Easter Bunny and Potty Training

We have been potty training for the past couple of weeks. It really has not been so bad.
I think it really helps that she is almost three years old. We have had relatively few accidents. We have had some constipation issues with her waiting too long, but that has been the main problem. I have not started working on naps and bedtime yet, but that is next. So hopefully we will have it mastered soon and we won't have to be spending sooo much money on diapers each month. Good grief!
A couple of days ago we went and took pictures with the Easter Bunny with Ryleigh and Aubrey. It was sweet to have them in matching outfits. Carly and Kate did great! They were full of smiles. Aubrey and Ryleigh were a little unsure, but it still made for a great picture. Kate had been asking for weeks when we were going to get to see the Bunny, so we were both excited.
Here are some pictures from that day from my camera. I don't have the picture we purchased on here, but you get the general idea.

This cracks me up because Aubrey is trying so hard to smile.

I love this picture because Aubrey just does not know what to make of the Easter Bunny.

These girls are crazy together!

Carly has two more teeth coming in on the bottom!

Such a big girl! Carly, thanks for the privacy! Kate is learning how to hold up her dress so she doesn't get pee on it. Notice her shoes are on the wrong feet, too. She loves to put on her own shoes but often gets them on the wrong feet. At least she tries!

Carly is now 1!

We celebrated Carly's first birthday last Saturday. It was a great day! We had most of our family and a couple of friends come over Saturday evening. I am so glad the weather cooperated for us! The kids could play outside and we also had some tables set outside. Zack smoked some yummy brisket and pulled pork. We were also blessed to have Zack's parents in for the weekend to help with setting up, cleaning etc... Thank you! I am posting pictures below. We took Carly to the doctor today and she weighs 19.3 pounds. She is in the 50th percentile for her head, length and weight. The doctor said she seems very healthy. Way to go Carly!


Dear Carly,

I can’t believe you are now a one year old! We are so very proud of you! You have been such a joy to have in our lives this past year. You are so cuddly and sweet. You have been walking every where just in the past couple of weeks. Last night your Daddy counted 21 steps. Way to go! We love how you will just crawl up and put your head on us as an act of love. You also love to stand up and grab our legs to be held. I love how you love to get a toy or item and hold it up for us to see and recognize. You have such a great smile and it brings so much joy to others to see it! You amaze us with how you are already saying so many sounds and trying to communicate with us. If you are excited about eating you will put so much food in your mouth at once. I am afraid you get that from me! :)
One of my favorite things is how you love your lovie, now. You will just press your face into the lovie like you can’t get enough of it! It is so sweet. I look at the way you are right now and I just want to hold onto it forever. I don’t want you to grow up too fast. Although, I see your beautiful brown eyes and long eyelashes and I look forward to seeing what a beautiful young girl and woman you will become. I hope that we can be the parents that you need us to be. No matter what I want you to know that we have so much love for you. That will never change! I know in just a matter of time we will be talking together. It is so much fun to watch you interact with Kate. You want so much to be involved with whatever she is doing. If Kate is in time out you want to go over there and sit with her. Our prayer is that you will grow up being the best of friends. Carly, may you continue to grow and be healthy. May you know God’s love and grace. May we teach you in the Lord so that you can be a warrior for him. Thank you Carly for showing us God’s love this year. You have shown us just how much he loves us by how much we love you. Again, we are so proud of you! We look forward to seeing what this life has in store for you and walking through this journey with you. What a blessing you have been and will continue to be.

With love always,
Your Parents

Here are the sweets! Cupcakes for the kids, a little smash cake with a C for Carly, a number 1 cake and a cupcake cake.

Some of the decorations honoring Carly!

Party Favors-They are wrapped Hershey bars

The sign-in sheet

A picture time line of Carly's first year

Here we are opening presents. Thanks Erika for taking the pictures!

The wonderful grandparents holding our kids

Visiting with Keari, Ellee, JT and Matt

Sheri and Chad getting their food

Erika and Harper

Kamara and Aubrey

Mom Mom and Kate

Carly eating cake for the first time. She was not too sure about it or everybody staring at her.

Carly and her cousin Ellee playing with the hula hoops

Precious picture of Carly. She loves to show us things when she gets them. She was showing me a leaf.

Some of the kids playing together

We had a great time! Thank you everybody for joining us for this special day!

Kate's New Attachment

Here is Kate's newest attachment. When she goes places she likes to take her purse(which is an old one of mine), her baby, and the bag that stores all purse items. It is quite the handful! We had a great spring break last week. We mainly did stuff around the house and relaxed. We also went to Dallas and rode the trolley around uptown with some of our friends, the Dunkles. I did not have my camera, so I don't have any pictures. It was a fun little activity for us to do that was free! Carly has started taking more and more steps walking. It looks like she may be walking by her birthday, which is this weekend! Can you believe it? Stay tuned for pictures of that.....

We enjoyed many trips to the park over spring break with the nice weather. You can see how Carly has worn out most of the knees in her pants from all the crawling.

February

I know, I know I have been horrible about blogging lately. February has come and gone and now it is March. I guess I attribute my lack of blogging due to illness. It seems like February was the month of illness for our family, mostly the girls. Carly has been on antibiotics back to back and Kate is now finishing her round of antibiotics, too. Carly had a bacteria infection and then an ear infection. Kate had a sinus infection. They both still have a little bit of a runny nose, too. It has limited us on what we have been able to do lately. However, now we are in March, yeah! In just a few short weeks Carly will be a year old. Can you believe that? I will do a bigger write up then. Some new things that she has been doing has been saying little phrases like "uh, oh." She loves to wave! She still is very cuddly and likes to put her head down on your shoulder. She also has discovered biting, yikes! We have only seen this a couple of times with Kate as a self defense, though. She has not taken any steps yet, but she will stand for awhile on her own. She will even squat and stand back up. We know it is just a matter of time before she is walking. Her hair is growing in a little longer and darker. We can't tell yet if it is going to be curly or not. Time will tell! Kate is growing up every day. She is looking more and more like a little girl. She loves to do things on her own. We are enjoying both of our girls so much! They definitely keep us busy.
As you all probably know Ryleigh celebrated her year birthday! I want to take this time to thank all of you for your support and prayers over this past year for her. She has been such a miracle and she is doing great! Kamara and I also celebrated our birthday. We are now 33 years old. I feel so blessed to have a twin sister. It is a true gift!

Kate was posing for me in this picture. Kate wants us to capture pictures of her every time we take pictures of Carly. It makes her look so old to me!

Carly will stand up in her crib now when she wakes up from sleeping. So cute!

This shows how she will stand and play with her toys now.

Look at that smile!

Harper came over the other day for a play date. It was cute to watch them both push around their strollers.
Harper was very intrigued by Dixie.

Last weekend we celebrated our birthday at the Tate household. We are holding our opposite children. I like Brett's face in the background. My Mom made a delicious meal! This was a red velvet cake. YUMMY!

This shows how big Carly is getting! Look at her food!

This just cracks us up! Kate loves to wear headbands. However, she wears them at the back of her head! She gets upset when I try to fix it, too. She is also wearing two different pink skirts on top of each other. She comes up with the most crazy outfits!

Snow Days and Life Membership

These pictures are from last week, not a couple of days ago. The weather has truly been amazing. One day we are enjoying the sun in Abilene, and the next day Zack is staying home from school due to ice. Growing up in the metroplex we never missed four days in a row for weather. Let alone four days one week and another day the following week! That just doesn't happen! I felt like I was waking up some place else. The snow was so thick and deep when we walked out in it at the end of last week. I really enjoyed having Zack home for four days. The icy streets do not intimidate Zack. He is a pro when it comes to driving on the ice. We went on little outings throughout the week. I was very thankful Zack was driving and not me! We did have one day where three of us was sick, not fun. We don't know if we ate something or just had a 24 hour stomach bug. This was the first time that Kate had ever thrown up! She threw up twice in the middle of the night last week. Zack threw up multiple times as well. I never threw up but I felt really ill! Luckily, Carly never got it! I also enjoyed us having another snow day a couple of days ago. However, Carly has been really sick this week with a bacteria infection, so it was not as much fun. I was glad that Zack could be home to help take care of her. She had a 102 fever for 3 days and was just so tired and weak. One of us was always holding her because she didn't have any energy for anything else. The poor thing! This was the first time for her to be on any kind of antibiotics or be really sick. I think that is pretty good for being almost 11 months old!

Zack made sure that Kate's feet and jeans would not get wet!

Here is the front of our house

It was a little too cold for Carly to be out in the snow. However, this was a picture of her all bundled up before one of our outings.

I love this picture of the girls looking at the snow out the window in the playroom. Carly is looking up at Kate. So precious!

Zack introduced Kate to making tents. She loved it. They were suppose to go through the tunnel and into the cave/tent.

Here they are inside.

I guess Kate was trying to do thumbs up

Last night Zack got honored as a life member chosen by the PTA for P.I.S.D. Throughout the district the PTA will choose parents, teachers,and administrators who give outstanding service and who have been involved with the Texas PTA for ten years or more. I am very proud of Zack! I was sad I couldn't be there for the nice ceremony and banquet.