The Girls are 9 Months Old!

Where has the time gone? The babies are 9 months old and growing up right before my eyes! They were much healthier this month until this week when they both got ear infections again, but I'm grateful they were healthy the majority of the month. We had a busy month with Grandma and Grandpa Feuz, Auntie Emily, and Uncle Shane visiting, then Auntie Kaley came for a visit, then we babysat cousin Savannah (5) and cousin Sawyer (9 months) for almost a week while their parents were away. The girls did great with all our visitors but we are ready for some relaxation!

Swimming with Auntie Kaley

Eden: Our sweet Eden has tripled her birthweight and is 15 pounds 3 ounces! Recently, she has decided it is quite fun to laugh and will often be found playing on the floor giggling to herself. She also has learned we think it is so cute when she laughs, so she has even started fake laughing for attention. I'll take a laugh for attention over a cry for attention any day!

Lydia: The lovely Lydia is still a bit bigger than her sister at 16 pounds 10 ounces. Technically, they are both "small" for their age (7th percentile and 20th percentile), but they seem just right to me! Lydia thinks she rules the roost around here. When she wants something, she lets you know she wants it now! She can also be a bit of a bully pulling Eden's bows off her head and crawling right over her ever chance she gets. Luckily, it doesn't seem to bother Eden at all.

Lydia loves splashing, but went a little crazy this time!

Lydia with her bully face on while climbing up cousin Sawyer.

Teeth: Both girls finally have teeth. Eden got one first and Lydia's followed two days later. Then they both got their second tooth on the exact same day. They must be twins. Thankfully, teething hasn't been too painful of a process as they were really only grouchy the day of. They are pretty tough babies. Every once in a while they bite me while eating and those little teeth are sharp!

Swinging at the park

Movers: I can hardly keep up with these two. They are cruising all around the house and getting into trouble. Lydia's favorite mischief is splashing Ollie's water and eating his dog food. Eden prefers to find every tiny thing that has fallen on the floor that we don't see and put it in her mouth. She even choked one day and thankfully, immediately threw up all over the floor!

Why yes, I made these adorable Thing 1 and 2 outfits!

Finding my Zen: Perhaps the biggest change this month is actually with me. The last several months I've been finding myself becoming more and more of a control freak! I was caught in the perfection cycle. Whenever we would have a bad day (or even just a bad moment in the day) I would blame myself and try to figure out what I could do differently. I felt that if it was my fault, then that meant I could fix it if I tried hard enough and was the perfect mom. Every night I would go to bed despairing over the events of the day and resolving that I would do better tomorrow. Well, tomorrow would come and inevitably something would go wrong at some point which would lead to a break down on my part. My former laid back self no longer recognized the neurotic mess I had become. Things finally came to a head this month and I realized what I was doing was not healthy for me, the babies, or Nate. So Nate and I sat down together and brainstormed my "Treatment Plan." The plan involved doing some things for myself like getting regular exercise and having regular outings both with and without the babies, as well as relinquishing some control and letting Nate take over certain things. Oh my goodness, that was hard for me! Telling a control freak that they are no longer in change of something doesn't always go over well. Anyway, as I've let go of things and started to accept that I can't make my children and my husband behave in the exact perfect way that I envisioned, a huge weight has been lifted from me. I am so much happier which means the entire household is as well. Funny enough, I swear things got better the minute I quit freaking out about every little thing going wrong. I'm sure the babies could sense my stress before and were reacting to that, so naturally they are reacting differently as my calm, laid-back self returns. I've certainly missed that side of myself and I am thrilled she is coming back.

Hiking at Devil's Den

It's Always Fun When Grandpa Comes (and Grandma, Uncle, and Auntie)

We love living in Arkansas but we don't love living so far away from our family. We were thrilled when my family decided to come and visit us. (And by us, of course I mean they were coming to visit the twins!) Sometimes I think my family wonders why we live half-way across the country, so we decided to branch out from our usual tour of the ol' Walton Five and Dime store/museum and show them there is more to our life than Wal-Mart.

Grandma, Grandpa, Uncle Shane, and Aunt Emily flew into Branson so we decided to make a weekend of it and stay in a condo for a couple nights. We found a great deal and ended up having more space than we would have at our house with all the girls' crap baby equipment strewn about the house. We enjoyed the amenities and took the girls for their first swim. Eden was a bit leery, but Lydia took to the water like a fish.

From a distance, Nate thought this was a basketball hoop but upon further inspection, realized it was an old person assist chair. After his initial disappointment, he was eager to give it a try with Eden. 

Lydia was a big fan of splashing

We also were able to check out Silver Dollar City (theme park) and had a blast. They had some pretty sweet roller coasters, including a brand new wooden coaster that is the world's steepest wood coaster (drop of 162 feet at 81 degrees) and the world's second fastest wood coaster at 68 mph. Yeah, it was pretty darn cool! (I had to ride it twice because I was terrified the first time and closed my eyes at the best part!)

Grandpa, Shane, Nate and I about to embark on the Outlaw Run. Nate was obviously excited!

Other than rides, they had some fun music/comedy live shows as well as demonstrations like glass blowing and old fashioned candy making that you could watch. One of the neatest things we did was tour the giant underground cave that the park is built on top of. The cave was stunning and a bit scary at some points. (I was afraid I would trip and drop my baby down a bottomless pit!) All in all, we were quite impressed with Silver Dollar City.

Touring Marvel Cave

After a great weekend in Branson, we headed back to Bentonville for some more fun and adventures. Some of the highlights included a Devil's Den hike, the food trucks and splash pad just off the town square, and a Jason Aldean concert. And of course, a lot of time just spent hanging around and loving on the babies! It was way too short a visit and we miss them already, but luckily we are headed to Utah next month so we'll be together again soon!

Family picture at the dam at Devil's Den

Grandma, Grandpa, Shane, Em and Ollie enjoying the beauty of the Ozarks

Lydia rehydrating on the hike

Eden was pretty sure she didn't want to get her feet wet and refused to put them down! She did like touching the water with her hands while Mommy held her though.