Another Baby in the Family!

Last Monday the girls and I went to meet our new baby cousin!  My cousin, Heather, and her husband Bobby welcomed a beautiful baby boy and we met my mom, aunt, and cousins there to meet him!  They aren't sure if he will go by his first or middle name yet so we are just calling him baby boy for now.  The girls were 13 weeks old when they met him and I am guessing around 9lbs and 22 inches long and their new cousin was 8lbs, 21.75 inches long!  He's not too far behind them already! 

 

My cousin Jenell holding Natalie and Baby Boy.

 

Me and the baby!

 

Natalie and her new cousin.  Almost the same length!

 

Noelle's turn with her new cousin.

 

My mom holding Noelle, me, and my cousin, Heather.

 

Mom and Noelle, Heather and her new son, Aunt Vicky and Natalie.

 

Jenell holding Baby Boy, Noelle on the left, Easton and Natalie on the right.  Minus Jenell, these are the four Eck great-grandchildren!

 

This was from this past weekend, Natalie and Noelle practicing their tummy time.

 

What the top rack of our dishwasher looks like....every night....

 

Lunch in the middle of Target with Bullseye the dog.

Our weekend was pretty uneventful....lots of errands yesterday, schoolwork today, and dinner with Ben's family to visit with his cousin Martina and her son!  We haven't seen them in over a year so it was fun to get to have dinner with them and show off our girls!  Hopefully we will get to visit with them this summer when we go to Texas.

Happy Sunday everyone!  Only 15 days left of school!

3 Weeks till Summer!

Only three weeks left of school!  I will miss my kiddos but I can't wait to spend the summer with the girls!  I'm working on my summer to-do list and will share soon.  We have a relaxing weekend ahead of us...no plans except for dinner with Ben's family on Sunday because his cousin and cousin's toddler are in town from Texas.  Other then that, lots of relaxing on our schedule!


Have a great weekend!

Happy Memorial Day!

Thank you to all the men and women who have given the ultimate sacrifice and have died for our freedom and safety. Words can not express how much that means. I have several family members and friends who have fought or are currently fighting and I am blessed and thankful that I am not remembering any of them today. Thank you military, for everything.

Enjoy your day with your family & friends and remember why we are so blessed to have this day off. 

Four weeks to go!

Until summer break!  I am so happy to have a three day weekend so we have an extra day of family time!  And I'm trying to use our extra day to convince Ben to go car shopping, haha!  Of course, it would help if we could agree on what kind of car to get...hopefully we will agree on something soon. 


Anyways, we have been busy busy busy since my last post a week ago.  Last Sunday we celebrated my father-in-law's birthday!  The guys went golfing and the girls went to church and afterwards we had lunch at their house and enjoyed hanging out together!  I thought I would snap a few pictures while there but I forgot.


On Wednesday I took the girls to their first Orioles game!  My school had a fundraiser for their Just for Dads group (a group dedicated to promoting male role models in childrens lives) so we bought tickets.  Ben didn't realize it was a Wednesday night and he wasn't able to get home in time for us to go to the game so my friend Lisa helped me take the girls.  I was able to try out my new TwinGo carrier too!  The TwinGo carrier was designed by a twin mom and it's kind of like a 3 in 1 carrier.  It can tandem carry two kids up to 40lbs individually or separate into two single carriers that can be used on the front or back of the body.  It folds up into two pouches for easy storage.  I really liked it!  Once I studied the pdf, it was easy to put on and very comfortable.  You aren't supposed to use the carrier until the babies are at least 10lbs and the girls are somewhere between 9-9.5lbs but I figured they would be okay since we were sitting most of the time.  I am excited to try tandem wearing them once they are a bit older and bigger!  My mom and I are planning to use them this summer to take the kids to the zoo and aquarium.

 

Mommy & Noelle

Sadly the Orioles lost but we still had fun at the game!  I saw several of my students who were SUPER excited to meet the girls.  The girls also got a first time visitor certificate for their baby books.  They did fabulous other than crying because they were hungry and slept or stared around at everyone most of the time.  We were able to stay till the 8th inning because the game was moving pretty fast.  And a perk of having twins?  We got moved to the front of the security line!  Hopefully we will get to go again this summer with Daddy!

I went to a retirement party Friday night for one of my coworkers while Ben stayed with the girls.  His mom and sister came over to help and enjoyed spending time with the babies.  Saturday morning the girls and I went to a brunch at my college bible study leader's house.  A few months ago, I messaged all of the girls in our study saying I missed them and hoped we could get together soon.  Well it worked out that two of the three girls who live out of state (Texas and Florida) were in town for graduations this weekend and we were able to have a little reunion!  It was so fun to see them and catch up!  Only two of the girls couldn't make it and we were able to FaceTime with one so we almost got to see everyone!  That bible study is a huge reason why I miss college...we did four years of life together and have some fantastic memories, funny stories, and inside jokes.  Hopefully it won't be so long in between getting together next time!

 

Love these ladies!

 

Lindsay was helping Jess (who is afraid of babies) hold Noelle....this picture cracks me up!

 Just some random pics from the past week...

 

Beautiful full rainbow!

 

Noelle was not feeling the Saturday morning selfie.

 

"Hey...don't I know you from somewhere?  You look really familiar."

We don't have any set plans for the rest of the weekend...I may go see my cousin's new baby on Monday and we may go look at cars.  Other then that, we will just be relaxing and enjoying our extra time together!

Happy Memorial Day to everyone, especially to our armed forces.  I've always thought it's important to talk about why we have off for certain holidays, Memorial Day being one of them.  As a class we discuss what Memorial Day is and I always read the book The Wall by Eve Bunting.  It's a somber book about the Vietnam Memorial in DC and every year the kids are transfixed by it.  And I always have a few who cry.  They are always moved by what the holiday means and it's one of the reasons I love teaching!  So thank you to all of the women and men out there who have fought, are fighting, or one day will decide to fight for our country and freedom!  God Bless the USA!

  

3 Months

Can you believe our little babies are THREE MONTHS already?!?  I can't believe they're that old already!  They are getting so big...no doctor appointment this month to measure them but I am guessing they are both around 9lbs and 22 inches long.  Highlights this month include starting daycare (more of a low for mommy but they're doing great there and we are really happy with our daycare person), celebrating our first Mother's Day, both girls rolling over from front to back, gaining some great head control, lots of smiles and cooing, and regularly sleeping 10-12hrs at night!!!  We can't wait to see what month 4 brings!

 

The next few pictures all happened one after the other...

 

Natalie starting to lean on Noelle...

 

Falling...

 

And knocked her down, haha!

 

Any other time they would be all smiles...I spent ten minutes trying to get them to smile for me!

 

Absolutely love these two!

Mother's Day

Last weekend was a BUSY weekend for us!  We were on the go all weekend but it was fun because we spent most of our time with family.  The weekend started off Friday night with dinner at my in-laws house because Ben's aunt and uncle were in town from Texas.  It was such a nice evening that we sat on the porch, passed babies around, and had a good time relaxing.


Saturday was our least hectic day.  We celebrated Mother's Day with Ben's mom by going out to dinner at a nearby restaurant called Timbuktu.  We had never been before but the food was really good!  We had lunch with Ben's parents, aunt & uncle, and Kevin.  It was really nice to spend some more time with Nanne & Wayne before they headed on to see Nanne's family.  The girls did great and pretty much slept through the entire lunch after we fed them.  Ben hung out with Kevin Saturday night while I relaxed and watched TV!  Not something I get to do often!

Sunday was super busy for us but a lot of fun too.  We left in the morning to go visit my parents on the Eastern Shore for Mother's Day.  They hosted a cookout for the entire family so we were able to see my grandparents, uncles, aunts, and cousins.  We also had some special visitors before the cookout began!  My parents' longtime friends came over to meet the babies for the first time.  Mr. Logan & Mrs. Cindy have known me since before I was born and were our old neighbors.  They enjoyed getting to meet the girls and we had fun showing them off!

 

Mr. Logan & Mrs. Cindy

 

They brought the girls a giant stuffed chicken family.

 

Mom and her Mother's Day gifts.

 

Noelle (pink headband) and Natalie's (blue headband) little hand prints!

 

Took a few tries but we finally got a good picture of us with the girls.  In the background is a picture of my mom's mom, my grandmother.

 

Noelle and her great-grandmother

 

Family

My first Mother's Day was exactly what I wanted...spending time with Ben, the girls, and family.  It was nice that we were able to see both moms and my grandmother during the weekend.  Ben's gift to me was supposed to be a set of professional pictures of the girls at 4m, 6m, 9m, and 12m but he also gave me tickets to see my FAVORITE band, Rascal Flatts!  We are going in June and I am so excited!  It's been 6 years since I saw them in concert and the last time we went, I actually thought Ben was going to propose to me...he didn't but that's okay.  He gave me an awesome proposal a few months later, haha.  My inlaws gave me a set of adorable tea towels with a mom quote on them and an Etsy gift card.  My parents gave me an IOU babysitting day so I can get a mani and pedi sometime this summer.

 

I think we have a thumb sucker on our hands!  Natalie is occasionally sucking her thumb now.

 

Noelle is really getting some great head control!

I hope you and your family enjoyed your Mother's Day weekend with all the special women in your life!