It's A Wonderful Life: July & Reese's Birthday

July has been a fun and busy month so far! The month started with my mom's birthday. Reese was so excited to have her over and bake a cake. She's so obsessed with birthdays right now, so it's so fun to celebrate. We gave Charlie his first bottle that day, and she helped Daddy give it to him. Such a good big sister.

The 4th of July was ridiculously hot, but we decided to go ahead and take Reese to see fireworks for the first time. We went with Jordan, Olivia, Audrina, and Beckett. The girls had a blast, and Reese even got to do her first sparkler.

After the second time Reese stuck her hand in her diaper to bring me some poop, I decided it was time to get serious about potty training.

But I wasn't about to potty train before getting a picture of Charlie & Reese together in their cloth diapers. I love these fluffy butts. Reese has now been diaper free for over 2 weeks, and she's doing great!

Charlie is getting really good at tummy time, and we owe Reese some credit for that. Everyday, she gets out his blanket or his playmat & demands that he do tummy time because she likes to lay on the ground next to him.

Reese turned two last week (how is that possible????) The weekend before her birthday, we spent a couple days in Chicago. We took the train in, got a hotel room, and planned to enjoy the city with the kids--Millennium Park, Navy Pier, Lincoln Park Zoo, etc. I'll save a lot of time by summing it up with one word. Disastrous. There were snippets of fun times mixed in there, but overall, it's not something we're going to be in a rush to repeat any time soon. Big cities are not for kids. Especially in 95 degree heat. But enough about that. :)

We spent the morning of Reese's birthday playing at my mom and dad's house, and then kept it low key at home the rest of the day. We got Reese a basketball hoop and her first bike. The bike is a balance bike, so it doesn't have pedals, she just uses her feet to push herself along. She caught on really quickly! She got a special delivery of balloons from Chuck and Lori, and she had a blast going crazy with them all around the house. She was nice and calm when she showed them to Charlie though. :)

Reese also got into a bag of sugar on her birthday.

We didn't do cake on her birthday, since she would be having it at her party, so we put candles in her fish at dinner that night. She loved it. Poor kid.

Sunday was Reese's big party. We had originally said that we were going to keep it super small....and then we didn't. Reese is SO into birthdays, and she was so excited about hers that we really wanted her to have her little friends here to celebrate. We ended up having 11 kids running around, and we were very thankful that the weather cooled off just slightly so we could have everyone outside. My parents were amazing & brought over lots of umbrellas for shade, and some extra toys and tables for the yard, which were a lifesaver!

Reese's party theme was Yo Gabba Gabba. She is obsessed with that show. She has a couple DVDs that she watches in the car wherever we go, and she has the episodes memorized. It's so cute to see how excited she gets about them, and I love listening to her sing the songs and do the dances that she learns. I had so much fun prepping for her party.

Last night, we went out and took some photos of her. I can't believe how grown up she looks, or how beautiful she is. I am so in love with this sweet little girl.

And since this update has been all about Reese, I'll give a quick update on Charlie. He is already over a month old, and this boy is fattening up quite nicely. He is up to 13.5 lbs (he has gained almost 6 lbs in 6 weeks!). He is waking up 1-2 times a night, and he's starting to become much more wakeful during the day. He has started giving us some smiles and coos, and he melts our hearts!!!