...so I'm back- from outer space....

Sorry for the 70's song reference, but that's where I feel like I've been the past couple months! To say things have been crazy would probably be a little too dramatic-- but if you know me, then you know that completely fits!!! From now on, no more excuses! I started this blog so that one day Chloe and Emma could read it and know how fun these times were and that we love them more than anything, (and so that when they're teenagers we can show them that at one time they thought we were pretty cool too!)-- so by damn, I'm gonna WRITE on this blog what I want, when I want-- and starting today I will do it at least once a week! (feel free to remind me of that when I start slacking off again!) So, when Chloe and Emma read this in a few years please know that my downtime from writing had little to do with the two of you-- it mostly had to do with WORK and just holiday schedules! Speaking of holidays, Christmas was AWESOME! Poor Emma woke up Christmas Eve night (Christmas morning?) around 2a.m. with 103 fever-- but she was a champ Christmas Day and still had a smile on her face for the cameras! And Chloe was thoroughly enjoying the big sister role and trying her best to explain to Emma how Santa worked and that she (Chloe) could play with both their toys, but Emma should ask before she played with Chloe's things! (we quickly fixed that don't worry!) Just teasing, they both shared everything from the start and have done great since. We'll see how long that lasts! but so far so good.
Emma turned 1 January 10. Can you believe it?!? What a year! There are times that I sit and think about how much our lives have changed in this past year-- how we've all adapted to new schedules, new sharing of our time, shifting our priorities so that we can spend Quality time together-- and you know, none of that change has been hard. Just different. I guess when you really want to do something, you just do it. And when I try to remember what it was like before Emma, I have a hard time recalling it. Part of me feels like she's always been with us. Maybe it's because when we had Chloe I prayed that was just the beginning and that we would all get the chance to add to our family one day and give Chloe a sibling-- I'm so glad she got Emma. To see how much Chloe loves her and wants to teach her things, and to see Emma's face light up when Chloe walks in gives me a feeling I can't put into words. It's just amazing!
So~ for the past month Micky and I have been asked approximately 12.7 times a day if Emma is walking yet. It's a legitimate question but after about the 6.8 time in a day I'm ready to hang a sign on my chest that says "Sort of!" Meaning, she'll take about 4 or 5 steps and then look around as if to say, "I hope nobody saw that. I don't want to blow my cover and not get carried around anymore, so I'm just going to sit down and act like that was a fluke!" It's actually a very funny thing to watch, but trust me we're in no RUSH for her to start running. She's busy enough as a fast crawler, Lord help us when she starts doing sprints through the living room!!!
I tried to capture one of her "fluke" walkings tonight on camera, but I think she was on to me so no dice. But I did get this cute clip of her playing one of her new favorite games-- "hide the magnet, then find it myself 100 times!" Maybe this is why she's not such a great walker yet. This is her favorite walk behind toy, but she's recently discovered that the seat lifts to reveal this awesome compartment so she'll spend like 10 minutes playing with that instead of walking! Kids a genius, what can I say?!? And just so you know-- we usually do brush Emma's awesome baby mullet but this was filmed right after dinner, hence the green beans on her face, so we all look a bit rough at this time of day! And the reason Chloe is saying Emma's gone is because she has been asking to hear "scary" stories lately and her father has been telling her some apparently involving alien abduction--he actually told her the Golden Arm story which she has now told to all of her 4 year-old friends. Thanks Mick-- I get to explain that to the moms at preschool! (oh, and forgive the end--it's been awhile since I filmed anything and forgot how to turn it off. yeah, she gets the genius part from me can't you tell!)