flights booked!!

Some exciting news to share, we booked our flights home for the summer! We land on the 31st of July and return on the 8th of September. Hopefully this gives us plenty of time to see everybody.

Also, Caitlin's passport is ready for pickup so I'm planning to get it tomorrow. She still needs her UAE residency visa, but that should be relatively easy to sort out (and she can travel without it).

A few new photo's to share

Sleepy babies.....


...wake up happy!!


Angela enjoying some beans - her absolute favorite food.


Check out the bruise on her chin! I didn't witness the fall but heard that she didn't cry, the teachers at nursery were impressed.

Two months!!

Caitlin passed the two month mark a few days ago! She is up to 5.97kg (13lb, 2.6oz) which is right around the 95th percentile for weight. Her height dropped off quite a bit on the growth chart but the doctor thinks the measurement may have been wrong (or she is just going to be short!). She is a champ when it comes to sleeping and regularly sleeps seven to eight hours in one stretch at night. Unfortunately the two year old in the house is not sleeping this well so we're still not getting much rest!

Pictures!!

We had family pictures taken last week! I've posted a few of my favorites here to share. Thankfully Angela waited until this week to take a tumble at nursery and bruise her chin!

Passport Photo's

We applied for Caitlin's passport today...baby passport photo's always make me laugh! I was going to post some of the attempted photo's but then figured Caitlin may hate me someday if I share those with the world.




In just a few weeks we should have Caitlin's passport and will be able to obtain her UAE residence visa. We are making sure we have everything in place so that we can book our summer travel plans!! More details to come soon but we are planning to be in the states from August 1 until September 8. We have rented a house in Newport, RI for the month of August and then will head to Maine for a week in September. Hopefully six weeks at home will give us plenty of time to see everybody.

I'm so pretty

As I've blogged about in the past, Angela is not the type of girl that enjoy's getting dressed up. She loves her cotton leggings and t-shirts. Bring out a dress and she screams. Try to put it on her and she has a complete meltdown. We've pretty much given up trying when it comes to clothes. My goal in the morning is to get her out of her dirty pajamas and into clean clothes. If I can get her to let me brush her hair its a good day.

However, it seems that she now completely understands the word pretty.

I haven't attempted to put her hair up in months. Everytime I try, it lasts all of ten seconds (and results in the same reaction I get when trying to put a dress on her). But she wore a new outfit the other day - an outfit that came with matching hair clips so I just had to try!

My oh my, aren't we pretty. She stared in the mirror for a good five minutes with a silly little grin on her face.




Unfortunately she decided to pull the bows out while in the car on her way to nursery school - and then screamed about them not being in her hair. Oh well, at least I got a few pictures!

growing girls!

Last weekend we were at the doctors for Caitlin's one month check-up and today we returned to the same office for Angela's two year check-up! Both girls are very healthy - up over the 90th percentile for weight.

Angela now weighs 31.35 pounds - putting her way up there on the growth charts. She has come a long way since falling below the 1st percentile at 6 months old! The doctor was happy with everything except one thing - the dreaded bottle. The only request from the doctor was to try and (gasp) wean her off the bottle (GASP!). Angela has a great routine and goes right to sleep for naps and nights, after drinking her milk from the bottle. We have already made some improvements to this - she now drinks her bottle in the living room with us instead of being rocked in her bedroom with the lights dimmed. So do we take the bottle away? Any tips from the experienced?


Caitlin is up to 11.22 pounds - maintaining her spot at the 97th percentile! Looking back at Angela's growth chart, she was almost six months old before she weighed this much! Again, the doctor only had one issue and that was that we were letting Caitlin sleep in the swing. She had been spitting up a lot and it seemed a lot worse when she was flat on her back so the swing seemed more comfortable (and ensured longer stretches of sleep at night). I've cut a few things from my diet and the spitting up has almost stopped. The past few nights she has slept on her back, in the bassinet, and continued the 3 to 4 hour stretches she was doing in the swing!

The two of them are so incredibly sweet together. Angela has had a few jealous moments but that was to be expected. She always calls us over if the baby is crying or needs something and she loves to kiss the baby and hold her hand.

the girls

Just a few new photos...

Mommy & her girls


Hi Caitlin!


CHEESE...