New Hair-do's!

Do you like the girls' new hairdos? I'm not sure Sylvia did!

Holiday Pictures

Well, I might be ruining the holiday card surprise and gifts for the grandparents, but here are the girls' holiday pictures! Don't you LOVE the hats? I think they are adorable!

Girls Visit Santa and Mrs Claus

This weekend, the girls had a visit with Santa and Mrs Claus. Evelyn was a bit unsure of Santa's big, white beard, but Sylvia was pretty easy-going about it.

The Girls Visit The White House

The girls enjoyed their first visit to the White House and even saw Bo, the First Pet. We brough Angela and Matt (her boyfriend) with us. The first picture is of Evelyn in the Blue Room under the official White House christmas tree. Her sister was ahead of the pack with Daddy visiting the State Dining Room and gingerbread house (we all know how much Sylvia loves to eat!)

Evelyn Explores

Evelyn climbed right under the exersaucer. Angela sent this picture to us at work and it made me smile widely! She's so silly.

Sylvia Loves Her Dolly

At my shower, my Mom gave the girls two dolls that were created to be EXACTLY like the dolly I obsessed for when I was a girl. It's 2 headed--one head for day, the other for night on either end of the doll. Sylvia goes nuts for hers. She wiggles her feet and screetches in delight. So adorable.

Self Discovery

We got this great baby-safe mirror to put at their level and they are LOVING it. There's no sound, but you can get the idea of how much fun they were having.

Evelyn and a Pear

Since the girls have enjoyed pear, we let Evelyn gnaw on one the other morning. She didn't even break the skin, but she enjoyed it.

Sylvia Giggles

I was playing with the girls after dinner and got Sylvia's giggle on camera! Listen closely and you can hear it. She's also doing this cute nose wrinkle, which is adorable. Daddy says I do it too, so she must be copying me.

Ba Ba Fun Meal Time

The girls get WILD at dinner. They are very chatty and messy, and lots of fun. Often Sylvia moves her mouth like she's eating or talking and nothing comes out. It's cute. This video sort of looks like one of those kung-fu movies where english is overlayed and the mouth movements don't match.

First Snow!

The girls experienced their first snow this Sunday. We tried to have them sit up, but they were not having it. It was super wet snow so they quickly got wet too. Not the greatest experience, but it was still fun.

Big Girl Sylvia

Sylvia is now officially in 9-12 month clothes (yes, at 7 months!). Here she is in her first adorable 9-12 month outfit, which was a gift from our friend Lauren. She's in the exersaucer, but playing with a phone from another toy. She loves that phone, her jingle bells and dolly.

Add Dressed Up and Dirty

They girls are always adorably dirty when I get home from work. About once a week, Angela dresses them in cute dresses and then the girls spit up on them. It's still super cute though.

Tearing Up Newspaper

All the time the girls are experiencing new textures. They love magazines, but especially loved this newspaper. It also turned their little hands black. Probably wasn't the best texture to play with, but it was fun! They didn't even try to eat it.

Mommy & Daddy With Their Girls

Me and My Girls

I rarely have pictures taken with me and my babies. I have to beg for them. Here we are one weekend morning.

Sylvia On The Move

Sylvia is now scooting! She maneuvered her way to the tunnel and pulled it down to play with the toys. Check out this adorable picture Angela sent to us at work! Do you think it put a smile on my face?

Playing Together

The girls really are playing together. They steal each other's toys and make each other giggle. It's adorable. Turn up the volume on the video and you can hear Evelyn cracking up every time Sylvia looks at her.

Indian Summer

The girls enjoyed the Indian Summer day on November 16th. It was lovely and Angela took full advantage by taking them to the waterfront in Old Town. The girls enjoyed playing with leaves and showing their true personalities. Sylvia held onto the same two leaves the entire time and studied them carefully. On the other hand, Evelyn couldn't get enough leaves, she's crinkle them up and shove them into her mouth. It was a good day!

Gram's Visit

This is WAY over due, but Gram came to visit in early November. The girls loved being read to by her. We could also take a lesson or two from her on her neat feeding techniques (they are so clean when she's done...we don't know how she does it!).

Big Girl Eating Arrangements

For about a month now, we have been feeding them in their high chairs. They love it. They are also getting better at holding their bottles and picking up cups and spoons.

7 Months

The girls are sooo big now! We weighed them around their 7 month birthday and Sylvia was 18lbs 4oz and Evelyn was 17lbs. It is amazing how much they've grown and changed in 7 short months (well, really in the last 2 months!).

Swings!

The girls LOVE their new swings. No more baby swings for these girls, they've moved onto real swings outdoors! They will have fun all winter long in our backyard.

Latest In Gross Motor Development

Evelyn is scooting, leaping and crawling everywhere. She is quite busy. She also hikes her butt up into a traingle. Here she is on Daddy. She will definitely be zooming around the room in a full crawl by Christmas. Evelyn is still far more interested in crawling than she is sitting.

Sylvia is yanking on the activity mat showing off her expert sitting abilities. She is doing a great job moving around in a circle while on her belly. She doesn't move forward or back, but uses her arms to move within 360 degrees. We think Sylvia will pull herself to standing before she'll crawl. She's very skilled at standing and now responds to "Sylvia Up?" by putting her hands in the air and pushing herself up to standing when I hold onto her hands. She holds herself up there for several minutes and then understands "Sylvia Sit", and bends her knees and plops back down. She could do this for hours.

So cute, very cute.

Cuddly Evelyn

Evelyn is getting more cuddly. Over the weekend, I caught her snuggled up to Daddy several times.

Thanksgiving

Grandpa Benson (Mommy's Dad from Indiana) and Uncle Aaron (Daddy's brother from VA Beach) came to spend Thanksgiving with us. The girls enjoyed a yummy dinner of turkey, sweet potatoes, green beans, pumpkin and oatmeal. They gobbled up their first bites of turkey, just like they do everything else. We saw lots of sites (Manassas Battlefield and Arlington Cemetary) and ate lots of food (Thanksgiving with all the fixings, turkey noodle soup, chili, etc). We also put up the Christmas tree and Sylvia was so curious she broke an ornament!

Sylvia's Laugh

Sylvia doesn't giggle. She's only giggled 3 times. But, now she cackles! It's so funny. I didn't edit the video so you can get an idea of how she gets going. She does this all the time and it's sooo adorable. What a big noise coming from a delicate little baby!

Cup

We have been practicing with a cup to be sure they are ready to fully transition from the bottle at 1 year. Sylvia is pretty good at it. Evelyn likes to chew it.

Evelyn Crawling

Evelyn is now moving around the room. She's not officially crawling (one arm then the other, etc), but she is getting it. It's super cute and she keeps herself super occupied. She will be zooming around the room in an official crawl very soon. She's trying to break records doing this at just 6 months! Crazy baby! Note, this video was on the 15th, we've made much progress since this time. Will upload another video soon.

Naked Time

The girls get wild during naked time -- we do this each night before bedtime to give them some freedom from their diaper. I think it's really helped with diaper rash. We've only really had one case. We are also crazy about changing them every 2 hours.

Messy Marvin

The girls are now in their high chairs and have been practicing with spoons and sippy cups. Sylvia is a pro at the cup. She pics it up and chugs water. They are both pretty good at finding their mouths with the spoon. They have now had squash (acorn and butternut), sweet potatoes, green beans, corn, pumpkin, broccolli, peas, and cauliflower. It takes a while to get through the foods because we wait 3 days before introducing something new to make sure they aren't allergic. They love everything! Here's Evelyn and her spoon.

Thumper

Sylvia loves to thump her legs. We are often worried she's going to bruise herself because she slams down so hard.

Gram Visits

Gram visited for a long weekend and we had a blast with the girls. We got them all gussied up and took them to the National Harbor for lunch. It was a beautiful November day!

Babbling

Both girls are now babbling, but here's a video of Evelyn's first babbles. Sylvia started soon after and favors Da Da, while Evelyn says Ma Ma. It's super cute.

Cute Smiley Picture of Evelyn

This is just an adorable picture of Evelyn and her gigantic cheeks, courtesy of our friend Jen Smith. She's a great photographer.

Play Date

We had our first real play date with our friends Ella and Max on Friday. They are all 6 months old -- Ella is 22 days older and Max is 14 hours older than the girls. It was fun to have them interact. Our typical play dates involve feeding them, feeding ourselves and then going on a walk. Now, they are nearly mobile, sitting up, reaching and "talking." Ella had a thing for Sylvia and kept crawling over to hear and grabbing her face. It was really cute. Ella didn't seem to care much for Max or Evelyn. They have similar features (blue eyes, ligher hair), so maybe she thought she saw herself. Max was super cute, babbling and rolling around on his belly. It was a great time had by all. Here's a link to the pictures taken by Jen (Ella's Mom). http://www.kodakgallery.com/gallery/creativeapps/slideShow/Main.jsp?token=770404109703%3A661315822

Here's a link a cute video of Ella reaching for Sylvia: http://sharing.theflip.com/session/fa65211d58735564cb2d0098bc7f83fd/video/7263818