The Adventures of Ellie and Alexa...

these days...

2011-12-14T15:27:00.000-08:00

Hello Blogger World! I have missed you! My blog posts seem to be getting much fewer and farther between... sorry Mom and Dad (my most faithful blog followers!). So... I decided to take some good time this afternoon and try to catch up in one fell swoop. We'll see how I do. Above is a sweet collage of my two little loves, as I affectionately call them. They keep me on my toes each day and if I take my eyes off of them for one moment, sometimes chaos ensues as pictured below. But I wouldn't trade these days for anything because they are so quickly passing me by...

We have lots of fun, these two girls and I. We spend most of our days together and we sure love it when Daddy gets to be home to join us! We play and we color, read books, dance, eat meals, clean up and repeat. There are baths and naps and fun with students in our home. We cook (I have TWO little helpers now!) and bake cookies... we mess things up and we clean... lots of laundry is dirtied by these two little beauties, but there are no clothes more fun to fold as I reflect on the lives of these two little miracles and what a privilege it is to be able to love them and raise them and spend my days with them. Here are just a few highlights from our last month and more specifically what the girls are doing these days!

In early November we got to head to Kansas City to celebrate the wedding of two of our good friends, Jordan and Macie Ayers! It was SO fun to see so many friends... former and current students. Joel and I both got the privilege of being IN the wedding, so Ellie and Alexa got some extra good time with students and staff who took care of them through the day!

Over Thanksgiving week, Ellie and Alexa got to stay with Nana and Papa J for a week as Joel and I went on a 10th anniversary trip! They had lots of fun and made lots of memories together, as did we! I think it was the first time that the two of us had gotten extended time together as a couple since these little ones entered our lives! It was a fun getaway, but also so fun to get back to our girls!

Right when we got back, we got to celebrate Daddy's 35th birthday with friends! It was a really busy but fun day! Ellie and Alexa made Daddy a really fun card and sign and made him a cake. Then we got to have dinner with our staff team and a few students at the Little Apple. So fun!

Early December has been characterized by lots of people in and out of our home. We LOVE to have our home full of life and laughter! The girls ADORE the students and love having them here for Bible Studies or parties, etc... We had about 120 students over for a finals study break and our girls were eating it up! I could hardly get them settled down to go to bed!

This is also the week that the girls have their monthly "birthdays"! Today Ellie is 41 months old - almost 3 1/2! Crazy... And Alexa will be 19 months on the 17th! My babies are definitely no longer babies...

More soon on what each of the girls are up to these days... but the girls just woke up from naps, so out of time for now! To be continued...

Dancing Queen...

2011-12-11T21:43:00.000-08:00

It's the day Ellie has been waiting for... She's finally old enough to start dance classes!!!

As you can see... on her first day, she starts out ALL smiles!

But the nerves kick in right before she heads into the studio...

But she is a trooper and goes in all by herself!

After 8 weeks of dancing, Daddy and Mommy and Alexa get to come and see Ellie perform! She did a great job!

Way to go, Ellie!!!

Haircut!

2011-11-06T20:39:00.000-08:00

It was time!!! Ellie's 2nd ever haircut!!! I had tried to stay on top of trimming her bangs, though if you look through several of my summer posts, you'll see I never did an excellent job of that. Ha!

Ellie actually LOVES to get her hair cut! She sits really still for our hairstylist, Miss Lindsay, who we LOVE! She KNOWS that if she's a good girl, there is a treat in store for her at the end... And she also really loves this penguin cape!

Ellie getting the royal treatment!

Something here is making her turn up her nose a bit. If I remember right, I think that she might have gotten a little hair on her nose and it tickled! lol...

Daddy had taken Alexa for the first part of the haircut, but then he had to drop her off and head to an appointment. I was a bit nervous if she would sit still and behave, but again... Lindsay to the rescue! She gave her this blow pop and as you can see, Alexa LOVED the haircut as well. :)

All smiles!

Thought I would add a picture from Ellie's FIRST Haircut over a year ago! Sweet Alexa was just teeny tiny...

Hard to believe how much my little firstborn has changed in a year! Her face looks so much more grown up now!

Mommy with her girl after her first haircut...
Fun to watch them grow and change...

September at a glance...

2011-10-03T16:40:00.000-07:00

Catching up yet again... Where has the last month gone??? Thought I would just do last month "at a glance" since I have managed to get myself so far behind, yet again!!!

No worries... Ellie didn't get glasses! This is just her new favorite past time... finding Joel's glasses and wearing them around. Yes, we are trying to put a stop to it cause we know it's bad for her eyes. But have you ever seen a cuter kid with glasses? :) Love it!

Over Labor Day weekend we got to spend a few hours with some of our favorite cousins in Kansas City!!! With 5 kiddos this small, it was tough to get too many good pictures! But here is one we managed to capture! We spent the morning at Deanna Rose Farmstead and then grabbed some lunch together and part of the afternoon! It was so fun! Just wish times like that could last longer...

This has also been a common occurance at the end of our days! Wrestling with Dad!!! It's funny cause both of our girls seem to really be "girly girls" but at the same time, they both LOVE to wrestle! Mom doesn't seem to be able to do an adequate job, so when Dad comes home, Ellie and Alexa love to play hide and seek, chase, dance and wrestle with Daddy. He is incredible with them!

Another highlight of our month was having our friends Matt and Jana come to visit for a night! They have a little guy named Cade who is just 2 weeks older than Alexa... It was fun to see them together, though at this age, they still don't seem to care if the other one is around or not... But I think they are awfully cute and who knows... maybe we'll match make them someday... :)

Alexa turned 16 months old on September 17th!!! She is now officially walking, running, chattering (though she still doesn't have a ton of words, she definitely knows how to get her point across!). Her hair has gotten SO long and she broke through her top two teeth to bring her total to a whopping FOUR! :) She is getting quite independent and always wants to do things herself like feed herself with her spoon and help Mommy sweep up messes. She has great fine motor skills and always loves to play blocks and figure out how things fit together... It's fun to see her little mind at work!

Ellie is now 38 months old and is quite the little spit fire!!! I mean that in the best way possible. :) She keeps me on my toes, that's for sure... Her naps are getting shorter (sigh...) and she wants to stay up later at night... She wants to be involved in EVERYTHING you are doing. If I'm cooking, it's "Mommy, can I help you?" If I'm cleaning, she wants you to give her a rag to clean with too! :) She is still a thumb sucker, though Daddy is now giving her a quarter for each morning she wakes up and her thumb is dry. She is super observant and doesn't miss a thing! She is very verbal and definitely converses like a little adult about everything. Her new funny phrase is, "Okay Mom...here's the deal.." She is quite the little negotiator. If you ask her to do something, she'll try to make a deal with you. i.e. "how about I watch 10 more minutes of VeggieTales THEN I'll brush my teeth..." :) She is a ton of fun and we can't imagine our world without her! :) If you're on Twitter, follow me at JenJohnson11 to hear funny daily quotes from Ellie... :)

And last, but not least, Sister Love... These two are just inseparable... They hug and wrestle and fight... true sisters. But one thing that's for sure. They love being together! And I just love life with my girls...

I already have a couple of October posts in the works, so hopefully they will be coming soon!!! :)

Beautiful day in the neighborhood...

2011-08-27T22:55:00.000-07:00

While we had a WONDERFUL summer, it's also great to be HOME... One of the things that the girls enjoy the most about being back home is getting to play outside in the neighborhood... Ellie has just learned to ride a bike, so she LOVES to get out and do that as much as possible. But she also loves to play with "the kids" as she affectionately calls them, though almost every kid in the neighborhood is older than she is! Above is one of our cute neighbors named Kinsley... Here is a pic of El catching a ride with her on one the neighbors electric cars. She has to enjoy theirs cause we only have ones that she has to peddle herself! Ha!

Below is Ellie's new pride and joy... Her PRINCESS BICYCLE and matching helmet... She is learning to master "bumps" or aka... cracks in the sidewalk. Her Daddy and I are trying to help her gain a little confidence to peddle up hills and make sure and put on the brakes when she is going downhill. :) She is getting better by the day!

Alexa has been a little bummed that SHE is not big enough to ride a bike. She tries so hard to reach the peddles of Ellie's tricycle, and she looks pretty cute sitting on it, but unfortunately for her, her little legs are still just a few inches shy of reaching. So, for this year, she will just have to be content with riding along in the stroller!

This pic doesn't necessarily fit the theme, but had to add it in there! Alexa got her hands on Ellie's priness crown from her birthday and had to try it on for size. Isn't she a little doll?

And last, but not least, this is usually how we end our days... In the bathtub! They play hard and have the dirt to show for it at the end of the day, that's for sure! But the good thing is all that playing makes them champion sleepers at night as well! :) Loving the summer days and being back home in the neighborhood!

St. Louis Zoo!

2011-08-27T22:25:00.000-07:00

"On the road again!" This was Ellie's theme song through the summer months as we would pack up and hit the road! From Manhattan to Kentucky to Alabama to Florida and through many other states on our summer adventure down to our summer KALEO project! She would often burst into song when we would pack up the suitcases an get buckled into the van... Well on the final leg of our trip back to Kansas, we decided to make one more pit stop before we reached home... or our "green house" as Ellie calls it. :) We were about 6 hours from our final destination when we passed a sign for the St. Louis Zoo! The girls are at a really fun age for field trips like this, so we made a last minute decision to stop! We are so glad we did. It ended up being a fun family memory! Here are a few pictures from our 2 hour tour of the zoo!

Family Photo Op at the Zoo!

Mom and Alexa Joy

We had to get a few pics at this statue! It actually brough back some fun memories. My brother Joe and I took a spring break trip to this zoo together the year after I got out of college and he was a junior. We have a couple cute pics right at this spot! Unfortunately, Alexa wasn't quite so fond of it. You might not be able to tell from the pictures, but she was stiff and trembling! Scared her to pieces!!! And can you find Ellie in the above pic? She was hiding. :)

Ellie looking at a cool frog!

Ellie is turning out to be a lot more like her Daddy than her Mommy in the arena of loving animals! I am okay with animals, but Joel and Ellie LOVE them... So, she is always enthralled with every exhibit and wants to tell me ALL about each one. Pretty cute, actually. :)

Playing Vanna - showing off the huge snake!

Gotta take time to cool down at the mister!

It was a very warm day, and our girls are definitely hot blooded! So they would take every opportunity to run through the misters that were strategically placed throughout the zoo!!!

Daddy and his girls!

Though we didnt' have time to make it through the whole zoo, it was a great place to stop and stretch our legs and get out of the van for a while!!! Lots of great memories at the St. Louis Zoo! :)

A few fun pics...

2011-08-24T22:01:00.000-07:00

First, a 15 month Alexa update! Took her in for her 15 month appt today and here are her stats!

Weight: 21 lbs. 4 oz - 20th percentile

Height - 30.5 inches - 50th percentile

Head circumference - 46.5 cm - 70th percentile

Both of my girls seem to have small bodies and big heads! Ha! :)

Poor Alexa had to have her 1-year shots today cause we left for KALEO before she actually turned 1, so they wouldn't do them back in May. She was a trooper, but it always is so painful to watch them go from happy to this look of "Mom, what are you letting them do to me???" Always makes me a little sad. :(

Ellie and Alexa have both become pretty avid readers lately! I love looking over to find one of the girls has picked up a book! Ellie has many of them memorized, so it has the appearance that she is actually READING it cause she will have all the words down pat.

This picture was from was from our time in Kentucky! Both of the girls just LOVE to be outside, so when it's too hot or raining, etc... they look longingly at the outdoors! Especially now that Ellie is riding a bike. She'd be outside riding ALL the time if she could!!! (pics of that to come soon!)... But I thought this pic was too cute to pass up. Can't you just feel the sister love? :)

We seem to spend a LOT of time at the kitchen table these days. For two different reasons... Alexa LOVES to eat and so she wants to be eating all the time. Ellie does NOT love to eat, so it takes us forever to get her to focus and get some food down her! Ha! Ellie usually tries to sneak her food to Alexa so she doesn't have to eat it herself. I keep telling Ellie that if she doesn't eat, Alexa will soon be bigger than her!

Another one of Ellie's pasttimes is trying to do everything Mommy does. She will often say "Mommy, I'm copyin' you!" Wow, what a reminder that these little ones watch every move and listen to every word. I want to be a Momma who is worthy to have a little girl walk in my shoes... I know I am far from perfect, but I am thankful that God continues to give me these little reminders...

Alexa is 15 months... ALREADY!!!

2011-08-21T22:15:00.000-07:00

Sweet Alexa Joy is 15 months!!! We had to start off her 15 month birthday saying goodbye to Papa Richard and Nana Becky after a fun 6 day stay together!

Joel and I had a staff conference, so Papa and Nana graciously offered to come and stay with the girls for a few days and they all had such a great time! It was my first time away from Alexa, so I was a little sad at first, but it was much easier than I had anticipated because she did so well while we were away!
Alexa is a girl of many expressions! And we just LOVE it! She can't say many words yet, but this little one DEFINITELY gets her point across. You very rarely have to wonder what she is thinking or feeling or try to figure out what it is that she wants. She has her ways of letting you know! :) One of my new favorite things that she does is if Ellie or some other circumstance frustrates her, she puffs out her nose kind of like a bull does right before he charges. Do you know what I mean? It's so funny! I need to catch it on video cause it's hard to get the full effect just explaining it. But I think she was doing it in the picture above. :)

Now this picture is of my FAVORITE Alexa face. She just has the CUTEST little thing she does with her lips. She gives you this smirk that absolutely melts your heart!!! Her eyes light up and it's like she looks right into your soul. She is a charmer, for sure!!!

And does this girl have some HAIR!!! It has gotten so thick and long over the last 3 months... It's incredible. It has this really pretty wave to it. I'm excited for it to get long enough to put into pigtails!!! Though, neither of my girls are huge fans of getting their hair fixed. If I wrestle some sort of bow or pony into their hair, it is usually out within 15 minutes. So, not usually worth the effort unless we are going to church or are going to be taking a picture or something. :)

Here are some other FUN FACTS about our 15 month old...

She still only has a few words that she says... "Momma, Daddy, hi, bye, uh-oh" are the most common things you will hear! Though she is really good at trying to imitate what you say to her. She babbles ALL the time, so it won't be long and we'll have TWO girls talking our ears off.. :) (which I love, by the way)

She is quite the go-getter!!! A mover and a shaker now that she has learned to walk and run! She took her first unassisted steps on July 1st and now that she is mobile, it seems like her whole personality is changing! She has become so much more outgoing and independent. Our cuddlebug no longer even likes to be held! She wants to be on the move.

EATER!!! This word describes Alexa to a tee... She EATS a TON! You'd never know it by her petite little frame, but this girl can pack away the food. :) She will make growling noises or cry if she sees you eating something and you don't share it with her!

TEETH - Alexa still just has TWO bottom teeth!!! I know, 15 months old and just 2 little teeth, but her top front teeth are beginning to make an appearance and I think will break all the way through in the next week or so. :)

Alexa LOVES her sister! It's so fun to see them becoming better and better friends by the day. They have their moments, but overall, they just light up when they see each other. Alexa follows Ellie around everywhere and Ellie could't be a more proud big sister.

Alexa is a KISSER. SO CUTE! She is always quick to pucker up with her little fish face and lean over to give you a smooch!

She LOVES when you read to her!!! Multiple times a day she will bring you a book and then back her little self up to you and plop down on your lap...like she's saying "okay, read to me!" I love it!

Alexa Joy Johnson, we are totally smitten with you sweet girl! So thankful for your first 15 months!

Ellie is 3!

2011-07-14T21:16:00.000-07:00

Here she is!!! Ellie Hope on her last night of being TWO! This girl couldn't be more excited for her third birthday!!!
We got to spend the day celebrating in Niceville, Florida where we were spending a couple of weeks between summer training programs! We had a fabulous day! We had a party where Ellie got to blow out her candles!

Ellie and Daddy even got to hunt for hermit crabs together!

Alexa wasn't going to miss out on the fun! She helped herself to a birthday cupcake!

And we even had a few of our Oklahoma friends come to help us celebrate the occasion!

When we asked Ellie what she wanted to eat for her birthday, she emphatically said "CUPCAKES!" So, cupcakes there were! And in abundance! Big cupcakes, small cupcakes, chocolate and white cupcakes... Whatever your heart desired!

Ellie definitely got to be the princess for a day and I think she would say it was a great birthday! We got to spend the evening as a family in Destin going to a fun Mexican place for dinner and she even got a free birthday Sundae there! She got to run through fountains, play outside, have a party, be with friends... who could ask for more? She is one blessed little girl and we sure are blessed to have her in our lives. It's been an incredible three years, sweet girl. You definitely bring light to our lives!

Here are a few fun facts about our THREE year old!

She is 36 1/2 inches tall - just over three feet and we started measuring on her closet door!

She finally reached 30 lbs!

She LOVES numbers and letters and colors. She can count to 60 and will gladly do that for you!

She can spell and write her name. (tho - like her Momma, she is a lefty and so sometimes will write in mirror images - we're working on that!)

She can spell her name in sign language (thanks to a kid we met on a sailboat this summer who taught her! ha!)

She can count to ten in spanish (cutest thing in the world to hear!)

She loves Barney, VeggieTales and Dora the Explorer. She has also recently become a fan of Sid the Science Kid. I think she's gonna love science like her Daddy!

She has a mind that just doesn't stop. She remembers details of things that happened months ago - remembers locations she's seen before, makes and models of cars, you name it, you're not slipping one past this girl. (i.e. "Look Mom, that car is just like Papa Barry's car! or "that van is exactly the same as our van!") She will also let you know if you miss your turn or which way you should turn. I experienced this several times this summer!

She LOVES to sing and can carry a tune really well! Often on road trips she will just sing and sing in the back seat. It always brings a smile to my face.

She has become quite the nurturer. She is SO good with her dolls and often tells me that I need to be quiet cause they are sleepin'! Or that if she leaves her baby, that the baby will probably cry... :) She loves her baby sister, too, and it's so fun to watch her teach Alexa things and help her out. They are quite good buddies!

She's a helper and oh so fun to have around.

She loves her tricycle.

She is incredibly expressive.

She is full of incredible one-liners.

And the list goes on...

So GRATEFUL for THREE wonderful years with our beautiful Ellie Hope!

Catching up...

2011-07-04T14:42:00.000-07:00

I have taken so many pictures this summer that there is no way I'll ever get completely caught up on blogging! But here are a few snapshots of our summer thus far!

First...Nanny Gentry!!! I think I may have shared a bit in another post, but our friend Gentry came down for about 5 weeks to help out with the girls and it couldn't have gone better!!! The girls LOVED having Gentry around and so did I. What a huge help and it was just so fun to have her around!!! Thanks for a great few weeks Gench! We miss you already!!! Father's Day 2011! We had a fun day all together... Church in the morning and then an afternoon playing at the park... We love you Daddy!!! I am so grateful that my girls have such an amazing Dad. They just adore their Daddy and I know as they grow older, they will appreciate more and more the GIFT of a Daddy who loves them and sacrifices so greatly for them... Joel, you truly are a one of a kind! So thankful for you!
In June, Ellie turned 35 months (pictured above) and Alexa turned 13 months (the two pics below!) These girls just keep growing and changing like crazy. I wish time would slow down cause they are getting big TOO fast! But it's so fun to watch them become better friends by the day and they interact so well. We're just entering the "don't mess with my stuff" phase as Alexa gets more mobile and into all of Ellie's projects. It's actually quite hilarious and provides for some good teachable moments as we help Ellie understand the importance of sharing and helping Alexa learn to do things... It's a fun and very hands on stage for both of them.

Yes, LOTS of baths down here as it's been very hot and humid and the girls play hard! But, it tends to be the favorite part of each of their days! :)

I'm so thankful for the creativity of grocery stores. This makes getting groceries a lot more fun for the girls and a lot easier for Momma! :) Don't they look adorable in their little car? And they each have their own steering wheel. Genius, I say. :)

Ellie and Alexa had their first boy babysitters while we were down here in Gulf Shores. A team of guys offered to watch the girls for a couple of hours so Joel and I could go and get some time together. It was SO CUTE! The guys arrived with a huge coloring book and box of 64 colors... Alexa did GREAT. Ellie actually was the one that took some warming up and kept trying to run to the girls rooms. Ha! But all around, I think they all had fun! They took Alexa on tricycle rides, colored and played hard. Great job guys! Thanks for taking such good care of the girls! And we even got this sweet little picture. The students have been INCREDIBLE at loving our girls. I am so thankful that they get the chance to grow up around such wonderful college students. We are all very blessed, for sure!

Just another cute shot of Alexa wearing big sister's sunglasses one afternoon while we were out visiting students at work! :)

Ellie and Alexa just LOVE our staff girls... Here is a pic of our two Ellie's... These two have a very special bond. I think part of it may be because Miss Ellie (as we like to call her :) lets our Ellie get away with quite a bit... She has a very high patience level and just loves this little girl to pieces. Again, we are very blessed. :) Ellie is bound to go Greek one day. She has learned the sign to almost every sorority this summer and she usually flashes an ADPi diamond or a PiPhi arrow or one of many other sorority symbols. It's adorable how the girls have adopted her. It will be interesting to see which house she actually chooses one day!

Another one of Ellie's favorite pasttimes has been running through the fountains located close to our hotel. She used to be a little leary, but now she is quite bold and blazes a trail through them! It's a lot of fun to watch. Next year I am sure that Alexa will join in the fun once she is running!

Ellie decided to jump in the back of the stroller with Alexa when she was all wet... This is actually my favorite face that Alexa makes. Isn't it cute? :) She scrunches up that adorable little nose! Aaah... I could just eat her up!

Remember those colors that I was telling you about earlier? Well, Ellie LOVES to color with them! But notice how the colors started... out of the box and all lined up...

Then she progresses to dividing them into color groups. She did this all by herself, but wanted to show Daddy...

This tells you a ton about our firstborn's personality. Everything in order and color coded. Ha! She will do this with her bath letters, too. I go in and she has the letters up on the tub, separated by color. It's hilarious!

Well, there's a random little update! It's been an incredible summer. I'm sad it's moving by so quickly... We're all going to go through withdrawals once we don't have the students down the hall and around every corner. But we're really thankful for the time we've had. One more month and it's back to Manhattan!

The world of questions...

2011-07-04T10:26:00.000-07:00

This is a question that we have been hearing about 20 times a day over this last week... It doesn't matter how you answer her, she will ask it again and again and again... I'm guessing that this will be the theme of the 3's. Bring it on...

Alexa turned ONE!!! (on MAY 17th!...a little behind the times!)

2011-07-03T21:29:00.000-07:00

Alexa Joy Johnson is ONE!!! Woo Hoo!!!

Okay, Okay... I know I'm about a month and a half behind on my blog posting! No excuses...but here she is! Our little ONE YEAR OLD beauty! :)
Alexa Joy Johnson... what did we ever do without your bright smile in our lives? You truly have added such JOY to our every day...

Aaaah... we just can't get enough of that face! The pics above are just a teaser to Alexa's real one year pictures. A student here at KALEO was gracious enough to take our family pictures, as well as Alexa's one year shots! We haven't gotten to see the finished product yet, but we did get a few snapshots on our little camera and those are the ones that I posted above! The picture at the very top and the one below are of Alexa on her ACTUAL one year birthday... We spent May 17th in the van all day travelling from Murray, KY to Gulf Shores, AL. Thankfully, Alexa didn't seem to mind! So the photos we took that day were few and far between, but we did capture a couple of pics of her in her "Birthday Girl" shirt! She was pretty sleepy by the time we actually got the pictures taken, but I thought they were cute anyway!

Here are some of the things that we are loving about our ONE YEAR OLD these days...

* Alexa LOVES to EAT... Anything and everything. There are not many things that I have found that Alexa will not eat. And she is so funny. Whenever food is around, she will grunt and point and not let you forget to feed her! Especially if ice cream is involved! She is absolutely passionate about food.

*Two bottom teeth! That's right...she is FINALLY getting teeth. I was starting to wonder if there were any in there. :) About a week after her first birthday, her two sharp little bottom teeth started popping through!

*She's found her VOICE... yes, she may be small and petite, but BOY does this girl have a VOICE! She can outyell anyone that I know of. She definitely makes her presence known, whether it's first thing in the morning or when her sister is picking on her or if she just wants your attention.

*Almost walking!!! Okay, so this is actually more of a 13 month thing, but she is just starting to take her first steps. About 2 weeks ago right before she turned 13 months, she started walking behind her baby stroller. She can now blaze a trail that way, but has taken about 2 or 3 steps in a row unassisted! Way to go Alexa!!!

*Alexa can hold her own! against her sister, that is! Ellie has a habit of picking on little sis (and loving her a ton, too!). Alexa is quickly catching up to Ellie in size and so she is not to be dismissed. She will wrestle with the best of 'em and I keep warning Ellie not to be too mean cause Alexa will soon be able to take her down. Lol! They have a ton of fun together, but believe me, you don't want to mess with Alexa! :)

*Hi and waving - this is absolutely one of the CUTEST things that Alexa does! No matter where we are, she waves and says "hi" in the the most precious little voice! She will wave to every passerby, at WalMart, in the van, on the TV, in a picture, on the computer... it's adorable! She also loves to pick up the telephone or one of our cell phones and say "hi" into it. I wish you could witness it. It's absolutely adorable.

I am sure there are many more things and as they come to mind, I will add them. But those are just a few for now. So grateful for our two little girls and thanking God for this last year with our sweet baby Alexa!

Action Packed few weeks!

2011-06-15T19:20:00.000-07:00

Unfortunately, I haven't been near as good at taking pictures as I set out to be at the start of our summer in Gulf Shores! It's been a wonderful summer... The girls have adjusted better than I ever could have expected; KALEO has been incredible and the students seem to be growing by leaps and bounds! We've gotten settled into somewhat of a routine and schedule and we LOVE getting to live life on life with the students... I was telling some girls yesterday that Ellie is definitely going to go through withdrawals after we leave because she is getting so used to having so many people around her all the time and she just loves it!

I got to celebrate my 35th (yikes!) birthday here last Friday and it was a perfect day! Our staff girls surprised me first thing in the morning by taking me to breakfast...so fun! And then for lunch, Joel and I took the girls to Chick Fil A (Ellie's favorite place in Gulf Shores, by far!...she asks to go there everyday!) for lunch and to play... (note picture above!)Friday night my sweet hubby took me out for coffee, then to a restaurant that I have been wanting to go to for the last couple of years! Then it was out to walk on the pier and the beach. All of my favorite things. I felt spoiled beyond belief!
Alexa has become QUITE the BIG...okay...HUGE...eater! You wouldn't even believe it! This girl would eat 24/7 if you would let her. I don't think that she has a "full" sensor... And she is intense. If you don't give her the next bite fast enough, she gets very loud. She doesn't cry, she just VERY audibly reminds you that you need to be feeding her. :) She still doesn't have any teeth (though I think her bottom two are ALMOST through), but you wouldn't know it because she can eat ANYTHING. Steak, french fries, chicken, cheese...you name it, she can eat it. She definitely outeats her sister 2 to 1... maybe 3 to 1. :) I keep telling Ellie not to pick on Alexa because before long, Alexa is going to be bigger than her! No joke. :) I got her eating response all on video, but wouldn't you know that I can't get it to upload to this blog for some reason. Maybe I'll put it on facebook.

This is a picture of our sweet friend GENTRY! Gentry has come down to Gulf Shores to spend part of the summer with us to help out with the girls. She has named herself "Nanny Maureen"... why? I am not quite sure. Maybe it's from a movie? But whatever the case may be, she is doing an incredible job and the girls love her and it's really helped me out a ton. I feel like I've had the best of both worlds of getting to be with my girls, but also being pretty plugged into KALEO and getting to be with the students. Thanks Gench! We love having you here with us!!!

Ellie has become quite the big fan of the beach... morning, noon and night. We haven't really gotten to go very often, but when we do, you better believe that Ellie is going to get the most out of her time! Here we are on a group date with some of our students and staff... They had a sandcastle building contest with glow sticks after dark and Ellie got her name in lights! :)

The days are just flying by, but we are very thankful for the way that God has provided for us in every day and the way that we are getting to see firsthand His work in students lives. We are truly blessed...

Gulf Shores!

2011-05-22T19:59:00.001-07:00

Can you tell Ellie is excited to finally be at her "summer home"? She's been asking about it for months! (Probably because we told her that she could open this cool gift - pictured above - from Uncle Joe and Aunt Bel when we got here!) Well, we finally arrived and are getting settled in for our 9 week adventure down in Gulf Shores, AL. So far, so good! This post will mostly be about the girls, though I am planning to post more about the program as things get started! We arrived on Tuesday, May 17th. Yep! Alexa's FIRST BIRTHDAY! Poor little thing spent most of it in the car, but thankfully, she didn't seem to mind. We had celebrated a little the week before and we hope to have another party with students sometime soon!

We are living in a hotel room for the summer. Well, it's actually bigger than that! We have two bedrooms and a small living/eating area. It's worked out perfectly. But here is the funny part. Ellie is getting the room with the King sized bed all to herself! Her bed is pictured above. Joel and Alexa and I are sharing a room with two full sized beds. As you can see, Alexa isn't in the full sized bed but instead in a pack and play in the corner. We rigged a curtain type thing to give her her own space. She won't sleep if she can see us. So, every night and at nap time we pull the curtain and she goes to sleep! It's actually worked quite a bit smoother than I was anticipating! The only catch is that I sometimes have to get ready in the dark in the mornings. Ha! Kinda scary... :)

Alexa is loving her new little home away from home! Here she is playing with some blocks she got from Nana and Papa McCulley for her birthday! Both of the girls LOVE them! We build lots of towers and Ellie is really getting into her letters and trying to spell things...

There is a cute little outlet mall down the road that has a great play area. Most days while Joel is in meetings with the students, I take the girls to go play for about an hour before naptime. Ellie just loves it!

Today was a fun day! We got to go to the BEACH with all of our student leaders! They have been training really hard for the last couple of days since they arrived and have a couple days of training left before the rest of the participants of the program arrive. So, some fun time was built into the schedule today and we all had a great time! Ellie has really changed her tune about the ocean this year. She hated the sand and water last year, but now she is loving it and you can't take your eye off of her for a second.

She got to build sandcastles with the students and they also built her her very own sand chair! She is eating up all of the attention for sure!

Sweet Alexa did great as well! She is going to have the complexion of her mother, so needless to say, I have to keep her lathered up in sunscreen like crazy! We found out that she loves to eat the sand. :/ And actually loves to have her little feet dipped in the water. She just laughed and laughed! She even missed her afternoon nap today but was just as content as could be. Such a little sweetie...

Daddy does SUCH a good job with the girls. Here is Alexa hanging out with Dad. He helped her get her little feet in the water, but it was Ellie who got to go out in the deep part. She couldn't have been more excited! She tried to get Mommy to take her back out there, but I wouldn't go far enough for her liking. Wasn't willing to chance us both going under! Ha!

Here she is posing for a beach pick. Isn't her little suit cute? Gotta love those pink ruffles.

It's going to be a great summer!!! We're so excited for all that God has in store!

So far behind!

2011-05-16T07:22:00.000-07:00

Hello Blog World! That's right...I've let myself get over a month behind in blogging. Ugh! When this happens, it is hard for me to get restarted again because I feel SO far behind!!! So...instead of just sitting here feeling overwhelmed about it, I'm going to do an abbreviated version of all that's happened over the last month and just post some cute pics of the girls and then try to stay more on top of things the rest of the summer. How does that sound? :)

So, to kick things off on a happy note. Above is a cute little picture of Ellie. It's become increasingly difficult to get Ellie dressed up cute and get her hair done, as she's become more and more opinionated about her wardrobe and the way her hair is done...or should I say...NOT done. Most days she just wants to wear leggings that she has outgrown and too small of a shirt and she says "leave my hair DOWN, Mom... and don't comb it!" So, the above picture HAD to happen since I got her dressed in an outfit that fit, that matched AND got her hair done! Kodak moment for sure. :) Doesn't she clean up nicely?Now for the not so happy note... our poor Alexa has had THREE ear infections during the 11th month of her short little life. Poor thing! She has been on several rounds of antibiotics and just couldn't seem to kick it. Well, when we went in a couple of weeks early for her 1 year appointment (we had to go early since we were going to be leaving for the summer a week before her big day!) our Pediatrician said that it was looking much better and we're hoping that it stays that way!!! Since her appointment was early, Alexa couldn't get her one-year shots cause I guess they won't count towards kindergarten required shots if they are taken even a day before she officially turns one. I was initially excited about this and thought since it wasn't a shots day, I could pull off taking both girls to this appt. with my by myself. Well, one thing that I forgot was that they send you to the lab to draw blood for that first birthday. I forget what they are testing for. I think they said led levels? Does that sound right? Anyway, it was a pretty traumatic experience for all of us as Ellie was VERY concerned about them "hurting Alexa!" and this Momma was so sad cause I had to hold her in my lap and wrap my leg around her legs and then with my arms I had to hold her one little arm down while a nurse tried to hold her other one still. Well, wouldn't you just know that they blew a vein in the first arm, so had to go to the second. All the while Alexa is screaming bloody murder, Ellie is distraught over what is happening and I'm just trying to keep them both calm. Thankfully, after the ordeal was over, Alexa took a nice long nap and I went to Sonic and got Ellie a slushy and she soon forgot about it all. :) I love that kids are so resilient!

Okay, whew! Got that out of the way! Back to the HAPPY things again. :) Above is a picture of the girls in their cute Easter dresses from Nana and Papa J. We had a wonderful Easter Sunday and while we were sad to not get to spend it with family, we were able to have some of the football players from K-State over for dinner on Friday night and then again for Easter Sunday lunch. Ellie had an Easter egg hunt, which was hilariously fun. Got that one on video! :) We had gotten to spend the weekend before Easter in Iowa with my family and so El got to do a lot of fun Easter things there as well! It's so neat to see her finally beginning to put some of the puzzle pieces together of what Easter is really all about - Jesus...

Alexa finally grew into a cute little outfit that Joel's cousin's wife Mandy made for her! She made matching outfits for the girls and they are SO CUTE! Thank you Mandy! It's actually one of the bows that she will actually keep in! :)

While we were in Iowa, Alexa turned 11 months old!!! She is growing and changing like crazy!!! Since I am posting this SO late, I think I'm just going to post all of the things that she's doing these days with her one year old birthday post! So stay tuned!

I seriously thought these were the cutest monthly pictures with our little "Alexa in a Box"... It's my Grandma Surber's storage footstool, but it made a great toy for kids!!! Kept my girls entertained for at least an hour... :) Above you will see one of Alexa's favorite skills. Waving! If you could hear her, she's probably also saying "Hi-i!" We joke that Alexa makes the HI two syllables. :) It's adorable!

And then these two pics are of Ellie at 33 months!!! She continues to grow up to be our BIG GIRL for sure. The craziest things come out of her mouth all the time! Everyday, I am just amazed at what she says and understands. She is definitely our almost 3 year old going on 16. That little mind (and tongue!) just go a million miles a minute! :)

Anyway, it was a fabulous month.... VERY busy, but a good busy. We're excited to now be safely settled in our room in Alabama! It's been great so far. I promise to post updates about the happenings in Gulf Shores. Love you all! Thanks for bearing with my long absence! I will "try" to do better the rest of the summer!!!

A Princess Party!

2011-04-18T09:21:00.000-07:00

Ellie got invited to her very first "Princess Party" a couple of weeks ago! Her sweet friends Gracelyn and Delaney both turned 3 and invited Ellie to go along with them to celebrate! The little girls had so much fun! And I tell you what... it was a girl party to the MAX! The girls got to get their hair and nails done and Ellie has never sat so still! :) It was absolutely adorable!

Ellie would never let me do this to her hair. Trust me, I've tried. :) But she was an absolute angel in the chair and I think it turned out adorable!
Then it was off to get her nails done. Ellie is most definitely all girl. She LOVES to get her nails painted. And while she had originally picked a bright BLUE polish - Mommy gently redirected her to the pinks, which I'm sure she loved much more. Ha!

Isn't this hilarious. She looks like a diva to the max.

The girls all got the royal treatment and they enjoyed every second of it! Look out Daddy... I have a feeling Ellie could get used to this.

Here they are! As you can see...it was hard to get a focused picture where everyone was looking and Ellie wasn't trying to get in front.

The sweetest little girls around! I just love their Momma's and the three of us decided that we were going to make this an annual tradition. It will be so fun to watch them grow!
So Happy Birthday Gracey and Delaney! Thanks for letting us join in the fun!

Bye Bye Binky!

2011-04-14T14:08:00.000-07:00

Boy is it ever tough to grow up... If you know our Ellie, you know that "binky" is a VERY special part of her life... Ever since she was a very small baby, she has LOVED her pacifier...aka "binky". Mommy loved it, too, cause we knew that as long as we had a binky along, all was well with Ellie's world. :) It could quiet her in her fussiest times as a baby and as she grew older, it was awesome on roadtrips and could always guarantee 2-3 hour naps and at least 12 hour nights of sleep!

Well... we knew that it was nearing time to give up beloved binky. Our dentist friend told us that by the time she was three, she should be done with it so it wouldn't mess up her teeth. We've been building up to it for quite some time now, wanting to make it special and wanting her to fully embrace it. So...we came up with a plan. Joel's sister Kristin and her husband Andrew are expecting their first baby in May and baby Logar is definitely going to need some binkies! So, "baby Logar" sent Ellie a letter requesting that since Ellie was a big girl now, could she please send her some binkies! Ellie wasn't too excited about it at first and wondered out loud, "why can't HER Mommy buy her some binkies?" We told her because her binkies were extra special and would mean a lot to the baby. Over time, she started to buy into it and would even tell people about it! So, we knew it was time.

I'll be honest. I was dreading the day as much as she was... Would we have many nights of crying and sobbing and would Ellie decide that she wasn't excited about sleeping now that she didn't have binky? Besides, it was kind of a part of her and another stark reminder that my baby is no longer a baby. :( But, alas, the time had come... So... on March 31st, Ellie went around the house with me after her last nap with binky (pictured above!) and gathered up all of her binkies to put in a box for Baby Logar... She was very excited as we were doing it! I don't think the reality that they were never coming back had hit her yet... not until bedtime!

Another special element to "bye bye binky" day was Joel had promised Ellie that he would put together her new kitchen! She had gotten this cute little set as a Christmas gift from Joel's Aunt and Uncle and Cousin, but we decided not to set it up right away but to use it as greater incentive to give up binky. Ellie was VERY excited about her new toy! As was Alexa!

As a grand finale to our big special day, we let Ellie stay up a little later to watch "Tangled" and eat popcorn! She was definitely on cloud 9 all day with all of her special treats! But...we had not yet gotten to bedtime... How would she do?

Well... night one was a SUCCESS! She cried for about 30 minutes, but then went to sleep and slept the whole night long. Nights have been good - though she does wake up about 30 minutes to an hour earlier than usual. Naps have been a bit of a different story. Some days she doesn't nap at all (very sad for Momma!) - and other days she sleeps for about an hour. So, life has changed around here - but binky has had her swan song and we are surviving without it! :) Now I just have to watch out and make sure Ellie doesn't steal Alexa's binkies. She does this whenever she gets the chance and will quickly tell me that Alexa is "sharing" with her. :) Yesterday, she actually stole one and hid it in her bed. I was amazed and excited that she was napping, only to have my bubble burst at the end of her nap when I realized that she had been sucking on Alexa's binky! Lol! But I'm trying to stand strong... My firstborn is growing up. And sometimes growing up is definitely hard to do... :)

Fun month of March!

2011-03-27T15:53:00.001-07:00

Lots of fun times around the Johnson house these last few weeks...
Here is just a short snapshot!
In early March, Joe and Bel, Wyatt and Isaac got to come visit for a Sunday afternoon! The weather was beautiful and we got to spend some fun time outside playing in the backyard, the park and wrestling with Uncle Joe in the basement. We love having them in KC now and hope that it means lots of fun day trip play dates in the future!

A couple weekends later, we got to make the trip to Olathe to help Wyatt celebrate his 3rd birthday! So hard to believe that it's been 3 years since these little ones have entered our world. And so much has changed since then!

Ellie loved getting to play with Wy and Ikey's toys! And the girls loved every minute of the carnival themed birthday party. It was a really fun day!

Nana Becky and Papa Richard got to come home with us for a couple of nights right afterwards and we had a great time together! It was short, but very sweet! Nana got to jump in on our bedtime routine, BATHS!
We also had another beautiful weekend to enjoy the park, a walk across campus and some ice cream! It was a perfect day...
Thanks for coming to spend some time with us, Nana and Papa! We loved every minute of it!
In the midst of the warm spring days, we've also had bursts of winter mixed in. It's snowing as I type this actually! But a few days after Nana and Papa left, we had another 6 inch snow! So Daddy and Ellie made the most of it and built one more snowman for the season...

This past week has been spring break for KSU! We actually got to spend the first couple of days at home and not travelling this year. Ellie got to treat Daddy to a tea party one afternoon.

On Wednesday, we made the trek to the University of Oklahoma for Joel to speak at StuMo down there! He was gracious and took the three of us girls along and we had such a fun road trip together! Poor Alexa got her very first sunburn on the trip... She was such a trooper, but I felt like a very bad Mommy! Thankfully the next morning she looked much better!

One of our families favorite things to do is to tour different college campuses around the U.S., so we took advantage of the beautiful weather to take our double stroller out onto campus (yes, we felt really cool. Ha!) Here we are stopping for a quick family picture at OU's football stadium.

It's been a fun March so far and we're excited about all the adventures that lie ahead over the next few months. Hard to believe that in 6 short weeks we'll be headed to our "summer home" in Alabama with all of the college students. Trying to soak up the time we have left in Kansas before then!

Alexa at 10 months!

2011-03-26T13:44:00.001-07:00

Here she is!!! Our little 10 month old!!! And stealing our hearts more by the day...

We just love her signature Alexa "smirk"... she's got the cutest little smile and her eyes light up our world! She's all over the place these days... crawling like a champ! It's amazing the difference one short month can make in a kid's mobility. Here are a few other new things in Alexa's world...

she is beginning to pull herself up on things. No cruising yet, but I'm not in any rush!
still NO BOTTLE for Alexa. She just refuses. It's going to make weaning her a little tricky here in the next month or two...
She loves to sleep in her crib and is sleeping much better at night!
She and Ellie are starting to play so well together! They are adorable to listen to on car trips. Ellie entertains and Alexa just laughs her little head off. I love it!
She's getting more curious and likes to open and empty drawers, grab hold of cords, you get the picture.
When we have to tell her "no, no Alexa", she is so sensitive and gets her little feelings hurt. It's hard for this Momma to discipline her!
She is very determined and perseveres!
She has a very serious look - our little studier!
She is still relatively introverted and not so sure about big groups of people.
She's still our little "Mommy's girl" and gets very uncertain if Mom is out of sight...
She truly is our JOY! I can't imagine life without our Alexa!!!

Happy 10 months sweet girl!

Gettin' better...

2011-03-08T20:49:00.000-08:00

You probably wouldn't know it by looking at these pictures, but my two little sweeties have been under the weather the last couple of days! Alexa was up most of the night Sunday night with a fever and just fussy. I think she is cutting teeth... Ellie slept til 1:30pm on Monday (that's right... that was the first time she woke up for the day!)... but I quickly realized she had slept that late because she was sick. :( So she was up for an hour and then back to bed from 2:30-6:30 and to bed at 9... Today they both seem to be doing better... and now it's poor Joel who has caught the bug! Praying that I stay healthy to take care of everyone! So far so good...

But anyway... tonight was one of those memorable nights... one you just want to tuck into your memory and pray that it will remain as vivid as it was tonight for the rest of life. Just sitting in Ellie's bed cuddling with my two precious girls, reading books... Tonight we read "I'll Love you Forever" for the millionth time. It's one of Ellie's new favorites and when we get to the end of each page she recites it...
"I'll love you forever
I'll like you for always,
As long as I'm living,
My baby you'll be"
It's the cutest thing ever... Her little voice is just so so sweet.
We also read a Bible Story or two each night and we're loving that. It's so fun to see things click in Ellie's little mind. She comprehends so much more than I could even imagine for a 2 year old. Kids are so much smarter than I ever gave them credit for!

Ellie just loves to love on her little sister... And she is still so smitten with her COW. Above you see Ellie giving Alexa some cow tail. This poor tail has been through the wringer. If you could see it close up, there is no fur left on it at all. It's not soft...but for some reason, Ellie is just obsessed with rubbing her nose with it. And if you're "in" with her, she will rub your nose, too!

Uh oh... this is trouble. Alexa going in for the binky steal.

I love you Alexa, but don't go messin' with my binky... :) We're in the process of trying to get Ellie to give up her binky. It's not going to be easy... We're trying to talk her into sending them to her new cousin in Ohio saying that the baby needs them! And since Ellie is a big girl, she could give them up. So far, she's not buying it... :)
*
So thankful for my girls and that they are on the upswing and starting to feel better... I have been so grateful lately for health and don't take a day of it for granted... Now, if I could just get my girls to stay little...

Come Awake...

2011-03-01T19:52:00.000-08:00

Ellie has become quite the little singer. I LOVE to hear her singing away to songs that she's heard at church or StuMo or learned at AWANA... Tonight after her bath she was belting out one of her new favorites... "Christ has Risen" by Matt Maher. Love it. Thought you'd enjoy her rendition. :) And please excuse the fact that she's not quite dressed yet!

Taking advantage of a pretty day!

2011-02-24T08:07:00.000-08:00

It was a beautiful day on Wednesday, so we decided to head to the park before the next round of winter set in! The girls and I had a great time... swinging, sliding and running off some energy! What a great day!

Birthday week! 31 months and 9 months!

2011-02-21T20:01:00.001-08:00

That's right! We're still doing monthly birthday pics... Joel hopes to keep them coming until she's 18 years old! :) So far, so good! Our Ellie was 31 months old on the 14th - Valentine's Day!!!... She's ALL little girl right now... No more baby here.

Look at this little lady. Just LOVE her... You can often hear her say "Ellie's gettin' bigger!" and that she is. When you ask her how old she is, she often answers very cofindently "I'm 3!" Soon enough, sweet girl, soon enough.

She is finally - for the most part - into her 2T pants, though some of them still need a belt. :) She is still as sassy and mischievous as can be. She always wants to "see" what you're doing and carries her stepstool around the house with her so she can get to anything she thinks she needs. :)

We always have a "story a day" about our Ellie. Sometimes it's a story an hour. :) I am vowing to video tape more often cause I feel like I'm missing so many special moments. And her cute little nuances just change so quickly.

And then our sweet baby, Alexa, turned 9 moths old on the 17th! And guess what? She started CRAWLING on her birthday and now she can get anywhere and everywhere that she wants to!

It's just amazing to me how quickly that change occurs. One day you can leave them sitting somewhere and know that they will be there when you return. The next day you can't walk away for a second! So...here we go again! Lock up all the valuables and watch all the outlets. Alexa is mobile! :)

Alexa is still our little blue eyed beauty. I could look at those eyes all day! She is just so sweet... She continues to be contemplative and a bit more of our introvert, though she does love people and is very smiley...especially in the mornings. She is incredibly observant and determined. When she sees something she wants, there is no stopping her from succeeding in obtaining it. She is relentless. Just ask her sister. The fighting has begun. Ha!

She has been on solid foods for almost a month now (yes, I waited pretty long to get her started!), and she is doing GREAT! She is also becoming a little better sleeper. She still often wakes up once or so a night and is up and ready for her day by 6am. But it's all good. I love waking up to her sweet little face!

So this Mom is getting ready for this new busy season of 2 "Mobilites" as I like to call them. :) They are sure to keep me on my toes in lots of ways. But I wouldn't trade this season for the world.

Oh please stay little my sweet girls... I am cherishing these days...

Snow day!

2011-02-03T07:33:00.000-08:00

Like most of the rest of the country, we've had some "snow days" this week! It's provided some really fun time with the girls, but I've had to get creative... especially as Ellie really started getting cabin fever about 24 hours into all the bad weather! So, for snow day #2, I came up with a list of activities to keep us busy! Activity #1... BAKE COOKIES!

Ellie and I had discussed our plan the night before as she went to bed... and she woke up SO excited! She didn't even want to eat her breakfast or anything! So, after bribing her to eat her breakfast, we dove in!

Joel's Mom and Dad got the girls these adorable aprons for Christmas, so I was excited to try them out... Alexa did not want to be left out of the cookie baking party, so we put her apron on her and put her in her high chair so she could oversee the whole operation.

Here is the play by play... Above is Ellie with all of our ingredients...

Alexa contentedly looking on, hoping that she'll get some food soon.

El was a champ and dumping everything in! She even cracked the eggs and did a pretty good job for a 2 year old! I was trying to loosen up and be a fun Mom who lets her kids make messes. I'm not always very good with that. :)

And of course she had to test out the batter! What fun would making cookies be without that? :)

We finished just in time to have them ready for Daddy to come home for lunch! Ellie was waiting for him at the door with a cookie for Ellie and a cookie for Daddy! :) Too cute...

Then another, "what was Mom thinking" moment was when I decided to take a picture with both girls and a plate full of fresh from the oven cookies. Alexa couldn't WAIT to get her hands on them. I wish you could have witnessed this sight. Ellie, trying her hardest to protect the cookies from little sister saying "No Alexa, you're too little!", but to no avail... Alexa won out and cookies and chocolate were EVERYWHERE! The next picture, which I did not post, is of the girls hugging without clothes because I had to throw them all in the washer! Nothing a little "Resolve" couldn't take care of on the carpet and it was SO worth it for this fun memory with my girls... Gotta love those snow days! :)

Alexa at 8 months...

2011-01-29T21:14:00.000-08:00

Alexa is almost 8 1/2 months old now and I'm finally getting her 8 month pictures posted! Just a little bit behind these days... Ha! It's been a big month for Alexa as well! I finally started her on solid food (yes, she tasted her FIRST solid after her 8 month birthday...) and she is doing GREAT! So far she has tried peas, squash, sweet potatoes and apples.

She is also becoming more mobile these days... Alexa has definitely been our laid back baby. Not in too much of a hurry to go anywhere at all. Until this month, I could sit her down somewhere and know she would be in the exact same spot when I came back. Those days are quickly fading and she is starting to learn how to move from point A to point B... She still isn't really a roller. She rarely chooses to roll, though I know that she can if she wants to. If I put her to sleep on her belly, I will find her the same way the next morning... But she IS a scooter. More of a "swimmer" I would say. She looks like she is doing the breast stroke when she is laying on her belly on the ground! She is getting very close to crawling, I think! She is starting to get up on all fours, so I think it's just a matter of days! Then life will REALLY change. Ha!

Alexa is still our sweet, sweet cuddly baby! She LOVES to always be with you, cuddling and sleeping on you. She was just thrilled when all of her Grandparents were here visiting and she would take turns napping on each one of them. She definitely went through withdrawal when everyone had to go back home and she didn't get to be held all of the time. She makes you feel so so loved and needed and special. She will look at you with the most precious smile and it breaks her little heart if you walk away from her. She'll turn her head 180 degrees if it means being able to see you and watch what you're doing... She is definitely my little buddy and I (and her Daddy) absolutely ADORE our Alexa Joy...

Alexa and Ellie are getting to be pretty good friends these days too! No one can make Alexa smile like Ellie can. I really do hope that they will be the best of friends. Here are some other fun facts about our 8 month old...

She is still not a huge sleeper. She takes little cat naps throughout the day and still wakes up at least once at night. I'm still holding out hope that this will change. Though I really don't mind waking up in the night cause I know i get to see her sweet little face...
Alexa can definitely make her presence known! She has a very high pitched little scream that will get everyones attention! She makes sure she has a voice over her very talkative older sister...
She is very content and happy. So fun to be around.
We think that Alexa will be more of our introvert. She loves people, but gets a bit overwhelmed in groups and she seems to really check people out a little more intensely than her sister did.
Alexa is an observer. She is so alert and watches everything that goes on around her...
She is saying "Da Da" and other little babbles. She is SURE that she is having a conversation with you!

It's definitely a FUN season... I don't want my baby to grow up. This is really one of my favorite ages. Just wish the days would slow down a bit. Loving our Alexa Joy!

2 1/2 years old!

2011-01-29T20:45:00.000-08:00

It's TRUE! Ellie Hope Johnson is now a very busy, VERY talkative 2 1/2 year old! It's been a BIG month for Ellie... She's moved to her BIG girl bed in her BIG girl room, she's now wearing BIG girl panties and doing really well with potty training (thus the "no pants" pictures!) - and she's definitely talking like a BIG girl these days... As her Poppa Barry said after riding in the car with her for close to 14 hours from Kentucky to Kansas... "that girl is never quiet unless she is sleeping!" He meant it in the kindest way... :)

I am loving these days of having a toddler. It's really fun to be able to have intelligible conversations with Ellie. She asks great questions and it's always so fun to see her little mind at work. She makes me laugh a lot and our house is definitely never boring! She wants to be a part of everything and loves to do everything "just like Mommy!". One of her famous questions these days that I hear about a zillion times a day is "What doin' Mommy?" which is quickly followed by "Ellie will help!" or "Ellie do it!" Yes...she always refers to herself in the third person. It's pretty cute.

Here are some other fun facts about our 2 1/2 year old princess...

She is 35 inches tall and weighs about 28 lbs.
She's FINALLY into her 2T pants... they just swallowed her until this month and her little legs finally took a growth spurt.
She LOVES singing. Some of her favorites right now are "Deep and Wide", "Jesus Loves Me" "Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star", "Please and Thank You are the Magic Words" (from Barney, in case you were wondering), and I am teaching her one of my favorites from when I was little... "I am a Promise". It's cute to hear her try to say "potentiality"
We end most nights with a family dance party.
Her favorite game is "Chase You" ...usually, Daddy Chase You!
She loves Barney and Veggie Tales and would watch them ALL day if you would let her.
She knows all of her numbers, letters, colors, and her address.
She still ADORES her baby sister and wants to see her first thing every morning. She can hardly stand it when Alexa is sleeping and I have to make sure she doesn't sneak into her room and wake her up from naps.
She is still our HUGE extrovert and makes friends with people pretty much everywhere she goes.
While she is doing great in her big girl bed, she still can't seem to part with her cow and binky... I know, I know... I'll work on taking that binky away in the next few months. I just don't have the heart to do it right now...
And the list goes on, but I will stop for now...

Loving life with our Ellie Hope Johnson.

Big Girl Bed

2011-01-09T21:16:00.000-08:00

It can sure be tough to grow up... Today was a BIG day at our house! For several reasons... First, Ellie got home! Yay! She's been travelling since December 17th and has spent the last 12 days with Nana and Papa Johnson in Kentucky. We are excited to have her home and she just chattered up a storm from the moment she walked through the door... We decided while she was away that we would transition her straight into her "Big Girl Bed" when she got back home. We have been letting Alexa sleep in the crib for the last couple of weeks and she is LOVING it, so we knew that this was the time...

As I'm sure is true for any kid, the first night in your new bed is EXCITING, but also traumatic. Especially for a girl who LOVES her crib. She said several times this evening that she wanted to see her crib. We'd explain to her that it was Alexa's crib now and that she was a BIG girl and that now she got to sleep in her BIG GIRL BED. She'd be excited one minute and then the next would say "No, ELLIE'S crib..."

We made a huge deal out of it, hoping that she would think this was really special. Which she did...until we turned the lights out and walked out the door. She got her cow and binky (which will have to be the next thing we take away... ugh... it's going to be a hard few months with all these transitions!) and then we methodically put her blankets on her one at a time. She has an order that they have to go in...and there are 4 blankets. Ha! So we tried to keep all of that the same... She seemed all good with it, but then we walked out the door and the tears just started flowing... We went in her room a couple more times just to reassure her and then we let her cry it out. The bad news was she cried for 20-30 minutes straight which is NOT like Ellie. She loves to go to bed usually. The good news is, she didn't try to get out of bed (at least not yet... we told her that she couldn't or we'd have to discipline her, and so far she has obeyed)! And now it's all quiet, so I think she fell asleep.
*
So goes the story of the first night in the big girl bed... I'll let you know how it goes! So far, so good...

Sweet Alexa...

2011-01-06T21:46:00.001-08:00

Took these sweet pictures of Alexa Joy today and couldn't help but post them...
Look at that sweet face!

Mommy and Alexa have had some good bonding time over the last 10 days...
After Christmas, we left Ellie in Kentucky for a few days to play with Papa and Nana Johnson and Uncle Josh. She is having a great time, but we're missing her here in Kansas!

But we're making the most of our time, and I will say that I have thoroughly enjoyed these days with my baby... Alexa is already growing up SO quickly. I just want to savor every moment.

It was over 60 degrees today, so we bundled her up and went for a walk around the neighborhood!

Just last night we got home from a 5 day student conference in Oklahoma City. Alexa's first SMC!!! She was such a trooper and it was a blast having my little sidekick with me!

2011 is off to a great start! Now, just to get both of my chickies back in the nest... :)

Sister Love...

2010-12-09T22:03:00.000-08:00

Took these pictures of the girls today and couldn't help but post them..
I'm so excited for the girls to grow up together...

So many fun memories yet to be had...

I love you so much Ellie Hope and Alexa Joy!

You are my sunshine!

Flower Girl for a day...

2010-12-09T13:11:00.000-08:00

It was a day we had been anxiously anticipating! Our good friends Josh and Betsy got married! We were so excited for their special day and it was Ellie's first time as a flower girl! That's where the anxiousness came in. Ha! :) At two years old, we just weren't quite sure how our little princess would handle the big day. Would she walk down the aisle like she was supposed to? Or would she cause a scene to be forever remembered on the wedding video? Again, it could have gone either way and we were hoping for the former and not the latter! I was a bit hesitent because the wedding was at 2pm...exactly the time that Ellie usually goes down for a nap. It was bound to be interesting.So, what's a parent to do? Well, on the night of the rehearsal you better believe that Ellie did SEVERAL trial runs down the aisle. Above is a picture of Ellie with Daddy...holding her fake flowers to practice with. The church had these cool flower pens that doubled perfectly for a little bouquet. After about 10 times, Joel was coaching her that she needed to do it TWO more times!
Ellie was all tuckered out after all that practicing! So we let her have her cow and binky and she crashed out on our way to the rehearsal dinner!But don't you worry! She was wide awake and all ready for the big day! She even got to get her hair done by our sweet friends Meg and Sarah and she was a GEM during the hair and make-up session. ;) She sat completely still and loved every minute of it!

I thought she looked just adorable!

And then, we had to get a couple more practice runs in before the guests started arriving... The dry runs on the wedding day were a little less successful. She would run like a crazy woman down the aisle and straight up onto the platform.

Thankfully, the bride wasn't worried at all...

And Ellie ended up doing a wonderful job! Straight down the aisle just like she was supposed to! I was proud as could be. First time as a flower girl: success!

Got a quick semi-family pic before the ceremony.

Unfortunately, Alexa was sound asleep and already in the nursery!

Most of the bridesmaids were composed of our staff girls, whom our Ellie LOVES! Here she is with one of them... our other Ellie, who is just like a part of our family! Ellie adores "Miss Ellie"!

So El got to spend a lot of the day with all the girls and she just ate that up! After the wedding, Ellie still had plenty of energy left so she proceeded to tear it up on the dance floor!

As you can see...she couldn't get enough. I should try to post a couple of her dancing videos! The still shots don't do it justice. :)

Congratulations Josh and Betsy! Your wedding was a FABULOUS day and incredibly memorable for us all!

Alexa is 6 months!!!

2010-11-23T06:20:00.001-08:00

Here I am world! Half way to my one year birthday!!! And as you can see, I'm pretty happy about that! I am loving life and growing like a weed!!!

One of the things that I have started doing more in the last month is sucking my thumb. It helps put me to sleep! I'm not too crazy about my pacifier. I usually just pull it out of my mouth. Mommy thinks I look pretty cute when I do this. At least right now... It probably won't be too cute if I'm still doing it when I'm 5. :) Grandpa McCulley also noticed that I always suck my right thumb, so he's guessing that I might be a lefty like Ellie and Mommy! We will see!

I'm also getting pretty big! At my 6 month check up I was:

26.5 inches - 77th percentile

15 lbs. 15 oz - 50th percentile

and my head was 43.5 centimeters - 75th percentile

Mommy and Daddy say that I'm a happy baby! I am still not too crazy about sleep. Why sleep when there is so much going on in the world? I think it's a waste of my time.

I'm talking a lot more these days too! I love to say "da da" and "ga ga" and things like that.

I also love to SCREAM at the top of my lungs for no apparent reason. It scares Mommy and then Ellie and I will get into screaming matches which we both think is pretty funny.

I can also sit up by myself for a minute or two at a time! I'm not quite sure how long I could actually do it, cause when I'm sitting up Ellie is usually quick to come and tackle me.

She and I have gotten to be really good friends. She's always hugging me and kissing me and sometimes sitting on me, but we're always having fun. I can't wait until I get just a little bit bigger and we can start running around together and getting into all kinds of things together!

I love being 6 months old!

Ellie at 28 months

2010-11-15T17:38:00.000-08:00

Ah... look at that sweet innocent face! :) But don't let it fool you... there is plenty of spunk and orneriness in there! Ha!
Decided to take Ellie's 28 month pictures with three of the most precious things in Ellie's life...
her binky, blankie and her cow! If she has these three things, all is right with the world.
If Ellie ever feels tired, mad, happy, scared, pretty much any emotion... all she wants are her, yep you guessed it, BINKY, BLANKIE and COW! That poor cow has been through so much! He's probably been washed in the washer about 50 times, been on lots of car trips, in lots of states, in lots of pack and plays and cribs... You get the picture. It's going to be a very tough day when the cow goes bye bye! We're hoping that his tail doesn't fall off. For over a year, that's been Ellie's favorite thing to do... Rub her nose with the cow's tail!
Much to Ellie's dismay, it isn't going to be long before we take binky away...
I just haven't had the heart to do it yet.
Soon... I think :/
I need to psych MYSELF up for it!
It will be a tough day... or tough few days...
But our little Ellie is growing up and doing so many fun and exciting things...
As of today, she knows all of her colors, her numbers, and many of her letters!
She can write an E, which she's pretty proud of.
She can spell H-O-T, say her address, spell her name.
She announced yesterday that Alexa was sucking her "RIGHT" thumb and sure enough, she can differentiate which hand is her "RIGHT" hand and which one is her "LEFT" hand!
And it's pretty definitive that she is going to be a LEFTY like her Momma! Yay!!! :)
She is speaking in much more complete sentences these days, too.
Last week she said, "come with us please, Daddy?"
LOVE this girl! She brings utter JOY to life! Not a dull moment around here!

Fun with Grandma and Grandpa McCulley!

2010-11-13T20:26:00.001-08:00

That's right! Grandma and Grandpa McCulley came for a visit, so Ellie decided to document the occasion. :)
She was SO excited, she decided to do a little dancing... in Mommy's heels. :)

Alexa was pretty pumped, too!

At the end of a long day of playing! Whew! We have a lot of fun when the Grandparents are here!

Alexa got some good bonding time with Grandpa Richard! Don't you think they kinda look alike? :)

You're never too young to read a handyman book...

And the girls got all dressed up in their pink to get a picture taken with Grandma! I thought this one turned out really cute!

It's a new Christmas tradition for Grandma to buy the girls Christma pj's... so here was our attempt at a photo shoot after bathtime and before bed!

This is fun, isn't it Alexa? :)

Thank you Grandma and Grandpa for making the trip to see us! We had so much fun!!!

9 Years!

2010-11-11T07:55:00.001-08:00

and SO much to be GRATEFUL for!
November 10, 2001 I married my best friend...
What an incredible ride it has been...
Thank you Lord for my incredible husband and beautiful little girls...
I am BLESSED!

Fall Leaves...

2010-11-07T07:42:00.000-08:00

It's that time of year again! All the leaves in our yard have fallen, thanks to a few days of pretty strong winds... This year, I was excited to get out and rake the leaves because I thought it would be a fun family activity!
And it was! Yet, not exactly what I had envisioned... I thought Ellie would be SO excited to get out in the leaves and play and jump in the piles... I did catch a few pictures of her playing in them, but it didn't turn out exactly like I had imagined... :) You know how that goes...

There were actually several times that I would encourage her to go out in the leaves and play and she would say "No! I'm scared!" ... which if you know Ellie, that is not like her at all! She is little miss "no fear"! But, of course, since I WANTED her to do it, she wasn't so keen on the idea. :)

After about an hour, we decided to recruit the help of DAD... Below is Ellie coaxing him out of his office with a "window kiss"... Let's just say she has him wrapped around her cute little pudgy fingers... Both of the girls do! :)

This pic of Ellie was definitely my favorite!

Yep, waist high in this "HUGE" pile of leaves. "HUGE" is Ellie's word of the month... Everything these days is "HUGE"! :)

About half way through, little sister decided to wake up from her nap and come out and join us, too! So fun to be able to put Alexa in her Bumbo chair and have her oversee our whole project!

She was very curious and interested in the leaves. I just had to make sure she only studied them and didn't put them in her mouth! Ha!

The picture below pretty much sums up Alexa's sweet little personality of late and our day as a whole! We had a blast raking the leaves, playing outside on a picture perfect fall day and then ending the day with popcorn and a WILDCAT victory over Texas!

Thank you Lord for beautiful days and fun memories!

Alexa at 5 months!

2010-10-21T21:57:00.000-07:00

That's right!!! Alexa Joy is 5 months old! And she seems to be very happy about it! :)
Our little pumpkin just gets sweeter by the day... I could just stare at this little face for hours... and she would just love that, too! This little girl cannot get enough face time. She LOVES to be held and cuddled and paid attention to. It just breaks my heart when I've spent time with her and then lay her down and walk away cause I have something I need to do. It's like she majorly gets her little feelings hurt and just starts sobbing... She's definitely my little feeler - while I'm pretty certain Ellie is gonna be our thinker! :)

We didn't have the most successful 5 month photo shoot, so I have to admit that we had to take a few of the pictures the next day. The top two pics are from our second go round! The pics in her sweet little monkey outfit are from her actual 5 month birthday! She was either sleeping, smiling but not looking at the camera, or looking at me with her serious/contemplative face! :)

I just adore this little beauty and I'm so thankful for 5 months with our Alexa Joy!

Here is what she is up to these days!

SMILING has become her favorite! And when she smiles, her eyes disappear cause she smiles so big! I love it!
Unfortunately, she is not the biggest sleeper in the world! She's still waking up one or two (or last night...multiple!) times a night! And she's still wide awake and ready for her day by 6:45am!
She's loving tummy time a lot more, as well as her jumparoo! She giggles and smiles and kicks her little chubby legs. It's adorable to watch...
She has also started "talking" a lot! Mostly in the form of raspberries and drooling all over the place while she does it!
I'm wondering if she's getting ready to cut teeth cause she has gotten super drooly and she gnaws on her fist all of the time now... She is also our resident thumb sucker and it's so cute!
She continues to be very laid back and go with the flow... I love it!

Our precious baby will not be a baby for long... Please don't grow up too soon sweet Alexa! Mama is loving every day with you!

Pumpkin Patch!

2010-10-03T15:45:00.001-07:00

One of my highlights each year since Ellie was born is our annual trip to the Britt's Garden Pumpkin Patch here in Manhattan! They have their own little petting zoo, lots of fun photo opps, a hayrack ride, corn maze and then you also get to pick your own little pumpkin at the end! The above picture is one of my favorites! Ellie HUGGED a baby cow... Now only if she would have rubbed her nose with it's tail. :)
Ellie was at SUCH a fun age this year and got to experience it all! Granted, we went during what would normally be her nap time, so she was quite the trooper!

My two little sunflowers! :) Alexa slept through most of the big adventure, so this was one of the moments where her eyes were actually open! :)

Make that THREE sunflowers :)

This goat actually tried to EAT Ellie's sweater, but she didn't seem to mind one bit. She is such an animal lover!

Ellie with her pumpkin finds... And aren't those sunglasses a hoot? :)

Daddy with our sleepy little baby Alexa... she was quite the trooper, too, letting us drag her all over!

Ellie found her very own ear of corn! She remembered how she and her Papa Johnson would feed the squirrels with ears of corn this past summer in Kentucky!

Quick family shot on the hayrack ride... It was such a beautiful day!

Mommy and her girls! It was such a fun family day!

Precious Baby...

2010-09-30T07:53:00.000-07:00

I can't write about my firstborn without sharing more about my precious baby! Oh our sweet sweet Alexa Joy! What a GIFT she has been to our family... Look at this beautiful little face!!!

Alexa is my little Mommy's girl, morning person, and laid back cuddler. I am absolutely smitten with her! Alexa and I get some great bonding time every morning while sister is still sound asleep... Usually Alexa wakes up around 6:45am every morning ready for her day to begin! She smiles and talks and kicks her little legs like crazy. Wherever I am, she turns her head to see me. I laugh because if I am behind her, she will tilt her head SO far back just so she can see where I am. She tries not to let me out of her sight for a second...

This has been a big week for Alexa! She rolled over for the very first time on Tuesday. She also discovered her thumb this week and has become quite the thumb sucker, which right now, I think is cute! And today was her first day to really enjoy being in her jumparoo! So, I of course, had to take several pictures to capture the moment!

She's already getting so big and grown up, but all I want is for her to stay my little baby... They sure don't stay that way for long...

Having two girls is more fun than I ever could have imagined in my wildest dreams... Enjoying these days and hoping that God will slow them down just a little, and even more than that, I'm praying that He'll help me remember every precious moment that is passing by... All the trips to the park, the belly laughs, the sweet faces of two little girls sound asleep, the hair bows and cute little outfits, the list goes on... God has been so good to us!

Beautiful Firstborn...

2010-09-24T10:59:00.000-07:00

Spent time today thanking God for my precious firstborn... Ellie Hope... It's crazy to think that three short years ago, God knew he was getting ready to bless our lives with this curious, creative, and courageous little beauty...but we had no idea what an incredible journey we were about to embark on!
I love these "thinking" pictures... I am pretty sure I have several of her Daddy doing the same thing...
Look at those pretty pink toes...

and beautiful chubby pink fingers...

and those eyes! perfect to me in every way... thank you Lord for the firstborn you chose just for us... please use her to continue to teach me patience, kindness, gentleness and selflessness as we walk through these wonderful yet sometimes challenging days of toddlerhood. Help me to teach her, train her and love her the way You would have me to. So thankful for this good and perfect gift...

Sister Love...

2010-09-22T11:06:00.000-07:00

This morning (our college student in the making didn't wake up until 11am :) when I went to get Ellie out of bed, instead of anxiously wanting me to get her out of her crib she said...

"Alexa? Hold her?" so I went and got the baby and put her in the crib with Ellie...
I just LOVE the way that Ellie loves Alexa... She is so sweet to her and loves her and snuggles her and kisses on her... Alexa is the only person that Ellie will snuggle with. Makes her Daddy just a wee bit jealous. My prayer is that my girls will always be the best of friends!

AWANA and POTTY TRAINING!

2010-09-19T23:13:00.001-07:00

Oh what a big week in Ellie's world!!!
First of all... tonight was the FIRST NIGHT that Ellie went potty in the BIG GIRL POTTY all by herself! Yay Ellie! Okay...now i need to get serious about this potty training stuff... :/ Not sure I'm ready for this! Ready or not...it's definitely time!

Good Job Ellie Hope! This will be a picture that I'm sure she will love in years to come! Ha!

And then as if potty training wasn't big enough... Ellie also started AWANA this week! At 2 years old, Ellie is now a PUGGLE :) It was so cute when we picked her up from her first night. She said "Mom, Puggles fun!" I asked her what she did and she said "snack...play..." Then after we got her packed in her carseat and headed down the road, she started singing "Jesus Loves Me" in the back seat! I love it!

Our little girl is growing up before our eyes... If only I could slow the days down... I'm not ready for her to be a big girl yet! But she reminds me daily that she's getting big with her big vocabulary and sharp little mind (yes, she figured out the child safety locks on the cabinets and can now also let herself out the front door... :/ )

Oh what a blessed woman I am! :)

Alexa at 4 months!!!

2010-09-19T22:56:00.000-07:00

The months are just flying by and our baby girl is now 4 months old!!! How quickly the days pass! Our sweet Alexa Joy is getting to be more content and precious by the day! We are smitten with this little beauty!

Yes, it's true! She definitely looks like a little McCulley. :) Some days I think she looks like my Dad...other days like one of my brothers! But either way, she favors my side of the family!

Look at that sweet little face... Alexa has come to be a very content little baby. She is a morning girl to the max and likes to get to bed early. The complete opposite of her big sister! Wouldn't you just know it? :)

Mommy and Daddy sure do love our little bundle of JOY!

A few other fun facts about our Alexa at 4 months...

Just found her thumb and seems to sometimes prefer that over her binky!
SMILES a TON in the mornings! She usually wakes up around 6:45am to eat and then just stays awake and coos and smiles for 2 hours straight before she is ready for her morning nap! She usually gets her morning nap in before her sister even budges for the first time in the mornings! Ha!
Is ALMOST rolling over! If she could just get that darn arm out of the way! :)
Is incredibly observant. She loves to watch everything and everyone around her. She gets very easily distracted from eating if she senses there is something else going on!
Alexa is really beginning to warm up to people and let others hold her now... For her first 3 months she was quite the Momma's girl and wasn't too sure about anyone else! :)
Alexa has a very keen sense of hearing! She is easily startled by sounds - loud or soft ... especially when her sister runs in by her bed and starts screaming "BABY!" trying to get her to wake up! Then in turn looks at me and says "Baby Awake, Momma!" hmmmm...wonder how that happened? :)

Loving life with our tiny beauty!

A fun day at the park...

2010-08-31T13:28:00.000-07:00

Hello world! I'm off to the park to feed the ducks and play!
This duck almost got me, but don't worry...I wasn't scared!

Look at all these geese! I ended up stepping in goose poop and getting it in the van. Oops! But it was definitely worth it, cause I had a lot of fun!

Out of food, so the geese decided to move on...

So, off to the park to play in the fountain and on the slides!

Mommy and I had lots of fun going down the slides together while Daddy watched Alexa in the stroller and was nice enough to take our picture!

It was a fun, fun day!

It's Papa Barry's birthday!

2010-08-24T21:07:00.001-07:00

Alexa says "Happy Birthday Papa Barry!!!!"
Wish we could have been with you on your big day, but at least wanted to say we love you and hope your day was wonderful!

See how I'm growing up so fast?

It was a beautiful day in Manhattan today so we got to go outside and play!

Ellie took good care of Alexa...who is now sitting quite regularly in her Bumbo chair!

Love you so much and can't wait for you guys to come and visit sometime soon!

Grandparents always welcome!

Alexa Joy at 3 months

2010-08-17T07:03:00.000-07:00

Our sweet Alexa Joy is just growing up TOO fast!!! As you can see from the pictures, she is turning into quite the smiley baby. Thanks Aunt K-Lo for the sweet outfit. It's one of her favs!
Ellie always wants Alexa to have some sort of doll or baby with her, so for this photo shoot, big sister gave her her yellow baby to hold. :) So sweet!
A few fun facts about our 3 month old:

Alexa is holding her head up so well now and gets a few 15 minute stretches a day in her bumbo chair!
She has a killer smile and it just melts her Daddy's and my heart! She is especially smiley every morning when she wakes up and her whole face smiles. I LOVE IT!
She is starting to "talk" with us now with her little coos and gurgles. Oh they are just precious.
Alexa is getting more tolerant of all the "Ellie love" that she receives a million times a day. I am so excited for my girls to be good friends!
She is still waking up in the night - some nights even twice. So, I'm a little sleepier this time around with the middle of the night feedings! But she is worth it!
Alexa is a HUGE Momma's girl! It's nice to be loved so much :) but sometimes makes it a big tricky if I need to leave her for any period of time. She can be crying her head off and the minute I take her, she will stop crying immediately. It's still funny to me how she knows.
This girl does NOT like to be hungry. I've never seen a little person get so fired up as she does if she does not have her food every three hours! I think we have a little firecracker on our hands for sure!
Our baby is definitely living up to her name and bringing our family great JOY!

Ellie at 25 months

2010-08-14T06:45:00.000-07:00

I feel like I was just writing our "Ellie is TWO!" post and now another month has already passed by! Not sure if I will keep doing these monthly updates for the rest of her life or not :) but for now, I will continue because Ellie just keeps growing and changing by the day it seems! We just celebrated each of our girls monthly birthdays while we were on a staff retreat in Great Bend, Kansas!
Here are a few fun facts about our Ellie at 25 months...

Her vocabulary continues to grow leaps and bounds! Yesterday she said her first 5 word sentence. Now, this is still an exception to the rule, mind you, but it's so fun to be able to really start to communicate with her!
Ellie is becoming more and more of a little "mommy" these days, carrying around her baby dolls and taking care of them.
She is definitely my big helper! Ellie loves to help me unload the dishwasher, the dryer, hold the dustpan when I'm sweeping, help us water the yard, etc. She will say "Ellie help" or "Ellie clean up!"
She continues to grow as little miss independent! SO...everything takes us a little longer now. She wants to buckle her own carseat, get out of her high chair by herself. Her key phrase is "Ellie do it!". She has also become very choosy about which outfit she wears everyday and how she gets her hair done and what shoes she wears. Oh my!
She has quite the little personality and is a bit of a prankster. Her big thing right now is she will run up to you and say "bug, bug!" pretending that you have a bug crawling on you and then she will LAUGH! She gets quite the kick out of herself. :)
She continues to love Barney and now has added Veggie Tales to her list (thankfully!)
Bottom line, our Ellie is a BLAST! I wish you could get a sense of her BIG personality from these posts... I will try to post a couple of videos soon cause writing just doesn't do it justice.

Thirsty!

2010-08-10T22:29:00.000-07:00

Did a little running through the sprinkler today... well, sort of! Do you like the swimsuit and aqua shoes? :) Ellie insists that whenever she is even close to water, she has to wear these shoes! Thought this video of her trying to get a drink was too cute not to post! Enjoy!

Excessive HEAT Warning...

2010-08-10T22:10:00.000-07:00

If you live in Kansas, you know that the last few days have been full of EXCESSIVE HEAT WARNINGS! Many days over 100 degrees actual temps with 110+ degree heat indexes. This combined with little to no rain has meant we're having a hard time keeping our grass alive! While Daddy has been out of town, Ellie and my job has been watering the grass and flowers early in the morning and later in the evenings. Well, yesterday Ellie decided we should water in the middle of the day, too! It was a great reason to get her outside and she loves to "help"... So here she is in action...watering one of the dead spots in our grass!

If you know Ellie, she hates to be dirty! I can almost here her saying in the above pic "Mommy, TOWEL!" which means "please come get this dirt off of my hand!"
She has actually been doing a great job watering and also pulling weeds... She's my right hand lady in the yard!

We're having lots of fun on these hot summer Kansas days!

Happy Birthday Papa Richard!

2010-08-07T21:28:00.000-07:00

Today was Papa Richard's 55th birthday and since we didn't get to be with him on his big day, we took a few pictures to say Happy Birthday! We love you Papa!

Catching up...

2010-08-06T21:28:00.001-07:00

Oh the blog... I am so sorry I've let myself get SO far behind this summer! I was almost too overwhelmed to even try to catch up! I think that's why I kept putting it off... But at least wanted to get some pictures up of my sweeties... All THREE of them! We have had a very busy, but WONDERFUL summer. We've travelled over 5,000 miles by car (minivan, actually :) and the girls have done fabulously! They are little road warriors! We have gotten to be with students, see family, ministry partners and also are now starting to get to know our neighbors in our new neighborhood in Manhattan. It's definitely been a summer of relationships, which I love. As you can see above, Ellie and her Daddy continue to bond and have great times together!

As have Ellie and Alexa. If you know much about Ellie, you will know that she has some major personal space. The only exception to this rule is her sister. We can't seem to keep Ellie off of her! It's hilarious. She loves to snuggle her and kiss her and hug her and try to sooth her when she's crying. She is a wonderful big sister and I know that someday Alexa will appreciate it, even if she's not quite sure what to think of Ellie right now. :)

And then we have our little doll baby Alexa. What a sweet addition to our family she has been. It's funny, but only after a few short weeks, I can't really remember life without her. She lives up to her name and definitely adds JOY to our days.

More to come soon, I promise. I hope to get back into the blogging groove now that we're settling back in at home and getting into "somewhat" of a routine! As routine as life can get at the Johnson house! Love you all... Thanks for being patient with me!

Alexa Joy at 2 months!

2010-07-17T16:22:00.000-07:00

Our little pumpkin is quickly moving out of that "newborn" phase and becoming her own little person and it's so much fun! We absolutely adore our little Alexa Joy! She continues to have a look and a personality all her own...

Alexa continues to be such a sweet, sweet baby and grows more content and happy by the day! Here are a few of the things our little 2 month old is doing these days...

Alexa is 11 lbs. 10 oz and in the 54th percentile! She's right in the middle of the chart for everything... height, weight and head circumfrence :)
She can now hold her head up all by herself and is a strong little thing at that!
She is SMILING, which I LOVE! And starting to make those cute little cooing sounds. :)
She has been sleeping pretty long stretches through the night...around 7-9 hours, which is great for this Momma!
She still LOVES to be held and cuddled and talked to. Though she is growing in her contentment of just being put in her swing or laid in her boppy.
Rarely has blowouts like Ellie did. Don't know if you remember, but Ellie blew out a diaper like no other and thankfully, this is a much more rare occurance with Alexa!

Still having a blast with my two girls and thanking God every day for the many ways he has blessed us!

Ellie is TWO!

2010-07-14T15:59:00.000-07:00

It happened! Our beautiful firstborn has officially become a toddler and gone and turned TWO on us! As you can see from her picture, she is very proud to be two years old! Sadly, her Daddy and I were away for a conference for most of her actual birthday, but made it back just in time to see her on her big day before she headed to bed! She was anxiously awaiting us at the door of my Mom and Dad's house and I couldn't have been more excited to see her and give her a huge hug!!! Here are some FUN facts about our now TWO year old!

She finally hit 25 lbs and is the 17th percentile for her weight...
She is HAPPY and SMILEY and just all around FUN! We have a BLAST with our little Ellie Hope.
She knows all of her colors and numbers and the letter E. The rest of her letters are coming along. But she loves to tell us numbers on speed limit signs, colors of cars and objects while we're driving down the road (white van, purple slide, etc)
She is talking up a STORM these days and is just hilarious... Quickly fading into the past are the days when she mis-pronounced names and words. :(
Ellie is in love with watching Barney and could see the same episode on repeat 20 times if we would let her (which we don't, by the way. :)
She seems to love boys and gets so excited to see them (her Daddy says this better fade pretty quickly!)
It's very important to Ellie that things are in ORDER. She is quick to close an open door, make sure things are in their place, will say "Uh Oh" or "other way!" in a store if something is knocked over or turned the wrong direction. I think we might have a little perfectionist on our hands.
She loves being outside, but hates to be hot and doesn't like wierd textured on her feet like grass or sand. She will stand like she is stuck in cement if you place her on one of these surfaces. :)
She finally loves to sit with me and read a book and is quick to grab her book before bed and sit in my lap as I read it.
She always wants a full account of where everyone is in the house. If someone is home, she needs to know where they are, what they are doing, etc. Then she is appeased and can go on with her playing.
She LOVES her baby sister and continues to smother her with love, kisses and affection.
Ellie still LOVES to sleep and is the easiest kid when it comes to putting her down for naps and bedtimes. She often asks for it by saying "night, night? binky? cow? tired!" It's not unusual for her to sleep in til noon after going to bed at 9:30 or 10pm. I wonder if this will continue into her teenage years?
She is getting very opinionated when it comes to what she wears, what color of shoes she puts on and how her hair is done each day. She also is pretty choosy when it comes to what cup she wants to drink out of in the morning, if she wants her milk warm or cold, you get the idea!
She knows her name is Ellie Hope Johnson and she will tell you her address, how to spell H-O-T Hot! and definitely knows who our President is (thanks Papa and Nana Johnson!) President Obama recently turned 49 and all day she said "Happy Birthday Obama!)

Oh wow, I could go on and on! This is SUCH a fun season... And if you couldn't tell, we are absolutely smitten with our Ellie Hope!

Alexa Joy at 1 month!

2010-06-17T09:25:00.000-07:00

Our sweet Alexa Joy turned ONE MONTH old while we were down at KALEO this summer! She has been quite the world traveler, even at 4 weeks old...
We are loving life with our 2nd little miracle... She has a look and a personality all her own and we just love it! People tend to say she looks a lot more like her Mommy... So it's fun cause Joel and I both have our own little mini-me's!

Here are some fun facts about our 1-month old...

Loves to be swaddled all the time!
LOVES to be held and cuddled as much as possible...
Hates to be cold, even for one second.
Will always let us know right away when she has a dirty diaper.
Is starting to like her baths...though she wasn't so sure at the beginning!
Loves tummy time and is developing some very strong neck muscles!
Enjoys her big sister, though can sometimes get overwhelmed with all her "love" :)

We thank God for our little Alexa Joy! She has definitely brought JOY to our lives!

Ellie is 23 months!

2010-06-15T18:50:00.001-07:00

Aaaaah! That's right! Ellie is 23 months old!!! How did this happen? My "baby" is now a little girl... She gets more fun by the day and you can't help but LOVE this little personality!
As you can see...we have a very smiley toddler. She is a very happy girl and is at her most fun stage yet... She is also quite a bit of work these days as she tests boundaries, exerts her independence and has more energy than 10 college students combined! :)

Here are some other fun facts about our almost 2 year old!

*After spending almost 2 weeks with her Grandparents in Kentucky after Alexa was born, she has developed quite the southern accent! She now pronounces down with two syllables, and says "baby" with quite the southern drawl! It's pretty cute.

* She is in LOVE with her new baby sister (if you hadn't caught on to that in previous posts!) and wants to be with her every second of the day. No jealousy here...just more love than the baby can handle! :)

* She's become obsessed with brushing her teeth!

*Puzzles are one of her new loves.

*She is starting to sing lots of songs... Two of her favorites are twinkle twinkle little star and "No One" off of the Chipmunks the Squeakuel CD. We've heard that CD about a zillion times!

*Nana J is teaching her her address and how to spell "HOT" and "COLD". A little speller already at less than 2 years old. Today I heard her practicing her numbers in spanish! Thank goodness for a Grandma who was a kindergarten teacher for 30 years! :)

The list goes on, but those are a few of the highlights...

Loving life with our two girls!

back from hiatus...

2010-06-14T12:01:00.001-07:00

Sorry that it's been so long since you've seen a post from me! It's been a BUSY few weeks, to say the least... On Alexa's 2 week birthday, we left Manhattan and started our trek to KALEO - our student summer program down in Gulf Shores, Alabama! We spent 15 hours on the road the first day...took a day to recuperate in Kentucky with Joel's family and then drove the other 12 hours down to Alabama on day 3. All in all, it was a great trip!
Here are some of the most recent pictures of our sweet Alexa Joy! She is changing by the day... These pics make her look like a little redhead, though her hair really isn't red at all... It was pretty dark when she was born and it's turning to blonde very quickly! She is a really good baby, now that we've started to figure out how to get her to sleep at night! We had a few rough nights of 2 hours of sleep or less. Whew! Never had those with Ellie, so it was good for me! :)

Alexa is a very content little lady... she LOVES to be held and cuddled. She's got beautiful little "piano fingers" and pretty lips! Those seem to be the first two things that everyone comments on about her! That and the full head of hair that she has already! :)

And as you can see... Ellie still LOVES her sister! She's the first person she asks for every morning and she gives her a million kisses, hugs and fist pounds a day. We have to be careful or Ellie will be putting a blanket or pillow over her head (very affectionately, of course!) or laying ON her with all her weight. Ha! She also is constantly wanting to cram a binky in Alexa's mouth, or pounding on her back like Mama does when she burps the baby. Ellie is already such a wonderful and motherly big sister... It's adorable to watch!

We continue to feel so blessed with our two little beauties! We've been lucky enough to have the help of both sets of Grandparents since the baby has been born. Joel's parents will leave this weekend and then I am so thankful that I'll still have the students around to lend a helping hand!

We're having a great time down here in Gulf Shores, despite the effects of the oil spill... YES, oil has hit the beach, but thankfully our students still have jobs and have only lost a few hours thus far.

I also got to celebrate my 34th birthday while we were down here in Alabama! It was a wonderful day and I felt spoiled by Joel and the other staff and students at the program... They are all too good to me! The below picture is of Joel and I at a surprise lunch that the staff threw at our favorite Mexican restaurant in town... I made Joel get under the hat with me! Is he cute, or what? :)

We have LOVED getting to live with all of the students in the same hotel. It's kind of like being back in the dorms again! This next picture is of Alexa and I having lunch with some of the girls at the program. It's SO nice to just have to run down the hall or down the stairs to get to be with everyone. It really is Joel and my favorite time of the year! We'd still live in the dorms with everyone if we could. And we love having our girls grow up around all of these wonderful college students!

So that's a little update from our corner of the world... We will be here until July 3rd and then we hit the road again! More to come soon!

funny Ellie story...

2010-05-29T21:23:00.001-07:00

Since Alexa has been born, it's like Ellie has grown up overnight! In the past week, Ellie has been doing all kinds of new things. As I have said before, she is just smitten with her sister. Every morning, "baby Yeta" is the first person she asks for! I love that she either calls her "yeta" or "exa"! So cute!

Well, this morning when Ellie woke up, we had just given Alexa a bath. As Joel's Mom and I were getting ready to dress her, Ellie noticed Alexa's little umbilical stub that hasn't fallen off yet... (though it's getting VERY close). Ellie was concerned and said "uh-oh...bleedin' - to which we quickly responded "No, Alexa's not bleeding..." before we could finish explaining what that little thing on Alexa's belly button was, Ellie then responded "poop?" We burst out laughing! It does kind of look that way! Ha!

Another very sweet thing that Ellie has been doing since Alexa was born was learn how to pray! Right when we sit down at the table, Ellie always quickly says "pray?" So we all join hands and pray. But this week we've been giving her the chance to pray. Her sweet prayer is "thank you Jesus...Amen!" YES... THANK YOU JESUS, AMEN!

Beyond blessed...

2010-05-27T22:21:00.000-07:00

I've been doing a lot of thinking this week about how incredibly blessed I feel to have such a wonderful family... As I look into the eyes of my girls, I have often been brought to tears to think that I have the privilege of raising these girls and helping to shape their little lives. What a huge responsibility, but awesome joy and privilege... My heart really is overflowing with gratitude for the way that God has blessed... He didn't have to and we didn't do anything to deserve it, but God has entrusted these little lives to US! When I think that just 4 years ago, we thought we might never see this day of having and raising children, it makes this season even more sweet.

So thank you Lord, for the wonderful man you gave me to do life with and raise kids with. He is more than I could have ever asked for... and thank you for our little Ellie Hope and Alexa Joy... They have brought such richness to life and I can't wait to see what you have in store for them in the days and years ahead. Thanks for the joy and privilege of being their Mommy.

What do you think?

2010-05-21T21:46:00.000-07:00

Ellie as a newborn

Alexa as a newborn Jen as a newborn

First Days at home...

2010-05-20T20:24:00.000-07:00

We've officially be home from the hospital for a day and a half now and are LOVING it! Above is our little Alexa Joy in her coming home from the hospital outfit! It's the same one we brought Ellie home in 22 months ago. Thanks to our good friend, Jana, for this sweet little shirt and hat!
Tonight, Alexa had her first bath... Let's just say she wasn't the biggest fan. :) So...we're not posting any of the actual bath pictures, but instead a pic of her happy again after she got warmed up in her towel with Daddy... :)

Ellie continues to be smitten with "baby"! I'm still not sure she realizes that this is her sister and she's here to stay. But I love that she loves her! Tonight as we were about to put Ellie to bed, she wanted to make sure and share some cow tail with Alexa. If you don't know Ellie well, her big attachment is to her stuffed cow and she rubs her nose with it's tail. To show her love, she rubs everyone's nose with his tail. I'm glad that Alexa made the cut. :)

Ellie is also obsessed with giving baby fist pounds, hi-fives and hugs! I can't get over how cute this is!!! I'm already SO excited to have two girls who I hope will be the best of friends as they grow up!

Alexa is such a sweet and content baby... Here's to hoping she sleeps like this all night tonight! :)

Our Sweet Alexa Joy...

2010-05-18T20:26:00.001-07:00

Our sweet Alexa Joy entered the world on Monday, May 17th at 10:36am! She weighed in at 7 lbs. 1 oz and was 19 1/2 inches long. We are absolutely smitten with her and already can't imagine what life was like without her in our family... Let us introduce her to you!

*
One last picture of us as a family of three... headed out the door to the hospital! Ellie had no idea that this day her life would change!

First pictures of Mommy and Daddy with our sweet little Alexa Joy...
Our first picture as a family of FOUR!

Daddy and his two little princesses...
Ellie is already a wonderful big sister!!!

More to come! Thanks for your prayers for a safe and healthy delivery. We feel incredibly blessed!!!

22 months!

2010-05-14T23:54:00.001-07:00

THUMBS UP to being 22 months old!
This is one of Ellie's newest things. Giving 2 thumbs up with a big grin! I just love it!
Another new Ellie-ism... throwing her head back and laughing like crazy! It's so cute!!!

Ellie is getting to be such a big girl these days! She is 22 months, going on 10, I think! She is not afraid of anything and is always wanting to try something new. Curious is her middle name!!! Here she is thinking that she can master a rock climbing wall that is probably way too big for her. But I love that she's not afraid to try. :)

Hard to believe that our "baby" is getting so close to 2 years old! And that we'll be welcoming baby #2 in just a couple of days!!! Where has time gone? We enjoyed one of the last days with Ellie as our only and tried to get a lot of play time in before life brings a big change on Monday!

Ellie LOVES spending time with her Daddy! It always brings a lot of smiles!

Other fun facts about our 22 month old...

She is getting a mouth full of teeth! And she is getting WAY better about letting me brush them. :)
Ellie is incredibly curious and has amazing fine motor skills, which can be a hazard to her health. She has figured out how to get into almost any "child-proof" thing, including bottles, undoing safety latches and today I caught her trying to take safety plugs out of the outlets. Gotta watch her every move.
She takes everything apart and tries to figure out how it works! Her favorites right now are pens. So, if she gets ahold of a pen...good luck trying to find all the pieces to put it back together!
She's getting quite the large vocabulary and it's so fun to watch her little personality develop!
Ellie loves anything that has to do with "baby"! She enjoys pushing her stroller with her baby doll, playing in baby sister's room and pushing the swing and bouncy seat, and whenever she sees a "baby" (sometimes they are way bigger than her even!), she is completely taken!
Ellie LOVES animals of all kinds! Right now she is VERY into puppies, birds (pronounced bird-a!), bunnies, kitties, goats, cows...okay, any animal!
She just started SINGING this week and it's SO CUTE!!! I got a little video of her singing a line from her Chipmunk CD. I'll see if I can post it soon.

Anyway, we are LOVING this stage with Ellie! She is just so much fun and we feel so privileged to be her Mom and Dad!!! Looking forward to adding number two. We'll introduce you to HER in the next post!

9 days away...

2010-05-08T21:13:00.001-07:00

Looking a bit "end of the day"ish, but wanted to post one more set of belly pics before the big day! Can't believe our new little princess arrives in a mere 9 days. We are so excited to meet her!
And Ellie loves being in on the action as well... She's going to be a wonderful big sister...
Lately she has been coming up to my belly and hugging it, giving it a kiss and saying "I U", which in Ellie language is "I Love You". I think they are going to be great friends...

Fun with the Fam...

2010-05-08T13:48:00.000-07:00

A day full of family! These days are my favorite... Just wish that they could last longer...

Joe, Belinda, Wyatt and Isaac got to fly back for a few days from Maryland to visit family, so Jason and Jen, and Joel, Ellie and I made the trip to Kansas City to meet up with them for the day! It was picture perfect weather and we had so much fun! The day just went by too fast. As you can see from some of these pictures, Wyatt and Ellie have gotten to the age where they are starting to become friends. Oh how I wish we lived closer so they could do everyday life together! But until then, we'll take advantage of these special moments.

Had to get a sibling picture with all the kiddos in it!

We got to visit the "Deanna Rose Farmstead" and it was a hit for the whole family! I would highly recommend it to all if you are in the Overland Park area. It's free during the week and only $2 on the weekends! You can't beat that. Ellie and Wyatt LOVED all of the animals!

We even got to spend a little time with Belinda's Mom and sister Brianna and her kids. Brianna is how I even met Bel in the first place and subsequently got to introduce her to my brother! The rest is history! So, it was really fun to get to catch up with all of them.

After we were done at the Farmstead, we headed to the Legends to do a little shopping and let the kids enjoy the water fountains. It was a definite hit as well! Wy guy just had to get in a little smooch. I love that they love each other. :)

The whole family all together. We missed you, Dad and Mom!

Okay...a couple more shots from the kiddy zoo. Ellie just loved petting the goats. We could hardly get her to move on to see the other animals.

And a closing shot of the two cousins.

Seeing them together just melts my heart.

We are truly blessed...

21 months...and under the weather :(

2010-04-14T22:36:00.000-07:00

Our sweet girl turned 21 months old today! But it didn't turn out to be the birthday we expected. Poor thing just wasn't really herself all day... wouldn't really eat much and was just not in a happy mood. I thought she was just tired since her nap schedule has been out of whack while we've been showing our house these last couple of weeks... But then we headed to Home Depot tonight to pick up some paint for her new big girl room and all of a sudden she threw up everywhere while we were at the paint counter! Thankfully, it was just on the floor and didn't get on her or anyone else and the lady who was working was SO sweet to help us clean everything up and was very kind about it. But my poor sweet girl has never thrown up before - at least not like this! We felt absolutely terrible!

After getting her packed back up in the car, all she said was "home" with those sweet and pitiful eyes... So we came home and she crawled under the table and just laid down. Her Daddy...who is just incredible, by the way... crawled down there with her and they laid together for like 30 minutes. Aren't these pictures precious. He so loves his little girl.

The pictures are a little out of order, cause I'm having trouble sorting them... but you get the idea. It's so terrible to have a sick little one and not be able to take the pain away. She was also running a low fever, so we got her all ready for bed and she was asleep before we could even get out of the room. She slept soundly last night, so I'm praying she's back to her happy self this morning when she wakes up!

few more pics...

2010-04-13T21:50:00.000-07:00

in my new spring pj's after bathtime! and no, I won't sleep in the skirt. :)

It was a beautiful day in Manhattan today! So I decided to break out the new spring dress and my friend Jena's sunglasses. :)

Once again, I can't go anywhere without my trusty backpack.

and decided to do a little dancing, too! I love to dance!

Easter and other happenings...

2010-04-12T19:31:00.001-07:00

Hey Everyone!

Just 5 more weeks until I become a big sister!!!

We are counting down the days. But I am enjoying every minute of having Daddy and Mommy's full attention until sissy arrives on May 17th!

***

First off...look at my cool new backpack from Papa and Nana Johnson! I just love it and feel like I fit right in with the college girls when I wear it.

And here is the view from the back... I also got to go on my very first Easter Egg Hunt! It was a few days after Easter, but it didn't matter to me! We were on the road to Papa and Nana McCulley's on Easter Sunday, so Mommy and Daddy took me out to the park last week for my egg hunt. I loved it! And I did everything I could to hold all the eggs all by myself. Mommy offered to help me carry them, but I told her that I could handle it on my own. I'm getting very independent you know.

Also, notice my cool yellow shorts and socks pulled up to my knees. Daddy dressed me in his favorite color of yellow and he thought I looked pretty cool. :) I think he's hoping I turn out to be a soccer player someday or something! :)

And finally, this is me in my pretty Easter dress from Nana and Papa McCulley! Isn't it pretty! I even left my bow in most of the morning at church, which is rare for me.

But I just loved it so much!

***

That's it for now! I will write again soon...

Party in the USA...

2010-03-24T20:52:00.000-07:00

20 months already!

2010-03-14T21:24:00.000-07:00

Okay, I know that I am biased... but look at that adorable face! We decided to do Ellie's 20 month pictures in her PJ's because bedtime is seriously one of our favorite times with Ellie. She has the cutest little attachment to this stuffed cow! She loves to rub her nose with it's tail. It's super comforting to her. Very cute. And when Daddy and I put her to bed each night, while we are praying for her she will rub her nose, then Mommy's nose, then Daddy's nose with the tail. It's just precious.Some other night time favorites are her bath, her blankie, her "baby" which is actually her pacifier that she only gets at night cause we tell her she is a big girl and pacifiers are for babies - therefore she calls the paci a "baby". :)
We also can't get enough of these SMILES! We love it when she smiles SO big that her eyes close. It's hilarious. And she's become such a ham lately...just cheesin' it up for the camera!

Other fun facts about our 20 month old.

She has just broken through 4 new molars - and she didn't even cry a bit!
Lots of new favorite words including I Love You (pronounced "I U"), bath, diaper, poopie and pee pee (I think we might be getting close to potty training time!), night night, plus she can now say almost every one of our staff's names (Beppy for Betsy, Mamie for Macie, Tracy, Kyle and Bob is definitely a favorite to say!)
She is tall enough to reach doorknobs now and even let herself out the front door last week. Yikes! Everything is now locked from the inside to prevent this from happening again.
Still a dancing machine! Her new favorite move is spinning in circles with her left arm extended straight out in front of her. It's hilarious. Kind of looks like her own version of the sprinkler. :)
She has what we like to the call the "naughty corner". It's where she runs and hides under our coat rack whenever she has something that she knows she is not supposed to have. A few days ago I found her there with an entire pack of gum that she had opened, unwrapped every piece of gum and started eating them.
When she is caught doing something she is not supposed to do, she looks at you all sweetly, reaches her arms out and says I U (or "I Love You") and then puckers up for a kiss. Where do they learn these things? Don't worry, she still gets disciplined, though it's very hard after that. :)
The list goes on...but these are just a few of our favorite things about our Ellie at 20 months.

Oh the joys of a toddler...

2010-03-13T19:40:00.000-08:00

Any other parents out there excited for spring weather? I know the Johnson's sure are! And it looks like we might get our wish here in Kansas this next week. Ellie is just getting so stir crazy in the house and she's ready to play outside! We got a little taste of it last week when the temperatures warmed up and now she is just itching to get back out there!

So until then, we've been embracing what is called "make your own fun". Ellie has been running around like a wild woman, unloading every book shelf, every toy from her toybox, every drawer, every non-child proofed cabinet, etc. Now if we could only teach her to put it all back!!! I think I spend a third of my day just putting everything back in it's place, but it's all worth it. Today I walked into her room when she had been quiet for a little too long and saw that she had pulled every book out of her book baskets - but then was sitting and quietly "reading" one of them! It is a rare occasion that this girl sits still long enough to look through a book! Ha!

We're having a really good time watching our little girl explore her world. Looking forward to exploring what's outside the house in hopefully not too many days!

Dancing the night away...by popular demand!

2010-02-28T11:52:00.000-08:00

Here it is! The video that has been highly requested! (by family anyway... :) Ellie Hope tearing up the dance floor at our Valentine's Dessert. Please notice how about half way through this video, Ellie decides to run out and slap a girl on the behind. It's hilarious!

27 weeks and GROWING!

2010-02-28T10:47:00.001-08:00

27 weeks 3 days along with #2
Thought it had been a while (over 7 weeks!) since I took my last belly pic. Time is quickly flying by in this pregnancy. I really can't believe it... It's going SOOOO much faster than my pregnancy with Ellie did... Some days I even forget that I'm pregnant unless I catch a glimpse of myself in a mirror and then am quickly reminded that I am INDEED pregnant! :) We are 27 1/2 weeks along - only a little over 11 weeks to go since we'll be having this little sweetie by c-section on Monday, May 17th. Or at least that's the plan right now!
*

I have been feeling GREAT! I can't believe how gracious God has been. Besides the crazy cold/walking pnemonia I have right now - the pregnancy has been relatively smooth. I feel good, haven't been tired or too achy or anything. I am starting to get to the "BIG" pregnant stage, as I like to call it and now it's a little harder to bend over and haul Ellie around. I will just get large from here on out. I tend to carry all in my stomach, so my stomach will grow by tremendous proportions over these next few weeks! I start bumping into people and things with it. Ha! :) Watch out!
*

We still haven't come close to picking a name - so we'd better get on that! If you have any suggestions send them our way cause it's been harder to agree on anything this time around!

Ellie is getting very excited about being a big sister. She's going to be a great one! I'm trying to soak up every minute of these next 78 days of her being my only little pookster... She's just so much fun right now!
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Love you all... Thanks for checking in...

Valentine's Dessert and Dance at StuMo!

2010-02-27T12:14:00.001-08:00

Our little performer!
Not happy when Dad tries to take her off of the stage. :)

Singing like she owns the place. :)

Ellie and Mommy with some of our ChiO friends!

Our beautiful staff girls!

A little family picture...

More fun with some of the the staff girls. We have such a fun team!

Our annual StuMo Valentine's Dessert was a huge success again this year and Ellie had SO much fun with all of the students. She danced her way into the night and was up WAY past her bedtime. I think she finally hit the hay around midnight that night and was such a trooper. It was definitely a fun night had by all...

19 months on Valentine's Day!

2010-02-14T14:34:00.000-08:00

Ellie and Mommy all dressed up on Valentine's Day!
Look at that face! Could you get more adorable that this? :) Not to this Mommy!
Sporting a new Valentine's outfit from Grandpa and Grandma Johnson!

And I couldn't resist including this one of little Ellie with her new bear from Uncle Josh and hairbow from Uncle Andrew and Aunt Kristin!

How can this be??? Our little chipmunk is quickly approaching 2 years old... Just three more months until sweet Ellie is not our only little girl, so we are trying to soak up every single moment with her. She is doing lots of new things these days and saying lots of new words. Here are some highlights from the last month...

She's started trying to say lots of our staff's names! So far she's only got Bob and Tracy down well...but she's working on the rest! Today when she try to say "Betsy" it came out "Beppy", which I thought was pretty cute. :)
Her new hobby is working on counting to five! It is SO cute! We're trying to teach her to hold up her fingers as she counts, but she struggles with anything more than holding up her first finger and then she goes straight to holding up 5! :) It's a challenge to keep those others fingers down.
She constantly points to Mommy's belly and says "baby"! But often will point to her own belly, Daddy's belly and sometimes other bellys, too! We're trying to help her understand that there is NOT a baby in EVERY person's belly. :)
She LOVES getting pulled around by Daddy on her little pink horsey on wheels. It's become her and Daddy's favorite pasttime together. He even put a rope on it so he can whisk her around the kitchen as she squeels with delight! Often as soon as Daddy walks in the door, she goes to get her horsey. :)
Ellie loves having a "bite" of everything! If either of us are eating, she will quickly walk up to us and say "bite?" and if we don't respond quickly enough she'll add on a loud "peeeeease?" (please)... it's adorable.
She is still our dancing queen, spinning in circles and bobbing her little head. I will soon post a short video from our Valentine's Dessert where she was cutting a rug with the students.
She's still a mere 23 lbs - but getting taller by the day and her feet seem to be growing fast!
Ellie is still not a fan of having bows or ponytails in her hair, so when you see pictures of her with her hair all crazy, I promise we didn't start the day that way. :)
Ellie is VERY independent and wants to do everything herself! She is also as ornery as you can imagine! She can get into anything like drawers, cabinets, etc and is even starting to figure out how to get baby proof lids off! YIKES! Last week she took a baby proof cap off of baby oil, but thankfully I caught her before she did too much damage. She has crazy good fine motor skills!

The list could go on and on, but I will stop for now! Love you all... Thanks for checking in!

cute little Ellie video...

2010-02-11T21:55:00.000-08:00

All Girl...

2010-01-25T15:21:00.001-08:00

Is this cute or what? I walked into the bathroom the other day to find Ellie with my curling iron "curling" her hair... She is definitely a girl after Momma's heart. I guess she's seen me doing it every morning, so she wanted to try! Not a problem since everything was unplugged!!! But I'd better watch her a little more carefully now that she has this new trick... Thankfully, she also is quick to identify when something is "HOT"! Like I (or she :) ) said in our last post, whenever she sees a coffee cup or a pot on the stove, etc. she quickly says HOT! I need to take a video cause it's so cute when she says it...

Luckily, she also puts the curling iron away when she is through! :)

18 months old today!!!

2010-01-14T13:48:00.000-08:00

Hey everyone!
Yep! You read it right! I am 18 months old today! Can you believe it? A baby no more and Mommy says that I am DEFINITELY a toddler! I am running and playing and getting into everything these days. You can't take your eye off of me for a second. My hair is getting really long, which I love cause Mommy puts it in pigtails and ponytails. If I'm good, I will keep them in. I'm getting a little better about that.

I'm doing lots of new things these days including eating lots of new foods. I feel like a pretty big kid. My other friend Ellie bought me this muffie from Panera and I ate the whole thing all by myself! As you can see from the pictures I was VERY serious about it!
This picture below also describes what I'm doing a lot more of these days... TALKING! My vocabulary is expanding like crazy and it won't be long before I'm able to talk in sentences! Honestly, I probably could now but I'm a little stubborn and want to make Mommy and Daddy think I don't know what they are saying... but usually I do! They are starting to spell things around me cause I understand everything now! Here are a few of my new favorite words.

Uh-oh!

(I like to say this when I do something I'm not supposed to or I notice that Mommy has left a door open to a room that I'm not supposed to go in or the dishwasher open)

Baby

(and then I point to Mommy's tummy or pick up one of my baby dolls)

Light

(this is one of my favorite activities - turning lights on and off!)

Cheese

(just like my Daddy, this is one of my favorite foods!)

Wa-Wa (or water)

HOT!

(not sure why, but I am obsessed with pointing at the oven or coffee cups and saying HOT!

Mommy thinks it's pretty cute!)

NaNa and PaPa

(I say these two words a lot...especially since my Grandparents

all watched me recently and spoiled me a lot! )
Okay, you get the point... I'm talking LOTS these days!

I still love dancing and music, too!
Pretty much, Daddy and Mommy say I'm at a REALLY cute stage and they are loving spending time with me! At the same time, I'm more work than I've ever been cause when I'm awake I just don't stop! I run fast and I am very curious! I have learned how to CLIMB on everything and also throw things in the toilet. The other day I even threw Mommy's cell phone in there. Thankfully, I didn't ruin it. I didn't know it wouldn't float!
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Thanks for checking in on me! OH! And I forgot to say how EXCITED I am to have a baby sister!!! Daddy is really going to be outnumbered now with THREE girls in the house. I think it's going to be so much fun. I will teach sissy the ropes and even share my clothes with her.
That's all for now! Love you all!

20 Weeks and it's a GIRL!

2010-01-10T11:19:00.000-08:00

I can't believe that we're already half-way through this pregnancy and this is the very first belly picture that we've even taken!!! We decided we'd better get after it so that #2 doesn't feel left out when she looks back at pictures, so we snapped a quick couple of pics after church today! Ellie didn't want to be left out, so she got to get in the pic... though her patience didn't last too long, as you can see our second picture was without her!

As many of you have already heard, we found out last Wednesday that we are having another GIRL and we couldn't be more excited for Ellie to have a sister!!! I've said many times that I had two awesome brothers, but never had the chance to have the "sister" experience, so I'm very excited to have a couple of girls in the house. Joel will now officially be outnumbered 3:1, but he doesn't seem to care a bit! I'm looking forward to even more PINK and hairbows around the Johnson house for a while (even though right now, Ellie won't leave a bow or ponytail in for more than 5 minutes!) ! I am feeling so good and am thankful for another wonderful pregnancy... We have been so blessed! Our official due date is May 27th, but we'll likely have baby girl a week or so early since I have to deliver by C-section again this time.

Ellie turns 18 months old this week, so the next note you read will be from her! She is looking forward to writing and telling you all about her adventures and all the new things she is doing now! But we'll leave that for the next post!

Thanks for checking in! More to come soon!

Christmas 2009

2009-12-25T15:13:00.000-08:00

Christmas 09 all started out with Ellie getting to spend good quality time with both of her Nanas and Papas while Mommy and Daddy were in India! Boy did she get spoiled ...or should I say loved on? :)

Here's the start of our Christmas 2009 photos! I am realizing that a lot of the pics we took in Iowa are on my parent's camera, so more of Iowa to come soon! We had a great time - though way too brief - visiting both of our families!

The above three pictures are from the McCulley family Christmas Eve! It's always a highlight and this year Ellie got to meet her 2nd cousin Bryce (top pic). They are just a few days apart...Ellie is actually older, but Bryce towers over her! She has some catching up to do! We also got to see 2nd cousin Akeelah and lots of other fun family, too! The third picture is actually a 4 generation shot with my Grandma Barb, Dad, Ellie and I! We also got to spend some fun time with Great Grandma Surber! We LOVE it at her house!!! We didn't get any pictures of Fluffy the cat this year. Probably because Fluffy kept running to hide from Ellie who wanted to give her a few more hugs than the cat wanted! ha!

Then there was time in Kentucky with Uncle Josh and Aunt Kristin! Let's just say that Ellie wasn't wanting for any attention! She got to have lots of fun playing with Turbo, Uncle Andrew and Aunt Kristin's dog whom she chased around the house yelling "aaaarrrffff" at! It was quite hilarious! And nothing was more fun than being toted around by Uncle Josh! :) And below is a cute shot of Aunt K-Lo and Ellie decorating Christmas cookies!

We also got a fun family shot by Grandma and Grandpa Johnson's beautiful Christmas tree!

Ellie loving on one of her new dollies from Nana and Papa Johnson

And finally, we actually got the baby AND the dog to somewhat cooperate for our annual family Christmas picture! Success!

It was a memorable and fun Christmas... Can't wait until next year when we will add another little GIRL to the family pic! More on that to come!!! :)

Snow Day!

2009-12-09T22:05:00.000-08:00

As many of you know, Joel and I just returned from a whirlwind of travel! Since December 9th, we've been to Kansas City, overseas to India, then to Iowa and Kentucky to visit our families for Christmas! I have lots of Christmas photos to upload and post, but for now here are a few of our first Kansas snow day... These pics were taken the day before we left to begin all of our travels! Both sets of our parents graciously came to care for Ellie while we were away for 12 days! Joel's parents kicked off the time and the timing of their arrival couldn't have been more perfect! Just minutes after they arrived, the snow started and didn't stop for the next 24 hours! So they made it in the knick of time... Ellie had a great time with both of her "Nanas" and "Papas"... so far NaNa is what she's calling both Grandmas... We'll see if that changes over time, but for now it's seriously her new favorite word and it's so cute!

This is a very classic Ellie face!
Could she be any cuter? :)

Fun with Dad in the snow...

Daddy and Nana Johnson

Papa and Nana Johnson

A few more fun pics...

2009-11-08T14:06:00.001-08:00

a beautiful Sunday afternoon playing at the park!
If I were just a LITTLE bit taller!

I love to read...or at least turn the pages of my book!

my favorite pasttime - getting into things! Here I have just gotten into a bunch of Mommy's gum from her purse.

Our friend Heath was over and I decided to try his shoes on... :)

Enjoying some Sonic Happy Hour at the park with Dad and Mom!

"Helping" Daddy

I LOVE lights and especially when it's the buttons on an elevator! Mommy says to disregard how gross this wall looks. :)

As you can see...I am keeping very busy these days having so much fun!

15 months!

2009-10-14T18:43:00.000-07:00

Where are the days going? Our baby girl is quickly growing into an independent toddler! No more baby here!!! Ellie is at SUCH a FUN stage right now - but I'm not gonna lie - it's a high maintenance stage as well and this Momma falls asleep at night the second her head hits the pillow! If I even make it that long! :) I'm starting to think that Ellie's nap times should be Mommy's nap times, too. Ha! :) But look at that face and it makes it all so worth it.

Our 15-month-old is quite the little lady. She loves to get dressed up and it's fun to see her look at herself in the mirror and you can tell she loves to be all dolled up! Especially when she is wearing her pink shoes!!! She LOVES them and would wear them everyday. If only they matched every outfit. Let's just say she is ALL girl!The picture above is one of Ellie as she sadly followed Daddy to the car as he left for an appointment with a student after church! Ellie is always sad when Daddy leaves, but we go out on the deck and wave goodbye to him and he always honks three times back at us to say "I Love You!"... And our little tyke's eyes light up when she hears Daddy jiggling the door when he comes home and wherever she is, she drops what she is doing and runs to greet Daddy!

This fun pic is of Ellie on her 15-month birthday holding a stuffed wombat from Uncle Andrew and Aunt Kristin! Funny story, but for some reason Joel just thought wombats were the cutest animal last Christmas, so his sister got him one! Now Ellie has taken it over and snuggles with it. She's becoming quite motherly and hugs and kisses her dollies and us all the time. It's great!
Our little princess saying "okay...enough pictures! Please HOLD ME!" :)
Yep, we're still sporting the "Pebbles" look many days. Her hair is at that stage where it looks messy if you leave it down and she is having NOTHING to do with a haircut! So we're trying this look out for a while. If she's feeling very patient, we try pigtails. :)

Here are a few other things that our little one is up to this month!

She now has 8 teeth! Four on top and four on bottom. Her pediatrician said at her appt. last week that he thinks her molars are getting ready to come in!
Ellie is absolutely smitten with "lights". It's the first word she says every morning when we go in to get her. We turn on the light, she points and says "light!". No matter where we go, she is always pointing out every light in the room. It's hilarious.
Her words this month are still pretty limited, but she's got some important ones down: Da-Da, Ma-Ma, Light, Uh-Oh, Ba-Ba for bottle (which I know I need to wean her off of soon...it will be harder on me than her!) and a few random others!
She has mastered taking CD's out of our CD player, opening drawers, zipping and unzipping anything with a zipper and then taking out all of the contents like Mommy's purse, make-up bag, backpack and her diaper bag, throwing everything in the trash, taking everything off of shelves that are in reach, you get the picture. :)
Ellie continues to LOVE music and dances to every tune - whether on the radio, tv, someone singing or even in anticipation that there MIGHT be music. :)
She's getting really good at giving kisses and hugs and I LOVE this!
She had her very first Happy Meal at McDonalds this month - not sure if that is something I should brag about! Feeding my child unhealthy fast food! Ha! Like mother, like daughter I'm afraid. :)
Ellie is loving story time at the library on Tuesday mornings and always entertains the other kids AND the teacher. Sitting still is not in her vocabulary. She is very busy and curious and doesn't like to be kept down.

It's been a fun month! I know I'll blink and another month will be gone... So here's to 15 months with our little sweetie. :)

The Beach!

2009-10-05T21:05:00.000-07:00

We had such a great time over fall break at the beach in Destin with Joel's family! Lots of pictures from our time, but they are all on Joel's computer... so just our family pic for now. We had so much fun, though the time was entirely too short! Ellie LOVED her time in the water and with Grandpa and Grandma Johnson and Uncle Andrew and Aunt Kristin! Let's just say she was not lacking for love and attention!!!