What I'm loving today.

The fact that I'm not pregnant anymore. The fact that I just happened to be wearing a white shirt today. The fact that something triggered me to remember my 39 week belly picture and be able to compare it to my 39 week baby picture. The fact that I am wearing the exact same nail polish in both shots. The fact that I am NOT due (or over due) in a week's time. The fact that I now have a 39-week-old baby in my arms... that's just to name a few.

Crazy how much 9 months can change a person!

-xo

.Eight Months.

{April 3rd}
Stella's 8 month pictures posted entirely too late! At least I made up for it with the pictures.. these are maybe my favorite of her, to date. :)

This eighth month of Stella's has been a busy one!

She crawls now..

She waves now! (and might I add that it is a VERY fancy wave!)

She has thinned out a ton! She is still super squishy but has lost a lot of her "round-ness".. which I can't believe because she eats more than anyone in our entire family.

Oh, and she's still as cute as ever.

She is super ticklish!

She claps her hands! (not the best pic of it, but that's what she was doing)

She is constantly on the go.

As I mentioned before, Stella has had quite a busy month.
She is constantly waving "hi!' and "buh-bye!" to everyone she sees.
She mastered the army crawl to perfection and is now crawling with her belly of the floor (which my pediatrician considers 'cruising')
She sits up in the bathtub, finally.
(she probably could have for a while now, but it always makes me nervous she'll slip so we waited til she was really sturdy to try it)
She all the sudden says words like crazy.
Da-da, Baby, Hi, Buh-Bye, Itty, Ball, Uh-Oh, Ba-Ba, Auntie...
Please take note that none of those EIGHT words are "mama"
Of course I am so happy she is brilliant and talking up a storm,
But Auntie?! Auntie is so much harder to say than "mama!"
She is seriously an Auntie's girl though, so it makes perfect sense.
As soon as she hears Ali's voice she is kicking and screaming up a storm til Auntie gives her some un-divided attention.
And ITTY? The dog.. the dog got named before I did.. not to mention she doesn't even have "Ba-ba"s.. how did that enter the list of words?
I do sort of think that she means "mama" when she says "baba" but I think it's more for those somethings that mama's got that no one else does...
I don't think I'll be fully satisfied until she actually says 'mama' but I'll wait my turn!
I actually think it's totally adorable.
If she didn't love me the most, I might be a little miffed. ;)
In the morning, though, she wakes up and looks around the room (she's usually in our bed at 7-7:30ish and takes a little snooze until 8:30 or so) but as soon as she spots Brady she says "hi dada!" over and over...
It's the best thing ever.
Same thing with Auntie, though.. as soon as she sees her it's "hi auntie!" the whole time.
She can't quite make up her mind of who she likes the most between Auntie and Mama.
She flies out of my arms to auntie, then loves on her and immediately wants me back.
But I don't mind sharing with Auntie one bit. She is the best.
She is an eating machine!
She eats 3 meals a day, at least 3 snacks and still nurses anywhere from 4-6 times a day.
She seems to be napping a lot better, too.
She will sometimes take a morning nap and sometimes not.
either way she naps from 1ish to 4ish when Harlo does so it's nice.
She SCREAMS all the time!
If she wants something, if she's bored, if she wants you to talk to her...
It's all good and fine until we're at a restaurant and people look at us like "take your screaming kids out"
But she's not crying or anything... I don't know what to do about it.
I guess grin and bare it til it's over.
Harlo is always telling her "Stel! Stop scweamin'!"
She LOVES peek-a-boo of any sort.
She especially loves when she wakes up from her naps and me and Harlo crawl into her room and play peek-a-boo with her crib bumpers.
She's been on a kick where she wakes up to eat in the middle of the night.
I'm sure it's something we should probably stop doing, but I really sort of love it.
Brady gets her every single time and brings her to me and she just loves and cuddles and eats then as soon as she's done, she climbs right on top of my head until I take her to her room.
This morning was espeically delicious when I woke up to a big, toothless, slobbery kissy.
She is super friendly and will wave and talk and smile to anyone... until they want to hold her.
Then it's all tears til she's back with mama/auntie.
Somedays she's better than others.. today she let a stranger hold her for a few minutes but she was diving for me the whole time.
People have started telling me that my girls look so much alike.
It's so fun.. I definitely see the resemblence but Harlo at 8 months looks nothing like Stella right now. Kinda funny.
People fall in love with Stella wherever we go.
We get stopped all the time with someone telling me how beautiful my baby is or that Stella is waving them down adn smiling and being so cute she wins them right over.
She is such a little ham already.
She has a love/hate relationship with dogs right now.
She either opens her mouth wide open so they can give her a kiss,
Or she cries when they come hear.
I haven't quite figured out her feelings yet.
She just gets cuter and funner and sillier and sweeter and sassier by the minute!
I just cannot get enough of her.
We ALL cannot get enough of her!

besties.

Me and Haley first met on a whattoexpect.com message board when I was first pregnant with Harlo and she with Finnley.
I had just surprisingly found out I was pregnant with Harlo and was trying to figure out when I was due when I stumbled upon the message boards. I noticed Haley pretty quick because she had a wedding picture in her signature and I noticed the date was a week after my wedding day. We became quick friends and stayed in pretty good contact through the boards. When the babies were born (just 12 days apart) we moved from the boards to facebook. When I found out I was pregnant with Stella, Haley quickly was surprised by another pregnancy as well and we helped each other along both planning natural births and started talking to each other all day everyday when we were the only ones who could relate to each other with all the pregnancy stuff that no one else can relate to. (like, "if my midwife tells me I'm dilated to a 2 one more time I may seriously just punch her.") We delivered those babies, Stella and Oliver, 7 days apart. We couldn't have planned it better if we had tried. Our lives are seriously freakishly similar. Down to us both having 3 sisters and no brothers. I'm truthful when I say that Haley knows me better than probably any other person. I was so excited when we started planning her trip to Utah. I would finally meet my best friend in person... kinda a funny thing.
From the second we saw Haley and the boys it was an absolute blast. I got to hear Finnley's cute voice that I had heard so much about and squish on Ollie's deliciously-chunky thighs.. She got to see Harlo in all her celebrified-self and snuggle with my sweet Stelly. It was pure bliss. We had so much fun the whole week doing absolutely anything we wanted to (well, I guess whatever we could do with 2 two year olds and 2 eight month olds). The kids got along amazingly well, Haley and I never stopped talking and laughing.. it could not have gone better. Saying goodbye was seriously tough. Harlo still asks for Finn everyday. We just loved those Sprawka's! Haley has really saved me over the years. I don't know how I would have done half of it without her!

See you soon, lovies!! Miss you madly-

xoxo

the Millers

Photos of Haley and her boys will be posted soon on the Blog.

Harlo Tidbits

{needing to get caught up! Our best friends were in town last week and we had too much fun to post... pics from our week coming soon!} Harlo is such a little Mama.This is a mild version of how she looks when she talks to Stella most the time, if you can believe it. Needless to say, it makes me absolutely crazy... In a good way.
I am basically obsessed with this stage.

Basically everything that comes out of her mouth is totally hilarious and silly and funny and cute.

I literally cannot keep up writing things down anymore.

The girl needs her own reality show.

She is so unbelievably cute.

And sassy.

And nice.

And the very best big sister ever.

The latter of which is probalby my favorite.

My girls are absolutely the best of friends.

They have such an amazingly tight bond. When they're together, nothing else in the world matters, it seems.

I feel the same way!

She is getting to be such a little grown-up.

Last week, we were at the park and she said "mommy, I have a cracker?" and I said, "they're in the stroller" and she goes, "oh, perfect!"

Her favorite thing in the car is talking to Stella.

She hates when the shade is pulled down too far for her to see Stel and always asks me to "See Stella!" She just chats and chats with her and hands her toys and shares whatever she's having with her.. Keeps us all entertained. I only wish I wasn't driving so I could sit and listen to them talk and giggle the whole way.

If Stella falls asleep in the car, Harlo always asks, "Where's Stella?" (sort of loudly, I'm sure hoping she'll wake her up so they can play) Anything she brings or shares with Stella, she says "Stelly, you love it?!"

This week when our landscape people came to mow our back lawn, I saw them tossing rocks from the grass. After I came back in from helping them, totally embarrassed, I explained to Harlo that's why we can't throw rocks in the lawn, the lawn mower people can't do their job right. She says, "Okay... I'll stop then! K? It's fine mom.. see!" (pulls the shade back so I can see the people outside mowing) "see mom? It's fine..."

Oh goodness, I have such a teenager on my hands. She is getting her top 2 year old molars right now, bottoms have been in for a while. Poor goosey, these ones are really giving her a run for her money.

She doesn't like to go on the big girl potty herself, but she makes a huge deal of anyone else who comes out of the potty. "yay daddy! you go on the big girl potty? good job! wanna treat?!"

We're getting there :)

She's always asking, "what's that?", "what's that for?", "what color is that?"

She asks for "pFinn" everytime she wakes up. (anything that starts with an "F" she adds a "p" sound to the beginning of it.)

she says "mommy help you?" when she needs help and says "there ya go!" after I help.

She will only allow my dady's "NinaDavo" CD to be played in the car, and calls it "Nina's song" She freaks if we change it. She knows every single word to every song and it's the cutest thing ever to hear her belt it out.

Which she will ONLY do in the car, never for anyone else.

She also loves to sing herself to sleep.. every night after we put her down we go in our room so we can hear her singing twinkle, abcs, etc. through the monitor. She's been making Daddy sing a song when he puts her down and the last few nights she's asked daddy to sing "nina's song" which I think is so hilarious.

She really only likes "special milk" (soy milk) now. Rarely has regular milk, which I'm totally fine with.

Her favorite remains as Oatmeal, but a lot of times she asks for Peach Ogurt.

When Stella is napping she always says "where's Stella?" and when I say she's napping, she says "I wanna hold her."

I always feel the same :)

Her new favorite past time is collecting money to put in her piggy bank.. she used to call it a "pib-bay-bank" but now it's the "pih-bank"

She can navigate her daddy's iphone like you wouldn't believe... She has been able to for quite a while now, but is just getting more and more amazing at it by the day. She hands down can figure it out better than I can.

Bubbles continue to keep her entertained all day long.

She also loves side-walk-chalk.

She wants to play "ausside" all day.
She has a little african-american baby that used to be mine and ali's that we just found cleaning out our garages..
She is obsessed with it and when I asked her what it's name was after she got it, she responded,
"Baby Cassidy"
I thought it was so funny and sweet and figured it would probably wear off..
nope.
Baby Cassidy remains to be a staple in our family.
The other day in the car I hear her say "Cassidy! Cassidy! wee! Cassidy!" when I looked back, she was just talking to her little Baby... Cassidy.
All day long, "where's baby Cassidy, mama?"
she's so non-chalant about it, I don't think she realizes we have the same name.
I absolutely cannot handle it.
I think it is the greatest thing that has ever happened to my name.
She is so dang hysterical.
Anytime she wants you to do something for her (like blowing bubbles) and you say you can't, she says "one time?!?"
How can you refuse that?
She asks to go to "Fwig" (swig) every time we get in the car.
Which I'm totally fine with, because I usually have the same idea. :)
She either gets a cup of ice or a "speshy drink" which they know exactly what that is when we order.
They sometimes refer to it as a "Harlo Water" too.
It's ice water with lots of ice and a splash of lemonade.
Todd sometimes throws in a lemon and she thinks that's really cool, too.
She has the best teeth you've ever seen.
If we could spend the rest of our days painting nails all day everyday, she'd be a happy girl.
She is such a little lover.
I am so extremely blessed that she is mine.

::side note::
Lately I have been absolutely overwhelmed with the amount of blessings I have been given.
I don't know why or how.. but my life is so extremely rich.
I don't mean to get all preachy or "my life is perfect"-ish, but I really am so grateful and I hope my girls and Brady always know how lucky I feel.