The Saturday 7

1. This was a big week for Levi. I should save all this for his one year update, but I like to write things down when they actually happen (because - baby book? Ain't nobody got time for that!). The biggest news is that he's finally become mobile!! After 11.5 months of just sitting where I put him, he has figured out how to move! Of course his method is a bit unconventional. Haha. He doesn't crawl or even army crawl, he scoots on his butt. Sometimes he uses his hands to pull himself forward, but most of the time he just wiggles his upper body enough to propel himself forward. Lol. I've taken like 1,000 videos because it cracks me up so much.

2. Levi also sprouted his 4th tooth this week (top right) and has started sleeping through the night!! Kind of. Haha. I nurse him when I put him to bed between 7 and 8. He usually gets up between 10 and midnight to nurse one more time, but then he sleeps until 6:30 ish! Now to cut out that extra feeding in the middle of the night . . . Oh, that's his other milestone this week: weaning. I'm down to nursing him morning, night, and middle of the night. Just 3 times. It's been a pretty easy transition for both of us. But he's got a nasty cold right now, so I'm not going to push being totally done by a year like I was with the girls. (Yeah, the cold is totally the reason. Not my denial about my baby growing up. Not my fear about this being the last time I ever breastfeed. ;-) )

3. I read two books this week: The Forgotten Garden by Kate Morton and The Girl Who Came Home by Hazel Gaynor. They took the prize for best and worst respectively so far this year! The Forgotten Garden is my first 5 star book of the year. Kate Morton annoys me because all of her books have the same basic premise, but she executes them so perfectly that I keep going back for more. And The Girl Who Came Home was just a mediocre re-telling of a story that's been told countless times already (The Titanic). It was my first 2 star book of the year. I'm up to 17 books of my 75 book challenge, though. Making progress!

4. We had a nice Valentine's Day. Justin and I agreed not to buy each other anything and I wasn't planning on doing anything special for the girls. But that morning when Lena woke up, she came downstairs and said, "Where are the decorations?" I didn't know what she was talking about, so she clarified, "It's Valentine's Day! You were supposed to decorate!" Lol. My girls think it's a much bigger holiday than it actually is. So we went to Meijer and got some stuff to have a fancy family dinner: a clearance Valentine's Day tablecloth, Velveeta shells n' cheese, sparkling grape juice, and salad and wine for the adults.

Gourmet dinner at its finest!

A big fan of sparkling grape juice.

And because my girls adore doing little projects, I came up with this quick idea. I gave each person 4 paper hearts and we all wrote down what we loved about every member of our family. Then we put them all in a bowl at the center of the table.

We drew them during dinner and read them aloud.

Reading what she loves about Lucy. 

5. Lucy hosted a play-date with a school friend for the first time this week. They had a half day yesterday, so we brought her friend home with us after school. It was great. The girls all played upstairs for like 4 hours, then played outside until it was time for Skyler to go home. She was very sweet, but the best part was when she told me that I should get a house cleaner. Lol. Lucy was showing her the chore chart (that she never does) and Skyler said, "You have to clean your bathroom sink? We have a house cleaner for that." And then she came over to me and said, "You should get a house cleaner so you don't have to clean it yourself." I told her that I agree whole-heartedly! Lol. And this family is seriously not at all pretentious. That's why it's so funny.

6. Justin and I looked at a house for sale today. I'm always stalking real estate websites looking for anything decent in our price range and something new popped up yesterday that is literally 1.2 miles from our current house. It was one of the nicest ones I've seen in our price range in years, so even though we're not 100% sure we're ready to buy yet, we decided we'd at least go see it. And it was kind of disappointing. It's just discouraging that what we can afford gets us so much less than it did when we bought our house 8 years ago. It's definitely a seller's market right now. So I guess we're just going to do our best to be patient and wait for something better to come along.

7. And finally, our week in pictures:

Trying to do yoga with a curious little helper.

Reading their Valentine's Day cards from Grandpa and Grandma

Levi's first Valentine's Day

School party fun

He's actually started to get up on his knees once in a while. Still can't figure out how to go forward on his belly though. Lol.

She got to ride in the big-girl booster for two miles and felt like hot stuff. Poor little shrimp isn't going to outgrow her 5 pt. harness until she's 16.

Lazy Saturday snuggles

Snapchat fun while waiting for that awful 4th tooth to poke through.

He's finally outgrowing his 6 month pajamas, so I put these new ones on him. Two piece pajamas instantly make him look so much older!!! He'll be one in 10 days! (Kind of . . . stinkin' Leap Day birthday . . .)