One birthday, two celebrations

On Bea's actual birthday on Thursday, the four of us celebrated at home. Here's the video from her 'real' birthday.




 On Saturday we had Bea's first birthday party at our house. Thanks so much to everyone who made this such a special day!  Here's the video from her party.




Unlike a certain someone, Bea didn't really get too much into the cupcake. She wasn't thrilled about having it all over her hands - or in her eyes. She did love the idea of having people singing to her.

Baby Bea is ONE!

Here she stands at one year old - Little Baby Bea, our sweet sweet girl.  Such a long journey it was to get to Four Schneiders. And every day, we look at this darling little face, amazed and grateful. 

Happy Birthday Baby Bea! 

In honor of her first trip around the sun, check out her amazing birth story: http://fourschneiders.blogspot.com/p/baby-girls-birth-story.html

A Downtown Day with Friends

A couple of weekends ago, we hit the city with Josie's best friend Lucia & her mama to go to the "Ballet Toybox" at the Aronoff. It was Josie's first ballet show in the audience (coincidentally her first ballet performance was on the same stage but she'd never seen a show there.)  It was such a fun day with our sweet daughters.

It started with a yummy lunch at Akash for Indian food and the girls were too excited to eat. Luckily, we had the place to ourselves and they took advantage of the skipping space.

The show was very cute - an excellent intro into the "real" ballet.

Josie was very impressed by the "real ballerina's" costume!

After the show, and big tears in the lobby because she didn't want to leave, Josie convinced us to go on a Graeter's run.  The girls had great big huge chocolate cupcakes.

After the treat, the spent a good amount of time running around Fountain Square playing "pigeon chase."   It totally took me back to those first two years of Josie's life calling Fountain Square our "back yard."  We do miss living right in the city and, no matter where we end up, Josie will always have a little city kid in her.

Aren't these two girls just the sweetest things ever?

Mama's girls

Both girls sacked out while curled up next to me tonight. Josie came in to kiss us goodnight when I was nursing Bea and before I knew it they were both sound asleep. I have the best life ever!

Published with Blogger-droid v2.0.4

Videos!!

Two little videos of the girls.

First up -  Playtime inside the big Amazon box that delivered our shipment of toilet paper, paper towels, diapers & wipes. Don't miss Josie's awesome question "We're twins, right?"


(We could also call this "The Origin of Bea's Claustrophobia")


This second video highlights Josie's latest dual-obsession. Equal parts obsession with The Wizard of Oz and The Fresh Beat Band. Soooo - when the FBB did "The Wizard of Song" - she just about had a four year old heart attack. I found the perfect "Dorothy Dress" and, no joke, she has had it on every day for a over a week!   I caught her here trying to learn the dance moves - in this case skipping around the yellow brick road.   The paper strewn out across the floor is the "cyclone" she made.  I tried SO hard not to crack up, but you will see I failed miserably. In just two days we are going to see the Fresh Beat Band LIVE.  And I must say, we really are all very excited!

Baby Bea's first words

This morning, just before 6am, sweet Baby Beatrice uttered her first 'real' non-family member words.

Let me set the stage for you.

Bea woke up crying last night with a fever about 1:00am.  We kept her between us in our bed. Just about the time that Bea's medicine kicked in and we all drifted off to sleep about 2:00, Josie woke up from a bad dream and insisted on sleeping with me.  Lou put Josie in bed with me and took Bea back into the girls' bedroom. Sick Bea wouldn't go back into her crib so Lou had to hang with her until Josie was asleep enough that I could sneak out of my bed and return to Bea in the girls' room. That happened at about 2:30. Lou came in and tagged out and I took Bea and he crawled in our bed with Josie.  I took Bea back into their room and had to lay down with her in Josie's bed to get her back to sleep. At about 3:00 everyone was sleeping...finally!

Then, just before 6:00am, sweet Bea woke up coughing and threw up on me - obviously waking me up. I yelled for Lou, who brought a towel and a clean t-shirt for me to put on.

The shirt was this one:

 

Bea, delirious with fever since the 1:00 meds had worn off, takes a break from her big sick tears, points at the shirt and clear as day and goes, "Dog, Woof. Dog, Woof" and then goes right back to crying.

And that is the story of Bea's first words.

'Round the house these days

It has been busy, busy, busy around here. And I have been slacking like crazy on the blog. Here's a little catch-up in the form of random photos over the last month of the chaos that is life as the Four Schneiders these wonderful, silly days. 

Josie is 4 1/2 - through and through. She constantly tests every limit of human capacity and tries daring feats like eating apple sauce with two spoons instead of one.

Bea eats off the floor most days.

Remember what I said about Josie being four.  Yep, this proves it. Lovely.

There's my sweet girl.

And like that we're back to being four.

Bea's favorite past-time is emptying and filling things. Such a fun age!

Josie spends a great deal of time dressing up.

Bea doesn't always cooperate.

Bea's real mission is to crawl or walk over to my leg and look up at me with those big doe eyes and tug on my pants until I pick her up for a cuddle. That second kid perspective reminds me this is fleeting, so I pick her up. Every time.

Josie is just as busy as ever. Creating.  On this day, we made a helicopter (which she loved so much that she cuddled it.)

The helicopter later morphed into a T-Rex that Josie named "Flexy Rexy."

Lou is just as crazy as ever. And this scene happens more often than you can imagine.

Josie and Bea play more and more together. In this case, Josie made a 'cage' for Bea out of toys.

And then a zip-line.

Another day, another adventure with Super Dad and two kid-carriers.

One night we got out the sewing machine. I knew it had been awhile, BUT I was enormously surprised to find I had left off on a project I was working on when I was pregnant...with JOSIE.  Ha, something must've happened in those last 4.5 years that made me too busy to sew. Hmmm....

We made some fun projects and have big plans for some new ones coming up.

Bea's little mind is developing more and more. She's staring to do "real" things that she sees us doing. Here she is using a baby wipe to clean the table. (Thanks Bea!)

She has also perfected "the look" and she's not afraid to use it. I got this one when I tried to get the wipe out of her mouth. (Sorry Bea.)

She's getting SO big - and now has 8 whole chompers.

In other random moments, here is a morning eating breakfast fireside.

And a centerpiece Josie made out of random stuff she found around the house.

More Josie-dress-up silliness.

A sweet moment when Josie helped Lou with some Volvo repairs. What you don't notice here is that Lou is also wearing his Bengals hat. When he invited Josie to help him fix the car, she insisted that their outfits match. 

Overall, life is grand. There are loads of silly times that make me smile. Like Mariah and Josie and Bea all coloring together. 

And Bea's sweet face/

 And wacko hair.