This poor blog.
The day I keep up with updates will surely be a glorious one!
Well shall I dispense with the excuse making and just get on with the updating? Probably so? Ok. Buckle up, because here it comes! The last 2 months of Borup news headed your way. And heaven knows I don't really know how to abbreviate anything. You may be here all day.
Where to start...
THE END OF MARCH
TAKING OUR BED BACK CONTINUED
You may recall when I posted here about Brinlee having trouble staying in bed. And I believe where we left off on that little episode was the not yet revealed identity of this awkward looking thing?
Well she earned all the pieces of that puzzle, and here was the finished product.
I know you're wondering, and yes, it was just as perfect for a child (read: just as disgusting to actually eat) as it looks. But she was SO proud of it. She helped frost it, and did all the decorations, and then sat on the counter with it for a while explaining to it how everything was going to be ok, because "soon we're just going to eat you!" So nice.
We have since gotten over the little staying in bed problem and have moved on to other incentives. Meet the game board! Now she is in an all-inclusive program. When she stays in bed, does her chores, listens and obeys quickly, is kind to her sister, etc., her star moves forward. When she's not, it moves back. So far it's worked pretty well! It's how she earned the new princess dress she got for her birthday party (more to come on that later!), and right now she's working toward a family movie night out at the theater to see the new Finding Dory movie. I hope she earns it quick, I want to see that one myself!
WORLD CLASS PARENTING
I don't think it's any secret that sometimes we are not the greatest at this whole parenting thing. But check out this piece of work!
I-phone movie and string cheese at 7:00 in the morning. Classic. They are becoming quite the early birds, and some mornings I'm just too tired to get going as quickly as these kids want me to! And, sometimes, they get bored waiting. I have found Brinlee downstairs more than once eating a bowl of cereal, which she poured herself, milk and all. She even wipes up her own spills!
I should probably just make myself move in the mornings. But it is kind of nice to have such self-sufficient kids sometimes. If only Brinlee could change diapers...
EASTER
Boy it feels like this was forever ago... I really am behind.
Easter was lovely. We enjoyed a nice egg hunt and bbq at a friend's house, and then a wonderful sabbath day!
The Easter Bunny did find us...
...Brinlee waisted no time in stuffing her mouth full of robin eggs.
McKenna's egg is that orange one, naturally.
And here's the reason for it all! I am SO eternally grateful for a Heavenly Father who has a perfect love and a perfect plan, and for a Savior who was willing to do what He did, so that I can have this forever and ever. That is happiness, and there's nothing sweeter!
IN APRIL
REMEMBER THESE CUTE LITTLE FACES?!
Yes they are darling, but they are stuck to some very busy bodies. Which is why April flew by and not a lot of pictures happened. But I do have a few. here's what we were busy with
Hair-do's. Never mind the totally awkward photo-bomber in the background. But check out those lovely locks! Mckenna is still quite the stinker about ponytails. but Brinlee is getting awesome about it. As long as it matches the character she's being that day of course. This was Rapunzel hair, of course.
Games. McKenna has really perfected peek-a-boo. She's also found a spot on the stairs that she loves to not only sit on, but she works really hard getting a good size stash of toys there, and then tosses them and watches them bounce down the stairs. It's really quite a fun one, for mommy especially, who always gets the job of cleaner-upper.
Big girl business. Mckenna graduated from her high-chair and now not only sits up to table with us, but she also refuses to be fed and uses (not always very successfully) her own spoon and fork.
Teething. McKenna is working on 4 more teeth. When she's done she will have a whole mouth full (minus that dreaded second set of molars), which is exciting. But when she's done we may also have a completely destroyed house! She has been chewing everything!
Messages to Daddy. Brinlee has become obsessed with sending Tim messages while he's away at school. For a long time she just did letters and symbols.
But recently she's gotten into sending voice messages. I couldn't figure out how to get a sound clip to work on here. But here is how my favorite one went:
"Daddy, you are the best in the whole wide world!
You can sit,
you can talk,
you can think,
you can wink...
you can dance!
You can do anything your heart desires!"
Doesn't get much cuter or heart-warming than that.
No more passie. This little face may still have that infamous scowl, but it sure doesn't have that passie anymore! When her new teeth started coming in, she took to chewing on her passies. But once they cracked, she would have nothing to do with them anymore. It worked out really well for us. One day she's a passie lover, the next day she's completely broken of the passie, with no problems at all! She took herself off and still went down for naps, still went down for bed, kept herself asleep all night, and stayed calm in sacrament meeting! It has been a dream. One that we didn't even have to work for! The best kind!
More proof that we are employing some really awesome parenting tactics here.
My brother had a baby. Welcome to the world little Charlotte Madison! Isn't she perfect? I haven't cuddled her yet, but doesn't she just look super cuddle-able?
IN MAY
I turned 28, and even though I'm not really sentimental about my birthday at all, Tim really went above and beyond in the celebration of Me! We got a babysitter and went out to dinner, then Tim got the kids and went home to put them to bed while I went and spent an hour getting the massage he had scheduled for me. When I got home, he had set up the very best thing a woman (or at least this woman) could ever ask for - a nice relaxing bubble bath. And he really set up a good one! (With Brinlee's help of course. She was the official rose petal scatterer) There were bubbles, candles, all my favorite treats, some cake, a book, relaxing music... I couldn't have done better myself. And best of all, I shut the door and settled in and didn't have to hear or deal with anything else for the rest of the night. An evening without the child routine really is the best gift of all! Well done Mr. Borup!
OUR NOT SO LITTLE GIRL IS 4
Little Miss Brinlee Kay had a birthday! As she likes to announce often "I used to be 3, but now I'm 4!" And she definitely is 4, in every way possible. She is smart, sassy, independent, spunky, funny, curious, creative, loving, thoughtful, bossy, stubborn, goofy, happy, sweet, and basically just wonderful. We sure love this angel! More to come on the birthday festivities later.
ANOTHER NOT SO LITTLE GIRL
McKenna had a half birthday, which I usually don't make a fuss about. Except for that it was her 18 month day. And I kind of do feel like that one is a big deal. It's just such a fun little stage! Her little personality has really started shining through and (no surprise here) she's just darling! I mean look at that face!
That's the little kissy face we get when we say "McKenna can I have a love?" Which we do often, because once you get her going on the kisses, she goes around the whole family several times making sure everyone gets their fair share. It's the cutest. And her kisses are the best! Even Brinlee says so!
Her half birthday fell on a Friday that happened to be our turn to host the babysitting group kiddos. So it worked out well! We had a dinner of all of McKenna's favorite foods and then when all the little friends got there, she shared with them the treat she had picked out from the store - mini powdered donuts. So fancy!
This little girl is becoming quite the little ball of fire! A little bit about her:
She is very independent and getting very brave. She likes to climb and get into everything! She's getting more talkative. My current favorites are "sissy" (Brinlee), "Nenna" (McKenna), "TeenToo" (thank you), and "BrrrrrNee" (Balloon). She has a mind of her own and an impressive little attitude. She loves to push her limits, and unfortunately kind of likes to bother Brinlee. But she's also very loving, very social, very goofy, gives awesome cuddles, and has the sweetest little happy face.
A family couldn't ask for a more special little person. We can't imagine things without her!
Love that crazy face!
MOTHER'S DAY
Mother's day this year was a big day for us! Miss McKenna went to nursery for the first time (not that you could have guessed it was her first time, she walked right in as if she owned the place), and Brinlee sang with the primary for the first time! I don't think a mama's heart could melt any more! I can't believe how blessed I am to be the mommy of these two little angels. They make my life wonderful.
FAMILY MOVIE NIGHT
We have been really perfecting our family movie night tradition, mostly thanks to our little family time coordinator, Brinlee. She LOVES family time and gets really anxious and excited for when we can all be together "as a whole family!" And it does help that we make pizza. Who doesn't love that?! We've tried several, but this was by far our most creative. Half cheesy bread sticks (because I love them!) and half rainbow style. Carrots and cucumber were a little odd on pizza, I must admit. But they are some of the girls favorites so, it worked out!
GOODBYE JOY SCHOOL
A couple weeks ago Brinlee had her last Joy School lesson. We were a little sad to see it ending. We both had a lot of fun with it. There's been talk of another group doing it again next year with more of an academic, preschool type spin on it. Hopefully it works out, I think we would be all for this again!
BLAST THOSE STAIRS
Dear Reader,
Sometimes being little is rough. There's so much to see, so much to do, such exciting stuff to try, and sometimes these little legs just aren't coordinated enough and don't move as handy as you need them to to get all your important business done.
Like carrying a big ball up the stairs for example... If my hands are full of important, fun things, how in the world am I supposed to get up those blasted things??
It's a real problem.
And it can turn out badly.
Now. Having tried it once, I would have to say that if my legs get wobbly again, next time I will probably try dropping the ball and see if my hands can help me out a little. Maybe that way I can avoid going head-first into the banister before the ball and I finish tumbling back down the stairs.
I think it sounds like a pretty great plan. If anyone tries it out before me, let me know how it goes!
Happy Exploring!
Sincerely,
A Very Bruised and Battered McKenna
Honestly, she couldn't have been up more than 3 stairs. It really is quite skilled that she ended up coming out looking so rough! She handled it like a trooper though! Barely any tears. I think Brinlee took longer to calm down actually. She was pretty shook up. At least until she remembered she could pull out one of her body books and teach McKenna all about how her body would heal the cuts. Then she quickly made a full recovery.
We wondered for a day or two if maybe she might need stitched up. But luckily my old nursing stash of goods had a few handy things that seemed to do the trick. She just looked a bit like a war hero for a while. And now, aside from a little scar, she's back to normal! She does still point to her face and head though every time we say the word "bonk" or "ouch". Bless this sweet baby!
MEDICAL BOARD EXAM #1 IS DONE!
Well, the day finally came and went. Tim sat at a computer for 8 hours, and came out feeling great! See?!
Ok, so he didn't feel so great. He actually felt extremely exhausted.
But then it was done! And we finally had a daddy who had no studying to do for a few blissful days! It was wonderful! We went to the zoo, we road the train, we went down toward Cincinnati and checked out the shopping, we slept in and took naps, we went for walks, we went to Memorial Day breakfast, we watched movies. Mostly we just kind of took it easy, and enjoyed having our house with all 4 people in it! It was nice. I'm already excited for his next break.
DONUT DAY
In most recent news, last Friday was National Donut Day...
I didn't even know that was a thing, but honestly, that's awesome! Not that you ever really need any kind of excuse to eat a donut. But we did figure it gave us a little more justification in heading up the street for breakfast to check out this little gem.
We had heard about HoneyDip's donuts, but had never tried them before. Well. We have tried them now. And we will definitely be trying them again! I can't speak yet for all their stuff. But I'm always on the lookout for a good custard filled, chocolate frosted Bismarck, and this place did not disappoint! And, it's literally just up the street from our comfy little home. Score! HoneyDip's, I feel like we are going to be great friends!
THAT BRINGS US TO TODAY
And that brings us right up to today. So far June has been pretty good to us. Thanks to the now consistently nice warm/hot weather, the girls have been exploring outside a bit more.
McKenna has discovered a real love of dirt. She digs in it, throws handfuls of it, brings it inside, and yes... she eats it. So lovely. But boy does she love that sunshine. She throws a major fit every time I try to bring her back inside, and if I would let her, she would happily spend her entire day being pushed around the neighborhood in the stroller looking for birds.
Brinlee has re-discovered her fascination with bugs. She loves ants, bees, rolly-pollies, and spiders! She is always trying to carry bug friends around with her (Not the spiders. Luckily she won't touch them, but I do get in trouble for squashing them), and just the other day she found a dead bee that she told me could be our "honorary guest!" She loves blowing dandelions, and she has already had me fill up her little pool a few times. She would stay outside in it day and night if I'd let her. She can't get enough of this summer time stuff!
Tim is officially in his third year of medical school and has been into his first rotation now for a week. So far he is loving being on his feet and out of the books a little. He's still a little lost as to how things work and what he's supposed to do, but overall he is much happier when he comes home. It should be a much more exciting year.
As for me? Well, the other day I locked me and the girls out of the house and had to pry the screen out of the window frame so I could (very un-gracefully) climb through the window and get us back in. Then I burned dinner to the blackest crisp you've ever seen. We had to leave the house to air out the awful smell while we all went for quick cheap take-out. And just last night we went to a friends graduation party, and it wasn't until we had mingled around for an hour and half and come back home that I realized I had been wearing my sweater inside out all night. So... June 2016? Yeah, so far I am totally crushing it!
Now, on to the rest of the month! Hopefully it's full of more (maybe not so embarrassing?) excitement!
And hopefully some more timely blog updates as well.
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