Another Day in Paradise!

Aloha!

We arrived safely in Molokai Thursday after a very looooong day of travel around 5:30pm local time. The girls did okay on the plane rides it was just a very long day trying to keep them occupied and happy in such a confined space. And we found out just prior to boarding that we could not sit together since they don't have enough oxygen masks in one row for all 4 of us... So we were sitting next to strangers on the plane. But needless to say we made it through and we are SO HAPPY to be here!!!

Our first night we arrived we made some mai tais and jumped in the ocean (yes it was dark out but we did not care!) Then we spent Friday resting in lawn chairs, playing with the kids, and getting in and out of the ocean - which is right outside the backdoor - amazing :) The house is absolutely beautiful! Here are some pictures of the backyard - WOW!!


The kids looked like they were in a band :) Pete is the lead singer and the girls are back-up singers and percusion

Me and Sophia playing in the yard
Isabella and James walking on the beach at sunrise
James got stung by a jellyfish in the evening :( He got stung on his arm, chest, hand and face - ouch! But he was fine after a few minutes and even got back in the ocean to play some more.

Christian has been making some amazing dinners - shrimp tacos and hawaiian bbq beef and we have all been doing some exploring of the island. We drove to the Halawa valley yesterday over a scary one-lane windy road through the rainforest, then spent some time watching the boys play in the ocean while Carrie and I hung out on the beach with the babies. We were completely alone at a very beautiful beach with HUGE waterfalls in the valley behind us - so cool! Then we went to the coffee plantation for a hawaiian jam fest (our fathers day suprise for the guys) then drove up to West Molokai and watched the sunset on a beautiful white sand beach - with nobody else around.

Here is everybody watching the show...

The girls were very sleepy at the end of the day but they were very happy sitting on daddys lap while he sang to them - so sweet

The beautiful hawaii sunset - reminds us of our honeymoon in Maui


Today we toured an old sugar mill, walked out to a beautiful view point looking down over the sea cliffs, then checked out the warf and did some snorkeling after the girls went to bed. James saw a sea turtle! Tomorrow morning James and I are going on a mule ride down the sea cliffs to an old leper colony - we are very excited! It looked absolutely unreal looking down from the top today! Probably the most beautiful view I have ever seen. Will post more pictures soon - Aloha!

Whew!

Well, unfortunately the next 2 days of daycare did not go so well and we have spent the last 2 weeks taking care of very sick girls :( They had fevers, runny noses, coughs, crusty eyes and even diarrhea starting after their second day in daycare....needless to say we are done with that! The nanny the girls have had since I first went back to work is going to start an in-home daycare and we are going to send the girls there instead of the wooden shoe. Maybe they just aren't old enough yet to handle one nap a day and that is why they got so sick... I really don't know but we can't make them go back again after seeing them be this sick for so long. The good news is they are FINALLY feeling better today and acting like normal babies. This is a very good thing since we are leaving on Thursday for Molokai!

On a more positive note, we have had a couple of great weekends up in Keystone lately! We went up for James birthday and got a night out without the babies (thanks mimi and papa) so we went to Old Chicago and watched the nuggets lose to the lakers in game 6 :( I made him his favorite banana cream pie for dessert. We also went up for my birthday with Bradley, Jolene, Joseph, Andrew and Mimi and Papa! It was a full house but lots of fun. We are getting better and better at riding bikes and last time I went 18-20 miles with Mimi! Woohoo!! It is just so beautiful up there we are getting addicted to going :) On my actual birthday James ordered take-out Maggianos and had a candle-lit dinner with wine waiting for me when I got home from work - what a guy! There will be more pictures soon, we recently got a new camera and still have to install software to download pictures...

First day of daycare

Well, the girls (and mommy and daddy) survived the first day at daycare today. The girls are going to The Wooden Shoe on Mondays and Wednesdays. Mimi will still watch them a few Fridays a month and James has them the Saturdays I work. It was very hard for us to drop them off this morning :( Sophia got down on the floor with a smile and started playing with the other kids right away, but poor Isabella was not a happy camper. She was crying quite a bit and holding onto my jacket with a super-grip...but the ladies there were so nice and we knew they would take good care of the girls. Talking with the daycare later in the day we found their roles reversed. Sophia had a harder time once she did not get her much needed morning nap. The poor girl usually gets a 9am nap as well as an afternoon nap, but at daycare they only do the afternoon nap so she was exhausted by lunch-time and almost falling asleep at the table, while Isabella adapted to the noise and the kids and had a good day after all. James picked the girls up after work and he said Sophia had an ear to ear grin when she saw him, and Isabella just looked up and then went back to eating her cheez-its :) They were both very happy once he picked them up and they didn't want to let go! When I got home from work of course they were in bed already, but I can't wait to spend time with my babies tomorrow and see if they still seem tired. Let's hope this whole daycare transition goes smooth for them.

Isabella is crawling!

Finally we have movement from our little Isabella. She has been up on all fours rocking and scooting backwards for awhile now, but her first forward movement was yesterday, and her first official crawl accross the room was today! Hooray for Isabella - we are so proud of her! She skipped the army crawl entirely and is doing the real deal :)

Reporting live from keystone

We are so happy we made it up to Keystone for memorial weekend. It is so beautiful up here - almost unreal! We left yesterday after I got off work and got up here around 8pm last night. James was a super-dad yesterday, he dropped me off at work, spent some time visiting with his family then got the girls home for a nap, installed one bike rack only to realize it didn't work right, un-installed it, returned it to Sports Authority then bought and installed a new one, fed the girls lunch and dinner, packed up everything for the trip (he even planned all the meals)and was able to pick me up from work so we could leave at 6! What a guy!! So here we are, babies, bikes, dog and all having a great time in the mountains. This morning we got up early and took the girls on a 6 mile bike ride almost to lake dillon. It was so much fun but now my legs are like jello and I can't move from the couch :) Here are some pictures from the bike trail...

Chili goes with us - she rides on the girls lap - you can see her in this picture:

This is the snake river that runs right behind the condo - the bike trail follows this river for miles and miles...
So beautiful! We could see all of the snow-capped mountains in the distance!

The trail goes through the keystone Elk Ridge golf course

Earlier this week we had a few days where it got above 90! The girls got dressed up in their sundresses and played outside a lot (they love to be outside, but they still hate grass!?!)

Isabella resting her head on the patio

Sophia figured out the sliding screen door and that's all she wants to do these days :)

The girls eating bbq chicken and watermelon - yum!

Schwinn Twins!

Since our plan is to become mountain bikers this summer we had to get a carrier to bring the girls with us... it is really handy and easy to use, and James said it wasn't hard to pull them behind him. Here they are getting strapped in for the first bike ride:

The little windows on the side are so cute I was laughing the whole ride. All I could see from behind was 2 little head bopping up and down and from the side they would smile at me and wave! It was just the cutest thing! At one point James went flying around a corner and Sophia ended up on Isabella's lap and they were both laughing and waving at me as they went by :) We are going to have lots fun this summer riding bikes with them...

We are just trying to figure out what kind of bike rack to put on the jeep... The ones that go on the roof are much cheaper but James and I are worried we will forget the bikes are up there when we get home and drive into the garage with the bikes on top still ;) Trust me, this is a likely outcome! So we will probably end up getting a trailer hitch hooked onto the jeep and buying a bike rack that sticks out the back. We really want to be able to ride bikes here and in keystone so we will have to figure something out...

On a side note, Matt and Fernando (our carpenters) are making great progress on the pergola finally after several setbacks. We had weather delays, several holiday weekends, and last week Fernando fell off the ladder and broke his thumb. We are starting to call it the bad-luck pergola but finally they are going to be able to get some work done this week. It is going to look so nice when it is done we can't wait! The red wood looks so much better than the white did...

Random pictures and an update

As of last week the girls are officially done with their bottles. All of a sudden they quit drinking them! They were drinking 3 bottles every day along with eating breakfast, lunch and dinner but one day they didn't want the bottle anymore so we stopped. It was sad for me, packing up their bottles knowing that I won't ever be holding my babies to give them a bottle again :( They seem to be adjusting well though - drinking lots of milk out of their sippy cups with meals.

We took Sophia to the Dr. this week thinking she had an ear infection since she just hasn't been herself lately. Well, he noticed that she has at least 2 (maybe 3) molars coming in! So she has been in pain obviously and we have had a hard time with her the last week or so. Here's hoping those teeth hurry up and finish coming in so we can all get some rest... Isabella also got her first molar a few weeks ago! She seems to be very proud of her teeth - she likes to smile big to show them off.

Off to the races! The girls were racing across the patio on Saturday - Isabella won this round!

James hooked up their new swing and they had a blast playing in it this weekend. We thought we might need two swings for them, but whoever is not in the swing thinks it's pretty funny just watching the other one swing back and forth, so one swing has been plenty of entertainment for both of them so far!

We took the girls to Target to get some stuff for the trip to Molokai... We couldn't resist taking a picture of Sophia trying on the life jacket - it was so cute how big and puffy it was, it pushed her cheeks up and she looked squished!

Here is a good picture of the girls playing with their kitchen - they literally fight over who gets to stand in front of the sink! Let's hope they are still as anxious to help with dishes when they get older :)

New toys

The girls are loving all of the new toys they got for their birthday! Their favorites are the ride-on horse and the play kitchen...They must watch mommy doing dishes all day because they stand at the play sink forever washing dishes just like I do! Isabella LOVES to ride the horse all over the place, and if sister gets in her way she better watch out! Isabella will try to run her over, push her out of the way, or as you can see here even pull her hair! Yikes! Watch out Sophie - Isabella is a maniac on that thing :)

They love the outside baby gym we got them, it came with balls and lots of squeaky things so they can be safe, outside, and have fun playing all at the same time! So nice for mommy to have a safe place to keep them outside where they aren't in harms way, with all of the construction we have nails and power tools everywhere...
Sophia loves to put this little plastic circle that came with the play kitchen on her nose and crawl all over the place with it! She looks so goofy and gets lots of laughs so she will crawl up and show everyone what she has on her nose :)

The girls have made it through their first year without watching any TV! It was important to us that they weren't exposed to television for the first 12 months, but now that we have a long plane trip in our future (to molokai in June) we figured we better get them used to watching a little bit so they can watch on the plane. Well, here they are watching their first baby einstein video - it kept their attention for a total of maybe 5 minutes so our plan of occupying them with tv is out the window!

First Birthday Party

The girls had their first birthday party on Sunday and they had a great time seeing all of their friends and family to celebrate their big milestone! Here are some pictures from their big day, okay LOTS of pictures - enjoy!

Mimi and I worked very hard on Saturday to make these cakes for the girls big day :) The top one is coconut cream and the flip flops are cherry chip. They turned out to be delicious and well worth the effort!

The birthday girl Isabella woke up so happy the day of her party!
The birthday girl Sophia getting dressed up before the party - she loves her party dress!
Well, we sat down and tried to take a family picture before everyone got there - this is the best we could do - the girls were very fidgety and we didn't have much time :)

Our little dolls... The girls were so cute with their flip flop cakes - they like to hold hands when they are eating

Sophia playing with her cake (the flip flop strap was a fruit roll up)

Isabella was covered in cake from head to toe - it was even pressed into her hair in the back!

Everybody had fun watching the girls get messy!

Good thing they don't get scared with lots of people watching them, there was quite a crowd!

Sophia getting ready for clean-up

Isabella was being such a goof

We all look so serious! Cleaning up babies covered in frosting is serious business

Little Andrew and Leland finally meet - they had the same due date! They are both so adorable
Kassie, Brian and Addison - she is so cute!
Some of the guys checking out our construction zone/ patio

Terri, Radik, Riley and me

The girls "opening" presents

Watching the girls play with their presents
This is our family room post-party once most of the toys were put together - and this doesn't even include the giant stack of cute summer clothes - wow! Thanks everybody!!

One year ago today....

We had NO IDEA how much our life was going to change after having the girls!

The morning they were born was an exciting but scary time for us, we were worried about the girls being so early, and just praying they would be okay. After months of bedrest and hospitals and worry we were ready to just be done with the pregnancy, and hoping that I would get better after delivering the girls... Needless to say all of our fears dissolved immediately and we were completely blown away by how beautiful and amazing it was to meet the girls for the first time! We both fell head over heels in love with them!

Sophia Marie Sandoval was born first at 8:05am (she was 4lbs 13oz and 18 inches) and Isabella Lynn Sandoval followed immediately after at 8:06am (she was 4lbs 8oz and 17.5 inches) Even though Sophia was born first, I got to see and hold Isabella first. I will never ever forget looking at her beautiful little face and trying to comprehend that this precious baby was ours!

I got to meet Sophia just after Isabella, and though they didn't let us hold her because she needed some oxygen, we were able to snuggle right with her next to our faces for a few minutes and just take in her absolutely adorable features. She was just so beautiful! I didn't want to ever let her go.
Looking back at these pictures I can see they still make these same faces - hard to believe that they have had some of their facial expressions probably since before they were even born! This next picture was taken by my dad - it was the first time the rest of our family got to meet the girls in the hallway outside of the OR. James got to go with them to the nicu and be with them for their first bath, feed them, and then was able to show them off to all of our family... This is a picture of little Sophia after her first bath, all cleaned up and so adorable. It was amazing how much she looked like me (and her papa!) right from the start!
Isabella was referred to as "the baby with the hair" by all of the nurses on the floor! They were all coming in to see her and her wild hair! She looked so much like James already :)

After they took the girls to the nicu it was very lonely for me. I missed having them inside of me. What a difficult feeling to describe... since I had been carrying both of them around with me 24/7 for almost 9 months and then all of a sudden they were gone and sitting in a room across the hospital without me - it was so hard, I just wanted to be with my babies. Thankfully I was able to see them later that night, and then quite often the following days. The nicu days flew by quickly and we were soon home to start our life together as a new family.... and here we are ONE YEAR later! Hard to believe!

Happy Birthday my beautiful baby girls! You have made our lives complete and brought us more happiness than we could have ever imagined possible... We love you!!