Jillian's 4th Birthday Photos

To see all of Jillian's 4th Birthday portraits, click HERE!

I had been anxious to take photos of Jillian for her 4th birthday, but things have been so busy around here that I got delayed for about 2 weeks.  Thankfully, I managed to get them done this morning before Evan makes his debut or it may have never happened!

Jillian is such a good girl when we take pictures- she will do just about anything I say and smiles so pretty.  We love her very much.  I can't get over how much catchlight/sparkle I can capture in her eyes.  She has the perfect eye color for this!

Here's the things about Jillian at this age that I want to remember.  Don't feel obligated to read it all, this is my journal so it's the best place for me to record stuff like this!  I'll break up the list a little with some photos -wink-

- Jillian is very kind.  She thinks about other people and how they are feeling.
- She is a wonderful big sister.  She is very helpful to me, and sweet to her little sister.  She's looking forward to having a baby brother in the house.  She has totally gotten over her aversion to him being a boy.
- Jillian loves to dress up, pretend play with her babies and read books.
- Jillian can read.  Not just a little... mostly anything she picks up.  When she comes across a word she does not know she will spell it to me or substitute something that makes sense.  She's amazing.
- Jillian talks a lot about climbing trees.  When we are driving she will point out which trees she thinks she would be able to climb by herself.

- Jillian also talks a lot about death.  A few months ago my Grandmother passed away and as a result, we explained the basics about death.  Ever since, she often points out what things are alive, and what things are dead.  It's interesting to say the least...
- Jillian likes all things fancy.  She likes to wear dresses, she likes to wear fancy shoes, she likes to curl her hair.  She was over the moon about painting her toes for her birthday and loves to show them to anyone who will look.
- Jillian has two blankets she likes to sleep with.  One is "pink blanket" and one is her "crying blanket".  The crying blanket is one of those little striped blankets everyone steals from the hospital when they have a baby.

- Jillian is great at listening to Ryan and I.  She very rarely gets in trouble and is very sorry when she does.  She has a stubborn streak however, and sometimes you can just see in her eyes the fun we have in store over the years to come...  :)
- Jillian's bedtime is 8pm and she sleeps until 8am.  She does not take a nap (has not for a long while) and does not really require 12 hours at night.  She does go in her room to 'rest' while Liv is napping and plays on her bed (sometimes until 10pm) before going to sleep.  She always reads a book with us before bed, gets 4 sips of water (an upgrade from the 3 sips she got when she was 3), and gives us hugs and kisses.  She loves to delay bedtime with elaborate kissing/hugging routines.  We're kinda okay with that ;)  Her preference is to drink water out of her "sparkle cup" or "princess cup".  She also has us guess every night which cup she will choose.
- In some lighting Jillian's eyes still look very blue, but mostly I think they are blue-grey.  She INSISTS they are "just blue".

- Now that Liv is starting to really put up a fight when Jillian takes something from her, we're having to talk more and more about sharing.  It's been an adjustment for Jillian.  ;)
- Jillian is very sensitive at times and can seriously wake up on the wrong side of the bed.  It's odd.  Sometimes we have to send her back into her room for her to "get control" and then she will snap out of it.
- Jillian's favorite places to eat are PF Changs, Melting Pot, Outback and Texas Roadhouse. I feel bad for the guys who want to date her in the future.  She loves steak.  Specifically a filet, medium rare.  If it's crowned with blue cheese or gorgonzola, even better.  She's not a huge fan of any veggie, but she will eat them without complaining if I give her a portion on her plate that is "not a choice".  She has selected green beans as her one veggie she does not have to eat for now.  She really likes salads with blue cheese dressing.  If asked she always wants spaghetti for dinner with lots of parmesan cheese.  She likes anything cheesy.
- Jillian sings all the time.  When she's playing by herself (which she does so well) she makes up songs about what she is doing.  I love listening to her in her room as she creates a whole world with her babies/barbies/blocks/books.  She's so creative!

There's a million more things but this will have to do for now.  We love you so much, Jillian!  We can't believe we've already known you for four whole years!  You constantly surpass our expectations for you and we can't wait to see what this next year brings!

She's getting big....

Lately, I've been going into Liv's room and finding her in her crib sans diaper.  Ugh.  It's awful because although she's really pleased with herself, I feel the opposite about the pee all over her blankets and mattress.  Not to mention that stripping the bedding off of a crib that is at its lowest setting is none too easy for me these days ;)

Anyway- I know in a way it's a good thing and that it means she is starting to be more aware of her bodily functions and will potty train sooner rather than later but...  Really Liv?  Right now?!

So, here's what our sweet baby was doing the other day while she was playing outside unattended.  Climbing up to the top of the slide (where she's not supposed to be without me being out there) and taking off her diaper.  Gotta love the look she's giving as her picture is being taken- "what's your problem?"

Love you, Liv!

More about Jillian's Birthday...

Let me tell you, May 16th was a JAM packed day! So much so, that I'm just mustering up the energy to post all these photos and tell the whole story of Jillian's 4th birthday celebration.

It all started the day before when Jillian helped me bake up 48 cupcakes and a small personal sized cake for her.  She's such a great helper!  (Not pictured is me cutting paper pendants for decoration, cutting out foam to create cupcake toppers, and running to the store for balloons/napkins and coordinating birthday girl/birthday sister outfits.... more on that later!)

On her actual birthday, we started out by having cereal as a family (for "special special breakfast"according to Jillian) and headed out the door for Jilli's bowling extravaganza. 

Jillian picked out some napkins that she "liked a whole lot" awhile back, so I ran with the color theme and made everything pink and black:

Here's some more close ups... the table looked so cute! Below that, a shot of some of our friends bowling (there were about 20 kids bowling plus little siblings...) and Jillian and Liv setting up a turn with Ryan:

Jillian was SO sweet helping Liv:

Here's the birthday girl posing with her spread and pointing out her FAVORITE part of the whole day... Ryan and I decided she could paint her toenails on her 4th birthday.  She's been waiting.  Years.  haha.  She was VERY VERY excited when I took out the polish after finishing her "hot curls" for the party.  Oh la la!  She's in the big time now!

Time to blow out the candles!  She took about 5 blows to get them all out- haha!  She was also VERY sweet and shared a bite of her special cake with her sister. Liv was extremely impatient during the whole party about when the cake would be served, so I know she appreciated this!

Here's our family outside after- what a great time we had!

After bowling, Jillian got to pick where she wanted to go for lunch.  Chipolte was her choice and in celebration of her special day, she got her VERY OWN kids meal AND a juice.  My-oh-my.  You have no idea.  -wink-  Usually it's water and some of my food, so this is a BIG deal!  Our friends the Spencers joined in on the fun- it was great to spend the morning with them!

Liv needed a nap, so we headed home, had our lovely sitter come over and hopped back in the car to head to DC for our birthday tradition- Mom, Dad and birthday kid out to explore a monument of their choice.  We started this last year when Jillian was 3 (she picked the Washington Monument) and this year her choice was the Lincoln Memorial.  The only problem?  After driving and finally parking, it started to POUR!!!  So, we grabbed a roll of paper towels out of Ryan's truck, and the plastic sun shade for cover (oops, forgot umbrellas) and made a run for it.  The shade came in handy to protect my camera bag, but did little for us.  By the time we got up the stairs of the monument, we were all soaked through to our underwear!  Haha!  Memories!  Jillian was a little cold and cranky, but a paper towel jacket seemed to help a little...

Once the rain stopped we got a few photos and explored the monument (Jillian will tell you that you can find Lincoln on a penny or a 5 dollar bill and also that he is a statue in a great big chair but when we saw him, he was already dead.)  Oh my.  ;)

A few photos, and an entire paper towel dress to ride home in wrapped up the DC portion of our day...  Did I mention how amazing her toes looked???

After that we intended to go out to dinner, but since we were SOAKED, we headed home for showers and PJ's.  Jillian requested to stop at 5 Guys (burger place) on the way home so that's what we did.

After we all dried off, Jillian spent a considerable amount of time opening presents...  she's one lucky lady!!!

 And finally, a picture which clearly depicts how all of us felt after that marathon birthday?

The last little thing I don't want to forget... those black, white, and pink outfits...  The only place I could find that had this color scheme was Kohls, but they only had it in the infant section.  Which meant the outfits only went up to 18 months.  There was a little tunic style dress with leggings I picked for Liv, but I could not find something for Jillian.  Then, I saw a cute little dress (size 18 months) and thought if I paired it with leggings it would not matter that it was short on her.  So.  I bought pink leggings to go under in size 24 months.  Then, when I got the outfits home, I realized Liv's really would go better with the pink pants, and the black was best for Jillian's.  That means for Jillian's FOURTH birthday she wore an 18 month size dress with 18 month size pants.  And Liv?  She wore an 18 month size top, with 24 month size pants.  I thought that was pretty darn funny!

HAPPY 4th BIRTHDAY SWEET JILLIAN!

WE LOVE YOU SO MUCH!

Maternity Photos!

I put up one photo on EVAN'S BLOG (LINK) yesterday, but wanted to share a link for the rest of the photos in that series on our family site.  You can click HERE to see the rest of them!

A LONG while back, Jillian told us that, "Evan told her his zero birthday was going to be on June 4th."  So, we'll see!!!!  Not too much longer!

Peek-a-boo!

My friend Ashley was visiting and took this cute video with her phone... had to share!  We love Liv!!

Jillian's 4th Birthday so far....

One quick pic to share... gotta run- more fun birthday plans before Jillian's special day is over!!

Guess What??

Today marks 60 days since we put the house on the market.  And?  Today, we signed all the paperwork for our house sale!  It's bittersweet for sure... the market (as everyone knows) is considerably lower than when we purchased in 2006 so our final sales price is a good bit lower than we paid, and that's not even taking into consideration all the money spent on improvements.

BUT.

We don't have the stress of selling a house anymore, we are not going to have to carry 2 mortgages when we move, and we're very happy to be done with this process!  Also, our realtor worked her butt off on our behalf, and we're very confident that we did as well as we could have under the circumstances.  We had a verbal offer about 8 days after we listed, the paper offer complete on day 15 and completed the closing in 2 months from our listing date.  Not too shabby!!!  -smile-  Live anywhere near us and need a realtor?  Aside from being an awesome person, Cookie did an amazing job selling our property and we could not recommend her more wholeheartedly!  www.cookiedrummond.com

We're leasing back from our buyer through the end of June so we'll welcome Evan into this home and then move when he's a few weeks old.  We think that's our best case scenario, and I'm very happy to still be here so near our amazing community of friends we've met over the past 5 years!

What a day!