My sister, Rose

Yesterday, my sister Rosemary turned 24. I wanted to take a moment to talk about how I'm so proud of the woman she's becoming :)

Almost 2 years ago (this May) she married her High School sweetheart Nathan. Shortly after that, she moved to a foreign land, Germany to begin their life together. She's been living there for over a year now. Nathan is deployed currently in Iraq but she's been a pillar of strength. She found a great job working on base with preschoolers, one of her favorite ages. She does a great job :)

My sister and I are hardly alike at all, night and day! we've had our ups and downs but we're family and I'm so happy she's in my life. I can learn a lot from my sister. Rose has a good heart. If/whenever we fight or have a disagreement, she's always the first to apologize or make things right, even when she didn't start it or cause it or was in the wrong! She's very selfless, wanting to help others wherever there's a need, great at putting others above herself. These are two things I struggle with! She also is very committed. Once she makes up her mind to do something, she's 100% about it. She's also great at keeping in touch with me. Keeping up with the two kids, I can get pretty awful at writing or calling people. Rosemary remembers every date, every birthday, every anniversary and is great at sending cards, letters, calling, etc! She's also very independent.

I admire her for moving across the World to a foreign Country where she didn't know anyone besides her husband and had a good attitude about doing it too! This was way different from me. When Robby and I got married, the first 3 years we spent living less than 10 minutes away from my parents house and saw them usually 3 times a week. That changed a lot when we decided to move to Orange County. The thought of moving 50 miles away from everything I knew was a little scary for me!

I still remember when we brought Rose home from the hospital. We had a lot of fun growing up, playing with dolls, dressing in twin dresses, roller blading, bike riding, making "fast food" mud pies! We also loved torturing our little brother Phil and making Holly get things for us since she was the baby! We have a lot of good memories together!

Happy birthday sis. I love you :)

Updates on the family :)

Well after a whole 9 days of Abby sleeping in her toddler bed, she's totally grasped the concept! She goes down for her nap but I need to be diligent in making sure she has her lunch first and gets in her bed before 12:30! she has a short window for nap and if I pass it, she can't/won't fall asleep!

We moved Christian into his crib last week and it's been tough! He was waking up at 3:30 or 4:30 in the morning and would just cry. Abby even walked in to comfort him one night :) So sweet! Sunday night, he cried for 30 minutes before he finally conked out! Monday night, it took him 12 minutes to calm down before I heard him playing with his toys. He eventually fell asleep without another peep! Last night, Robby laid him down and he didn't fuss ONCE! He's getting the hang of it! Yeah!

Did I mention too that Abby's started potty training herself? For her birthday, I'd purchased a potty chair, knowing we'd start that sometime during her 2nd year of life. She's totally got it down. She comes running to me saying "POTTY ChAIR POTTY CHAIR" when she needs to go! Unfortunately for me, I'm not always able to drop what I'm doing to take her! She doesn't really want to wear diapers anymore either. We bought special princess pull ups, big girl diapers for her. This is a fun experience :) I'm not ready to switch to big girl UNDERWARE but we'll get there eventually. Right now we're enjoying our tries!

Robby and I have been getting up at 6- to read the Bible together and do our Bible study. I haven't been going to bed early enough either to feel rested when the alarm goes off at 6-! I also GAINED back 1 of the 6 pounds I'd lost. Bleah.

That's all the new news going on here :) Eventually, I'll get some pics up from Abby's little birthday party!