hi girls

I can't believe I write Girls.. I have two girls. it's crazy to me..

welcome to the family makena!

makena, you are such a little blessing. I didn't realize I would love being a mommy to two so much. first, you are a sweet sweet baby, with such an easy going personality, that you are just so lovely to hold and cuddle up and love. you are so warm, and you curl your little body up, and put your legs like a frog, and lay on me, and I can't get enough of it. and your sister giselle, loves you so much, I just want to bottle up the beautiful relationship of you two. she treats you like she is your mommy, and cares for you. but there is a fine line between loving and smothering. she wants you so close, she almost sits on you when she sees you in the swing, or presses her face against yours so hard, that she doesn't realize how fragile you are. she tries to pick you up, and she always wants to hold you. she holds you for two seconds and says " I think her poop" or I think her hungry. and if you are crying in the car, she repeats what I say to you... but with sissy. sissy here...it's okay, were almost there, sissy's here. and you love watching her, and get a big smile when you see her. you started smiling at four weeks, and you rolled to your side right after birth. your legs are strong and you love to stand and press up, and you can hold your head up now too. you grew so fast, after two weeks you went from 21.25 inches to 22.5. you are trying to communicate now too, with your little cute voice, you concentrate so hard, and seem so happy to say ahhh, or just a little something to me. and I sing a lot to you and make funny noises, and you look at me as if I am interesting, but a little crazy. you raise your eyebrows, and give a cute little grin. you are so happy, and content, and calm, I didn't realize it could be this easy. I am so happy you are a good baby! you have your first cold and your poor little nose is plugged up, so trying to get you to eat/sleep has been difficult. lots of time in the shower in the middle of the night, and trying to unplug your nose w/the bulb thingy. and you don't even get too upset about that. you sleep a lot. giselle was up all the time, so this sleep all day thing is unreal. I try to wake you, and I even thought there was something wrong, because I am just not used to it.
you try really hard to breastfeed, and it is always a little hard to get you started, and I tried to introduce the bottle, and you gag and choke. I am hoping it gets easier for you, as you are attached at my side, which I love, but at some point, I need to get to the gym! you eat when you are awake whenever you want, which is usually every hour right now, so at some point, we need to use the bottle every once and awhile. you want nothing to do with the pacifier either.
you have made a beautiful light to our family, and we all have enjoyed you. don't want you to grow up, if I could keep you like this I would. but, I can't wait to watch you grow. we love you!!!
giselle, you have been such an amazing sister. you are so loving and I just thought you would be a little jealous, but you have welcomed her, and been so good about me holding her all the time, and feeding her. you crack me up, as you watch me and try to breastfeed your dolls, or you repeat everything we say about the baby, hi pupmkin, or right when you get home, hows the baby? when we were at the hospital, you asked where her mommy was...and I said I am her mommy and you said no your are my mommy. but that was it. you love being a big sister. sometimes if you want me and are crying, you yell to daddy..you take her. we took you skating for the first time at alki skate, and it was pretty amusing! lots of feet coming out from under you! and it was such a struggle, but you liked it! and you told daddy you wish you were bigger so you could skate. and you want to go back! we still go to the gymnastics place and you run and jump freely and enjoy that, and daddy took you swimming tonight. I have loved being home with you. right now your big thing is Why? you are almost potty trained, and the one thing you love to do is sleep with us, so we said when you go number two you can sleep in our bed, and you did it once, and were so proud of yourself, but haven't since, so we are waiting for you to get it. but, every friday we let you sleep with us, as we know you are growing so fast, and wont want to sleep with us eventually. so we love it! you talk up a storm, and sing songs to cartoons, like agent oso..ok, gotta run makena is fussing! love you!

hi love

I have so enjoyed being home with you after being laid off in November. I really couldn't imagine a better life. I am so in love with you, and just absolutely love spending time with you. you are a peach, and you smile is to die for. anyways, I just feel blessed to spend time with you. especially before your sister comes. any day now! you saw my belly move today as you put a toy on it, and it moved. you seem excited about baby, and I am excited for you to have a sister, but there is a part of me that will miss it just being you and me. this time has been so precious. you are my first born, and you and I will always have a close bond. I spent so much time with you, and now I have to share it with your sister. I know my heart will grow, but I do know it will be hard to feed a newborn and change her and make sure I am giving you as much attention. I know you will be a big help, but know that I know it will be hard for both of us. I am hoping we can take special moments of you and me time and dates out, so you know how special and important you are to me. my heart is filled with joy, and you are such a blessing, I just can't believe we will be blessed with a sister for you too. you have started to repeat all of my words that I say to you..it's pretty funny. I will say don't go in the road, and you repeat so I don't get ran over. or make sure you brush your teeth, "so I don't get cabities?" or you need to put your seat belt on, "so the polizie?" yes honey, you are learning. the other day you said I am your mommy and daddy is your daddy, and lucy (your dog) is your friend. it was pretty cute. and you were playing in your play kitchen and you were carrying your baby and said mammas here, and then you put her in the microwave. hmmmm.
you had a nice christmas this year, and enjoyed opening presents. it was fun for us to watch you. you had your elf on the shelf that you would look for every day, and you knew you couldn't touch him. and you would tell me not to touch him, and you thought if you did santa would bring you "cold". thats what your uncle told you. and we did a lot of christmas activities...we went to the issaquah zoo w/reindeer and you saw santa, you still are afraid of him. you get so excited to see him, and talk all about him, then we get up there and you don't want to see him, but you definitely want the candy cane, so you make us go with you. we went to see lots of lights, and you would get so excited when you saw lights " look mommy look at all THAT lights!!!!" and we went to stanwood beach for this amazing christmas celebration with a train, and lights, and mini donuts, and ponies, and jesus. you loved it. and we went to church and you saw grandpa singing. you had your first preformance at school, and you had rudolphs nose and antlers on, you were very cute. and you stood there holding one of the older kids hand, and put your other hand in your mouth the whole time. but sometimes you love to sing, and we put a video on youtube of you singing jesus loves me, and so many people have went to see you sing your heart out, it's adorable. and at little gym today, you were the only one singing so loud to twinkle little star. you are two and a half now and still working on potty training, you do amazing peeing but freak out about number two, and you still love your pacifier. so, a few things we are working on, but other than that you are doing amazing. you know your shapes and colors, and you can count in german and spanish, and you know who mommy's mommy is and daddy's mommy and you know who my brother and sister are, and you know your whole name is giselle rose hoven and you say sonja elisabet hoven and andrew russell hoven. you are talking up a storm, and I love when you first wake up, and just say what you are randomly dreaming about. you just start going and don't stop. it's funny. love you baby!

Hawaii

Hi sweety
I wanted to write about our trip to Hawaii we just got back and today is Saturday December the 3rd. Right now your mom is pragnant with your sister and we are excited to meet her. You are finally starting to understand a little bit that you will soon have a sister. You have kissed Mommy's belly a couple of times and just last night you were pointing to your belly and saying you had a baby in there - silly girl! This morning we went downstairs and you watched Mickey Mouse and Little Einstiens for a little bit.

We went to Hawaii for two weeks this was your second time in Hawaii. We went there for your Uncle Tom and Aunt Andrea's wedding they rented a cool house with a pool and a hottub we also spent a lot of time with your Oma and Pappa. You really loved to go in the water this trip you started swimming around with your life jacket and you jumped into the pool from the edge trying to jump farther each time. You also loved to go into the "bathtub" as you called it but it was really the hottub at the hotel. You also liked to go down to the beach and play in the sand your favorite thing to do was destroy sand catles. On the last day we were in Hawaii you met a 7 year old little girl and had a fund time playing with her at the beach.

November 2011

Hi doll, you are running around downstairs as daddy is watching Gold Rush. We went to a Halloween party tonight and you played a lot of games where you got to throw the balls in the monsters mouth and you did the cakewalk and won on your first try, and you bounced in the bouncy house..you said you had fun. it looked like it! you have such a sad scrap on your nose. we put you in the crib for a minute and I heard you say jump, jump, and the next thing I hear is you crying and you are laying outside the crib on the ground. I have no clue how you fell out, and it scared me so bad...if you were jumping, I don't know if you flew over and landed on the ground or did a flip or what. I am just so glad you didn't break you neck. but it looks like a rug burn scrap on your nose, and it looks bad. you pulled at the scab today, and I am so worried it's going to scar your pretty little nose. you are really good about wanting to put medicine on it, and you like to do it yourself. today we put a bandaid on it, so you wouldn't play with it, and daddy put one on too, so you had matching ones. you want to help with everything, even if it's dangerous, like helping to cook your eggs, and you are pretty stuck on doing things on your own. you are the only kid in your peps group that will not sit through breakfast. we've been meeting the group on friday mornings at endolyn joe's and you cannot sit still. the only thing that sometimes works in mickeymouse clubhouse on my phone. but toys/books/coloring/playing with the other kids/eating...nothing will have you sit still. you want to get out and walk around. today you swiped a baby pumpkin and put in your backpack..I didn't know you took it! then we hit little gym, and you are quite the star there. you are so advance for your age and you have no fear so you just go for whatever. but you do a good job of listening to the teacher and you do whatever trick or gymnastic move she teaches you. and you sing the songs, and you do a lot of jumping from blocks on your own. you love the bubbles and stamps. and sometimes you run to the stamper and try to do it yourself. you love putting the keys in the car door..you hate getting in to your seat..you would rather drive. you love playing with your dolls, walking them in their stroller. and you love to eat Jelly jel leee. you are so loving, and you cuddle a lot. you like to hold ears of those close to you, and we love it. you give "big hugs!!!", and you like your paci and blankie. you are on and off with the potty. today we took a nap and I forgot to put a diaper on after and you would rather sit here and pee the bed then get up and go to the potty..so now I am trying to figure out how to get pee out of the mattress. we went to a gymnastics birthday party of your older friends selena and kendra and you were in the 3 and up group, and you did so good. you couldn't go if you were younger, so we said you were three. you loved it. and the older girls always love to be with you, you make friends easy. you always let me know if you are happy, I am happy mama! or I am excited! and you can count to ten in german and you know the night prayer, and you know all your colors, and you really have conversations and think about what you are saying, and what you want or what you want to know. you know all the relations to your gma and omi and papa, and you know that they are my parents, and your grandparents. and you like to tease too. you will say daddy is my daddy and your husband. and then you laugh. you sing baba black sheep, the whole thing, and I know you don't know what you are saying, so it cracks me up that you know all the words. we love sneaking you in our bed in the morning to cuddle, we just can't get enough. but we want you to be independent so we put you down in your own crib. today we went to teriyaki and you say the red hot sauce bottle and thought it was ketchup and I told you it was hot sauce and you said, oh thats uncles cause you know he likes that. you love watching mickeys clubhouse, but that is about it...every once and awhile yo gabba, but no sesame street, nothing. so I don't know if I have wrote that I was laid off, but it like my prayers were answered. I so wanted to be home with you, and I feel so blessed to spend time with you before the baby is here, I just love being with you, and I cannot tell you how much I love it. I think we would have done it after the baby, but this was better! I can't imaging ever going back to work, and I just savor every little thing that you do, and so glad I am here to experience it. I am really lucky. I have kept my photography passion alive and have started dabbling in that more, but to me that is fun, and something I can do on my time, so I can spend time with you. you love going to omi and papas house and you have a routine and like to call them on the phone and talk about the kitties, and the park and taking a bath with omi. and eating eggs with omi. we went to vegas a couple weeks ago and we had so much fun. you love the plane, but get restless after a while, but overall pretty good. and we had fun at the venetian playing in the toddler pool and we went to see the dolphins and tigers. your baby sister will be here in a few months, and you have no idea! I tell you about the baby in my belly and you have felt her move, and asked to open the door and let her out, but I don't think you get it yet. you love babies, but you always tell me to give the baby to it's mama when I am holding one. so I think it will be hard for a while, but I think you will love having a sister! k, mommy loves you with all my heart!!!!