Where do I begin?

It's summer 2012, and the days and nights are full of fun, full of love, and full of two sweet baby girls that Matt and I adore.

Margaret is two, and Libby turned four on July 7th.  Words can't describe how it feels to have two daughters, aged four and two.

Life is good, life is sweet, and life is full of God's rich blessings.

The girls are awesome.  Have I ever mentioned that? :)))

Libby has done a few camps this summer, one at church, one at ballet, and one at gymnastics.  She is loving it.  An independent, brilliant, hilarious young lady she is becoming.  She loves friends and she loves activities.  SHE LEARNED TO SWIM THIS SUMMER!  She is a fish!!  Still needs us, obviously, to be in the pool with her, but she's swimming. And she is so proud.  Not as proud as this mama is!!  She loves her MaeMae, but she also loves it when baby sister is sleeping so she and I can do a project all on our own.  Oh, how I cherish the days of being with her, still young yet becoming big before my eyes.  I love her, I admire her, and I want all of her days to be happy and full of fun, full of love, and full of all her hearts desires.

Margaret is amazing.  She is SO funny - after she turned two her words started coming, and today her sentences are long and she's making it clear that she has been listening to every word we've said all this time.  It's so much fun to see her becoming her own person and being such a big girl.  She is a big eater, and she loves milk.  :)  She loves her Wibby, or her big sissy, as she calls her.   She's not much of a tv watcher, she much more prefers to play or read books.  SHE CHANGES CLOTHES ALL DAY LONG.  I would say that before 10 AM she has changed between four and five times....it's hilarious.  She's almost potty trained completely (yay!) and she just is a cuddlebug.  I pray the same for her, to have a life full of fun, full of love, and full of all her hearts desires.

Big girl in the pool

Daddy-O

The Maezzer

Fourth of July fun!

Our buds, Kelsey & Kate!

Libby & JJ

Birthday girl - her fourth birthday breakfast with a doughnut!

Oh, wow....

Our first Pet!  Lib got a fish tank, named her fish Guppy!

Me and my girls....ahh, nothing better.

Summer fun.

Birthday manis...

Airport park with Mae while Lib was in ballet camp

Fernbank

Everett's birthday party!

Sissies looking for puddles

She drew this cat because of a beanie baby I just bought her, it looked JUST like the cat did!  Little leftie artist!

Pool time

Ice cream

Hugs with Max & Luke

Here are some pictures of our little angel bears.  Summer 2012 has been awesome.

june already!??

it's already june, whoa.....we are loving summertime!! yay!  best times ever.

i have been reminded lately just how blessed i am that i get to stay at home with them. i am so thankful that matt realized how important it is for me to be with them daily!  we literally just play all day.  i am obsessed with them both.  i am trying everyday to live in the moment....even when i need to fold laundry or vacume or clean the bathrooms,  i will sit down with lib and read a book.  even when i need to make the  beds, i will sit and read with margaret.  i just keep thinking every day how fast they'll both be in kindergarten and how i will long for the days of staying home with them in our pjs and sitting in the sandbox digging at 9 am while eating some watermelon.  moments are fleeting and they're going by fast and i plan to enjoy and savor them ALL.

tomorrow we start VBS.  i am beyond excited!!!! i am a shepherd for libby's class!  margaret will be in the nursery (she's too young for vbs) so she'll be having fun with other two year olds while libby and i are learning about Jesus (as she explained to me today!!).   i cannot wait to see what libby learns and how God opens both of our eyes this week.   it's called OPERATION OVERBOARD, and i pray that God uses me with all of these children, and i am so happy that i'll get to see God at work in these precious young children!

in libby's prayer tonight she said she was thankful that i was her teacher because she couldn't wait to have me all to herself.   yes, it made me cry.  

margaret is two!

margaret turned two, and what an awesome celebration we had at home.  on her actual birthday which is may 13 it was a rainy rainy day.  it was also mother's day.  how blessed am i, to be able to celebrate my daughters birthday on a day dedicated to all the mamas in the world.  we had the best day.  literally stayed in our jammies until four pm.....then saw a movie, then had dinner at the girls favorite place to eat, saba.  it was a special day of watching movies, looking at pictures and old videos.  we baked cupcakes,  and sang happy birthday to you about 75 times.  libby loves to say "and many more!"  just like we did growing up. it was such a perfect day.  margaret opened her gifts with gusto as if it was Christmas morning!

margaret is such a hilarious little girl!  she does the quirkiest things and is often the life of the party.  she certainly has developed her own personality and is showing it to us more and more.  immediately after turning two she began talking SO much more than before.  all of a sudden, maemae is talking all the time. and she wants to be naked.  ALL THE TIME. no matter where we are.  friday at nordstroms? naked.  pool in front yard? naked.  pool in neighbors yard? naked.  it has become a problem, and although i don't mind it at home of course, we have to figure out a way to keep her clothes on!!  haha!  she is so funny and every day she makes us smile and laugh and thank God for her.

her birthday party was really fun - helen and jeff made the trip from ssi with turner and miles - who is only two months old.  they'll never know what it meant to us that they came!!  it was so much fun!  my dad and lisa were here and we loved having them here.  the whole neighborhood was here and all of our friends here, too.  it was a craft party in the backyard, and baby pools and sprinkler in the front.  about 18 kiddos were here throughout the afternoon, and margaret was loving it. she walked around with necklaces on, bracelets, and had about 5 outfit changes and bathing suit changes during the day.  hilarious little angel bear!!  libby was a doting big sister, and she loved having her big friends come over, too.  it was just a special little party and we are so thankful to everyone who came!  couldn't have been any better.  

can't believe she's two! happy birthday my precious margaret virginia certain....we love you SOOOO SOOO MUCH!!!

celebration time...

little margaret is almost two.  i am so excited about celebrating her precious life!

this day, may 9, two years ago i thought i was going to deliver her way before her may 21 scheduled c-section....it was a mothers day and i just didn't feel that she was willing to stay inside for two more weeks!  i just knew it.  she was kicking more, punching more, and i was just not feeling great.  so may 9 2010 they put me on a monitor for about three hours.  lots of contractions but the doc wanted me to hold off for as long as we could. the rest of the day we didn't do much (stayed in backyard all day with my feet up watching my precious 22 month old libby play!) and the key family came to visit. the next day was monday, my doctor again said i needed to be hooked up to the monitors.  more contractions but not "in labor" yet - I'm not allowed to go into labor because I'm a c-section mama!

long story short, the next few days were full of doctor visits and finally my awesome doctor said that in order to eliminate any surprises, we should deliver on thursday may 13 - i was so nervous as i was 38 weeks and i wanted to get to 39 weeks, but i  had to be safe for myself and baby margaret!  so the time had come to deliver my little angel bear. i'll never forget when they handed me my second daughter to hold and feed.  God's miracles never cease to amaze me.

fast forward two years - and i do mean FAST FORWARD because it has been so fast.  she is now wearing the clothes libby was wearing when she was born - how  crazy is that!!  can't  believe it.

we have planned a party for may 19 for friends and family to celebrate, and on her actual birthday we'll have the four of us celebrate!  two baby girls, doesn't get much better than this!!!!

SEASIDE!!!!!!

we just got back from seaside late yesterday afternoon - and OH MY was it a FUN trip.  perfect weather, perfect hotel, perfect pools, and PERFECT beaches, and most of all, perfect company.  just the four of us made the journey down to the gulf and i have to say it is one of my favorite places on earth.  seriously.  it is just paradise and it's only five hours away from atlanta.  it was just wonderful to be with matt and our girls for five straight days.  no work, no household chores, nothing except time to enjoy our little family.  we had such  good time.  matt took some insane pictures and i am waiting on him to download and then i'll post them.  be prepared, there will be quite a few that we'll be putting on the blog.  i am so thankful that the four of us were there together and i'll cherish the week forever!!

the girls had a great time - lots of pool time, digging in the sand time, shirley temples for libby, chocolate milk (and not "pain") for margaret, too many hot dogs to even mention, several ice cream cones, a whole lot of running in the grass barefoot, we made stepping stones at camp watercolor one afternoon, (and they are now in our flowerbed), some good naps (and some short and/or nonexistent ones!), coloring in books, eating pizza, taking long showers (there were two shower heads in the shower, and this was so so so fun for them both), long bike rides into rosemary beach, lots of time playing at the playgrounds we found, and so much good time for matt and i to spend together just watching these big girls interact and enjoy each other!!    they are so funny these days.  libby is really into books, and writing the alphabet, she loves to have "homework" and margaret is still just into anything libby is into!  margaret loves to change clothes at least 12 times a day.  and libby wears dresses and only dresses every single day.  :)

they are getting so big!  i'm in the midst of planning margaret's SECOND birthday party!  i can't believe it.  and libby is helping me plan her FOURTH birthday party as well.  things are good, things are busy, and i am thankful for all that we have going on in our lives.  matt and i marvel at our daughters on a daily basis.

loads of pix coming soon, i promise.

trip to ssi