babies and secret messages

Here's some randoms from the end of August...

Caroline, Claire, and Scout are the cutest of cousins - we like to put them all side by side and take pictures of them. :)


Of course Claire was the first to get grumpy...


With Emma starting up school, I've been happily engaged in trying to create a new daily routine. In order to get anything done in the day, with a nursing baby, in regards to laundry, cleaning, or my to do list, I have to have stellar time management skills (which I'm currently NOT doing, as I type up this blog post). This has been a painful adjustment for me. I'm not sure that it's really been any more of an adjustment then when I had Jake, but it's still been difficult to try to create a day for myself that keeps me from feeling like an utter failure by the end of it. This week has been the best yet and I'm even currently caught up on laundry and I've been making dinners too. wahoo!! Emma doesn't get home from school until 4pm - I had thought that homework time would be well suited for that 4:00 hour before we have dinner... but I hadn't forseen how exhausted she would be when getting home. She just wants time to rest or play and not have to come home to immediately start up homework. So, instead of homework right after school, we have snacks and some downtime - either a movie, or a little at home activity...

Yesterday we did "secret messages" using a white crayon and then revealed with watercolors - I didn't have any paints, so I just added some food coloring to some water and that seemed to work well enough. :)







This past Saturday, Ben took Emma on a daddy daughter date (the last of the ok mommy bucket rewards) - they had SO much fun. I'm kinda jealous I couldn't tag along. They went to Jumpstreet to play and then out to lunch. Emma LOVES her daddy...