August 9, 2009

Luca loves to play hide and seek now. Today he found a new hiding spot.....our magazine holder!



Can you find him?



Bye Bye Uncle Nay Nay! Uncle Nate came to visit today to say goodbye. He'll be moving to Japan for one year to help with HR at the new Abercrombie and Fitch store in Japan. Nate, we wish you lots of luck and you will be missed!



I will save this pic b/c when you come back in one year Olivia will be MUCH bigger. ;)

August 8, 2009

Today we had some visitors. My friend and sorority sister Erica Groeber came by to meet Olivia. Erica was my "Big Sister" when I was a Chi-O. She's still a good Big. She had Jack on February 28th about a week before I had Luca. Jack was such a good boy. They even bought Luca a gift~his very 1st Basketball! It's so funny because I will tell Luca to bounce the ball but he starts bouncing instead. It was great visiting with Erica, Jon and Jack. Plus, Erica is expecting a little girl in December....YAY! Olivia will have a little playmate, too!





Olivia at 7 weeks old and she still full of smiles!



Luca couldn't stop giggling today! He's getting to be such a big boy! This past week he started to feed himself with a fork and spoon on his own. It's a little messy but for the most part he gets most of the food in his mouth. He's always been so independent...he held his own bottle when he was 4 days old! He's adding more words to his vocabulary! He can now say Nay Nay for Uncle Nathan, Ju Ju for Aunt Julie, bag, bike, and I'm sure there's more that I can' t think of right now. We were at Target today and he saw a picture of a Rooster and he started to make the sounds of a rooster! This is such a neat age where he is really absorbing and learning so much.



Thanks Zia for my cute Gap dress you bought me...I love it! I finally am able to wear it now that I'm growing.

August 3, 2009

Today was such a busy day of shopping! We bought all of our ceiling fans, mailbox and post, and our dinette and formal dining room furniture. Thank goodness my parents were in town and watched the kids ALL day for us. Olivia is becoming such a happy little girl...THANK GOD! I catch her smiling constantly. Here are a few pics I was able to take. She's getting soo big that she's growing out of her newborn clothes so I had to make sure to get a pic of her in her lil bunny sleeper that I LOVE. Plus I was AMAZED last night. We fed her at 8:30pm and she fell asleep around 9:30ish and didn't get up until 6AM! I kept waking up at 3am, then 4am, then 5am and I had to make sure to listen to her breathe because she was sleeping for soo long w/o a feeding in 9 1/2 hours! I'm hoping she does it again tonight and all of the time.



Olivia is smiling all the time...I took about 15 pics of her today smiling but these two are my fav.




Papa and Olivia getting ready for bed.



Papa showing off her cute bunny PJ's. See the little bunnies on her feet? So cute!

August 2, 2009

Olivia smiling in her new swing that her nonna and nonno bought her. She loves it so far.



Luca likes to press the music button and dance for Olivia.



Luca missed his little sister. He was exhausted after his 11 hour car ride and he was taking a small nap w/his lil sister.



He loves Olivia. Isn't this precious?

July 30, 2009

Olivia is 6 weeks old today! She's getting soo big & she is starting to coo it's so cute! I have some video but haven't figured out how to upload on the blog. Olivia loves car rides. These past few days we've been shopping for furniture and accessories for the new house. Now I think she will only nap if I'm driving! She also seems more hungry so I think I'm going to have to start giving her 5 oz b/c the 4 oz won't last every 4 hours. She gets too hungry. I have my 6 week check up tomorrow and looks like I have 4 to 5 more pounds to get back to my pre-pregnancy weight...it's all in my belly, too! UGH...I need to join a gym so I can drop off the kiddos at the gym daycare while I work out.

July 29, 2009

They installed our hardwood floors today.


They also installed all of our lighting and plumbing fixtures in the house.

Here is the dining room chandelier which I LOVE. It's rubbed bronze as well as the entryway. The rest of the house is in Satin Nickel.

July 28, 2009

Olivia taking a bath.


Aunt Mary was in town this week and took care of Olivia. She gave her baths, changed all of her diapers, fed and burped her. She even woke up in the middle of the night for her feedings so I could get some rest. She's such a good aunt.


Here is Aunt Mary getting Olivia to smile.

July 26, 2009

Today I took Ms. Olivia to the pool. I didn't let her in the pool since the water was freezing - our pool is supposed to be heated but it wasn't today. We just hung out in the shade while she slept most of the time. See her cute lil flip flops? She hates them...kicked them off her feet both times I put them on her. She does not like shoes...what girl doesn't like shoes?





Olivia is really starting to get more personality and she's VERY ALERT. She's starting to smile a lot more. She slept 7 hours straight last night from 10pm to 5am! It was great. She had a hard time falling back asleep so I put her in bed with me and she finally fell asleep.




Here she is showing off her personality. Her neck is getting stronger & stronger everyday. She always seemed to have a strong neck since we brought her home from the hospital but today I noticed how she didn't have her head leaning on my shoulder for a long period of time when I was holding her.

July 25, 2009

Today Corey and Luca are leaving for Hilton Head with his family. Olivia and I were supposed to go but since our last mini vacation it was awful and I want to make sure she's 100% better so it's not a nightmare for everyone's vacation. I'm sad I won't be going and will be missing out on Luca playing in the sand on the beach but hopefully Corey will take lots of pics for me. I will also miss Corey's Bday for the 1st time ever since we've been together. He's turning 33 on the 28th.

July 24, 2009

This is our entryway stairs. Originally, we had in our plans to do a "bridal' stair which is curved but we had to take it out b/c it wasn't in the budget but these stairs turned out nice.


Yay Olivia! She slept for 8 hours last night from 6pm until 2am then we fed and changed her and she slept again until 7am! Woohoo! I was waiting for her to get up around 10 since she's been eating every 4 hours and waited until 11pm and she just kept sleeping! I hope she keeps this up for us. :)





Here is what Olivia looks like when she's not happy. In this pic she is 5 weeks and 1 day old. Unfortunately, she wasn't smiling at the time I took the pic but even though it doesn't look like it she has been a happier baby. Luca is so cute...whenever she starts crying he grabs her pacifier and tries to put it in her mouth. Today he even started to get upset b/c he wasn't able to get her to stop crying so he started to cry. He's such a good brother.



This is our foyer.

July 23, 2009

This is the kids bathrrom - we got these countertops from the "Boneyard" which is all the granite scraps from kitchens that you can make into bathroom tops. This type of stone is Quartz which means it's both man made and a natural stone. It's less likely to scratch which is perfect for the kids room.


This is our master bath sinks, also from the Boneyard. I'm so excited to have a little vanity
area to put on my make up!

!

Here's a close up of the kitchen granite. I love it. When they delivered the countertops it was so heavy that they had to back up the truck really close to the front door entryway and the guy chipped our concrete stairs. Now they have to re-do the stairs which is great b/c we didn't really like them and they are going to make them wider so they will look better.


The island looks much bigger now that the countertops are in. So excited to finally have the kitchen I've always wanted. :)

July 22, 2009

Olivia seemed to be much happier today. Not as much crying
as the past few days. She even smiled a few times and I was able
to capture a few of those smiles on camera. We're hoping
the new formula is helping.





I need to find a pic that I have of Luca that looks JUST like Olivia in this pic.
I think it's saved on our other computer that is in storage.

July 21, 2009

Here is the mudroom lockers that Corey built himself...pretty impressive, huh?


They painted the trim, fireplace and columns in the GR.




This was a bonus. We had no idea they were going to trim around the door
like this and we love it.


Here is the fireplace mantle painted. So excited to finally be able
to hang X-mas stockings on the mantle for the 1st time. ;)

July 20, 2009

We were able to sleep in today thanks to Grammy for watching Olivia all night and all day so Corey and I could get some rest. She's starting to get fussy again so today I gave her the different formula Alimentum. We're hoping it works! When I gave it to her she fell asleep after not sleeping from this morning until 5pm today!

I feel like I'm leaving Luca out in my blog. He's been such a good boy and he's starting to say a lot more words. I tried counting the words he can say but I haven't written them all down and in parentheses I have written how the words actually sound. Momma, Pappa, Baby, Nonna, Nonno, Grammy (Mammy), Papi (Bobby) More, Water (Wawa), Snack (Nak), Banana (nana), Monkey (Money), Tree (twee), airplane (plane), car (ca), ball (baw), cookie, Thank You (tank), Luca (caca), pee pee, woof woof, moo, oink oink, hi, bye, blue (bu), purple (popul), bottle, and I have to think of some more...I think there are a few! He has been starting to repeat the words back to us so we better watch out what we say! ;)

Corey is working on the mud room lockers today at the house. He's making good progress. I'll post pics tomorrow when I have some time to take the pics. We were very pleased with the trim work. They did some extras that we weren't expecting like framing out the front door with beautiful trim and I didn't realize that our trim was going to be that tall which I like a lot. This week they are going to paint the trim, doors and then put in the ceramic tile in the kitchen and baths and put our granite it on Friday! Can't wait. I'm excited to go decorating and furniture shopping next week with my sister when Corey is on vacation with Luca and his family and I'll have Olivia. I'm hoping she will get better soon.

July 19, 2009

Here are pics of the house...they are finishing up the trim. This is the dining room. The pic below is the great room, stairway and bathroom.

July 18, 2009

Olivia at one month old.




Olivia is one month old today! It's unbelievable how time has gone by already. She weighed 9lbs 13 oz at the doctors office. We've had a rough week but we're thinking that the formula was upsetting her. The doc told us to switch to soy and he also prescribed Prevacid for Acid Reflux. Since we've changed the formula she seems much happier so we haven't given her the medicine. She slept two 5 hour increments last night and are very happy with that! She's also drinking 4 oz every 4 hours which is nice that she's going for a longer period of time. She's definitely getting bigger and changing everyday. She's smiles a lot and Luca is still such a good brother to her. Yesterday she had some spit up dripping out of her mouth and Luca wiped it off her face and gave her a kiss! She also likes to kick off her socks and Luca tried putting it back on her but wasn't able to. He's a good brother and is always looking for "baby".

July 17, 2009

We just came back from our first family vacation. We went to Mary's cottage in Crescent Beach, Michigan. It was a nightmare because poor Olivia was basically crying the ENTIRE trip. As you can see....we didn't take any pics because we were exhausted. Thankfully, Aunt Mary, let Olivia sleep in her room so we could get a little rest. We took Olivia to the doctor and we switched to Soy formula. So far it's been helping and she's been a happier baby.

We stopped by the house and were amazed at the progress within the 4 days that we were gone. Cabinets are installed and they look beautiful, the house is painted and the stone is mortared and stucco painted. We are thrilled with the progress and how it looks so far! We are getting closer to moving into our home. ;)