four.

Wow! FOUR. Four wonderful, amazing, beautiful, HARD years.  Emily has brought us so much joy as parents, and has also taught us so much about life.  She is a free spirit, with a stubborn personality.  She knows what she wants and she will dig her heels in and die on that hill.  I compromise a lot, much more than I should.  My husband is amazing.  He is strong and knows when to compromise and when to dig in his heels.  (Emmy may or may not have gotten this from her daddy. :) )

Three was so hard.  The hardest year yet.  Terrible twos, that's laughable.  Three is the real deal.  Emily spent the year learning boundaries and testing them.  There was lots of laughing, lots of tears, and lots of drama, but every single day was worth it.  Because the bad days were far out weighed by all the good days.  Emily is an AMAZING sister. She is patient and kind with Sophia.  She talks to her and is always looking out for her.  She shows her how to be a kid, sings with her, and teaches her so many words.  If Sophia is awake and around, Emily is helping her learn new things every day.  It is such a beautiful thing to watch. They have such an amazing bond.

Things she loves:

• Dressing up like a Princess.  Every day is Halloween. EVERY.SINGLE.DAY
• Coloring and practicing her letters
• Singing
• Reading books
• Anything Disney Princess
• Little Einsteins, still. She also has really started liking Sofia the First.  We stick to Disney.
• Boots
• Dresses. ONLY dresses.  It's a battle in the morning if there are no clean dresses.
• Cereal bars
• Her trampoline.  She loves to jump!  Really wishing it was warm outside.
• Her friends at school. She talks about them constantly.
• Her daddy.  This is her number one.  She LOVES her daddy.  

Starting last year, I started asked Emily a set of questions and documenting her answers.  It's so much fun to see how her preferences change and watching her grow.  Lots of her answers were the same, many were different. All words are hers. :)

1. What is your favorite color? Purple and Pink
2. What is your favorite toy? My Little Ponies and princess dresses
3. What is your favorite fruit? "Vegetables," Oh and strawberries and cherry pie
4. What is your favorite tv show? Little Einsteins
5. What is your favorite thing to eat for lunch? Mac 'n Cheese!
6. What is your favorite outfit? Dresses
7. What is your favorite game? Hide n Seek
8. What is your favorite snack? Fruit snacks
9. What is your favorite animal? Kitties and dogs
10. What is your favorite song? "My ABCDs"
11. What is your favorite book? The Tickle Monster book
12. Who is your best friend? Madeline and Brayden Bundy
13. What is your favorite cereal? Fruit loops
14. What is your favorite thing to do outside? Run and climb in trees...... 
15. What is your favorite drink? Milk
16. What is your favorite holiday? My Birthday
17. What do you like to take to bed with you at night? All my buddies 
18. What is your favorite thing to eat for breakfast? Cereal bars
19. What do you want for dinner on your birthday? Mac 'n Cheese!
20. What do you want to be when you grow up? A Princess 

A little bit of catching up to do...

I realize I am months behind where I should be.  This year flew by for us.  I started a new job, which I love, the girls moved to a new school, Sophia had her first birthday,  we moved houses, we traveled, Emmy turned four and the girls fell in love with Christmas! It was a pretty good year.  I have no complaints.  We stayed busy and lived life, which meant this blog was neglected a bit.  I will do my best to catch you all up!

The biggest change we had this year is we said goodbye (kind of) to our first family house and hello to a new one.  We kept our old one as a rental and that is working out really well so far.  Our new house has a pool and is so close to our parents and in a neighborhood we love.  The house is comfortable and works really well for our family. We couldn't be more excited!  Plus, it was pretty well updated when we moved in, so we only have had a few small projects for now!

Goodbye Freedom Way!

We have been in the new house for about 6 months.  I have yet to capture a photo of us out front.  In due time people.  But we have had some fun in the pool and loved entertaining in our new huge back yard!

This summer we rented a beach house in Panama City, FL with Grandma, Papa and the Kaases', which meant, Sophia had her first plane trip and both girls saw the ocean for the first time.  We spent a lot of time on the beach.  Our house had it's own private area and the sand was so soft. We spent hours each day collecting sea shells and making memories with cousins!

In September, I made my first work trip to San Francisco.  Rough life. Here is the view from my office window! Now that is the kind of work travel I could get used to.  San Francisco is really a beautiful city!

Next, as an early birthday present to Emily, we went to CA to visit Aunt Koley and Emily had her first trip to Disneyland.  What a magical experience that was!  We had an absolute blast!! That deserves it's own picture post, stay tuned!

In October, we took our annual trip to the Pumpkin Patch with the Korpan's.  This year, baby MacKenzie was with us!  We always have a great time eating lots of food and picking the perfect pumpkin!

Flash back time!  Here is Emmy in 2010, 2011, and 2012! Crazy how much she is changed!

Emmy 2010-11 months!

Emily 2011-2 years!

Emily 2012-3 years!

I tried to do the same with Sophia, but she wasn't having it this year...

Sophia 2013-20 months

Sophia 2012-8 months

Then came Halloween!  We always have a great time carving pumpkins.  It was super cold this year on Halloween so we took the girls to a few houses in the neighborhood and headed home to pass out our own candy, which I think Emmy liked more.

We celebrated Emily's 4th birthday this year and had an amazing Christmas, both of which I have already scheduled blogs about.  We really had a great year!  We are looking forward to what 2014 has to offer, but if it was just like 2013, we'd be just as happy!  Here are a few other randoms!

Balloon Fiesta

Trip to the dentist! Sophia's first!

Sweet sisterly love

Emmy's first ever movie!

Itty Bitty, 20 months and lots of change

Wow another 5 months have flown by! It's very sad actually.  When I first drafted this post, Sophia just hit 18 months, but it has taken me this long to publish it. Time keeps slipping away, and things, outside my blog have taken priority.  I can't believe it. There are many days that I think I am missing out on documenting so many memories, but then again, I am spending my time living them to their fullest and soaking them in. The last 4 months have been crazy. We bought a new house and have spent everyday since May cleaning our old one, getting it ready to find a renter (which we did!), packing, unpacking, garage sales, many trips to goodwill and the dump, and just getting settled in the new house. We are so happy with our decision to move. The new house has an AMAZING, HUGE backyard for our family to make lots of memories in. Did I mention there is a pool! The girls love it and so do we. It's a great, comfortable place for us to watch our girls grow!

So Sophia is now almost 20 months and my sweet sweet Emmy is closer to 4! Birthday planning will commence any day now, which is unbelievable. Because I don't want this to be the longest post in history, I will commit this one to an update on Sophia and then Emmy deserves a post of her very own. So here's whats new with Miss Sassy Sophia!

Words: SO MANY WORDS! Sophia has exploded with words, especially over the last month. At her check up the doctor said  she should have at least 28 words by the time she is one.  Well we counted and she is well over 100. Woot!  Some of her most used words are pancake (can cake), berry (blueberry), mine, no, hot (said in a whisper), jump, pinkie pie (one of Emmy's My Little Ponies), Kiki, Nani, drink (dink), hungry, snack (nack), bye-bye, nye-nye, bubble, please (peas), nose (no), thank you, "phia," bird and airplane. The last two she yells any time she sees either a bird or hears an airplane.  She babbles a ton and there are some phrases she says over and over that we are still trying to decode. She repeats everything  I am really happy with her word progress.  I am going to try and put together a comprehensive list so I have it because it's fun to see where she is to date.  

Signs: more, all done, please, eat, milk, water, sleep and thank you.
Stats: 12 month tops and bottoms, Size 3 diapers, Size 3 shoes. She weighs 21 lbs 6 oz and is 30 1/4 inches tall at 18 months and is in the 10th percentile for weight and height. She is teenie tiny.  It's funny because everyone always says what a chub she is.  She is actually smaller than Emmy was at this age.  She may be tiny, but she is also a very strong minded little girl. 
Things she loves:

• Singing- She sings parts of twinkle, twinkle little star and no more monkeys jumping on the bed.  She also sings to the tune of the ABCs.    

• Still loves dancing and music.  Her favorite song is I Don't Care by Icona Pop. Mother of the year right here. 

• books, but she would rather read them to you than the other way around

• Jumping

• Hugging and kissing Emmy. She sure loves her sister and the feeling is mutual.

• Laughing.  She is seriously so happy.

• Food- ALL FOOD.  She is a great eater.  She almost always clears her plate.  She also likes to snack, which we are working on.  Her favorites are any kind of berry, string cheese, broccoli, and pancakes.  

• Sleeping-She still sleeps amazing, although bed time can be tough because she wants to stay up and play.  She will whine for about 2 minutes and then will fall asleep for the night.  I usually wake her up for school around 7, but on the weekends she will sleep till about 7:30 or so.

• Sophia is very physical.  She has no fear, which is so different from Emmy who was our very cautious, verbal child.  I would say she is ahead of the game on her fine and gross motor skills.  She can climb up the stairs holding onto the wall. She jumps and climbs.  She can latch and almost unlatch the straps on her booster seat and depending on the shoe, she is pretty close to putting her shoes on by herself to name a few things.    

• We are working on numbers and letters.  She says words to the "tune" of our counting or singing the alphabet, but is not super clear yet for me to consider it counting or at getting past C in the alphabet. 

• Sophia has really blossomed over the last few months.  She is very sweet and super silly.  She is very outgoing.  Seems to be out of her stranger danger phase and has lots of friends.  Her words have exploded.  She is a master at throwing tantrums.  She does not like to be told no and she is very determined when she sets her mind to something.  As she learns to communicate more this will get better, but it's all about her learning boundaries and right from wrong.  Because her communication skills are still developing, she gets very frustrated and has been known to pinch and sometimes bite.  We are working on that.  Overall she is such a sweet baby and so much fun to be around!

What's New: We had lots of firsts this summer, including first time on an airplane, first ice cream cone and ice cream sandwich and first trip to the beach. Other than that, basically everything in our routine is new with the new house.  We are finally settled in and loving making this house a home.

The good stuff: