Willow's Four Month Update

 Age: Four months!

Nicknames:  Lo Lo all day every day.

Stats: 25 1/4 inches, 13 lbs 5 oz.

Clothing size: 3-6 months pretty much across the board.

Eating: Still loves eating!  She self-weaned so she's exclusively on formula as of very recently.  I wouldn't have minded nursing a little longer (nighttime was much easier not having to get up to make bottles!), but I followed her lead with this one!  I plan to share more about nursing the second time around soon, but will save that for another post.  We celebrated her four month birthday eve by letting big sis feed Lo her very first solids!! Ellie picked pears, Willow seemed to like them but was still a bit confused by the whole spoon/tongue business. :) 

Sleeping: Lo usually goes to bed around 8:00/9:00, gets up around 12:30/1:00 to eat, goes back down until 4:00/5:00 to eat again and will sleep until whenever Ellie wakes us up for the day.  She's still sleeping in her pack n' play in our room, but will join us in bed if she keeps waking up after she eats in the middle of the night (because I choose sleep!!). Naps are all over the place and generally very short, especially if I dare to put her down and not hold her for the entire thing. :)

Favorite things: Eating, being held, being on the move/bouncing around the house, watching Ellie do pretty much anything.

Baby Lo can officially roll both ways, meaning if I put her down on the floor and walk away for a few seconds, there's a 99% chance she's not where I left her! ;)  She is the sweetest little sister and seems to think Ellie is the coolest ever.  It's so much fun going through all of these new things and milestones again, although I definitely feel like we were just at this stage with Ellie not too long ago.  Time flies, you guys!!

Happy four months to our tiniest baby girl!  We love you so! XO

 

Friday Favorites

Happy Friday and Happy First Day of Fall!! Before we head into what looks to be another beautiful weekend, I wanted to share some of my favorite finds as of late!

There are tons of cute graphic tees at Target in babies through adult sizes right now.  Loving this one for Ells and this one for Lo.

One of my new favorite shirts for myself, peplum style everything. I'm obsessed with this festive number for all the holidays as well.

The prettiest new print in one of our favorite blankets.

Love this Anthro pillow?  I found this very similar style one at a fraction of the cost!  Also, this is the cheapest I've ever seen these mixing bowls.  Free shipping on both today only!

All the Pillowfort new arrivals, especially these cute flannel sheets.

The sweetest pink skirt for a little ballerina.

Lastly, this Halloween book.  I totally judge books by their covers, but the description sounds pretty cute too, so I'm calling it a win. :)

Hope you all have a great weekend!!

September So Far

As always, time seems to be flying and I haven't been doing the greatest job at updating the blog!  We've been enjoying our September so far and have been having lots of end of summer beautiful weather before the cold is here to stay for awhile!

If you follow us on Instagram (I say "us" because it really is the Ellie & Willow show for the most part!), you probably know that Ellie started dance class and it just might be the cutest 45 minutes of my week.  I love watching her, and judging by how fast she ran into the room when her instructors opened the doors this morning, I'd say Ellie loves her class too! :)

I kinda want to blow that picture up poster size and hang it on the living room wall.  Too much? ;)

Ells also started speech recently! While she (somewhat surprisingly) tested within the average range for her age, she was taken in for a six month program because her auditory understanding was on the tippity top of the range while her verbal expression was on the low.  We get a little bit of "homework" every week and it's very much a learning process for all of us, but we are so excited for her and look forward to hearing everything she will soon be telling us!!  Coincidentally or not, she has been very chatty lately, mostly with a handful of the same words over and over again, but has been adding some new ones here and there too.  Also, she now almost always calls me "mommy!" instead of "mumma", which is just the cutest in my opinion.  Note the exclamation point because she is ALWAYS YELLING.

As for our little Lo Lo, she will be four months old next week and I hopefully be posting a little update then!  She is getting so, so big.  She rolled over for the first time last week, all four of us were in the living room together to witness it and I may or may not have teared up a bit.  The best part of seeing Lo grow and do new things might be seeing how Ellie reacts to it and how she cheers her on, just like Tyler & I do.  I'm so excited to have her help us feed Lo when we introduce solids, I know Ells will get a kick out of it! :)

I hope you're all enjoying your September so far and are soaking up the last few days of summer! :)

Mini Style // Fall Favorites

There's nothing like doing a little back-to-school shopping... even if your kids don't go to school just yet! ;)  Fall is my favorite season from a fashion standpoint, and as always, shopping for little girls is ten times more fun than shopping for myself!  Here are a handful of my favorite items I've come across so far. :)

dot raincoat // pom hat // peplum top

tulle skirt // tutu dress // skinny jeans

kitty shoes // tights // boots

friday cap // bow sneakers // dotted top // velvet bow

As always, Old Navy has the cutest things around, it's the first place I check for new arrivals!  If you enjoy dressing your kids like small adults (as I sometimes do), Zara has tons of cute clothes out right now.  H&M and J.Crew Factory always have adorable things too, plus I'm loving some of the basic items at The Children's Place (like that peplum top above - we have a few colors and love it!).  They almost always have free shipping and their prices really can't be beat.

Tights and hats are must-haves for us here in New England for the fall + winter months (and usually spring, too).  I love those polka dot tights above, and I also grabbed a bundle of June & January tights for Ellie on their buy/sale/trade Facebook page - I've gotten a few good deals on there, so definitely check it out if you love the brand!  We also love our boots!  I got Ellie's Hunter's on sale a few months ago, and was so excited to find them (in pink!) at an awesome price.  I was a little sketpical about buying Hunter's for my kids, but can honestly say the quality is great and they've held up so much better than a lot of Ellie's other shoes - especially nice since they will eventually be handed down to baby sis!

I've been working on switching out the girls' clothes, moving things from Ellie's closet into Lo's and putting tiny baby things in storage.  Next on my agenda is my own closet.  Although, I'm a little envious of Ellie's wardrobe and totally wouldn't mind if I could squeeze into all of her clothes instead. ;)

Apple Picking 2017

Checking something off our fall bucket list, we took the girls apple picking over the weekend!  It seemed to be the shortest apple picking excursion ever for some reason, our bag filled up so quickly! Regardless, Ellie said she had fun and the weather was pretty much perfect for the occasion.

I'm going to keep on holding my babies as long as possible, these days of little babies go by way too quickly. :)

We grabbed apple cider donuts on our way out (possibly my favorite kind of donuts on the planet), and went home to bake an apple pie - in case the donuts weren't enough! ;)  It was mostly a flour-all-over-the-floor kind of chaos, and it's some kind of a miracle that this thing even slightly resembles a pie, but Ellie loves (loves might be an understatement) helping us in the kitchen and it tastes pretty delicious!

Oh, and P.S. I always use Pillsbury pie crusts + follow the super simple recipe on the box, it makes (mostly) homemade pie so easy to make! ;)

Fall Bucket List

Last fall, we were in the midst of packing up + selling our house.  Two of the past three years, I've been in my first trimester of pregnancy in the fall (i.e. completely exhausted), and the other we had a little baby Ellie on our hands.  We're getting more and more into a really fun age with Ells now and it's just the best.  She gets excited about doing just about anything, which is going to make this upcoming fall + holiday season so much fun!  We've been discussing all the festive things lately and she seems especially excited about getting pumpkins, apple picking and of course having Santa come down our chimney. ;)  But let's try not to get too ahead of ourselves here!  These are some of the things we plan on doing over the next couple months:

1.) Pick pumpkins and carve them.  Discussions of cat-o-lanterns have already been had, and I'm pretty sure I am no longer the one who is most excited about them.

2.) Go apple picking.  I'm so looking forward to taking Ells apple picking this year, I know she will have a ball!  Obviously we'll need to make a pie afterwards, and possibly some homemade apple sauce for baby Lo (who will be eating solids next month, what?!).

3.) Make a giant leaf pile, and jump in it of course! Having a two year old help rake leaves is totally okay as long as she's having fun, right? ;)

4.)  Go on a fall foliage drive, or maybe get a little adventurous and go on a hike?

5.)  Decorate what will soon be my brand new mantle for fall!

6.)  Go trick-or-treating.  This will be Ellie's very first time actually going trick-or-treating and I cannot wait to see what she thinks!  I took the liberty of picking out the girls' costumes since I'm sure this will be the last year Ellie lets me choose - she seems to be on-board and I'm just hoping she doesn't change her mind before Halloween!

7.)  Have a festive movie night with a fire in the fireplace (and fireplace s'mores!).  We haven't stopped watching Room on the Broom since last Halloween, but would you believe me if I said I've never seen Hocus Pocus??

8.)  Boo at the Zoo - trick-or-treat at the zoo (free admission for kids in costume!).  If you're local, you can find more information here, and if you're not, definitely check out your own local zoo - I know this is a pretty popular thing!

9.)  Thanksgiving for four.  I wanted to do this last year but we never got around to it.  Just a simple, mini-Thanksgiving dinner at home just the four of us!  We love seeing all of our family on the big holidays, but I'd also love to have a quiet (if that's possible) dinner together where we actually sit down at the table without the TV on in the background.

10.)  Get updated family photos taken.  I think we've made this an annual tradition, at least while we have little kids, and we obviously need some photos with our newest addition!

I feel like it's so easy to just say "no, that's going to be a giant pain in the butt" when it comes to doing different activities with a small baby around, so I thought putting our fall bucket list in writing would help make sure we get these things done.  Of course this list isn't all inclusive, I've already checked off one of the most important items on our bucket list: matching Halloween jammies! :)

Hope your September is off to a great start!