Sunday, July 20, 2008

Time on the Boat and a Visit with Mamaw and Granddad

We're really enjoying our summer around here. Lots of time in the pool and on Mom and Dad's boat. Here's a picture of Ellie enjoying the tube with Daddy:

Emerson continues to do well. We moved her into her bedroom with big sister a couple of weeks ago, and she's also now on a 4 hour feeding schedule throughout the day. I feed her at 8:30 each evening and she usually sleeps until around 7am, which is SO NICE!! I feed her at 7 and then we all go back to sleep until between 8:30 and 9. Are we spoiled or what?! It's going to be a rude awakening when I go back to work! More on work below...

Emerson is definitely not quite as easy going as Ellie, though. She tends to not be happy with others for long, and she definitely has a fussy time between 6 and 8 pm where she's tough to keep happy. But, she's still a fantastic baby and we're loving getting to know her. Here's a photo of her first time in her jumper:

James' Granddad (his mom's dad) is ill. The doctors are saying he may not be with us much longer, so we made a quick trip to College Station where they moved last year to visit with them. We had a very nice visit and I think Mamaw and Granddad enjoyed getting to see the girls. One cute story was when Granddad asked for a pillow. Ellie was in the bedroom with James where the pillow was and offerred to carry it back out to Granddad. She did like a champ and Granddad was very grateful. Such a little helper! Here's a photo of the girls with Mamaw and Granddad:

And below is a photo of the girls with Aunt Glenda and Uncle Charles. They've lived in College Station longer, and we just adore them. Glenda is Mamaw's twin sister, and we were thrilled to see them even if it was brief:

Regarding an update on my work... When I went on maternity leave, I was on a 60% reduced schedule with PwC. During my leave, they've asked that I return at 80%. That means another 8-10 hours per week. Before, I worked full days on W-F and stayed home on Mondays and Tuesdays. My boss also changed during that time. I've spent much time in prayer over it and am happy to report that we've agreed that I can put in those extra hours from home on Mondays and Tuesdays as a general rule. I'll go in if needed on those days, but in general I can work those hours from home. We're going to try it for 3 months and make sure it works before making it permanent, but I'm confident I can make it work. I'm so grateful to still have those days with my girls! The extra money will be a huge blessing as well. Thanks to those of you who were aware of the situation and praying for us!! I'll return to work on August 11th.

Next week is VBS at church. James and I are both helping out, which means being at church at 8am all week long!! Our girls aren't going to know what hit them! LOL. I'm sure it will be a great time, though. Then on Saturday, James leaves for his mission trip to Tijuana, Mexico for one week. Please be in prayer that he has a wonderful time and is a huge blessing to the people of Tijuana. I have no doubt he will be blessed as well. If anyone wants to come around or get together that week to keep me company, I'd love it! We'll definitely miss the Daddy around here!

While our lives are certainly not perfect and conflict does exist from time to time, I'm overwhelmed this summer by how blessed we are. I have an amazing best friend in my husband James who is also a completely fantastic father. We have two beautiful girls who bring us immeasurable joy. We have amazing friends both here in Dallas and beyond with some newer friendships growing especially in our LifeGroup. And God's blessings are pouring out both financially and professionally for us both. As we sang in church just this morning "How Great is Our God!"

Thursday, July 10, 2008

Fun on the Boat, with the Cornwells, and the 4th of July

Well, following our big trip, James had 2 days at home before he left for a conference in San Francisco. He had a great time, but we missed him a lot here.

Aunt Jen got the girls some super cute matching dresses. They wore them last Sunday:


I also put Emerson into her Exersaucer for the first time last week:


Here's Emerson swimming:
On Monday, we went out on dad's boat with the Cornwells. The kids loved the water and had fun riding on the tube off the back of the boat. Here are a couple of photos. Keep in mind that since I was alone with the two girls, I wasn't snapping photos as much as I would have liked!


Cute photo of Ellie sleeping:

My friends Carrie and Libby both had their babies around the time of our trip. James Coleman Rogers (far right) was born on June 18th, and Noah Benjamin Faulkner (middle) was born on June 28th. Despite Emerson's demeanor in the below photo, we were all thrilled to meet them!

We went out on Dad's boat with Jessica and Matt on the 4th of July. We had a fantastic time, but alas I didn't get any photos. We swam and ate and relaxed and got to watch tons of fireworks from the water. The reflections off the lake were fantastic. What a blessing to get to watch from there!

James came home on Sunday, and we're happy to have him back. Ellie and Emerson both did great while he was gone and continue to do well. Emerson sleeps from 9pm to between 6 and 7:30am these days which is fantastic. We also started putting them to sleep in their room together recently which is going well. They don't seem to bother each other so far. We're spending tons of time in the pool this summer, and Ellie is turning SO tan! I'll leave you with a few cute videos I captured recently. Enjoy!


Monday, June 30, 2008

Two New Posts!

For those of you anxiously awaiting news from the Wiebes, you are in luck! I just posted two posts. One with our latest professional photos and one that recaps our recent road trip. Enjoy!

Two Year Photos

Wiebe Road Trip of 2008

Two Year Photos

My friend Leah did Ellie's 2 year pictures a couple of weeks ago. We threw in some of Emma and the family as well. Here are some of my favorites. Enjoy!



















Sunday, June 29, 2008

The Wiebe Road Trip of 2008

Well, we just returned from our 12 day road trip. Some found us insane to drive so far with two young children. Perhaps, but we survived and actually had a great time. Here are some stats for you:

Number of cities visited - 5. Little Rock, Syracuse, Watertown, Detroit and Indianapolis
Number of children we stayed with - 7 (2 in Syracuse, 2 in Detroit and 3 in Indy)
Number of times Ellie woke up during our one drive through the night - 8
Number of people staying in 2 bedroom condo in Detroit - 8. 4 adults and 4 children under 3
Number of diapers changed in said 2 bedroom condo during our 5 day stay - somewhere in the neighborhood of 120
Number of times Georgie said "Why?" during our five day stay - infiniti to the infinity power
Number of times Georgie climbed into the crib with Ellie on night one of our stay - 5
Cousin time - priceless....

We had a fabulous time. We left on Tuesday and stopped in Little Rock to have lunch with Aunt Becka and Uncle Daniel. This was their first time to meet Emerson, so we're so glad we got to see them! The quick lunch went by way too quickly, but it was fun nonetheless.



We then continued on the road and drove through the night Tuesday night and all day Wednesday to visit our friends Doug and Jennie and their daughters Hannah and Lauren in Syracuse. Ellie struggled through the night getting comfortable, but both girls did great on Wednesday. We arrived in Syracuse by 4:30 on Wednesday - tired but happy to be there! We had a lovely dinner and crashed fairly early. On Thursday, we left the Lapes for a bit and took a road trip up to Watertown. James wanted to see the condition of his childhood home, and we also paid a visit to his (and now our) good friend Mitzie DeGennaro (and their dog Rio...get it? Rio DeGennaro?). Mitzie and her husband Vinnie built a beautiful cabin on a lake 30 minutes north of Watertown. The picture below is of us by the water. We also had lunch at one of James' favorite places - best wings ever!



Ellie found some interesting reading at the Lapes. Perhaps this means she'll start thinking about potty training soon...


On Friday, Doug got off work early, so all 8 of us went to a great park near their home. I was horribly remiss in taking good pictures, so below is the only picture proving that we saw the Lapes. Hannah is on the left, and you can barely see Lauren's head sticking out in the middle. Jennie is on the right. Below that is Ellie walking like a runway model. :) We had a great time with good friends. Thanks, Lapes!


On Saturday morning, we said goodbye to the Lapes and headed out to Detroit. Unfortunately, I completely forgot to pack our passports which would have allowed us to go the fast way through Canada. Alas, we had to go the long way, so it felt like a long drive to Detroit. We arrived a little after 7pm and sat down to a wonderful home cooked meal by Jennie (my sister - not Lape!). And that's right, folks. You heard me correctly. I said home cooked and Jennie in the same sentence. (Just kidding, Jenn. The lasagna was wonderful!) They have a beautiful condo that we hadn't seen before and are in a really nice area. We had so much fun letting the cousins hang out.

We embarked on the precarious mission of getting photos of all 8 of us taken at JC Penney after church on Sunday. It went amazingly well. We got some great photos. Sunday night was boys night out. Jenn and I stayed with the kids and James and Dave enjoyed Get Smart and some coffee. Monday we took the kids swimming and just generally took it easy. Dave and Jenn had a church obligation, so James and I put the kids to bed that night. Tuesday we went to the zoo. That's right - we took 4 kids under 3 to the zoo. It was a blast. See the pictures and video below. Tuesday night was girls night. Jenn and I enjoyed a lovely dinner, a bit of shopping and Get Smart as well. (Great flick, by the way.) Wednesday we took the kids to the splash area at the nearby mall and also had a nice dinner with Dave's parents. We then headed out Thursday morning for Indianapolis. It was such a nice relaxing time in Detoit with the Brady's. Thanks for having us!!












Videos:
Detroit Splashing - 1 minute
Detroit Zoo - 1 1/2 minutes
Cousin Bedtime - 1 minute
Cousin Bedtime 2 - 30 seconds
Cousin Naptime - 1 1/2 minutes
Our wonderful friends the Cornwells live in Indianapolis with their 3 kids Reagan (7), Ryan (5 as of the day we arrived) and Riley (2 1/2). We were pumped to get to help celebrate Ryan's 5th birthday with them since we were there staying with Reagan the night he was born. Crazy that it was just 5 years ago. As it happened, the Cornwells were also heading to Texas on Friday to visit Lori's mom and us. So, we worked it out to caravan! We all left Friday morning and arrived at our hotel that night around 5. We let the kids swim and ordered pizza and then all went to bed. Saturday we kept trucking and parted ways after lunch. We'll see them again this week when they come to visit. Thanks for caravanning with us and letting us crash a night at your place!



Saturday afternoon was our longest day, I think, mostly due to an unhappy Emerson. She was an angel the rest of the trip, but she'd finally had it by then. Fortunately, we were home by 5 that afternoon and were able to unpack and get laundry going while the girls unwinded a bit. Whew! What a great trip!





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