Category Archives: ivy

Ivy Turns 4!

October 1, 2017

Happy Birthday today Ivy! 4 years old! Our first born spunky little girl. Can’t believe you’re 4! It’s gone by so fast! You’ve grown up to be such a spunky girl and are so sweet! We love you so much!

balloon by queen city balloons

Ivy the FOUR year old:
Her favorite thing might be to talk. MAN she can talk. And talk. And talk. We like to try to tell her to ‘rest her mouth,’ but that really doesn’t stop her for more than a few seconds. She even talks in her sleep sometimes. Her favorite word is probably, “why?” because she asks me approximately 629 why questions a day. She is completely curious and wants to know about everything.

She absolutely LOVE barbies and dolls. She always wants me to braid their hair and she loves to change their clothes and outfits and shoes. Ivy is totally obsessed with KidsTube and could watch other little girls play with their barbies and dolls all day if I let her. She likes to act like the girls in the videos she watches and plays barbies and dolls just like them. I even catch her saying some things like they say in the videos, it’s hilarious. YouTube star might be in her future. Although she says she wants to be a dentist.

Ivy loves to dress herself and she’s got her own thing going on. She really loves to wear mismatched shoes and all she ever wants to wear is a dress. She doesn’t even own a pair of shorts. But she has plenty of tutus and skirts and about a million bows. She will try to put them in herself and they end up in the back of her head, makes me chuckle each time :)

She is a total pleaser and rule follower. Ivy is always trying to do the right thing. She really doesn’t ever want to be in trouble and she is really well behaved most of the time. I can’t even remember the last time she got in trouble. She seems so grown up lately and it’s scaring me how big of a responsible girl she’s become.

Ivy is such a good big sister. Again, a total pleaser. I can always count on her to help with Faye or Leo when I need her to. She asks to hug (she even says, “huggie Faye?!” In her baby talk) or hold Faye about 24 times a day, and she loves to squeeze Faye’s cheeks and I always catch her holding Faye’s little hand, pretty much adorable. She really looks after Leo too, always making sure he’s behaving and doing the right thing or helping him. Although she LOVES to try to tell him what to do and I can tell Leo is bothered by her half the time :) Nevertheless, a really good big sister.

Her favorite food is chicken strips and “white noodles,” AKA fettuccini alfredo and she eats Captain Crunch Berries almost every morning for breakfast.

She wants to be Pocahontas for Halloween, even though she’s never even seen the movie

She’s spunky and sweet and we love the little big girl you’ve become Ivy! Happy 4th Birthday IVY!!

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First Day of Preschool 2017

September 6, 2017

Ivy and Leo had their first day of preschool today! I can’t believe summer is over and Ivy is already back in school! And Leo! This is one for the books! Our little hardly two year old walking into his classroom, gah! Getting so grown up.

Ivy is at the same school as last year and even has the same assistant as last year, so she’s very excited for that! And Leo is at a different school for the Kids Day Out program for 2-3 year olds (He’s not old enough for Ivy’s school yet). Which means I’m running around with my head cut off to two different schools from 8:50-9 for drop off! Thankfully they’re just a few minutes apart, and Leo’s school opens doors a little early so I can get Ivy to her class in time. In and out of car seats though, UGH! #deathofme

At drop off this morning, Leo clung on to Daddy at first, then found some toys to play with and we jetted out of there before he could notice us leaving. Hope he was okay! And Ivy just strutted her stuff right into the classroom, so proud of her :)

I asked Ivy and Leo a few questions this morning to see how their answers will change as they go through the school year. I did this with Ivy last year (see that post here) and her answers were cute and funny!

What’s your name?
Ivy: IIIIIIVY
Leo: Yeo (Can’t quite say his L’s too good yet, haha)

How old are you?
Ivy: 3, but almost 4!! (October 1st, same birthday as her teacher!)
Leo: 2

What’s your favorite food?
Ivy: Chicken strips
Leo: Daddy’s cereal (He loves Daddy’s Wheaties!!!)

What’s your favorite color?
Ivy: Pink and purple and golden and silver
Leo: Blue!

What’s your favorite thing to play with?
Ivy: My lamby (she said this last year too and she did love it, but this year she just found it last night after all summer not playing with it and now is loving it again, so weird… I swear she probably just remembers these questions and remembers her response from last year! This girl doesn’t forget!)
Leo: Dump truck!

What do you love the most?
Ivy: Faye (OMG, so cute)
Leo: Trucks

What do you want to be when you grow up?
Ivy: A dentist
Leo: A mouse (Not quite sure he understood that career lesson that he hasn’t had yet, haha)

Happy First Day of School Kids! We love you! So good to be back into a routine! And I get some Mama time with Faye :)

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Ivy the Helper

August 3, 2017

Three kids basically means you have your hands full at all times. There’s always someone that needs something at all times of the day. Since having Faye, it’s been tough to keep up with things around the house, being a stay-at-home Mom has never been harder! Recently though, I’ve been noticing that Ivy is asking to help more and more, her intuition that Mom needs help has definitely kicked in (thankfully!).

I’ve been having her put her laundry away and make her bed for about 6 months now, but that’s really the only chore I have made her do, besides the obvious ones such as picking up toys and dressing herself. I feel like I’ve totally deprived her of helping out and being independent! Not that any child really likes chores, but Ivy totally does! I plan on taking full advantage of that until she’s a teenager and hating it! I think it’s the feeling of being involved and doing what Mom does.

Ivy has recently asked to help dust and empty the dishwasher, she’s all of a sudden such a big girl and such a big help! I feel bad that I haven’t had her help with those things for months! It took her to ask to help instead of me encouraging her to be a big girl and help out around the house. #momfail. I love that she’s independent and I know that having chores around the house will make her feel involved. Time to encourage all of that!

I looked up some other chores on this site and this site that are age appropriate and I couldn’t believe all the ones that I could be making her do! We’ve been doing the no-brainers, like pick up toys, get yourself dressed, put clothes away, etc., but the ones I never would have thought about are helping set the table (WHY didn’t I think of this! DUH!), scrape your own plate into the garbage, water the plants, clean the windows, put away groceries (obvi she knows where the snacks go! Haha), etc. I am excited to get her to try out some other chores around the house! Here’s another site that has great ideas too! I’m considering doing a chore chart. Looks like a fabulous way to stay organized and to encourage them doing their chores on their own.

The thing I have to get over, is that I know it probably won’t be done exactly how I would do it (I tend to be particular about some things!), and it will take longer than if I do it myself, but what a great opportunity to teach!!! And for her to learn! And hello, 4 hands are better than 2! It will take patience on both of our parts for sure, but she is to the age where I want her to feel her worth around the house and take pride in learning and helping out. And she is antsy to help! Time to take advantage of that before it’s gone! :)

What are some chores you have your toddlers do?

Faye’s Newborn Lifestyle Photos

July 11, 2017

Babies are just TOO cute to not photograph. Their rolls and sleepy eyes and cute little pudgy bodies, gah! Love it all. So I couldn’t WAIT to get some pics of our new little (or big, 10 lbs!) bundle Faye. I wanted to do more of a lifestyle shoot instead of the posed newborn photos, so we booked Emily Mitton and she worked her magic! I was excited about getting the three kids in some photos together as I knew Ivy would cooperate, but Leo was a whole nother story! CRAZINESS. That was one of my first lessons with three… have low expectations! Ha! Just kidding (well, kind of), but really, Leo was a maniac and pretty sure we don’t have one great photo of the three of them, but hey, that’s what “lifestyle” is all about, our “lifestyle,” the chaos and far from perfect life that our house holds. And that makes me love these photos even more! Seeing my kids’ true personalities in these photos makes me cherish them! Thanks for capturing our love for our children and our spunky kids Emily!

So many! Hard to pick a favorite! Her little cheeks are so irresistible. Thanks again Emily Mitton Photography! Love them!

My dress // Ivy and Faye’s outfits were from Target Victoria Beckham collection // Leo’s from Zara

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Shared Girl’s Room

May 29, 2017

Ivy and new baby are going to share a room! I can already imagine them staying up past their bedtime chatting about princesses and happy endings. Looking forward to that best friend and sister bond. But first we had to get through the process of redecorating! I opted for a pretty simple room and OF COURSE kept the pink wall (color is Amaryllis by Sherwin Williams) :) The other three walls were a bluish gray that I haven’t liked since we moved in, so I finally got rid of it since I had to patch a bunch of holes to move around art anyways! I painted those three walls Chantilly Lace by Benjamin Moore, looooove the soft crisp clean white. Ivy helped out with picking where she wanted things, except that she wanted the crib RIGHT next to her bed, I had to talk her out of that one, so cute, haha. She’s really excited to get baby in there! It’ll be a few months until the transition into sharing a room, but I’m happy to have it done already!

Starting with the baby’s crib corner. This is Ivy’s old crib. I love that Jenny Lind spindle style. So adorable. I chose to match Ivy and baby girl’s crib and twin sheet, love the pale pink and white. The swan adds just enough decoration to the pink wall!

bookcase // blanket

mirror

storage basket

Moving on to Ivy’s side of the room. Hers basically stayed the same, but she LOVED the flamingo animal head so had to have that!

twin bed // mermaid quilt // bunny // twin sheets

lamp // side table (similar here) // OK to wake clock

Now to the dresser. I LOVE this dresser! It has tons of room, big drawers, and is actually a really great piece, for IKEA! The right half is new baby’s clothes and left half is Ivy’s. Plenty of room!

I had so much art work from before, so I wanted to reuse some of them. The shelves worked great to add the art and some other decor.

changing pad cover // storage bin (similar)

love is spoken here // lamb // swans // floral // tea // alice in wonderland // cat // love

Really happy with the way it turned out! Nice to be a little more minimal in there and thankfully her room is big so plenty of room for her baby! My favorite might be these animal heads! #targetdoesitagain

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