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Hey everyone! So, I grew up with 2 very health conscious women in my life...my mother and my grandmother. Both went through breast cancer and as many of you know, that is what killed my mother.

We lived in Austin, Texas, until I was 9 years old. We did most of our grocery shopping at The Whole Foods Market, and I miss that awesome place. I am actually making a fun trip to Austin on Monday to spend some time with my cousin Tyffany and do some shopping for items you just can't get where I live.

I always used to think my grandma and mom might be a bit paranoid. Your mind sure does take a dramatic shift when you have kids of your own. I want to do all that I can to avoid pesticides and harsh and unnecessary chemicals in the products we use in our home. Now, don't get me wrong, I am still going to dye my hair and paint my toenails (I painted them black last week and LOVE it!!)

But I think it is important to limit the amount of crap that I put into my kids world...you know, the world that they still stick in their mouths and suck on. :) How does one go about this? I had no idea...

One day when I was still pregnant, I played around on this website that a good friend had sent me. I was shocked at the chemicals that were in some of the stuff I was using everyday. So I bought a LOT of my babycare items according to the "shopping guides" that I found on this website. I don't think we are perfect over here, but I do feel better about the fact that the shampoo, sunscreen, and diaper ointment I use is not loaded with chemicals and junk.

I was just printing off some shopping guides this morning since I want to get a lot of stuff at Whole Foods next week and saw that they had these buttons for your blog. YEA!!! Now I can share the wealth of information and any of you reading can get the same stuff if you want to. :) I just wanted to share the info in case anyone was interested.

I realize this stuff is usually more expensive, but I will see what I find on Monday and let everyone know if I found some good deals. Have a great day, and enjoy playing with the new buttons!

Baby Sign Language

My girls have been watching us teach them sign language for months and months now. So far they think it's funny to watch us and never seemed to show an interest in doing a sign themselves. We stopped signing "Mommy" and "Daddy" since they vocalize those words so well.

But in the past couple of months the girls have been getting very frustrated with certain things...wanting an item and either not being able to reach it, or not being able to lift it, and wanting more of an item. They are usually wanting more food or more milk in their sippy cups. So lately we have really focused on teaching them to sign "more", "done", and "help".

If they are trying to get a stuffed toy out of a basket and it gets stuck, instead of crying and screaming, hopefully they will learn to sign "Help". We just keep showing them the signs with hopes that they will one day make one back.

Well, I am proud to say that it worked!! Last night at dinner, Lilly started to get upset when she wanted another bite of pasta. It was hard to tell if she was done and just mad, or if she wanted another bite. I asked her if she really wanted more or if she was done. All of the sudden, she signed "More" and accepted the bite from Eric. I was ecstatic!! Then Lexi started doing it! It was awesome. Hopefully they will get the sign for help down soon. I love it that this allows us to alleviate frustrations and still help them with things they need.

The first video is Lexi signing "more". The second video is Lilly signing it. I like how they both have different ways to do it. :) Such smart little girls!

And the firsts keep coming...

Sadly, it had been a while since we had gone to church. We do so love our church too! But with 3 sick, one week at a time, and then a weekend vacation, we just hadn't been in a while. So it occurred to me this past Sunday as I was dressing the girls that this would be their first time at church since they had really been walking everywhere. This could only mean 1 thing...the girls first "graduation" of sorts. They would now be in the ONE YEAR OLD WALKERS class!! That to me is huge. Crazy, I know, but in 9 months they will be in the 2 year olds class and then it's off to kindergarten, high school, and then they are gone. :( Isn't that sad?

So I dressed them up cute, gave lots and lots of tight mommy-hugs, and took pictures of my no-longer-babies-growing-up-too-fast, little girls!

Lilly got tired of walking and plopped down in the hallway after breakfast. Isn't she a doll?!

Here is a smile for Daddy after Lexi walked by and ripped her hairbow out!

Miss Lexi climbed up on the couch to hug her new favorite lamb...

This is now what you get from Lexi when you ask her to say, "Cheese!" Such a big girl!

On Monday, we spent a lot of time playing. Toby is feeling tons better. He has been begging for food and eats about 5-6 times a day right now...YEA!! Lexi took this opportunity to lean in and scare the poor dog to death by giving him a HUGE kiss right on his nose! She was soooooo proud of herself for kissing him. :)

Later that afternoon, Lexi went into her bedroom and closed the door on me..this is a very common occurrence. So, I checked on Lilly again and could hear Lexi giggling in her room. I knew exactly what she was doing (standing on the other side of the door holding the door shut), so I left her alone for about 1 minute. Then she stopped giggling at the door. When I went in to check on her, this is what I saw. Awww!!!

Later that night, we went to the park across the street from our house. It was the girls first time at our park as "walkers". We have been spending our "swing" time at home since it has been so hot. So we put on the pink sneakers, and loaded them into the car. They still LOVE to swing together and still fit in 1 baby swing. :)

Here is Lexi...all smiles and giggles!!

I love the sun shining through the tree!
Miss Lilly smiling for me! She was all smiles too, but was harder to get to look at me. She was very interested in the other Daddy pushing his son next to her. :)

Lilly wanted us to pick her back up...still not sure what to do with the slide. It made her nervous. Lexi didn't care either way...at first!
Lilly loved walking all around. She also liked to hold Eric's hand after falling down on those wood chips so much.
Checking out the wood chips...The first time Lexi put one in her mouth, I took it out and said, "Ewww!!" I told her we couldn't eat those. Then for the rest of the time we were there, if she fell down, she would yell, "Ewwww!!" and dust off her hands.
This is my favorite one of Lexi...
Lilly checking it all out...
Playground, here I come!
When we left, Lexi decided that she LOVED to slide....as long as I held onto her!
It has been a great week so far, and it's only Tuesday! Yea for good weeks! I really needed one!

Sooooo Many Pictures

Since I have taken so many fun pictures over the past few days, I am overwhelmed with what to post on my blog...therefore, enjoy this for the morning!!!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h64opCwLZCw&feature=fvw

Or here is the video if you just want to listen. It will not show all of the frame though, so you can't read every word. :(

I will post some pics by tonight!! I LOVE this song...and so do the twins!

Compare and Contrast

Some of you may remember these pictures from July 2008. I almost can't fathom them being that tiny anymore. :) Well, they had these adorable little "newborn" sized onesies that were too big for them. Lilly is in the stripes and Lexi is in the hearts....

Lexi used to always snuggle Lilly to her side when they were newborns.

Well, they got the same set of onesies from a friend and they are 18 month size. They are still too big, but super-duper comfortable. Tonight after bath time, we put the girls in the same patterns and tried to take some pictures. First, we laid them side by side and asked them to snuggle with each other. :) Ha ha, ya'll should have seen how that went over...notice Lexi's screams! :)

Then when everyone was in a better mood, Lexi tried to pin Lilly down for a kiss. They ended up cracking up and giggling for a while.

Family Time

My first baby, Toby, has been sick lately and it makes me very sad to see such a sweet, old friend feel so badly. He got treated about a week ago and is feeling so much better. Here he is yesterday giving me a loving glance! I just LOVE that little boy! :) Although prayer is still needed for his weight gain. He has always been a tiny boy, but he is pretty underweight right now at 4.5 pounds. You can feel every bone in his body. He needs to bulk up!! He ate almost a whole can of food yesterday which is great!

On a different note, Lexi has started giving TONS more kisses. Both girls have given us kisses since they were pretty little, but Lexi just learned how to pucker up and make the smacking sound that Mommy makes. ;) So she practices every chance she gets. I took pictures of her kissing baby Jesus over and over in her little Bible yesterday. :) That makes me smile BIG!!

It wasn't the best angle, but here she is bending over Sneezy so she can give him a big wet one right on his nose. She is also obsessed with noses right now.
Lexi in pigtails!
Oh, Mommy, not again with the hair up!
Lilly being curious and thankfully not noticing her hair yet. Gotta love that face!

More of my little Lilly!

Just being adorable and cranky at the same time...can you blame the girl? She has 3 teeth popping in right now!

Lexi clapping with me since she had just put a hair bow on her lamb's ear. :) Notice the orange bow at the bottom of the pic. :)
Lexi, can you pucker up and give Daddy a kiss? Sweet girl!
Here we have Mommy and Lilly snuggling while Lexi smooches Daddy!

Cleaning the Floors

Remember my post on natural cleaning with vinegar? Well I am still working on figuring out even more super convenient ways to do this. Eric, or as I like to call him, Mr. Brilliant, had a great idea.

We have a Clorox Ready Mop that we were using to clean the floors. I wasn't excited about crawling around on my knees with this squirt bottle wiping up the floors with vinegar, and I hate regular, dirty mops.

Eric suggested emptying the Clorox solution out of the bottle and after a thorough cleaning of the bottle, adding my own vinegar solution. GENIUS!!!!

Here is my handy-dandy squirt bottle of 50/50 vinegar and water that I use to clean tons of stuff. Not great for floors. :(

So I did this instead...First, I swept my floors. They don't look too dirty. :)
Next, I filled up and labeled my container. I made this about 60-65% vinegar since we have lots of little feet (aka...the muddy dog paws that ran across the floor this morning) scurrying around my house. Feel free to draw a cute little flower too ;) I'm silly that way!
Put the Clorox bottle filled with the vinegar solution back into the mop and set it up just like you did before, cleaning pad and all.

Get to cleaning!! I tried not to be biased, but I have to say that it cleaned the floors super well. It got up some spots that I wasn't sure it would...nice! See the pad afterwards? Yea!! Bye, bye dirt!

Just make sure that you clean out the container REALLY well before adding the vinegar. Vinegar reacts with certain other chemicals and the last thing you want is to create harmful fumes when you are trying to clean naturally to avoid fumes. :)

I rinsed the bottle out several times over a week or so. Then I made sure to flush the lines well and let the bottle dry completely to ensure that all the Clorox was gone and evaporated away.

Happy cleaning!