Arden took three or four steps today, more than once. Usually it was from her daddy to her grandpa, amid hoots and hollers and a lot of clapping and telling her how awesome she was. Anything we can do to encourage her to “put her landing gear down”, as Judi says, we do. The clapping seemed to help and she went back and forth between the two a number of times. She has taken a few steps before with no help, but infrequently and for very short distances. We hope this is the beginning of some new developments for Arden because Mike and I really need a break from carrying her around with us everywhere. My right arm is twice as strong as my left.

We had a nice and active weekend. Saturday Grammy and I took Lily to see Curious George. She liked it, but wasn’t feeling 100% since waking Mike and I up at 3 AM because she had barfed all over herself and her bed. She had some nice diarrhea to go with it but rebounded quickly. Mike and I went out with the Yeagers and the Bereikas on Saturday night. I’d never been to a Cheesecake Factory before, and it was really tasty. Of course I was extremely hungry and buzzed by the time we actually got our food, but I don’t think that made much of a difference. We braved the “snowstorm” Richmond received and went out to dinner despite all the hype and the clearing of Ukrops shelves for bread and milk. A number of people were out besides us as we still had to wait for an hour to get a table. The boys all told ridiculous college stories and the girls laughed and drank. It was a really nice break for us - and I think I can say for the rest of them. All of us have been working hard, and needed a night out, especially Tim and Sara.

Today the girls played inside and looked at the snow and after naptime we went to Grammy and Grampa’s for a change of scenery. Steve and Katie met us out for dinner and Arden enjoyed piercing the entire restaurant’s eardrums.

I’ve got some new pictures of Arden and Lily to post from the weekend, but I don’t feel like going downstairs to do it, so you can look forward to that later on in the week. In the meantime Mike and I are busying cheering for Shaun White during the Olympics.

This morning, while getting Lily dressed, Delilah trotted into her room. Her normal routine is to sit in front of us while we dress and breathe on us, apparently in an attempt to make us all vomit first thing in the morning.

Lily’s “little” potty is in her room in case she gets the urge to go in the middle of the night or during naptime. I’m sure you can see where this is going but I’m going to spell it out for you anyway. Lily had just gone to the bathroom, and Delilah, being thirsty, decided to help herself out by slurping out of Lily’s potty. Overheard from the master bedroom by Mike: “DELILAH! STOP DRINKING LILY’S PEE!!!” followed by a crash as I whipped the hairbrush (I was brushing Lily’s hair) in Delilah’s general direction . . . I missed. Delilah went slinking out of the room and has been sulking in her bed ever since. I’m still seriously nauseated from the episode.

However, our Open House is today and I’ve got to hit the road.

Sunday morning, Lily had an accident in her bed . . . so I spent some time stripping, scrubbing, washing and remaking it. We talked again last night about getting out of bed and using the potty if she has to go during the middle of the night. Lately, she’s had accidents about once every week to week and a half - and they seemed to be getting longer and longer between accidents. However, this morning she greeted me with wet pants again and was crying. 6.38 AM and all I hear is, “Mommy, my butt is cold!” No wonder - it was soaking wet.

So it’s been two mornings in a row. Mike’s first thought was to put her back in a Pull-Up (which, I might add, will traumatize her - she loathes diapers now and wants nothing to do with them). I have no suggestions. I think that she is actually peeing in her sleep. She sleeps very heavily and I know she’s not doing it on purpose. If she were awake, she’d get out of bed and go - she has done that many times. This leads me to believe that it’s unconscious. I’m getting a bit tired of constantly cleaning her bed, so if any of you have brilliant suggestions on how to stop this trend, I’d appreciate it.

Grammy and Grampa brought this for Arden today, thinking it would be a lot of fun to see how she did with it. She made a huge mess but loved it. Currently she is coated from head to toe with sucker goo, but it was still pretty cute. Here are some shots of her attempting to attack the sucker.

I heard some odd bumping and giggling today while Lily was supposed to be “napping”. I opened the door and was greeted by Lily in full napping regalia, including rain boots, a butterfly sceptre, high heeled princess shoes complete with fake fur, frog backpack and napper. It was quite unusual to say the least. I tried to be stern because we had talked before nap about how she needed to lie down and be quiet, and rest, so that she wasn’t super-crabby this afternoon. I managed to keep a straight face for all of 30 seconds and then I burst out laughing. She laughed, too. So much for nap today. I don’t know where she got her bizarre fashion sense - I think it’s from her father. Or from me when I was in high school.

Oh yeah, Happy Superbowl, everyone. I hate football but the food is always good . . .