Check Out My New Digs

I am a Recessionista. I was cheap before being cheap was cool. Actually, I'm too little to be cheap but I was born to cheap parents. We find lots of ways to justify our so-called thriftiness but with the current economic climate we've stopped apologizing and started giving ourselves props for being trailblazing cheapskates. At the same time we are also capitalizing on the current Green Initiatives by recycling (aka: buying used) so we are really ahead of the curve. Try to keep up, people.The latest in our endeavors of penny pinching involved Mommy finding a used plastic playhouse on Craig's List for only $60. This is much cheaper than this playhouse which is actually much nicer than the house we live in. Anyway as you can see (you clicked on the link, right? check it out before you read any further - really! you have to see it to believe it) anyway as you can see that playhouse retails for a cool $9,299.99. Since my new plastic playhouse was only $60 Mommy actually SAVED us $9,239.99. That is quite a cost savings. I suggested to Mommy she take the money we saved and go ahead and buy herself some new diamond earrings that she can give to me when I get older.

We spent the afternoon cleaning my new playhouse. You all know I enjoy cleaning. My new playhouse even has its own sink for pretend cleaning! I am loving this!

In fact, I enjoy cleaning so much I decided to try to eat the washcloth I was cleaning with. This actually does not taste so good but look at the photo opportunity I created for Mommy and Daddy and YOUR benefit, dear, loyal reader.

Finally I wanted to let you know that Anna is doing very well. She slept for 5 hours straight last night! I did not do that until I was about 8 months old. Anna is only 3 weeks old so she is doing much better. She is very laid back. Maybe one day when she gets a little older I will let her blog once in a while. Maybe. If she pays me.

Love,

Lilly

Waaaah! I Want My Mommy!!!

Anna = Not Happy

Lilly = Not Happy

Lilly + Paci = Happy

Anna is such a good baby. Mommy has it easy. Everyone told Mommy it was going to be SOOOO HAAAARD. Well, it hasn't been. We feel like Anna has always belonged with us, so it's been easy, as easy as it can be with a newborn and a toddler. It's no cakewalk or anything, and we all 3 have crawled into a corner and cried for our Mommies at least once but really, it's not as hard as Everyone told Mommy it would be. It helps that Anna is such a good baby! She really is! She sleeps, she eats, she poops...there you have it.

We have the Derby this weekend. Well, "we" don't actually have the Derby, "we" will be staying home watching the Derby on TV while Daddy and my Uncles go get blitzed. Daddy, if you're reading this, Mommy hopes you realize and appreciate the sacrifces she's making for your Good Times. Remember, payback comes in the form of a Phish concert in June and the Forecastle Festival in July.

Holla!

Love,

Lilly

Mommy's Lill' Helper

Here is Anna on her 2 week birthday. 2 weeks old already! It's amazing how different it feels for Mommy the second time around. Yeah, yeah, Mommy knows, a million people told her so but still, some things you just got to go through for yourself, you know?

I have been a wonderful Lill helper (Lill...get it? Lill = short for Lilly = ha ha Mommy is so clever! is there no end to her wit?) Here I am covering Anna with a blanket on her bouncy seat. Daddy took this picture. There's a whole series of them, and they end with me trying to cover Anna's face with the blanket. That's when Daddy stepped in, "Gentle, Lilly..." Okay, okay, GENTLE! I get it! I get it!

And here we are on our new Laz-Boy recliner. Remember when Mommy said she would never in her life own one of those god-awful fugly chairs? She went out and bought one right off the floor only 8 days after Anna was born. It's our new favorite chair, and I must say, it blends quite nicely with the decor, but still it is god-awful fugly.

Here I am rocking Anna in her swing. This is another "Gentle-tunity" lesson. First I start by slowly, slowly and then real fast, fast, fast. Mommy and Daddy say (all together now): "Gentle, Lilly, gentle!" Yeah, yeah, whatever...

Finally we have here Babi getting all dotey on the baby. I can't have that, she does not have exclusive dotey rights on Babi. So in order to steer Babi's attention back to me, I (on my own accord) brought Babi a burpy cloth. I get accolades for this and I enjoy accolades, don't you?

Speaking of accolades (such a big word for an 18 month old, no? But I am a baby genius, you should hear my vocabulary...here's a sample: Elmo, Oscar, Cookie, cracker, oh no, uh oh, Nana [for Anna], and GAR!!! [for Garp, the cat, whom I like to yell at]) anyway I digress... Babi left yesterday after 2 and a half glorious weeks and we miss her already. Thank you, Babi for being here and keeping Mommy company, and spoiling me, and making us dinners, and doing our laundry (particularly my pukey linens), and buying us stuff and for everything else you did. Mommy is a much more centered, happier Mommy. This morning even went well for us! Mommy got up before me, got showered and cleaned up, made me breakfast, woke me up and walked me to Ms Norma's this morning! I cried, though, I didn't want to go. I wanted more girl time with Mommy, Babi and Anna...so when Daddy's vacation is done, please come back! We love you! THANK YOU, BABI, YOU ROCK!!!!

Love,

Lilly

Rota-virus. Puke.

You wouldn't know by looking at me that I've been sick for the past week, but I have. I have been puking all over myself at night and sleeping in it and Babi gets to wake up and clean up for me. I bet she's glad she's here! I am still all smiles during the day though. What can you do? I really hope I stop throwing up soon, though. We need a break! I already puked all over our rug which Mommy and Daddy just bought 2 weeks ago. Yum. The smell of yucky, pukey milk.

Here I am with my baby sister. She is doing pretty good. She isn't sick, and don't worry, I took this picture before I got all pukey. Mommy would have downright had a cow if anyone who was sick would have gotten near me when I was only a week and a half old but what can ya do? I can't live in a plastic bubble! I was here first.

Uncle Dan, this picture is for you. I purposely did not wipe my face before smiling all pretty and playing with Babi while I was in my highchair. So there. I am 18 months old. What do you expect? I even rubbed a little food in my hair, for effect.

And here is Anna getting her first bath. She was pleased as you can tell. Look at Mommy and Daddy dorking it up in their goober glasses. Anna already asked me why we weren't born into wealth. Anna, I can't answer that for you. We got shafted. What's worse, is we were born to two people who think their own stupid jokes are hilarious. Just go with it, trust me. It's not worth telling them they aren't that funny. We'll do plenty of that when we're teenagers.

Love,

Lilly

Enough About Anna...

You came here hoping to see pictures of Anna today, didn't you? Well surprise! I am having a little hard time with Anna. I don't understand what she's doing here and why she won't leave. All she does is sleep, cry and hog Mommy. This makes me sad, which makes Mommy sad because she feels guilty and then Daddy gets sad because Mommy is sad and when Mommy ain't happy Daddy is miserable. I decided to lay it on real thick last night by puking all over myself in my crib and then sleeping in it. Daddy got that little surprise when he came in to wake me up this morning. Surprise, Daddy! I puked on myself and you let me sleep in it! Then Daddy felt guilty. Well, fine. They should. They didn't get my permission to bring home a new baby and if they would have asked they wouldn't have gotten it anyway. I liked having all the attention.

On the bright side, I am a good little girl, and I have been real gentle with my sister, the three times I've actually interacted with her. Mommy and Daddy are doing their best to overcompensate for her arrival and I am going to go ahead and let them. This used to be the Lilly show, now it's the Lilly and Anna show. I will get used to it, I guess... Maybe one day I'll even like the little stinker. By the way, I can say "stinker" now. I say it like this: "Stink-AH" It's terribly cute. Just like me.

And I'll admit, Anna is terribly cute too. She has a punk-rock hairdo. I think she's going to have brown eyes like Mommy's but it's too early to really know that. I've heard she can actually lose all her hair and then be blond like me.

These pictures are from Easter Sunday and our Easter Egg Hunt, the First Annual Lilly Bean Easter Egg Hunt. You'll notice it was all about me, me, me! Anna was too little to come outside this year. Oh, darn. I got all the Easter Eggs and candy and money to myself. I'll take what I can get, when I can get it!

I'm off to nap now. I'll post some Anna pictures next week, I promise. Believe me though, she hasn't changed yet. She lost her umbilical cord stump today. Ooooh. You know what I did today? I said "ELMO." That's far more impressive.

Love,

Lilly

The Honeymoon Is Over...

As of Thursday, April 9th I am officially a big sister! Little Sister has a name, it's Anna Jane. She has black hair. She looks like my Uncle Mark, who looks Mexican in the summer, especially when he doesn't wash his hair. She sleeps a lot. I love her. I especially love to hold her. I am going to be the BEST big sister! I will teach her how to get Daddy to give her candy instead of fruit, how to get Mommy to buy me extra clothes, toys, and shoes that maybe she can have when she gets bigger if she pays me. We'll see.

Here's a link to some more pictures, it would take Mommy all day to load all 234 of them we have so far, which incidentally is less than we had by the time I was 5 days old. The second kid gets the shaft. Just ask Uncle Dan and Aunt Tracey, they've been shafted their whole lives.

Keep checking on us, I can't wait to start telling stories! I thought right now it apropros to start with pictures. I did overhear Mommy say that Anna was the biggest pain in the goozie she's ever had. Literally. I didn't ask. You probably don't want to either.

Enjoy our pics!

(That there is a link. Click on it!)

Love,

Lilly

Easter Egg Hunt!

Mommy took me to my first Easter Egg hunt on Saturday at the church! It was such a great Mommy and Lilly day, we both wore pretty dresses (there's a picture of me with Mommy, she's looking mighty puffy these days) and afterwards we had a Ladies Luncheon together at Chick-Fil-A. Then we went home and took naps. We were probably the most over-dressed gals at both the Easter Egg hunt and Chick-Fil-A. But, we're girls! Why not fuss it up once in a while? I don't have to look like a tomboy all the time, only when Daddy is around.

I had a lot of fun hunting for eggs in the grass. They had a special area roped off for kids my age. Unfortunately, none of the candy in the eggs were age appropriate for me, so Mommy had to eat it all. And that's exactly what she did.

I had the most fun rooting through all of the plastic eggs in the bins once people took out all their treats. To me, it seems much easier to hunt for eggs like fish in a barrel, rather than one by one in the prickly grass. So I spent a good amount of time playing with the eggs in the bins.

This Saturday, if Mommy hasn't pooped out Little Sister by then I'm going to the zoo with Mommy and Daddy and Babi and Duda and Teti where they are also having an Easter Egg hunt and then the bunny and then I will go visit my friends the gorillas. I have a Birthday party scheduled for Saturday night, and then Sunday is Easter! It's pretty sad when my social calendar fills up faster than Mommy and Daddy's. But, I bring them along with me, I hate to leave them home by themselves. That's just pathetic!

Love,

Lilly