Some pictures from today

Sophie loves having graham cracker sticks dipped in applesauce at grandma & grandpa Schlueter's house for breakfast.
Grandma & baby V

Grandpa & baby V

So, I was trying to get a video of Vollen rolling over again today and I laid him down on his stomach on the blanket while I ran to get my camera out of the diaper bag. When I came back that stinker was laying on his back. He flipped over in less than 15 seconds. In total that is the 4th time he has rolled over. And of course he wouldn't do it again on camera for me. I swear he is teasing me!!!

Sophie's fake smile.

Cheese!

FINALLY

I have been working on updating the photos for three days now and they are finally done. Over on the top right is the link to our Shutterfly web page with all the photos ~ it says Our Photos. I did April and May, under May is where you will find the most recent photo shoot of the kids. So many good ones I can't pick just one!!!! Check them out.

If you are receiving the blog by e-mail here is the link to the actual page again: http://theschlueters.blogspot.com/

Visitors

We had some visitors stop by and say hi to the baby. Calleen one of my former supervisors came over.
And Crissy also from work, who had her baby a month almost exactly before Vollen was born.

My Little ~ Big Girl

On Memorial Day we took Sophie's 2 year pictures. I picked up the CD of all the pictures today from my dad. When I was going through them I came to this one and tears started streaming down my face. I can't believe my little girl, my baby girl, is going to be 2 years old! I can't believe how fast time goes. I try to enjoy each and every day and really document and remember every little thing she does so I won't forget, but it still seems like just yesterday she was my new born baby. It is funny because I have loved each and every stage more than the last and hopefully that continues. She says and does the funniest and cutest things that make me laugh all the time. She really does bring so much joy to my life. She is my beautiful little, 'big' girl.

Rollin' Vollen

Guess what???? Vollen rolled over today from his tummy to his back TWO times today!!! I couldn't believe it. I thought to myself this is awful early for him to be doing this. I swore Sophie didn't do it this early, so I went and looked in her baby book. Sure enough, I put that she had almost rolled over at 2 months, but actually rolled over at 4 1/2 months. I didn't have weather it was back to front or front to back but from what I can remember I think that was from back to front.
Vernon thought that since he doesn't have very broad shoulders and he has such a long torso, that it is probably easier for him to flip over. I was trying to get a video of him doing it and I had looked away to tell Sophie something and sure enough he did it and I didn't get a video of it. But I have a lot of video of him almost doing it. Darn it anyway, maybe I will get a video tomorrow of him actually doing it.
When I had Vollen down on the floor Sophie wanted to be all up in the mix and right down by him in his face. She would jump over him and lay down next to him and try to sit on top of him. It was more work trying to keep her from landing on him. I think I need to do tummy time with him when she is napping!!!

She calls him "Brudder"
Awwww kisses

Little puppy and Big puppy

Here she is stealing his puppy

Walking all over him

Again being rough with him

He almost get over several times

Again so close, but no cigar on camera. And my nudey butt 2 year old would not put her pants on. She likes running around without bottoms on. One of my favorite things is those cute wrinkles on his forehead when he raises him eyebrows.

ECHO & Meeting

It was a busy morning.

First we had Vollen's ECHO for his heart at Children's Hospital. They weighed him in at 9 lbs. 2.7 oz. and he is now 22 in. long!!! He also decided to pee everywhere during this procedure! Fun.
Here the tech is doing the ECHO sonogram. He was a good boy and slept during most of the test.
We met with the doctor and he went over the results. He told us he was very pleased that the valve that I talked about before is almost all the way closed. There is a VERY tiny, microscopic hole that is not fully closed yet that is letting just a few red blood cells through. The valve could close all the way on it's own still, but it may not also. If it doesn't, this could cause the heart to work harder than it should over time and cause hypertension for his heart. The doctor can also go in and surgically close it, but he said the risk and complications of the surgery may or may not out way the stress that is put on the heart. He wants to see him again in a year to see if it fully closes and re-evaluate what we want to do at that time. But for now it is pretty good news.

Vollen's ECHO was at 9:10 and they were running behind and I had to have them page the doctor and tell them that we needed to leave in 15 minutes in order to be home, the doctor was able to come right up and talk to us. So, then we rushed right home and everyone was waiting for us at 11:00. Neither of the appointments were able to reschedule or change times without a lot of hassle. If we didn't do his ECHO today he wouldn't have been able to be seen until July. And the Early Intervention Team consisted of trying to get 7 peoples schedules to match up for a time and since they weren't supposed to meet with us until late June, and I had requested to meet earlier, this was the only time they all could. Plus, Vernon had to take the morning off work. Anyway, it was a mess, but we made it work.

So we met with our Early Intervention Team from Millard Public Schools. It was the Service Coordinator, a classroom teacher, the speech pathologist, occupational therapist, and physical therapist. We went through all the paperwork to enroll him into the program and set up services. The O.T. evaluated him and was very pleased with his strength and abilities thus far. We set up a time for her to come out again next week. I will be meeting with her 2 times a month for now and we can adjust it later if we want more or less often.

It was a busy, busy morning but all is well and everything is going good. Whew!

Sleepy Baby

Sophie's puppy riding piggy back.

Dad and the kids.

The family

Rainy Day Activities

I decided to let Sophie play with "finger paint" aka~Chocolate Syrup
She had a good time, once she got used to it.

It was a fun indoor activity.

She is not liking being messy.

She made her own pizza.

Today was the very first time I heard Sophie say she was going to go 'feed' her babies. She took her shirt all the way off (which I don't do, by the way) and put her frog up to her.

Then she had to go feed her other baby bear. Too funny.

I took Sophie to get her second haircut ever today. Vernon has been wanting her to get it cut, it really didn't bother me as much as it did him. So, I had the lady cut about 1 1/2 in. off and just even it all up and trim up the split ends. It doesn't really look that different, just a little shorter in the back. Her hair is so thin and fine, there is not a whole lot that can be done with it. I don't even know what style we are aiming for. I just wanted to be able to still put it in pigtails, ponytails and such, which I can, so that is good.

I really don't like spending so much money for a stinking haircut for her. I swore last time I was just going to cut it myself. I guess I didn't learn. I really need to research a cheaper place to go by the next time she needs a cut.

We did have to wait a while before we were seen, but she had fun playing with all of their dirty, germ infested toys there. The stylist working on one of the kids before us called the mother over and told her that her daughter had lice. GROSS. I was so glad Sophie saw the other lady and not the one that found the lice. She didn't clean up her area very good at all. YUCK! I guess that is what you get at a place that specializes in kids cuts. : (

On our way home, Sophie was saying her finger hurt. I looked back and she was half out of her car seat straps!!! She had pulled down the black buckle part to her lower belly and shimmied out of the straps so her shoulders we not strapped in. I was yelling at her to get back in them, but she couldn't. At a stop light I was able to reach back and get the straps back over her shoulders and I tightened the straps way down, so she couldn't get out of them. SCARY!

She loves pretending she has a baby in her carrier just like mom.

She even carries it like I do. She had to have her blanket over her baby too. Too funny.

Playing with syrup, not liking her hands getting dirty.

She does not like when her hands are messy. Maybe we should do this more often and get her used to being messy!

Sophie playing with her puppy. She was so funny saying stinky, poopy, ewwww

Breakfast with grandma & grandpa

We had Vernon's parents over for breakfast. We had blueberry pancakes (Sophie's favorite), scrambled eggs with cheese, and a cherry and cream cheese filled braided pastry. Yum!

Vernon's dad (Fritz) holding baby V.
Sophie in her pj's after breakfast.

Being silly.

Park Time

We had a picnic for lunch at Walnut Grove park. It was an absolutely beautiful day. We had such a nice walk around the park and lake.

My big stud with his (well, actually my) do-rag on.
Sophie eating her picnic sandwich and apple.

Mom and Soph

Daddy and Sophie running and running. It sure wore her out. She had a SUPER nap after the park.

Grandma came up and walked around the lake with us. Vollen was loving the outdoors again.

Sophie blowing a dandelion seeds.

For dinner we actually went back to the same park and met my side of the family.

The cousins (Rylee, Skyler, Sophie) eating some snacks.

We actually got a pavilion! Amazing since the park was really busy, but everyone was so spread out that it didn't feel like it was crowded.

The three girls swinging on a disk swing ~ they were different and cool!

Sophie didn't like it at first when she was on one of the ends, but when we switched her with Rylee and she was in the middle she felt more secure and had fun.

The girls were all singing and swinging.