Can I help?

Riley's big thing lately is she wants to help. She wants to do everything herself. When I clean the house she wants to help. Yesterday she followed me around asking if she could clean the bathroom. I told her that only grown ups use the cleaning products. She replied with I can't wait till I can clean the bathroom. I think I'm going to have to record her saying that so when she's a teenager I can play it back to her!

She wants to learn how to do everything Mommy does like folding laundry and loading the dish washer and cleaning the floors. Every time I bring the vacuum out she drops what she's doing and runs and to get hers. Yesterday I gave her a damp rag and she cleaned all the baseboard in the house and the chair rails in the dining room and in her playroom. Then she filled the fridge with water and pop and took out all the boxes from that too the trash. Then she swifered the kitchen floor. She also picked up all the carpet fibers in the babies room that Ella had clawed up but were still stuck enough that the vacuum wont pick them up.

She then tells me "Thank you Mommy for letting me help!" She was so proud to tell Zach everything she helped with. And while we are cleaning she likes to say how happy Daddy will be to come home to a clean house. She is just too cute! I hope she continues to WANT to help for quite a while yet!

It's a....

Monday I had my ultra sound appointment and we found out that we are having another GIRL!! Riley is very excited and I'm so glad because she was really stuck on wanting a baby brother. But in the room she said "It's a girl" that's just what I wanted and then went on to tell the Tec all the ways she's going to help take care of her new baby sister.

Zach and I are both excited too of course. We have been talking about name but of course the name we both really like the other one doesn't! Well not really because I'm still considering Madison Rose! He won't even think about Lola Rose. Rose is also a contender but we can't come up with a middle name. And Ruby is still being throw out there although I'm 80 percent sure I don't really like that name.

Summer is finally here well in the sense of the summer solstice. Last week was chilly it was like fall! And yesterday was HOT! We are in the last 10 days of June already and even though it seems to be going fast it's going slow for me 19 weeks doesn't seem like I've gotten every far! My belly is huge already and I fear Riley will ahve to roll me out of bed in the morning very soon here! I'm already having some trouble getting up from sitting or laying down.

World's Best Dad!

This started out as a Happy Father's Day post but time got the better of me but I still wanted to share what a wonder father and husband Zach is!

Since we were 15 years old I always new Zach would be a good father some day but I have to say he really surprised me after I got pregnant with Riley.

He asked me many times when he would be able to feel the baby kick, he went to EVERY one of my doctor visits with me, he read to my belly every night. And in the weeks leading up to her birth ever time I had a pain he would jump up and say "IS It Riley Time?" He was wonderful in the labor room and was there during my c-section after laboring for 15 hours. He even cut the cord when he told me time and time again he was not going too. That kind of stuff grosses him out.

After she was born he struggled to change her diaper and clothes all by himself worried that he would hurt her. (We planned on me showing him but I wasn't able to get up after my c-section)

When we got home he was the one to get up with her at night time. He would move the bassinet to his side of the bed so he could make sure she was still breathing several times a night. He was the one up at 4 am in the morning for hours when she wouldn't go back to sleep those first few days. And he continued to get up every night for 2 weeks then we took turns.

He was always excited to come home in the evenings and give her a bottle and sit and hold her. As she got older it was all about the playing. He comes straight home from work every night and is home every weekend. He doesn't care about going to the bar or playing golf for hours on end he would rather be at home playing with Riley and reading her a bedtime story.

This pregnancy Zach really has helped SO much! This is not an easy pregnancy for me although it's better then what it was in the beginning. Zach took over basically everything in the house hold on top of working at his day job and the 2 other jobs he does to make extra money.

He did the laundry, cleaned the cat boxes, cleaned the kitchen, picked up the house, made Riley dinner, got me what ever I felt like eating, gave Riley a bath and put
her to bed pretty much every night for those first 13 weeks! When I felt so horrible. He even gave up his Sunday sleep in day so I could sleep in both days on the weekend.

I'm so luckily and blessed to have found a man like him to spend my life with.

Riley's Toy Story Room!

First let me say I hate painting that being said let me say I hate painting things green! I've never had so much trouble getting another color to cover like I have with green! But I will say the end result is very nice!!



The Doorway!



We picked out fabric and Gan is going to be making curtains!



I just love how the dresser turned out!




We got most of the stuff at the party store like the poster. Was 4.50 vs 10 at Walmart!







And we put up a ceiling fan!!


Riley loves the room and I must say it looks pretty great!

Playroom Clean Up!

Getting Riley to clean up her playroom had been a consist daily battle. She doesn't understand the concept of take one toy out and put it away before you get another out. In her defence she has TOO MANY TOYS I know people always say that but this child really does! She is one child and she has a 18 X 14 playroom that is filled to the brim!

It got to the point were you couldn't find a empty space on the floor anymore. The room was just too messy for her to be able to clean it up on her own. Day after day I would fight with her about cleaning up things got messed up on the shelves and she couldn't find a place for them. Usually about once a week I go in there and straighten everything up so it's organized better but since I hadn't been feeling well do to being pregnant it wasn't on my high list of priorities.

So finally enough was enough. I closed down the play room. Riley wasn't allowed in there for a few days till I could go in there and do a major clean up. We put some toys that are too young are haven't been played with in a box and one of her big items then workbench down to the basement.

I went out and got bins and toys were organized in bins and I printed out labels with pictures and words on them. It took about 2 days to get the room clean and the new rule is only one bin out at a time. If she wants another bin out she has to put the one she's playing with away. If she asks she may get 2 bins out if it's something that she will play with together like say her food bin and her baby doll bin.

She has done wonderfully with this system for the past few weeks. There are no more fights about cleaning up her toys daily. Hopefully it will stay that way.