I was in the kitchen doing dishes while the girls were right in the living room playing two weeks ago. Sophia was sitting on the couch with her mini magna-doodle that she can't seem to put down lately. She takes it in the car, in every room of the house, on the potty, etc. It's getting really beat up and I think I'm going to get her a new one. Anyway, she yelled to me, "Mom, I made an A!!!" This is what I saw:



I'm so proud of her and she was SO proud of herself. I didn't even know she could write that letter! I have taught her a bunch of other letters (E, H, I, T, V, Y, F, L, O, X) and she knows how to spell SOPHIA and STELLA and STOP but can't write them yet. She has a hard time with S. I think the curvy letters throw her off. She has known her letters since she 18 months old (capital ones) and her lower case for at least a year now. She spells out everything she sees...signs, writing on shirts, magazines, books, etc. Anyway, her A is great! She just loves anything to do with words and letters. She loves to have us tell her what words say and wants us to use our finger to point to the words as we read them in her books. I will not be surprised if she's reading before she's 4 only because her interest in books and words is so intense. I think both of my girls would be happy without any toys if they could have an unlimited supply of books! Guess they take after Mom and Dad because we LOVE to read! Now if only I could find the time to do it as often as I would like without my house becoming disastrous!

Friday night fun

Tonight we ventured to downtown Greenville to see what it was like on a Friday night. It's actually a pretty hoppin' place! We grabbed a bit to eat at a kid-friendly little restaurant where you eat at tables on the sidewalk. The girls loved it. Then we walked through Falls Park and checked out the interactive fountains that we will be visiting this coming Tuesday for a playdate. Our last stop was Spill the Beans for some refreshing ice cream. The girls were awesome, especially for being up 2 hours past bedtime. The whole experience was great and we learned that the girls can really handle being up a few hours late every once in awhile. In a few weeks we're going to try out a concert in an outdoor amphitheater and I'm so excited. Not only will it be nice to get some fresh air and visit with people, but our girls LOVE music and will be dancing away I'm sure! I'm just sad that we have been here almost a year and a half and have not taken advantage of downtown at all yet. Hopefully before we move away we get a bunch more time to enjoy it.

While we were crossing the street tonight, Sophia grabbed my hand and Drew's, too. She looked up at us, as she always does when holding both our hands, and said, "Look, we're a family now!" That reminded me that she also always says, after she sees a man and woman kiss, "Look Mom, they're married now!"

Next to our house, there are two empty lots on one side and one empty lot on the other side. Across the street there is also an empty lot. People have come this week to start building homes in the two empty lots on one side and across the street. I'm not sure why they are not building on the other side, but I am thankful for that because that's the side of the house where Sophia room is. At least it shouldn't be too loud for naps right now. So, they have the homes started and have been digging for the slab and piping. The other day Sophia looked out and said, "Where are the mans who are building those houses?" They not there at that time so I told her they were done for the day. She looked at me and said, "Mom, women can work with tools, too. Someday when I get bigger I can work with tools." Of course I told her she was right and can do anything she wants when she gets bigger!

Yesterday we went outside to get the mail and there were some men working next door. Sophia looked up and said, "That boy has a naked shirt! How come?" I told her that he was probably hot because it was very sunny. She looked at me and said, "I want to take my shirt off, too!" I told her only boys can do that and the rest of the afternoon she kept quizzing me on why only boys can do that.

Today there was noise outside from some dump trucks. Stella is particularly tuned into noises lately and will ask what a noise is when she hears something. So, today we went outside to check it out. There were two large dump trucks that were dumping gravel in front of each empty lot. As we were watching a third truck came to dump gravel across the street. The girls were enthralled with the trucks and Sophia has informed me that each day we're going to go outside to watch what is happening with the houses! Next weekend we're going to take the girls to an event where you get to touch and climb on lots of big trucks and I think they will love it!!!

We have a book with a picture of a boy eating a piece of lime. Sophia has always liked that picture and talks about lemons and limes being sour. Stella saw the book the other day and thought the boy was crying in the picture. Sophia informed her that that was not the case. Yesterday, while eating a slice of fresh pineapple, Sophia told me that pineapples have lemon juice in them, too, and with every bite she made the sour face! It was really funny because, as usual, Stella was copying her!

Those are our updates for the week...it was a busy one for us. Drew's interview in NY seemed to go really well. He enjoyed his time at the company and felt like the people there liked him. We have to wait a few weeks to hear anything, but there are some other companies we're waiting on as well. I hate being in limbo like this. I hate the thought of leaving all my friends here and would really like some time to mentally prepare myself to start all over again someplace new. We have a very special thing here in SC and I'm afraid that I might never find friends quite like these ones again. Once we do move, I know the girls will adjust well and I know we'll be closer to family but I am going to miss everyone lots! Pray for us that when the time comes we will know what we should do and we will make the right choice for our family.

On a very happy note, my cousin got engaged last week in Paris!!! He will be getting married next summer. My niece is getting married this summer. My other cousin got married last summer. My brother got married last summer. I'm hoping my BIL will get engaged soon and get married next summer (that's just my plan :-))! I just love weddings...I think being married and having a family are so great and everyone should get to experience that happiness! Yay!

Pictures and Quotes

Here is Sophia back home after attending the Greek Festival held at our church. She got her face painted for the first time ever and really enjoyed posing for pictures. It's supposed to be a fairy, which Sophia really loves at the moment. The woman painting her face put some glitter on and some got on Sophia's dress, so we called it fairy dust. She was SO excited! She wanted to go back the next day with Drew and I when we volunteered to get her face painted again!


Here's Stella at lunch today saying "cheese" with food in her mouth. I wanted a cute picture of her outfit and hair today, but this is cute enough!


Sophia was actually spinning around being silly so I couldn't get a good picture but I happened to click at exactly the right moment! I feel like she looks so tall and grown up in this picture.

Here's Stella with sort-of bad lighting but a silly, cute face anyway.

Last night, as I was putting Sophia to bed, she asked me, "Mom, why is the world so beautiful?" I told her, "Because God made it that way for us all to enjoy." We proceeded to have a conversation about God and beautiful things and Jesus and church and the priest, etc. She was really just stalling so that I wouldn't leave her room at bedtime, but it was cute. She comments on something she finds beautiful at least once every single day. It could be the silliest thing (something we might never call beautiful) but she really finds beauty in lots of things!

Tonight, at dinner, Sophia was pretty much done eating so she was out of her seat. She had been sharing some feta and kalamata olives with Drew from his salad (plus other veggies) when she got down to start running across the kitchen floor. She was going from the fridge to Drew's side and yelling, "Opa!" After about the tenth time, and with Stella copying, she said, "Now I'm a Greek girl, see?!" She just really loved seeing the children dancing at the festival and can't wait to learn that herself. Hopefully when we move we will end up in a community with a very active Greek church so that Sophia and Stella can both belong to a dance troupe and Greek school. I know Sophia would just love that!

Mother's Day

Here are the girls before church Sunday. They LOVE getting on dresses and tights and church shoes. Too bad they didn't love being at church so much this time. For the first time ever, they were both awful and we had to leave the service early. Once we walked out to settle them down, Sophia really stopped misbehaving. We decided to try one more time, but Stella just wouldn't give up. She wanted to climb and play and talk, etc. I was so sad because they had a Mother's Day luncheon after church and I really wanted to attend and meet some other moms at our church. So, because we had to leave early and we were all dressed up, we decided to go out for lunch. We tried 3 nice restaurants and all were packed, even though it was only 11:30! We decided to just go home and eat and ate out for dinner.

The sweetest part of my day was when I was grabbing a sweater before church and Drew was getting the girls in the car. Sophia came looking for me and found me in the closet. She walked in and said, "I thought you were in the bathroom." and then in the cutest little voice she said, "I wanted to tell you Happy Mother's Day." I almost started crying because it was just so cute. I guess Drew had been prepping them that morning while I slept a little late.

Sophia has been bouncing off the walls the last few days with excitement that Yiayia and Papou are coming to visit. She LOVES having company and especially loves having people sleep over. I've realized that there is nothing more exciting for a 3 year old than having someone to wake up in the morning! We've been counting down the days...Sophia counts by how many more times she has to go to sleep. I can pretty much guarantee that she will not nap Thursday because she'll be so excited that they're coming. She even has an outfit picked out for when they arrive! We're going to the Greek Festival this weekend and I'm sure we'll have so much fun! Drew and I are working at it Saturday night so the girls will have Yiayia and Papou to themselves for a few hours. This will be the first real time the girls have had someone else watch them for a substantial period of time (and handle bedtime!) since before Stella was born! The girls have only been watched two times EVER by someone besides me or Drew. First, about 6 months ago when Drew had his wisdom teeth out our neighbor watched them for about two hours one morning and second, last week my friend watched them for two hours so I could go interview for a part-time job. That's it, EVER!!! This is a big deal for me and them! I love my girls but I am so excited for an adult social event (even though we'll technically be working).

Drew has an interview in a few weeks so the girls and I will be on our own for two days, but at least it's not longer. I wish we could go but Drew really can't take the time off for us to all drive. If anything comes of the interview, we'll go up and check out the area. It's hard to believe that our time here in SC is quite possibly going to end after this summer. We have come to love it here (aside from the bugs and humidity) and have made some really great friends. Sophia has more friends than I can count (or than she can keep track of!) and I have lots of great blossoming friendships. Sometimes I can't believe that we're going to give it up, but family really does mean more than anything. To see our girls light up when family visits, and then to think that if we stay here that only happens a few times a year hurts. It kills me to think that I could deprive my girls of more time with people that automatically love them just because they are alive by living so far away. We could certainly have more here (a MUCH bigger, nicer house, private school for sure, more vacations, etc) but at what cost? The cost is having to regret not having our girls grow up closer to family. I didn't have that and know what a blessing it was for Drew to have family live so close. We can love our girls with every part of our being and it's still not going to replace being close to grandparents. We are keeping our prayers strong for a great job closer to the New England area and ask for your prayers, too!

In closing, I will leave a little quote from Sophia. We were talking about going to church last weekend (we hadn't been in awhile but talk about it a lot) and Sophia asks about the priest a lot. We have told her that you can't talk because what the priest has to say is really important. She looked at me last weekend and said, "Mom, I know what the priest's name is." I said, "You do? What is it?" Sophia replied, "God." How cute is that!!! She was telling Stella about all the pictures in a Christmas book today and knew Joseph and Mary and baby Jesus. I was so proud of her! More cute quotes to come tomorrow....