The Girls

It used to be that we referred to our kids as the girls.
"I love you girls,"
"Common girls,"
"Girls, stop talking and go to sleep!"
you get the idea...

Now we have "kids" or "children" or "monkeys" and doesn't that sound so much crazier?

Kylie has been loving being back in preschool again. They had a one month break over the holidays and just got up and going again last week. It's so fun to see her so excited about going to school. She has such cute little friends there and talks about how she rides bikes with them at recess or paints and cooks with them during centers. She is also always so excited about the fun songs that they sing. Her favorites are the Bubble Gum Song, Bear Hunt, and When Cows get up in the Morning. 

Next week they are starting little weekly report cards so that her teacher can share with us which activities she prefers and her strengths and any areas of concern. Kind of crazy that my baby is old enough for a report card. But with how overly-involved I am, I'm excited to know a little bit more about what she's been up to in class. They also started a blog for the class that updates us on all of the fun things that they do in class each day. I don't know what I'm going to do next year when she's in kindergarten and they don't hold my hand the whole way. 

Emily is our little firecracker. She has been obsessed with dressing up lately. When daddy gets home, she tells him that she has a surprise for him and he needs to close his eyes. Then she leads him up the stairs and to her room, opens the closet and says, "surprise!... can you get me a pretty dress?" But it's never complete without a necklace, ring, glass slippers, an a headband. But she always had to put the headband on herself. She is very, very particular about her headbands. 

She is so friendly to everyone. If we are out and someone starts talking to the girls, Kylie will usually get really shy and look to me for approval before she answers back, but Emily will start talking about her pretty hair, or what she ate for breakfast, or how cute her baby brother is. She's just a people person and it's really funny to see it coming out already. 

The poor girls have had the most horrible little coughs for the past couple weeks. It's that darn inversion that's settled over the state and is making the air quality bad, coupled with the dry cold. Ugh, winter, I don't think we should see each other anymore... We've been battling that, especially at night. There have been a number of nights where Kylie has come into our room coughing and Mike jumped up and switched to her bed so she could have some mommy cuddles and we could all hopefully get some sleep. (It took a few sleepless nights before we figured that one out). Luckily, they both seem to be getting better, and Em's ear infection seems to be going away, but it stinks hearing those little coughs through the monitor at night, knowing that you can't really do anything about it aside from the humidifiers we have running 24/7.

We took these pictures back before Christmas when we were getting ready to take our Holiday photos. We were waiting for Daddy to get home and I told the girls to jump up on the couch while I was getting the lights set up. They're pretty cute together. They're best friends... and -not so- best friends sometimes. And together they are the sweetest big sisters too.