Playing in the Park

Another fun week for the Clay Family. Friday night we went to the zoo for "Feast with the Beasts". From 6:30-9:30 there were food vendors at the zoo and once you paid admission you could have as much as you wanted to eat and drink from the various booths. We had BBQ, mexican, ice-cream and all sorts of goodies. There were also games and prizes for the kids, face painting and people dressed up in costume. The one thing we came to find out was that Amy does not like the costumes at all!!! She would start crying when we approached them so rather than try and get her photo with some of the characters we just kept walking :-)
Sunday was a nice day and in the afternoon we went to the park. There were a lot of kids there but Amy still had fun and enjoyed swinging and climbing on the equipment. Obviously all her practice at Little Gym is paying off. Caitlyn was content just sitting in the sling with mummy while Daddy supervised Amy. This week Caitlyn turns 6 months old and we have doctor appointment today for her regular check-up. Unfortunately it also means more vaccinations for our baby girl. Can't believe Easter is nearly here - we will be decorating eggs and on the weekend we are heading to Amy's friend Blake's house for an Easter Egg hunt - so that will be fun. Will post more and some pics on the weekend :-)

Amy loved the Big Bird show at Seaworld

It's been a fun 2 weeks for us. We ended up going to Seaworld last Sunday as the weekend before it was too cold (yes believe it or not it got really cold here in San Antonio in March!). Jerad and I can't believe that we had not been to Seaworld before now, considering it is only 6 miles from our house. It was such a great afternoon. When we first arrived we went to line up and see the Big Bird Beach Party show. We were sitting right down the front and at first i wasn't sure how Amy would react to the crowds and the noise etc, but she loved it. Her little eyes lit up when she saw Big Bird and Elmo and all the characters she knows from the TV show. Being a kids show they had a lot of music and songs and encouraged the kids to get up and dance as well. So she loved standing of the seat and clapping her hands along with everyone else. Cailtyn even seemed to enjoy it. After that we headed over to the Dolphin Cove where she was able to lean against the angled wall and look down into the pool of dolphins (Jerad standing behind her to support her of course!). She was fascinated watching the dolphins as they were being fed. Then it was time to go to the Sea Lion show. This was one packed with people so I stayed with Caitlyn asleep in her stroller up the back while Jerad took Amy down closer. It was a fun one to watch with them doing their tricks and getting the front section of the audience all wet. By this time it was starting to get late so we stopped by to see the Clydesdale horses and then headed home. It is so nice having the season passes because we can just have 2-3 hours at a time at the park without wearing the girls out and essentially we will see something new each time we go there. We barely saw 1/4 of the park during this trip - there are still all the rides to go on, more animals to see and a lot more shows that are on and different ones throughout the year. Definitely a lot more family friendly park than Fiesta Texas - feels like there is a lot more space, plenty of shade and seating and landscaped beautifully.

As you can see from the photo Caitlyn is holding her own bottle now for Daddy during the day - such a big girl!! She is rolling over a lot more too and trying to push up when she is on her tummy. I am sure she will be crawling sooner than Amy did (granted that won't be hard :-) Jerad has got back into playing golf on Sunday mornings now that the weather is starting to get nicer. Although he missed out on his game this morning as he has a delivery to Laredo. He bought one of the 20 game players cards though so he has plenty of weeks ahead of him to play. When we go on vacation in May there is a golf course 1 mile away so he'll be able to play a couple of rounds then too. Yesterday we went out in the afternoon and bought a Wii game system. Jerad set it up last night and it looks like so much fun. Jerad just played the golf and the bowling and has tried the boxing - it looks like her got a real workout with the boxing game. There are a few games that Amy can play too so we'll see how she does tonight on it :-) Mummy bought the Wii Fit game, I can see Amy wanting to do that with me because when I was pregnant with Caitlyn and did my stretches each night Amy loved to "help" me.

Nothing much else happened during the week. I had a follow-up appointment with Dr Washington and everything is well - I am back down to the weight I was pre-Amy, blood pressure fine and checked out OK. I also went during the week to visit a friend I work with, Edda, who has metastatic breast cancer. This is her third time fighting it and she is having a rough time. She looked well though and is in good spirits and was being discharged yesterday. My thoughts are with her and her family.

Caitlyn turns 5 months old

Once again I have been slack and didn't update the blog last weekend....sorry about that. Well as you can see in the photo Caitlyn is getting ready for Easter early and has had some photos taken of her reaching her 5 month milestone. She of course rolls over now, seems to really like music (just like her sister) as she kicks her legs and "dances" whenever we play particular tunes. She is also a lot more vocal than Amy was and really gets some loud high pitched laughs going at times. It is really cute watching Amy play with Caitlyn and Caitlyn will reach out to grab Amy and just giggle and giggle.

It was an exciting week this week as a friend of ours from Charlottesville was in town for the week attending a conference. We picked Joanne up last Sunday night and took her to the hotel and then she stayed with us on Friday night and got to spend time with the girls. Hopefully she traveled home safely yesterday. It was great catching up with her and learning about her new job and how people are doing back East. After I dropped Joanne back at the airport yesterday I finally went and used some of my gift card at Spa d' Sante and had a dead sea salt body scrub. It was pretty good - I'd never had that treatment before. They mixed the salt scrub with tea tree oil and man I must have had a lot of dead skin to remove because I felt so smooth afterward. Oh and I have to get one of the Vichy showers they had - 5 shower heads at once over your whole body......pretty nice. Next time I go back I think I'll get a massage maybe with the hot rocks.

Today we are all off to Seaworld to meet Big Bird!! Luke (Amy's friend from Little Gym) and his parents asked us if we wanted to go and we thought why not. We have wanted to go to Seaworld for a long time and with the Sesame Street characters there at the moment doing their show we figured Amy would like that. I have purchased season passes for us so we can go anytime we want until the end of the year. It will be another option for Jerad and the girls during the week too.

I am also looking forward to next week, thanks to our tax refund and a bonus from work we are able to pay off the car next week. It will be sweet not having a car payment again!

A quiet couple of weeks

Sorry I didn't get around to posting last week. I think after the long birthday weekend we were all worn out. So the last two weeks have been pretty quiet for us. You know fun stuff, like getting taxes done, grocery shopping, playing at home. The most exciting news is that we have booked a small getaway for the first week in May. We are going to pack up the whole family (Buka and Domino included) and head to the Texas coast (Port Aransas) for a week. We have rented a 3 bedroom house at the beach. It seems like a great deal for us since it is pet friendly, a house rather than a condo, we can buy groceries rather than eating out every meal and if needed we can be back home in 2 hours. It will be nice to take the girls to the beach as neither of them have ever been to the coast. It won't be too hot or too busy that time of year either. There is also a golf course 1 mile away so Jerad can have a few games of golf.

Caitlyn is just getting cuter and cuter. As you can see from the video she really enjoys her jumperoo and I think she has the cutest little smile and giggle. It's hard to believe she will be 5 months old next week. It didn't seem that long ago that I was pregnant. Still, it sure is fun watching her grow each day and interact more. She rolls over more now, smiles and laughs a lot (more than Amy did at that age) and reaches out for objects (which unfortunately sometimes includes my hair or necklace!) Both of the girls are taking a nap right now..............correction were napping. Well it looks like I'll need to cut this one short - so until next week then.

Our little girl turned 2

What a busy week in our household this week. Friday was Amy's 2nd birthday which unfortunately for her started with a trip to the doctors for her and her sister. I took the day off work so I could take them. Amy is now 23.5lbs and 35.5 inches tall. She is in the 10th percentile for weight and 80th percentile for height. She had to have 1 vaccination but is now all set until she is 4. Caitlyn had her 4 month check-up and now weighs 13lb 11oz and is 24.5 inches long. She is in the 50th percentile for weight and 70th percentile for height. Funnily enough she is tracking nearly identically to Amy when Amy was that age. Caitlyn was a brave little girl and also had 4 vaccinations and an oral vaccine. Of course as soon as she started crying Amy started too. So for about 10 mintues I had them in stereo!! Luckily by the time we left the doctors both had calmed down and all was well as we headed to shops for some retail therapy. In the afternoon Amy had fun opening her gifts she had received from the family. She received a Tinker Bell pop-up book, Tinker Bell blankets, Tinker Bell DVD, Tinker Bell wand (are you picking up a theme here :-), a growth chart, new pair of swimmers, cover-up, Peter Rabbit books, crayola crayons, crayola magic coloring books and a dirt devil toy vacuum. By the end of it she was an expert at unwrapping.

Friday night we went to Madison's house for her 2nd birthday party. She lives in The Dominion in a very nice home. We arrived there in the afternoon with 3 other little kiddos and played in her playroom before heading downstairs for pizza, cake and ice-cream. Before leaving Amy was given 2 pink balloons to take home and she has been playing with them ever since. On Saturday we went to Little Gym in the morning and then came home for an early nap. While Amy and Caitlyn were sleeping I headed out to pick up the Tinker Bell birthday cake. Then it was nearly time to get the party girl dressed and head downtown for her party. Amy looked so cute and when we arrived there and her little friends showed up she was so excited - literally squealing with excitement. We had plenty of food and drinks for everyone and the kids loved looking around the Children's Museum. It is so great because everything is their scale and they can touch everything. Amy had the party room upstairs and they had signs made up for her and the room of course was decorated nicely. The host we had for our party was great - she helped with everything. After the kids had played for a while we called everyone back into the party room and each child decorated a fabric square with handprints and pictures. At the end of it our party host tied all the squares together with bright colored ribbon and made a quilt out of it. It is such a neat momento and we love it. We have it hanging in the girls play room near where Amy does her coloring in. I took a photo to add to this post. Once the quilt making was done it was time for more play out in the museum. Then it was back to the room for cake and gifts. As you can see from Amy's choclatey grin she loved her cake. She was a very lucky girl and received some fantastic gifts from her friends (clothes, a Tinker Bell doll, Tinker Bell book, Build-A-Bear gift card, Little People play castle, puzzles, coloring books, clipo hippo). And the Children's Museum gave her a t-shirt, pencil and beanie toy. Needless to say when we left she was worn out and fell asleep in the car on the way home. But once we were home it was time to watch..........you guessed it Tinker Bell. Mummy and Daddy are tinkered out to say the least. It was a fantastic day though and while it saddens us to think she is growing up so quickly it is great to see the little girl she has become and how happy and friendly she is. It also reminds us how quickly Caitlyn is growing up too and we can't wait to celebrate her milestones too.

Where does the time go?

I can't believe it is February already with Caitlyn turning 4 months old last Friday and Amy turning 2 next week. The weeks and months just go by so quickly. Both of the girsl have their well visits at the doctors next week so we will see how much they have both grown then. Nothing too much to report this week. Amy and Caitlyn had fun during the week playing in their playroom - and big sissy did a very nice job of reading to little sissy (as you can see in the picture). Of course I don't think poor Caitlyn has a choice as Amy is always sitting next to her or on her and giving kisses etc. Poor little Caitlyn probably wants some time to herself some days :-) Jerad also took the girls to the park during the week and Amy went down both of the big slides on her own. Jerad said she absolutely loved it and went down about 10 times. Needless to say she was very disappointed when it was time to come home.
We have been talking to Amy about her birthday and seeing if she will hold up 2 fingers to show old she will be. She doesn't quite do that but gives a great two thumbs up action instead! It was also funny this week she has started to mimic Jerad and I when we hold a finger to our mouth and say "Sshhh". At night after Caitlyn goes to bed whenever Amy is heading upstairs she now with a quite little voice says "Sshhh" but holds her finger sideways across her mouth. It is very cute to see. I am taking the girls later today to have some photos taken. Fingers crossed they both behave and smile for the camera. Sometimes Amy is really good and will pose for the camera and sometimes she just screws up her face and looks everywhere except at the camera. Caitlyn thankfully doesn't really misbehave for the camera just yet - I'm sure that time will come.

Next week we'll have a lot more to report as we have Madison's birthday party on Friday and Amy's on Saturday. I'm sure we'll be on Tinker Bell overload by then!

Jerad's in business

Another busy week for the Clay family. Amy is really enjoying listening to music with Daddy during the day. As you can see in the video she loves dancing and is trying to show her little sister how to dance too. It was the start of a new semester at Little Gym and they have now split the class so some of Amy's friends are now in the older kiddies class. But she still has Blake, Abigail and Lillie in her class and is now able to meet some new little kids too. She had fun with her new teacher Miss Beth and was also able to hand out her birthday party invitations to her friends. This week has involved a lot more birthday party planning - we have ordered her cake and went to Party City to buy party supplies (all Tinkerbell of course!). Mummy and Daddy had fun picking all the little gifts to go in the favor bags too. We also went shopping on Saturday and bought Caitlyn some new clothes and socks. I love shopping for little girl clothes - they are so cute and so much to choose from.

This morning we all went out and got the car washed, did the grocery shopping and bought Amy some birthday presents with money sent by Grandma Liz. Thankfully Amy had a nap after getting home so we can hide the gifts without her having a meltdown as she sees us unpack them and not allow her to play with them! Caitlyn had fun playing with Mummy while we were waiting for the car to get washed but then while we were shopping it was all too tiring and she had to have a nap. She has been such a good girl lately - sleeping through the night, not fussing when we are out (e.g. we ate out twice during the last week and she just lays there while we eat our meal smiling at everyone), laughing and giggling at nearly everything. Of course she is also getting cuter each week. Hard to believe she will be 4 months old this week - she is growing up way too fast. But it is so much fun seeing her with Amy as they interact more.

The other exciting news this week is that Jerad now has a business of his own. He signed up this week to become an Arbonne Consultant. His friend Amy in Oklahama is a stay at home mum and has been doing it for 2 years. They specialize in skin care but also have a baby care line, mens products and health supplements. So Jerad thought this might be a way to make a little extra money while being a stay at home dad. Check out the products at www.arbonne.com
If you want to order something just use his Consultant Number 18105090

Well until next week...................bye