meeting briana and group (chaos) pictures

madelyn met her little cousin briana during our trip. she did pretty well at being gentle with the baby except for the time i had briana on my lap and maddie ran up with her milk cup and knocked her on the head. it was just an accident, but i still felt bad!

so i had this brilliant idea to take the girls (all three) for birthday portraits at jcp. grandma had bought maddie and annabell matching dresses for the fourth of july so of course it became a red, white, and blue themed shoot. the day before we stopped at the grocery store to pick up simple cupcakes and birthday candles to use in the shoot (jcp requested that we bring a plastic sheet to put down underneath them when the cupcakes were in their hands). it was chaos! i mean chaos! the set up was totally different from the jcp up here. the camera must have been the first digital camera - ever - and had next to no mobility. plus the photographer had some very unrealistic expectations for two one-year-olds. she wanted them to both stand behind briana and rest one of their hands on her shoulders. okay - like that was going to happen. not to mention that it was like a hundred degrees in the studio/closet and very crowded with the photographer, the table the girls were on (yes, a table - as in off the ground), and at least three of us as wranglers at all time. however, when it was all said and done, we got a few good shots. the pictures got a lot better once annabell and maddie sat down with their cupcakes. now i just need to schedule time for maddie's one-year pictures...

love.

briana marie is here!

madelyn has a new cousin (well as of yesterday morning). briana marie was born to her uncle josh and aunt adrienne at 10:02am yesterday. we are really excited because this means that we will definitely get to meet her on our upcoming trip to florida! adrienne was originally due july 1. grandma z. and big pop now have three granddaughters with birthdays within a one and a half week period in june! not to mention that adrienne's birthday is today! (happy birthday, aunt adrienne!)

i wanted to post about this yesterday but was exhausted from a cranky, fever-y, tired maddie all night. maddie has at least 5 teeth coming in right now. i say "at least" because that is how many i can actually feel and see. she had a fever of 103 and all she wanted to do was sit with me, suck her thumb, and hold onto "bear". i had to hand her off to matt for a few minutes so that i could eat some dinner and you would have thought that i was leaving her forever. she had such a devastated expression on her face. she settled down in to her daddy's embrace quickly, but the initial reaction broke my heart. i just hate it when she is so uncomfortable and there is really nothing that can be done for her. luckily the motrin kicked in within an hour and her fever was down by bedtime. she napped a total of 6-7 hours yesterday! during one of her medicate "happy" times yesterday she was playing with a ball by throwing it at the wall and furniture to bounce it back to her. by the time i got the camera she had gotten too close to the furniture to get much of a bounce, but in the second video she starts throwing it and 'chasing' it. enjoy!

today has been another really rough day for madelyn. neither one of us got much sleep last night because she is in so much pain. say a prayer for us that tonight will be better. it is so hard to hear her with such a pitiful little cry. love.

update: i added a little baby orajel to her gums just now and it made a huge difference! she was actually able to play and sleep a little.

update #2: just came home from the doctor's office and madelyn has hand-foot-mouth disease. there is nothing that can be done other than treating the fever - it could be a very, very long week.