Gabrielle Turns 5

She LOVES Barbies!

Wow, so stunning and "grown up"

And this is her 5 years later, a stunning Princess full of love and life!

Sleeping on Mommy's shoulder

Mommy and Gabrielle at the Hospital (one of the few pics of her and I)

Daddy and Gabrielle at the hospital

Today our oldest Princess turns 5! Seems like just yesterday Jake and I were "racing" to the hospital in our Monte Carlo to the hospital. We would spend what seemed like forever waiting for Gabrielle to make her appearance! She FINALLY decided to show show at 8:07pm at 7lbs and 5 oz of pure love!

Every since then she has had her Mommy and Daddy (and many others) wrapped around her finger! I love you sweetie!

Love Mom, Dad, and Little Sister Avery

Avery is a walkin......

One of our stunning Girls!

And.....the other one!

Avery took some steps back on the day of her birthday while my family was in town visiting from up north! She had been on and off since then. Braving some steps here and there! And then this Friday/Weekend she just took off....practically running at times! We are so excited about this new adventure of her! Did I met ion how much I love my girls and how much they inspire me to be a better Mom/Wife/Woman! I just love them to pieces, the good and bad days!

I have been trying to do some school shopping for Gabrielle since her 2nd year of Preschool is coming up VERY soon! She is so excited to see her teacher and friends. Because "Mom I miss school, It is fun there!" Guess Mom and Little Sister are not enough excitement for her!

That is all for now! Have a great week and much love!

Birthday Fun

Cake session outside (she was more interested in crawling around!)

This past Saturday we celebrated Gabrielle and Avery's birthdays! It was a great day shared with friends and family!

Thanks to all who came and shared this day with us!

Still can not believe my little girl is 1 and the other is soon turning 5!

The Big 1

Playing in the water spouts

She loved this!

Yummy, pool water......or not!

Avery snuggling with Great Grandma Hanson

Avery swinging and laughing at Gabrielle, who is being silly on the slide!

Just a swingin

It was official at 8:59am today our little girl turned 1!! I still can not believe it. Just how fast time flies by and how fast our little ones grow up! We celebrated today with a trip to the swimming pool as a family for the 1st time! Avery loved the pool...it was a huge bath tub to her!

We had a nice weekend with the Hanson's visiting! My dad, Ann, my grandma and uncle all came Friday and left this morning. This morning they even got to see Avery take 4 steps. That was fun for all of us! We had a very nice visit with them and good laughs. Nice for them to come down and celebrate the Birthdays with us!

This coming weekend is the BIG birthday party for Avery and Gabrielle. They will be sharing the day of celebration with our family and friends! Some of Gabrielle's friends from school are going to be there! Should be a great time!

Have a great week and see some of you this Saturday!

11 months ago....

Finally a picture of Gabrielle

My assistant!

My soon to be other assistant!

LOVE baby toes!

Cheeks!

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Avery is now over 11 months old! As I have said before, where has the time gone?! Seems like just the other day, we were calling up Chrystelle frantic (since she was not answering) to come and stay with Gabrielle at our house at 2 in the morning! Jake asking me, "Do you really think it is time to go, I do not want to get there and they send us home. Lets see how close the contractions are........oh a minute....i guess maybe we should go!" And we were off, him and I driving downtown Sioux Falls at 2am ...which happens never! Later that morning we would welcome Avery into our lives! And what a joy she has been (no really seriously!). She is just a great little kid and as my Dad called me when I was born "a ham". Next month, we will be celebrating her 1st Birthday and Gabrielle's 5th Birthday! So we are getting everything in line for that! Can not wait to see family and friends! And see my girls with cake all over them!

Gabrielle is in T ball (they still have not met since it was rained out last week). Hope this Monday works for the kiddos! They will get together from 10am-1030am every Monday and Wednesday! There are a lot of kids from her Preschool in it so she is very excited! Next month, she will be starting swimming lessons also! Can not wait for this either! She is pretty excited!

I hope to see you all in about 1 month for the birthday party! It is really fun to see everyone and celebrate such special moments together!

May Love...

So much hair...

Chillin in the grass!

Love her baby blues!

Smiles

Crawling in the grass! She is starting to not mind this now! She, for awhile, did not enjoy this!

I love this one of her!

This is her ET pose! She loves pointing and will usually say some jibberish when pointing!

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Is it just me or has May just flown by!? Guess they say, that is what happens when you are having fun and enjoying life!

As of this past Thursday, Gabrielle is done with preschool for the year. She will be attending the same place next year in the afternoon class, 4 days a week! We will be having play dates and such with her friends from school!

Avery, she is still as sweet as can be! She is such a great little girl! She will be turning 1 on the 10th of July and Gabrielle will turn 5. Avery now has her 2 top teeth and her 2 bottom teeth. We are working with her on the walking (she walks holding onto things and will stand for a few seconds by herself!), eating table food, holding her own bottle, and sleeping through the night. Can not complain she only wakes up once, drink a bottle and goes back to sleep.

I have attached a few videos and pictures for you to all enjoy!

Lots of love!

May...already....

As Mother's Day approaches us this weekend, I think of how thrilled I am to be the mother of 2 healthy little girls. They have taught me so much about life and love, and they do not even know it. They are everything to me and the reason I stay home everyday to ever miss anything with them. Which some days can be pretty overwhelming! Whoever said being a stay at home mom was easy and full of bon bons and watching TV------has never been a stay at home mom before. It is more like cleaning, meal preparing, playing, laundry, daily tasks, and the list gos on and on. I am still very honored to be able to stay home though and would not trade it for anything!

To all Moms, Happy Mother's Day because you deserve it and you are the one who keeps the house together and strong!

I also wanted to share some family/girls pictures we had taken about a month ago. To me as most of you all know, pictures mean a A LOT to me and I have many of them in my house. I never want to regret the day where I did not do a family picture because of my insecurities because I do not want it to be to late. (After all that the Thovson family has been through I think they can all understand where I am coming from.) So to me it is important and Jake gets it when I do some explaining! (He is great! Love him tons too! He is my best friend and my amazing husband for almost 6 years!) And the lady who took them could not help herself and needed to get some of our pretty girls!!! She was so amazed by all of our SUPER blue eyes!!!

As you can tell, I am feeling a little mushy today! Not sure where this is all coming from. I am just so thankful for everything right now, even on my hard days.

Enjoy the pictures and have a great weekend!