She was a dancing maniac! Rachel and Cameron got to go up on stage and help do some hula dancing, they were so cute.
We took lots of pictures while we were there, but here are just a few.

How cute are they!?!

Uncle Ross and his hot date for the night :)

Another morning, we went to the aquarium. Again, the kids had so much fun running around and seeing all the different creatures. Cole and Cameron were pretty much attached at the hip and get along so well (for the most part, if they aren't fighting of the iPad, ha!)

Rachel and her two sweet girls at the aquarium. Rachel is pretty much super mom....she would carry around Sydney in the bjorn and just hoist Cameron up on the other hip like it was nothing. There was also one afternoon where for some reason Rachel and I were alone with all 4 kids and she asked if I wanted to take them down to the pool. At first I was a little hesitant because 4 kids, near water, 2 adults.....ugh, that made me a little nervous but she thought nothing of it, so if she can do it, I can do it. AND, we had a blast!

Back to the aquarium....Finley thought this was so cool. The scuba diver got right up to her and they were giving high-fives through the glass.

That same evening, we got together with some family friends that live in Maui. He is a photographer and he took some family pictures for us. We haven't gotten them back yet but we can't wait to see them! By the looks of it, he got some great shots! But here are a few that we took on our own camera.

The rest of our week was much of the same....one night, my parents even agreed to stay in with the kids so Ross, Ryan and Rachel, Nick and I could go out for a few drinks. It was a nice evening because I'm sure you can imagine that going out with kids can be a bit crazy.
We got all packed and left Friday evening on the red eye flight. I highly recommend those flights because the kids slept almost the whole time. Well, Finley was flying HIGH the beginning of the flight home, acting crazy but she finally settled down and slept the rest of the flight. Again, those flights are great for the kids, but very tiresome for the parents! Nick and I didn't sleep at all because we have kids sleeping on top of us so we didn't get much rest. However, when we landed in DFW, it was 5am so we drove home, put the kids to bed and crossed our fingers that they would sleep a few hours....and they did! We got up for the day at 11am and finished off the day with grocery shopping and LOTS of laundry. I knew our time zones would be off a bit but we gave it a shot and tried to put Finley to bed at 8:00pm. Well, at 9:00 she woke up and was ready to be up because apparently that was just a nap for her. Needless to say, it took a couple days to readjust but they are doing great. Actually, I'm really loving it because Cole is now sleeping in till 9am this whole week. No more of this 6am business! We'll see how long it lasts!
Again, we had such a fun trip and are so grateful for my parents for making it all happen. We are blessed to have such a wonderful family and make some great memories!

10 Months

Finley Marie.....you are 10 months old today!!!
In 2 short months we will be celebrating your 1st birthday, I can't believe it!
**She is sporting her Baylor gear because we are so proud of Baylor the last couple days!! The women's basketball is the Big 12 Champs and the men's basketball made it to the championship but just fell short. I just think it's so funny that the beginning of the school year, Baylor was pretty much homeless when the Big 12 was kind of falling apart. Now, we have #1 ranked women's basketball, #11 ranked men's bball, a heisman trophy winner and an overall football program that did so much better this year. Boom!!!!
Ok, back to Finley :)

You have done so many new things this past month, what a fun month!!
Not sure of your weight or height. I would take a guess around 21lbs. You are very true to size, which is a very new concept to us because Cole was wearing 24 month stuff at this point.
You wear 12 month clothes still and are now in a size 4 diaper
The past couple weeks you have not been sleeping as well. You have been waking around 3am and the paci just isn't cutting it at that point. You act so hungry so I feed you. I feel like I'm losing a bit of my "supply" so after we get back from Hawaii I may start to partially wean you. I'm ready and you are definitely starting to lose interest so I think it's about time. I'll still keep the morning and night feedings but will probably do formula during the day.
You go to bed between 7:30 and 8:00pm and are always up for the day around 7:00am.
You are still on 2 naps a day. I try to do 10am and 2pm but the days that Cole is home with us, I try to do 9:30am and 1:30 so that you and Cole nap around the same time in the afternoon.

Like I said, this was a big month for you!! Seriously, within one week you started crawling (no more army crawling), pulling up on furniture and cruising around the furniture. You have even gotten so good at getting back down to your bottom when you do stand up. I remember when Cole was this age, we'd have to go help him get back down in the middle of the night because it took him longer to figure out how to sit back down. Maybe because he had about 8lbs on you at this point, ha!
You are also clapping, waving bye-bye, and playing peek-a-boo.
You like to scratch people with those crazy sharp nails :( If I'm not paying attention you will claw my face off....ouch!!
You are sort of becoming a better eater. You now tolerate baby food and still love feeding yourself table foods. I am starting to venture out and giving you more and more foods. You even had your first taste of ice cream yesterday....just a couple bites because when you were little you were very sensitive to dairy so I didn't want to push anything. You loved it!
Sometimes you are still a stinker to try to feed. If you don't want anymore of the baby food, you will take your hand and karate chop the spoon away, sending the food flying in every direction so we have to be very watchful of that :)
We are definitely starting to get a glimpse of the girl drama and sensitivity that come along with girls. I had to say "no no" to you for the first time the other day and to say you got your feelings hurt would be an understatement. Sheesh!
(She looks thrilled in this picture huh?)

You have your 2 bottom teeth and your top teeth are almost peeking through. I know they are bothering you because you have been pretty fussy the last couple days and those top gums are so swollen.
You are annoying your brother more than ever. You are constantly chasing him and he is constantly running away from you, ha!
You will experience your first looooooong plane ride this month and we are praying that goes smoothly. Can't wait to see how you like the beach and ocean, should be a blast!

Finley, we love you more than words and we just absolutely love this age. You have been so fun and seeing all these new things you are doing is such a joy!

Not much this week

This week has been a bit uneventful, we've done a few things here and there but we've also spent a lot of time at home. Our week started like this.....

Literally from the time we are done with breakfast till it gets dark at night, Cole wants to play outside. Cool with me! Again, I love it because I can put Finley down for a nap or do some things around the house and I know (for the most part) that Cole is fine by himself. Of course I keep an eye on him though, I'm not THAT terrible of a mother :)
We still go to the park down the street though because Cole loves playing with the other kiddos.

I've said it before that Finley pretty much thinks Cole is the coolest person to walk this planet. She speed-crawls to wherever he is and will be gone in a split second if Cole has left the room. Even though he gets super annoyed that she always wants to touch and play with his toys, he is still so sweet to her. Although, I have caught him trying to pick her up and carry her lately...which is fine but then we doesn't just gently set her back down, he drops her :)
(mom, I can't handle his hair...hope you bring your scissors to Hawaii!!!)

While Cole goes to school, I get a lot of extra time with this cute girly. I know she misses her brother terribly while he's gone but it's still nice to have that alone time.

She has also become very interested in the iPad....great, it's starting already!!!

And she also plays with all her brothers stuff while he's gone :)

Nick's parents are in London for awhile so while we are in town, we are watching Max. Cole has been obsessed with Max, always chasing him and wanting to pick him up. Last night after I put Cole to bed, I was looking around the house to see where Max was (he always hides under beds). I couldn't find him...then a couple minutes later, I checked on Cole on the video monitor and I saw Max...do you see the eyes glowing???I laughed because Max loves nothing more than to cuddle up with people and sleep. I should've known! So this is what the real picture looks like when I went in there. Max even slept in there all night and we never heard a peep from him.

I am also trying to get some things situated for our trip to Hawaii. I know it's a little early but if I do it gradually then I won't be so stressed the days leading up to it. We are getting so excited about going but I've been looking at the weather in Maui lately and there has been lots of rain, I sure hope it's not like that while we are there!!

I'll end this with a video of something fun Granddad taught Finley last weekend. Last Saturday night, Nick and I went to dinner and a movie and Gigi watched the kiddos. While she was watching them they decided to Facetime with Granddad since he has been in London for awhile. I guess while they were on FaceTime, he was playing Peek-a-boo with her and then a couple mornings later, Finley started playing with me. I didn't even prompt her to do it, she just started and then I quickly realized what she was doing.

Our new addition

This past Wednesday, we got our new swing set installed!!! It couldn't have come at a better time because the weather has been amazing! Granddad and Gigi gifted it to the kiddos for birthdays and Christmas and Cole is beyond thrilled. It was so fun because they came to set it up after I took Cole to school and when he came home from school he got to see it...and then played outside for the rest of the day, and every day since :)

This is a picture of it after the set it up and before Cole got home.

Here is the video of Cole seeing it for the first time. No crazy reaction but you could tell he was super excited because he kept running in circles around it, trying each station a few times.

The little neighbor boy Jackson even came over to play with Cole. He is 6 but is so sweet to Cole. Jackson has a trampoline at their house so they swap between the two backyards.

Finley is a big fan of the swing too :)

It must be that we are starting the month of March or the weather but there is just nothing better than perfect weather, watching your kids play outside. The last two afternoons have been amazing, we literally have been outside all afternoon. Then when I put Finley down for her afternoon nap, I will take my Bible study outside and work on that while Cole plays. Of course he always wants me to swing or go down the slide with him but he will also play by himself and play pretend Buzz Lightyear so I can get some of my study done. I also love the fact that we have hardly had the tv or movies on, just a little bit in the morning while we do breakfast but after that, it's outside the rest of the day.
I'm just trying to soak it all in because I know that in a few short months the only time of the day we will be able to spend outdoors is 5:30am-6:00am :)