Tyler 20 months - Ella 3 months

Damn! Can my kids get any cuter? lol :) This duck raincoat is a hit with Tyler. It's a hand-me-down from someone and since his obsession with ducks continues - this was a great find hidden in the back of our coat closet! Tyler continues to be a wonderful big brother to Ella. He is a bit ornery and tries to steal Ella's bottle if I leave it unattended in arms reach. I have caught him twice now with it in his mouth! He just laughs when I take it away.

Ty is now 20 months old and started at Enchanted Care in Lewis Center on March 11th. For the first 5 days in daycare, he cried all day asking for Mommy and Daddy and kept saying 'home'. This was very heartbreaking! He now has to take his naps on a cot and eat school food. Although he is choosing to skip most of the main meals at lunch b/c he is still a picky eater - or should I say - he is simply unwilling to try anything new that doesn't look familiar. Ty's teacher's have taken him to Ella's classroom several times to make him feel better and he also go over to 'A-ya!' and gives her a kiss. How freaking cute is that?? I believe he is slowly adjusting and doing better at 'school' but I'm hoping to be home in a few months and spend quality time together! (Now if we can only decide if we are going to build that new paver patio...??)

New obsessions - Book 'Things that go'. Tyler LOVES trucks, school buses and cars (beep beep). It is too cute to hear him say that. He loves pushing his toy cars and trucks all around the house. He is babbling to himself a bit more now and really making an effort to try and talk, although he does get very frustrated and whinny if we don't understand or get him what he wants. Also he is now infatuated with the Moon and looking for it in the sky. Much like the word train, he is getting Moon confused with "Mooo". More favorites are broccoli and hummus! Finally a veggie he likes!

Ella updates: LOVE LOVES to COOOOOOOOOOO! Much like the pictures above taken from my cell phone, Ella just loves to talk if you are willing to spend some time and look her in the eyes, she will smile back and gurgle, coo and sometimes scream - happily of course.

I will say her schedule is still all over the map. One day she sleeps a lot, the next day she barely takes naps longer than an hour. Sometimes she wants 1 oz, other times she wants 4 - she is so hard to predict. She still doesn't like snuggling on my chest (her belly) but will do it from time to time with Nate. Last night I noticed her checking out her hands and fingers while she was drinking her milk. Sometimes she sleeps 3 hours at night and other times she sleeps 6 hours straight. We are trying to give her a consistent routine at night and that now consists of me putting her to bed sometime between 8:30- 9:30pm - whenever she is hungry for her last bottle. We were doing 10pm for almost a month b/c than she usually only got up once at night and that was saving us on sleep. However, I want her to begin to work on longer stretches of sleep and I want her to get overly tired.

Another thought, we are still swaddling her for nap time and bedtime - did I mention that she loves it?? Well, once she is able to rollover, it's recommended we stop swaddling her for fear of self suffocation. I would be glad to end the swaddling but I have NO idea how she will sleep. I call her, Ella crazy arms! Her arms have a mind of their own and are flying around everywhere, even when I'm feeding, I have to hold down her arms so she can concentrate on sucking and not hitting herself in the face. lol - kind of funny and cute - I know I will look back and laugh but I’m hoping she will be ready for this new freedom in a month or soo. Time will tell.