Our Two Precious Daughters

Claire

Still is working on mimicking sounds and starting to say words and I've very hopefully that things will pick up really fast soon. She's too picky in her eating for us to get her good meals but I'm trying hard with the things I know she likes.I now understand the frustration of having her like one thing one day and then the next not want the same food. She usually likes eggs and toast with a clementine for breakfast but sometimes has none of it or just one of those depending on her mood. She does well with shredded cheese and string cheese but not cheese slices, and she likes croutons and mac and cheese usually but then again only on days when she hasn't had them for a while. At least I can get her to eat snacks like veggie straws and gold fish regularly but those might go soon since she used to like fruit snack and now doesn't.

Shay

She is as sweet as ever and is starting to see us better because she smiles when we make some noises and faces at  her. She is starting to be awake more often which means I really need to get her newborn pictures taken and some new family pictures with it. I was a procrastinator with Claire when she was first born too and they turned out pretty well so I'm hoping as long as I get them done in the next few weeks they'll be cute. Well I know they will be cute because I have the cutest little girls in the world, but you know what I mean. She still loves sleeping in my arms and I found her trying to suck on her wrist instead of the binky I kept giving her which was the funnies thing. She doesn't sleep very long if shes not cuddled up just right which is something I hope gets better because I like my sleep too much. I'm working more and more and need her to sleep longer so I can get a good night sleep

Other

Since my two precious daughters are basically my life besides the time I work and the working out I do, I feel like I don't have much else to say. Chris and I are still living life and trying to figure out how to spend time together when I'm a morning person and he is a night owl. Getting to work out together is the best though and we try to schedule kidcare appointments so we can as often as possible. Having time to spend together without the distraction of taking care of Claire is hard when I want to go to bed as soon as she does because I'm so tired but we enjoy our evening walks. We often stop at the park so Claire can have some time to play even though it is kind of small and she has started to try to fun to the baseball field to play in the sand dirt that is there.

Busy Easter

Easter

We spent a wonderful Easter visiting family because we planned Shay's baby blessing for Easter Sunday. Although we didn't do a lot of the traditions that I am used to, but we did some with Claire. I made sugar cookies and was planning on letting Claire decorate but she wasn't interested just yet. I knew decorating boiled eggs was not something I wanted to do, and this was going to be a better way to do decorating eggs. I filled and hid a bunch of eggs for her to find really easy and she enjoyed finding and then getting to play with the eggs and her basket.

Claire got two presents, magnet toys from us for church and a bubble machine from Nana and Grandpa Cox that we look forward to playing with outside! Earlier in the week, Claire also got a card with stickers wishing her Happy Easter and had fun putting them on the card. We spend a lot of time outside this week and although it is getting warmer, we like to bundle up Shay just in case. We go for walks with our stroller and still like using our side walk chalk, but I can't wait until we can fill our kiddie pool in the back and have water fun! For Shay, she will get to play with things Claire has eventually but for now we just got her a new outfit that she will get to wear.

Family

We saw everyone from Chris's family for the blessing and I had my family that lives close come too, except for my mom who is still recovering from surgery and couldn't spend 6 hours in a car. She was missed but there was enough of a full house that there was plenty of distractions like all the cousins Claire got to play with! She is still learning about sharing and has a hard time sharing toys she was playing with all day when the other kids showed up. Grandpa and Grandma Bell loved having all the kids and grand kids around we got to take a picture together. I was the only who went through the pictures to find one that most people were looking at the camera and it was so hard! I am so grateful for moving pictures that capture several seconds to scan through for the right moment.

Claire

Our little adventurer is good at playing with her new toys alone and not letting us help, but we are hoping if we keep them in the diaper bag and she doesn't see them every day it will keep her focus during church and outings. Her hair is getting so long and I love dressing her up in all the cute springs colors now with a cute hair do. She doesn't sit still very long so the most I can usually go is pig tails or one ponytail but I am determined too and will get to eventually try more. I just need practice!

Shay

What an angel we have! She sleeps so good and loves to cuddle even if she makes some funny faces at you. She is too cute to set down anyway and was the center of attention with all my sisters-in-law on Easter when everyone was together. Shay loves mom but shes great when being held by other people. She even recognizes faces and daddy got her to smile really well while making funny faces. I still can't wait to hear her first giggle!

Sisters

I love that I have these two precious girls that get to be so close in age, mostly because I never got a sister of my own. Claire gets to learn how to give kisses and when Shay gets older they can play together. I look forward to them having more matching outfits and being cute together. I like looking at pictures of Shay in clothes that Claire has worn especially that blessing dress was heart warming. I don't want Shay to grow out of this soft newborn stage yet but I do want them to be able to play together.

Work out

This was my first full week of weight and cardio work outs and I am very proud of my starting weights even though my cardio part isn't great just yet. I am comparing myself to my non pregnant self which is why I think I'm not doing great but I am probably doing better than some 6 week postpartum women. I shouldn't complain but I am ready to have my stamina and speed back when running. I am starting with 3 weight exercises focusing on different body regions and then doing the rest of my time at the gym as cardio getting at least 200 calories. I've done 3 days of stair master work outs and 2 days of running, one speed and one distance. Now that I know starting weights I've made goals for summer 2019 and by the end want to accomplish as many as I can before my birthday.

Bad at taking pictures!

Claire

Our now 10 month old daughter is learning so much and is such a ball of energy most of the time we are constantly trying to catch up with her. She loves it when we play her little games and we love to hear her laugh so it is a win-win. She is learning new ways to communicate with us and is starting to mimic sounds of words but her favorite is 'more' which sounds like 'mo' but is so cute to hear. I want her to start saying more words and sentences like her friend downstairs who we think is the one who showed her how to start talking. We had a game night with our neighbors and they got to play together...or really Claire got to take all her toys away from him when he tried to play with them. 

Shay

6 weeks have already passed since our little Shay was born and now I'm officially cleared to start really working out. It isn't as important to me that Shay go to the kidcare at the gym because she doesn't need the social interaction but the people who knew me as pregnant were excited to finally meet her. So far she usually just sleeps through the visit because I feed her right before we go and then she falls asleep in the car seat on the way there. She also has her smiles that she gives on those rare occasions and can follow our faces with her eyes sometimes. I seriously cannot wait to hear her first giggle!

Work out

So my new plan of action is starting this next week, I've been doing full body workouts on the rare days I've been able to go to the gym the last few weeks. Now I get to work out with Chris more often I'm going back to working out different parts of the body different days and getting some cardio in as well. The start of April was my cracking down on nutrition and starting my counting calories and now that work outs are starting again I hope to lose my baby weight. It now feels weird to not be pregnant when I go to this gym and its fun to see other pregnant women there too.

Date

The only other eventful thing that happened this week was finding a really good Korean BBQ place that we went to on Saturday night. Chris served his mission in South Korea and ever since we've been married our goal was to go to a place that was like the BBQs he remembers in Korea. We did it! This place was delicious and according to Chris very authentic with the cooking of the food but not the way restaurants were there because the waiter brought us the meat instead of having it buffet style. It took longer for food to get to us and we were constantly waiting for more instead of cooking more while you ate some but other than that it was good. We also learned to get a babysitter for Claire because she is starting to be way to crazy for a restaurant settings, especially when shes isn't allowed to roam free and gets mad about it.

P.S.

I don't know why I was so bad about taking pictures this week! Half the time I've left my phone plugged in and would have to go run to where it is when the thought to take a picture comes up. Then the cute moment passes and I've already missed it but I'll try better next week for all of you who only come to see the cute pictures of the girls! I know exactly why we didn't get pictures of the Korean BBQ though....she's 20lbs of distraction and mayhem.

Family and Conference

Claire

She is getting so much fun to teach her things and have her copy what we do like shrug our shoulders and give high fives and kisses. It is cool to see how she is developing and while we were visiting family, she got to play with her cousins and liked playing with the cousin that is only 2 months younger. She went a lot of time with out a nap for two days which was surprising and I'm not sure if I should try letting her go without naps more because the whole week she has been waking up grumpy from her naps. Learning how to take care of her is so much fun though and I'm glad she is getting more aware and understanding more.

Shay

Our precious little Shay is already a month old! It seems like time is moving so fast with her and I just need to stop and enjoy how small and perfect she is right now before she changes too much. She is making these cute smiles sometimes when she is being held and she is happy which melts our hearts and sometimes makes me tear up. I tend to tear up with happiness or overload of cuteness a lot and it catches me off guard because I thought I was done with all those intense emotions. Shay must have given me even more of a soft heart when it comes to things like that.

Visits

Chris had drill this weekend and we went together up to Idaho so Claire could see her cousins and grandparents and everyone could see Shay! It was General Conference this weekend and although I spent the first session alone because of how busy everyone was, the rest of the sessions we were joined by family. Claire had so much fun playing with the cousins that live close and was happy to see everyone else like their foreign exchange student she was attached to during our Grand Canyon trip. We went and visited one of Chris's military buddies Saturday night and had a fun night with a dinner and movie. The girlfriend adored Shay and now we realized we need to be better about getting out there to find new friends in Utah.

Adventure Awaits

Family

We traveled down to the Grand Canyon this week to spend time with Chris's parents, brother, and their foreign exchange student. There was a package deal to get a train ride into the canyon for a discount when buying a hotel room so we took advantage of the deal to join in the adventure. I feel like we got a lot of 'looks' because each of us had a young child attached to us and we were hiking...I definitely didn't see any other young children there. 

Claire

She had so much fun spending time with grandma, grandpa, and her uncle, but her favorite person to be held by was their foreign exchange student. It was mostly likely because Claire likes to be held and she had no problems holding her constantly and playing songs and videos on her phone. For Chris and I, it was nice to have people around to play with her while we got to enjoy the trip, at least when we weren't driving. With all the driving we did, I'm surprised Claire did so well with how much she prefers to run around and not be sitting. We broke up the days we drove and made it about 4 hours a day both down and back so she only had to be sitting for about 2 hours at a time with the breaks we took. Enjoy her fun dancing videos!

Shay

I got a lot of comments about Shay as I carried her in my Boba wrap around stores, on the trail at the Grand Canyon, and everywhere else. Not only were there many women who ogled how precious she was, there were comments about why I was hiking only 4 weeks after having a baby. Shay loved riding all cuddled next to me like a baby kangaroo in a pouch and was able to sleep soundly as we hiked the south rim Trail of Time. I moved a lot slower than the main group but I enjoyed the leisurely walk with Chris and it reminded me of the times we used to take Sunday afternoon walks. I'm hoping we can start them up again soon now that the weather is getting better.

Train

Our trip into the Grand Canyon was on a train from our hotel and we enjoyed the 'wild west' entertainment they had to offer. Claire didn't like having to stay in our laps but danced in the aisle when the singing cowboys came out which everyone enjoyed. We are lucky she is so cute and can get away with things like that. 

Matching

If you know anything about me, you know I got outfits together that were of my girls matching while we were on this trip. I even rolled them all together when I packed so I could take them all out at once when we were getting ready in the morning. I was tempted to make Chris wear a pink shirt with us, but I didn't want it to get ruined some how...he only has one. There were other days we wore the same color too but somehow I didn't get pictures because we were mostly traveling in the car and not doing fun things.