November Already?

Yesterday, Daniel and Lauren turned 2 months old! I can't believe how fast the time is going by and that we are already to November! Even more so, I can't believe that when Sarah was a baby, by this time I was preparing to go back to work in 2 weeks! I am SO glad that I am fortunate enough at this point to stay out a little while, because I can't even imagine packing up this crew at 6:30 each morning and going to work all day (although it would be nice to have an "8 hour break" every day--I guess if I didn't have to actually "work" at work, I could handle it.....). We had a little scheduling mix up with the pediatrician, so Daniel and Lauren are not actually going for their 2 month check up until they are almost 3 months, but as far as we know, all is well with them. They are eating like champs and growing like weeds.

At 2 months, Daniel....

- is almost 2 pounds bigger than his "baby sister" Lauren, and is probably around 11 1/2 pounds
- puts himself to sleep in his crib with almost no assistance from mommy or daddy--hallelujah!
- cries when he is hungry, poopy, or tired
- is almost always hungry when he wakes up from a nap, no matter how long or short the nap was
- can roll over from his stomach to his back, although we have only seen him do it twice
-smiles, but only when he wants to, like when he hears Lauren cry
-is going to bed around 6:30 p.m. and doing his longest sleep stretch of the day until about midnight
-doesn't particularly care for his pacifier, but sometimes he won't let it go
-wears a size 0-3 month clothes, but will probably move up to 3-6 months before long!

At 2 months, Lauren...

- is almost 2 pounds smaller than her "big brother" Daniel, and is probably around 9 1/2 pounds
-is starting to put herself to sleep IN HER BOUNCY SEAT in her crib with only some assistance from mommy or daddy, sometimes. Other times, she needs LOTS of soothing to fall asleep.
-cries when she is hungry, poopy, tired, bored, lonely, gassy, cold, hot, you name it :-)
-loves to be on her side and does not like being flat on her back to sleep
-smiles often, with a beautiful toothless grin that melts my heart everytime I see it
-looks and behaves very much like Sarah did at her age
-is going to bed around 6:30 p.m. and doing her longest sleep stretch of the day until about 10:30 p.m.---on a good night.
-likes to cuddle her new lamb lovey and watching her hold it is just about the cutest thing you've ever seen
-is addicted to her pacifier and never leaves home without it :-)
-wears a size 0-3 month clothes

At 3 years, 4 months, Sarah...

- is the best big sister ever and is SO sweet to the babies
- loves to play with the baby toys and claims them all as "hers." I guess she's technically right- they were all hers at one point.
- is going to preschool 3 days a week and is learning a lot about letters and reading
- tries to sound out almost all words
- is very preoccupied with whether something is "breakable" or not
- is not sure what the word "chapel" means. Today, I asked her if she had chapel at school today, and her response was, "No, I didn't have apples...." Hmmm....
- is very clumsy and gets boo-boos multiple times daily, especially if she goes outside to play
- has a new "best friend" named Jonathan who lives across the street
- has made tons of new friends in our could-de-sac and is always watching to see when someone goes outside to play
- wears a size 3T clothes

We had a fun Halloween here- we decided to do a costume theme this year. Lauren was a mermaid (Sarah's old costume), Daniel was a fish, and Sarah was a "homemade" snorkeler put together at the last minute, whose costume looked fabulous if I do say so myself. Sarah even won second place in the costume contest at the carnival we attended! She got a $10 gift card which went toward the purchase of a Big Wheel so she can speed around the could-de-sac with her new friends.

Happy Fall!

We saw camels and zebras on the hayride---so strange!

Daniel's and Lauren's first hayride

Cute as a pumpkin

Cute as a pumpkin #2

Cute as a pumpkin #3 and #4 :-)

Fall family photo

Sarah and her two favorite babies

Sarah, going on her very first pony ride

Feeding the goats

We decided that instead of sitting at the house stressing over all there is to do that it would be better to take a family mini trip to the pumpkin patch. We looked online and found a neat place in Catersville called Pettit Creek Farms and off we went. Enjoy the pics!

Home Sweet Home

We are finally moved into our new house, and we're trying our best to get settled in. There's not much time to settle, though, with trying to keep up with three children all day! It's been fun not knowing how to find anything around the house--which box did I pack that in? Where are the bowls? Where are the fingernail clippers??? Jeremy and I are loving our new house, and Jeremy is loving his new 15 minute (max) commute even more. As we sort through our boxes and start unpacking things and putting them away here, we have realized that the new house does in fact have significantly more space than our old house, which is super! I've been having a grand old time picking out several "small" items that were missing when we moved in (toilet paper holders, a light fixture, etc.) and making the house really feel like "our new house." Jeremy probably wishes I would stop spending money though!

Sarah, the babies, and I are having lots of fun exploring Acworth, too. We've been to Wal-Mart once and Target several times. SuperTarget, along with lots of other stores and way more yummy restaurants, is literally 3 minutes away, so I am probably going to have to work really, really hard to limit my trips there or else I will go broke and then have a heart attack from eating too much grease. I realized that Target has a buggy big enough for all three children and even some groceries, too, and that has perhaps been one of the most exciting things I've realized lately ;-) We've been to three different playgrounds and Sarah is trying to decide which one is her favorite. Today we found one with a spot in the shade, and we took a picnic blanket and spread out on the grass and had a nice little lunch time, babies and all. Too bad they slept the whole time and didn't really get to enjoy it!

I think we'll like living here and I am hopeful that Sarah especially will make lots of new friends in the neighborhood. We seem to have moved onto the "kid street" and there are LOTS of kids who play outside a lot just outside of our house, so I think she will have a great time. Maybe Jeremy and I will even make some new friends as well! We will surely miss living in Bethlehem and near all of our other friends and family, though! That's definitely going to be the hardest part of this move! We miss you already and come visit us soon!

Double Trouble=Double Blessings

Our twins are 2 weeks old today! Daniel Briggs Gulley and Lauren Elizabeth Gulley were born on August 31, 2010, and we are having SO much fun getting to know their little personalities. At two weeks, it is amazing to see how different they already are from each other. For example, Daniel is quite mellow and enjoys being left alone sometimes, while Lauren wishes NEVER to be alone or out of someone's arms. Lauren loves her paci, while Daniel usually can't stand it. The one thing they do seem to have in common is that they both have their days and nights confused :-) This makes for long, sleepless nights for Jeremy and me, but on the flip side, the daytime is pretty mellow if they happen to be sleeping at the same time (although that hasn't been happening too much this week). We are grateful to our huge family for being so helpful with sending food, holding babies, shuttling Sarah back and forth to daycare, and sharing in the sleepless nights. We couldn't do it without you!

Enjoy the pictures. I'll post more later, but we're about to have a busy busy end-of-the-week. Our house closings are on Thursday followed by moving day on Friday and then finishing up getting the last things out of our "old" house on Saturday. Then the unpacking process will begin at the new house, although I foresee that project taking months and months to complete :-)

All My Bags Are Packed, I'm Ready to Go...

Well, sort of...our hospital bags are packed, and we're as ready as I guess we'll ever be to go have these babies! The bags are in the car, the car seats are in the car, the nursery is all set up (for now, anyway), and we are playing the waiting game. My blood pressure was getting a little higher than the doctors wanted to see it, so as of last week I have been home resting and waiting. It's quite a different lifestyle from working full time, especially since Sarah has been going to school. In fact, as of today, I think I could get used to this pace :-) When I went to the doctor last week, they did a routine ultrasound and discovered that Baby Lauren decided to flip around and she is no longer head-down, so at this point, they are recommending a C-section just to be on the safe side, unless she changes her mind and turns around again. We went ahead and scheduled the C-section for next Tuesday, August 31st! I can't believe it's just over a week away!!! I have tried and tried to coax the babies to go ahead and be born now, but it looks at this point like we will be going all the way to the 31st :-) I will be 38 1/2 weeks at that point, so it's still just a little before my due date, but I'm sure they will be plump and healthy by that point!

Two weeks after the babies are born, we're moving. Great timing, right? After a long, grueling summer of trying to sell our house and having no "bites," we suddenly got an offer one day! What an answer to prayer! We are closing on this house sometime between now and September 16th. We also have an offer on a "new" house (after a LONG weekend of stressful home searching- the house we picked was the LAST of about 30 that we looked at), and we'll close on that one on September 16th. So the bags at home are somewhat packed as well. Well, there is still a long way to go, but I think we've made outstanding progress and will be in great shape for moving out in just a few weeks! It's very strange to spend weeks and weeks in your house surrounded by boxes, and boxes, and boxes.....but I know packing now is the smart choice and that once next week gets here, our minds will be elsewhere!

Oh, by the way, Jeremy started a new job two weeks ago. We can't do anything simply, can we? He started his job as "Assistant Professor of Physics" at Kennesaw State University and has been commuting 1+ hours each way at odd hours of the day to avoid Atlanta morning and evening traffic (hence the move to Acworth). So far he seems to enjoy his new job and is so excited about getting his research program going. He's teaching one class this semester, which doesn't sound like much, but it pretty much takes up most of his time at this point. Hopefully once that gets settled into a routine, he will have more time to focus on his research. He's also planning to go to Colorado at the end of September to present at a conference. Thanks to Mimi, who is planning to come stay the week with us here while Jeremy is gone, I think we might survive the week while he is out of town!

My goal this week, besides relaxing and enjoying what I feel like is my last week of "me time" forever, is spending some quality one on one time with Sarah and making sure she knows how special she is to all of us and that she will be a great big sister and that more importantly, she is already a great daughter :-) As much as I'd like to be glued to the couch at all hours of the day, and as hard as it is lately to get up and down off of the floor, I've still tried to do what I can with Sarah and make sure she is enjoying the rest of her summer and getting lots of "mommy time." We've spent a lot of time at the pool, and we are all so excited that Sarah finally wants to swim all by herself (with her floaties)! She has been nothing less than terrified of being let go of in the water ALL SUMMER, until one day this past weekend Nana was able to sneakily let go and Sarah actually realized she enjoyed it! Yay Sarah! This will make going swimming with three children a bit easier (I didn't say easy!) next summer, I assume. Enjoy the assortment of pictures below--it's been awhile since the last update!















Look at me! I can swim all by myself!















Painting a masterpiece for her new bedroom




















Sarah "performing" for her last day of dance/gymnastics at The Little Gym















Is that a big belly or what???















Sarah and her new best friend (ie. cousin) Elizabeth















Mary Evelyn's wedding was so much fun!




















Preparing for her debut as "The Flower Girl"




















Sarah with her quadruplets- I hope she doesn't think I'm having 4 babies!




















At Mary Evelyn's bridal luncheon, reading her new flower girl book




















Getting ready to watch the fireworks on the 4th of July!















Mommy tried out taking black and white pictures :-)