Claire Bear is THREE!

Claire Bear turned THREE this year! I suppose it's a tradition to post about my baby's birthday a few months late. Oh well, she knows I love her.

Claire celebrated her birthday while we were on our family vacation in St. Louis. I'll talk about our amazing vacation in another post (possibly). To celebrate her birthday, we started out with breakfast of pancakes, pancakes, and more pancakes. Afterwards we went to Grant's Farm to visit the Budweiser Clydesdales. This was a really cool place! Not only were the Clydesdales awesome but they also "let" you take a souvenir photo with one and you "get" to buy some pricey prints of the photo. Well, our photo was nothing short of hilarious. See for yourself:

After visiting the horsies, we went to the other part of Grant's Farm and took a trolley tour. The Busch family bought the property many many moons ago from the family of Ulysses S. Grant. Grant's home is still on the property. The not-so-cool part of Grant's Farm were the goats. You could pay a few dollars to go into a pen with about one hundred goats and feed them milk from a giant baby bottle. Sounds like a good plan, right? Not so much. Those goats were aggressive. They attacked anyone with a bottle of milk and practically knocked Claire to the ground. One of them jumped up and kicked Lyla in the teeth! We got out of there as soon as we could!

Later that night, we ate at a place in STL that appeared on Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives: Anthonino's Taverna.

Oh my goodness - it was so delicious. Claire agreed! Perfect birthday dinner for my baby.

Isn't she pretty?

At 3, Claire really is growing up to be quite the young lady. Of course she wants to do what her sissies are doing from time-to-time, but other times, she's marching to the beat of her own drum, doing her thing. In case you were wondering, she is still the best baby ever. Except, now she says "I not a baby, momma, I a big girl!" To which I reply, "You'll always be my baby, Claire Bear." Claire: "O-tay mommy, I be your baby." Isn't she the sweetest?

After we returned from vacation, we went to the pediatrician for her annual check-up. Big girl is growing!

At three years she weighed in at 36 pounds (90th percentile) - up 5.5 pounds from year 2. She is 40 inches tall (97th percentile) - up 2.75 inches from her 2nd birthday. She is definitely a big girl and is very tall!

We continue to be blessed by this sweet girl. I don't know what I did to deserve her as my daughter. I couldn't ask for a better baby girl. HAPPY BELATED BIRTHDAY, BABY!

Two Six-Year-Olds

Today, my beautiful baby girls turned six-years-old. They have brought more joy to my life than I could ever imagine. Last year, I conducted an interview of my then five-year-olds. I decided to ask the girls the same questions to see how much they have change. They changed most of their answers but kept a few the same. Enjoy!

Natalee

Nickname - Nat
How old are you? Six
What is your favorite color? Purple and pink
What is your favorite animal? monkeys
What is your favorite book? Jasmine
What is your favorite TV show? Sophia
What is your favorite movie? Frozen
What is your favorite song? The "Let it Go" one
What is your favorite food? watermelon
What is your favorite drink? Sprite
What is your favorite breakfast food? cinnamon rolls
What is your favorite snack? crackers
What is your favorite outfit? the yellow one
What is your favorite game? Madagascar
What is your favorite toy? my drawing thing that I got for Christmas
Who is your best friend? Teagan
What is your favorite thing to do? Play on your notepad
What is your favorite thing to do outside? Do the monkey bars and climb the tree
What is your favorite holiday? Mother's Day
What do you like to take to bed with you at night? blanket
Where is your favorite place to go? to grandma's house
What is favorite restaurant? Charleston's
Where do you want to go on vacation? To the water park
What do you to be when you grow up? A teacher, a kindergarten one
What did you do on your birthday? got a birthday hat

Lyla

Nickname - Lyla Bear
How old are you? Six
What is your favorite color? Pink
What is your favorite animal? monkey
What is your favorite book? Frozen book
What is your favorite TV show? Sophia
What is your favorite movie? Frozen
What is your favorite song? Ariel
What is your favorite food? Strawberries
What is your favorite drink? Lemonade
What is your favorite breakfast food? Pancakes
What is your favorite snack? Crackers
What is your favorite outfit? the shirt with the poodle on it
What is your favorite game? Ladybug game
What is your favorite toy? my doggie toy
Who is your best friend? Avery
What is your favorite thing to do? Color
What is your favorite thing to do outside? Do the monkey bars
What is your favorite holiday? Mother's Day
What do you like to take to bed with you at night? my pink bear that Nanny got me
Where is your favorite place to go? Grandma's house
What is favorite restaurant? Charleston's
Where do you want to go on vacation? Great Wolf Lodge
What do you to be when you grow up? Teacher
What did you do on your birthday? Brought cupcakes to school

Once again, they answered some of the questions pretty differently, with a few more things in common this year than they did last year:

• Their age, obviously
• The color pink
• Their favorite animal: monkeys
• Their love of the movie Frozen
• Eating crackers
• The monkey bars
• The world's best holiday - Mother's Day
• Going to grandma's house
• Being a teacher when they grow up

Big girls with their baby sister

Six-Year-Old Stats:
Natalee - 51 pounds, 47.5 inches (up 6.5 lbs and 2.5 inches at age 5)
Lyla - 36.8, 43 inches (up 3.8 lbs and 1.5 inches at age 5)

Needless to say, people typically look at me like I'm crazy when I tell them they are twins. They don't look anything alike and Natalee easily looks a year (maybe two) older than Lyla. I wouldn't change a thing about them. They are both perfect, wonderful, beautiful, sweet, caring, smart baby girls. I am so lucky I get to be their momma. So lucky. Seriously, I hit the daughter jackpot with these three.

New Year, New Everything

Last month, I wrote about how blessed I am, despite how much 2013 was the worst year of my life. Today, I am excited that, 5 days into 2014, things are already looking better than last year.

This year, like previous years, I have many goals. Last year I think I set something like 12 goals. I think I accomplished about 9 of them. Not too shabby if you ask me.

My goals this year include a focus on -

• My relationship with God. The hubs and are are reading through the entire Bible together this year. We have not yet missed a day and are loving it. I am also making prayer a daily thing, attending church every Sunday that we're in town, and overall just focusing on living as the Lord wants me to live.
• My marriage. Our relationship took several substantial hits last year. Needless to say we are more focused on our relationship now than we have ever been. A big part of this is a daily marriage devotional. I love our new routine.
• My babies. I am not a perfect momma but I love my little girls fiercely. I hope to focus on becoming even better this year. Less yelling, more hugging, teaching, learning, growing. 
• Financial. The hubs and I are very blessed but work very hard to ensure the financial stability of our family. This year, we hope to strengthen that stability and really focus on our financial future. Super nerdy but exciting stuff. 
• Family and friends. Life is busy but family and friends are important enough to deserve your attention. I'd like to focus on those valuable relationships. 
• Job. My career is one area I do not stress much about. The company I work for is a-maz-ing. Seriously the best. Still, I'd like to focus on becoming a better employee, manager, and co-worker to the wonderful people I'm blessed to work with. 
• Physical. Everyone has New Year's resolution focused on something related to diet or their physical well-being. I'm pretty blessed in this area as well but there are things I'd like to focus on. I carry around about 5 more pounds than I'd like to. I'd also like to run a half marathon at the OKC Marathon in April.

That's all. Writing down goals is the first step towards accomplishing them. 

Happy New Year

Lindsey Loo