Christmas fun!

Well, It's been a little busy around here gearing up for and celebrating Christmas. I was able to find the words to finish my Christmas cards and we spent December making fun family memmories! Here is a little slide show of December.

Christmas Cards!!!

I am so excited to get started on my Christmas cards this year! Our family was fortunate to be models in a friends photography workshop and we got some amazing pictures that I can't wait to share. This year I am using Shutterfly to make Christmas photo cards online. It took me an hour to choose a design because they are so adorable and there are so many options. I ended up choosing the "Snowtastic Snowflakes" design. I LOVE the bold color scheme, the year right on the front and a cute monogram decal. If you haven't had a chance to check out Shutterfly yet here is a link to their Christmas Cards! I have ordered photobooks from them in the past and have been very happy. Have fun browsing through all their great holiday cards!
OK... I have inserted pictures and now comes the tough part... the words. HAHA! I better get busy!

Family Time

All too often we take for granted the time we get to spend together as a family. It seems that we are always trying to squeeze in errands and cleaning and projects when Kevin and I are both home together with the kids. I know these things must get done but I really cherish the momments we spend with the girls because they are growing and changing so fast.

In 5 short days our little Madalin will be 1 year old! A whole year has gone by and sometimes I'm not even sure what we did or how we got to where we are right at this very momment. I do know however, that I wouldn't have changed a thing. The plan the Lord has laid out for us this past year was perfectly constructed and I have happily embraced the good, the difficult, and the nearly impossible!

So as the minutes tick by, inching us closer and closer to that joyful day, I know that on November 25th at 4:05pm you will find me snuggled up with my baby girl thanking the Lord for her and smothering her with kisses! Here are some pictures from a recent family outing to the beach. It was a perfect day!!

Somersaults!

Look out Shawn Johnson! We have a little gymnast on our hands! Maddy has been rapidly growing and changing as her first birthday quickly approaches. She is becoming more sturdy on her feet trying to keep up with her sister and her friends. She loves to dance and she and her sister are having so much fun laughing and playing together, it is so sweet and has been some of my most favorite momments lately. Here is a clip of her first gymnastic stunt!

Kids Will Be Kids

Happy Halloween! Or at least what's left of it. What a fun but exhausting day! I am completely ignoring my bodies desire to sleep right now just so I can get this post up!

Today OUR WHOLE FAMILY decided to dress-up for Halloween! It was so much fun to be silly, laugh, and just be a kid {with kids} heeheehee! Caralin really got a kick out of daddy wearing a costume. Kevin was such a good sport, but made sure he wasn't looking too serious by wearing a goofy giant mustache!
He looked GREAT!
We all did... all the way down to Madalin's homemade cow costume! Yes, you heard me... homemade. {But not by choice. Totally last minue when my Craigs List buy didn't pan out}. Good thing I'm crafty!

Anywhoo... we had a great time and even got stopped by tourists in Coronado that wanted to take a picture with us! HAHA! {I wonder if they knew it was Halloween. OR if they just thought we were REAL cowboys}. We'll never know!

YEE HAW!

I'm baaaack!

So I was having some problems with my blog that I think have now been fixed! Yay! Hopefully now I can keep up with posting!
~cross your fingers~

The big news I have to share is that my baby is 11 months old today!!! Wow! I know we've all said this {and heard it} but really... where did the time go? I mean, it feels like it has flown by ~ wait, zoomed by... super-turbo-jet-style! *Yikes*

She is the cutest little toddler I know...
{and I know some CUTE toddlers}!
OK-OK I know I'm her mom so I may be a teensy bit biased... but whatever heehee.

She is walking, no... running, ALL over the place. And she loves her new found freedom. Now she can {try to} keep up with her sister AND she gets to play outside!

She is also starting to comunicate better what she wants {mostly through screeches and squaks} but she is starting to pick up a little bit of the signs we work on.

Now I gotta get rolling on planning her first birthday party! {eeekk}
I LOVE PLANNING PARTIES!

Let the maddness begin...

Mobility!

Madalin is 6 months old! I can't believe how big she is and how fast she is growing. She has been such a joy and blessing to our family and I am so thankful to God for her. Here are a few Maddy stats! ~She weighs in at 16 lbs. 2 ounces and is 25.5 inches long. ~We have started solid food and she really enjoys peas! ~She rolls ALL over. ~She says ba-ba, da-da, and ma-ma. ~She likes to blow zerberts on your cheek. ~She has no teeth yet. ~She looks like her daddy! ~She seems to be right-handed. ~She LOVES kisses! ... and the biggie - she is starting to scoot! MOBILITY is scary. Breakin' out the baby gates. Here is a little video of her first attempts at scooting...very cute!

Earings!!!

My girls are pierced!

Last Saturday the two sisters got their ears pierced together with their sweet little friend Scarlett (Lolo). It was an experience much more traumatic for the mommies than the girls! In fact Caralin didn't even whimper! What a trooper! Caralin has actually had them pierced before (when she was a baby) but she kept pulling them out and when I thought she had swallowed one I decided to take them out. Now she is so excited to have earings and is always checking them out in the mirror. Madalin on the other hand cried, and cried. I felt horrible, so I rushed her to the stroller for some tylenol to ease her pain. She has done well with them so far, but she doesn't like it when I have to clean and twist them. They sure are cute!

Oh the price of beauty!

Funny Girls

Wow... been a while since my last post. I have been busy trying to set up my new shop online and create a website, blog, newsletter...you name it so when I have time to use the computer that is usually what I'm doing. Please pray for me and the success of my new business. I hope I am taking a step in the right direction.

I have several things to post so should be a few more coming this week. I wanted to share with you how much my little girls are growing. Caralin just celebrated her 3rd birthday! I can't believe my baby girl is 3! It went by fast. I will dedicated my next post to her birthday with more pics. She is such a big girl and loves her sister who thinks she is the BEST thing ever! Madalin always has a big smile ready for her big sis. I'll leave you with a pic of these two cute, silly girls.

Visit with the Tsuciyas

Well, we recently had our friends Mark and Julie and their cutie cute kids in town visiting. We had so much fun hanging out with them. We really miss them but it's so nice that they were able to come out to San Diego and visit. It was especially sweet to watch Caralin and Maile playing together. They were best friends instantly. They slept in Caralin's big girl bed together. They would wake up in the morning and get up and play in Caralin's room for a couple hours while we slept. They were so cute and played so well together. Caralin was sad when they had to go home (so were we). Can't wait to see them again.

More to come...

It's been a busy week for the Hastings. We are planning Caralin's birthday party for the end of the month and trying to keep up with all the changes Madalin is throwing our way! We also have the Tsuchiya's coming to visit today! They will be staying with us a couple of days and Kevin and I are so excited to see them. So is Caralin. She keeps asking when her friends are going to be here. So that's it for now. Just a quick update. I'll post some pics of our visit with the Tsuchiya's in my next post. For now here is a little pic of the baby. Enjoy.

Baby Bed Head

Ok... since I (and we all) know how gorgeous my sweet little Madalin is I just had to post this picture of her funky, and funny bed head. What a bad hair day!

BTW: She was so mad at me for snapping this pic... can't you tell!

Happy 3 months Madalin!

Wow the last three months have flown by in the blink of an eye. I can't believe that my little baby girl is already 3 months old, although when I look into her beautiful blue eyes and see how much she is changing, learning and growing I think she's gotta be bigger than that! Here are a few little Madalin facts:

She would rather sit up or stand than chill in her bouncy or swing (uh, oh like her busy mama and sis already). We have just recently put her in the jumper and she loves it. She is a chatter box, especially when she really gets going, it is really cute when she "talks" with her big sister. She has a ton of hair and it looks really cute with a flower in it. She also has the prettiest pouty lips and an amazing smile. Her smile quickly puts life into perspective, and can instantly alter your mood. I've noticed she has several different smiles: a sweet closed mouth grin; a big cheeks, squinty eyes smirk and, my favorite, a wide open mouth in the shape of an oval, like she going to swallow up your face, her cheeks show the twinge in her lips at the corners of her mouth and her eyes get really big. That is the smile I get most often from my happy, content little baby and I LOVE IT! She is still sleeping all night (knock on wood, don't wanna jinks it) from about 9pm to 7am and she takes two good naps during the day. Just like her sister and daddy it takes her awhile to wake up after nap. She snuggles and wiggles and burries her face and sleepy eyes into my shoulder. What a sweet, sweet girl. I love her and can't wait to watch her grow more. Happy Three Months Madalin!

Beach Babes

So Spring feels like it has arrived a little early. We have been fortunate to be able to enjoy the lovely outdoors this week with several days at the beach and a day at the lake to feed the ducks. I knew Caralin loves the beach and now it seems her sister really enjoys it too. I always bring a cozy seat for Madalin to sit in and she loves to watch the waves and the kids play. It is turning out to be our FAVORITE thing to do. Here are some pictures from our first days at the beach in 2010.

PRECIOUS...

...enough said!

SISTERS!

Madalin is two months old now and growing fast. As I check out my new beautiful baby I can't help but notice all the similarities and differences between her and her big sister. Madalin is so far much more quiet and content. She sleeps ALL night, rarely cries, and loves to cuddle. She has darker hair but other than that I think they look alike. While I was browsing through some old pictures of Caralin I found this picture that looks just like Madalin. What do you think?
In case you're wondering who is who... Caralin is on the top and Madalin is on the bottom.

Now Booking Sessions

Caralin is getting so big! She will be three in just a couple months! Her personality, traits, and talents continue to develop everyday. She is AMAZING!

- She loves to dance.
- She is very dramatic.
- She is empathetic of others.
- She loves to read.
- She has a great vocabulary.
- She pays attention to details (she often compliments others)
- She stands with her hands on her hips (like me).
- She's kinda bossy (ok, who am I kidding... very bossy, hopefully just a phase).
- She loves to pretend play.
- She's no good at hide-n-seek ("I'm in here")
- She talks outloud a lot (usually to herself).
- She's very helpful.
- She ADORES her baby sister.

And her new passion - Photography :) Here is her first portfolio (She took all the pics with her new kids digital camera she got for Christmas, except the ones of her that I took). She seems to have a good eye for objects and angles. If you need a photographer, give her a call! Enjoy!

Big Smiles

Milestones!!!! I can't believe I get to experience them all over again! To feel so much excitement, happiness, and pride by the little things in life, like smiles, puts so much into perspective and makes me appreciate all the wonderful gifts God has given me.

Madalin is growing fast! I don't remember things going this fast with Caralin, but here we are 7 and 1/2 weeks later! She has been smiling more and more lately. She can bear weight on her legs and holds her head up really well, even on her tummy. She is such a content baby and has been blessing me with MANY full nights of sleep. She LOVES to sleep! And so do I (I just wish her sister didn't get up at 6am - Ouch!)

It takes two...

Adjusting to life with two children has been mostly a fun journey but not without it's challenges. Here's a funny story of today's challenge.

Madalin was pretty needy today (She didn't take a good nap all day) and was not happy if I had to put her down to do something. To her credit she gave me about 3 minutes before she started wailing. The evening played out like this: run to the bathroom to start Caralin's bath, call Caralin to get her undressed for bath, check the bath water, cue Madalin, Caralin says "sister" and runs to her "aide", turn off bath water, Caralin is jumping on our bed naked, Madalin is lying on our bed wailing, grab Caralin before she jumps on her sister, get her in the bath, pick up Madalin and feed her, Caralin yelling to me she is done with her bath after only 5 minutes, tell Caralin if she gets out of the bath she'll get a time out, finish feeding Madalin, put her in the bouncy seat, run to bathroom to get Caralin washed up, Shampoo in her hair, cue Madalin, quickly rinse Caralin's hair, wash her body, and get her out of the tub, wrap Caralin in a towel, run to living room to pick up Madalin, realize Kevin is going to be home for lunch in 25 minutes, calm Madalin down, start pulling out the ingredients for a pizza, cue Madalin, Caralin climbing on a stool naked in the kitchen to help with dinner, pizza dough has to sit for 20 minutes so feed Madalin AGAIN, Caralin watching TV - naked, put Madalin in the bouncy seat, start making the pizza, cue Madalin, grab the baby sling so I can hold Madalin and have one free hand to cook dinner, Caralin helping = flour all over the counter, pizza in the oven as Kevin walks in on his lunch break, Caralin running around in circles from kitchen to living room... still naked! At least we could laugh about it all. Thankfully Kev helped me get things back in order before he went back to work. Whew... exhausting but hopefully it'll get easier.

New Year - New Adventures

Happy 2010 everyone!

I have decided to try a different, shorter format to updating my blog. No more long posts catching up for weeks or months of not posting. I figure this may help me to have time to post more often.

So, here it goes:

As you all know Madalin Grace was born November 25th and she has fit right it making our transition from a family of 3 to 4 smooth and easy. She is a sweet baby girl and has a great calm temperment. She has been eating and sleeping well and she is growing fast.

Her big sister loves her so much and even now (6+ weeks later) Caralin still gets excied to see her after she wakes up from a nap, like she's been away on vacation or something. Too cute. Here's my girls: