Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas everyone! We hope everyone had a happy and safe Christmas. Christmas Eve we took the girls to church and then went to Nana Bev's house for dinner. We had a good dinner and had a lot of fun with everyone. All of the kids seemed to have a really good time and were excited with all of their presents. It blows my mind that only 4 years ago there were no kids around for the holidays and now there are 4! This year I decided to try a couple of old fashioned desserts - Figgy Pudding, Sugarplums and Mincemeat pie. They were all good except for the Figgy Pudding which was a little too heavy on molasses for my taste. When we got home, Caitlin put out reindeer food in the front yard so that Santa's reindeer would have something to eat and because it had sparkles in it, it would make it easier for Santa to see the house. :-) (The food was dry oatmeal and glitter provided by Nana Bev)

Christmas morning was a lot of fun. Caitlin had a great time opening her presents and Emma seemed to enjoy seeing everything and trying to open some of her presents. :) The girls did pretty good. Caitlin seemed a little upset that Santa didn't bring anything for me and Toni though so next year we may have to change our tradition a little. This year we bought the new TV so we didn't do too much for each other. I got Toni a pearl necklace from the girls and she got me a couple of shirts. :-) I can definitely say that Christmas with kids is a lot more fun that when it was just Toni and I. :-)

This week should be nice, I'm off work all week and will probably be fairly busy running errands, cleaning and doing car maintenance. This has been a good year for the Vargas Family and I hope 2012 is even better. We hope everyone has a happy and safe New Years!

It's almost Christmas!

I can't believe we're already less than a week from Christmas! The girls are both doing great and I'm convinced that Emma's gonna walk on her own at any minute. She loves walking holding our hands so I think she's close to taking off on her own. Last week we had the girls out of school for the week. I stayed home 2 days and Toni stayed home the rest with them. I think they really enjoyed the quality time. This weekend we took them to an indoor playground with Maddie and Ryan and they seemed like they had a lot of fun. This week should be pretty busy with Christmas. Tomorrow morning we have a dentist appointment which we'll probably take Caitlin to and then we'll schedule her for her own checkup soon. I think Christmas is going to be a lot of fun this year and Caitlin is going to enjoy opening all of the gifts including Emma's! I'm going to keep this post short this week but we want to wish everyone a Merry Christmas!

Happy Birthday Emma!

Yesterday was a big day in the Vargas house. We celebrated Emma's first birthday! We had a small party here at the house which was nice. The theme for her party was Tinkerbell and Toni did a great job with the decorations. Everyone had a great time and Caitlin especially liked helping Emma open her presents. :) I really can't believe that a year has already passed. Emma seems like she's getting bigger every day and is learning so fast. She now enjoys turning off the lights when we leave a room and is doing it pretty much all the time. :) At school on Friday they also had a small party for Emma in her class. Judging by the pictures, she looks like she really enjoyed that one as well.

The other big news this week was that on Thursday night Toni went to her office Christmas party and won an iPad 2! Needless to say, she was pretty excited!

I know I've written this several times before but I seriously can't believe how fast time is going. It's strange but at times it seems like Emma was just born a couple of months ago and at other times, it seems like she's been with us for such a long time. It's been amazing watching both of the girls grow up and I am so thankful for this blog. It's been great for looking back on the last few years.

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas!

This week was fairly busy for us. The weather has started turning colder and today we took the kids to see Santa! Caitlin told us while we were waiting in line that this year she wasn't going to cry because Santa was her best friend. That thought lasted until about the time Santa called us over for pictures. Caitlin pretty much used Toni like a lead blocker and tried as hard as she could to keep Toni between her and Santa. For a minute, Caitlin wouldn't let go of Toni at all and I seriously thought we were going to end up with just a picture of Emma and Santa! We were able to get a picture of both girls with Santa and as you can see, we had quite an adventure! Emma had mixed feelings about her first visit with Santa. At first she was crying but after a minute or so she seemed to be having fun.

Last week was pretty busy. We cashed in on a great Cyber Monday deal and got a new 60 inch LED tv! We got a great price and the picture quality is amazing! It's litterally only an inch thick and we're waiting on our wall mount to show up so we can hang it on the wall. The first movie we watched on it was "The Smurfs" which we all surprisingly enjoyed. Caitlin is now into the smurfs and her favorite character is "girl Smurf". Also this week we went and got our Christmas tree. We decorated most of it tonight and I'll post pics next week when it's finished. Yesterday I spent the day doing crown molding at a friends house and it came out great!

This week should be busy. I'm on call and then on Saturday we're having Emma's first birthday party! I seriously can't believe a year has gone by already! It should be a very busy week. Hope everyone has a good one!

Happy Thanksgiving!

Happy Thanksgiving everyone! We hope everyone had a happy and safe holiday. We had a short week. We took Wednesday off and went to a Thanksgiving lunch at the school for the girls. We had a good time and then hit the road for Brownsville. The ride down was pretty rough. Emma did not like being in the car for very long so our normal 4.5 hour drive turned into a 5.5 hour drive. We had a nice visit with everyone and the girls seemed to enjoy themselves. Caitlin had fun playing with all of the kids and was especially interested in all of the different pets that people had. She enjoyed playing with several cats and dogs. :-) Thanksgiving was nice and on Friday Toni got up early and went to Burlington Coat Factory and got Emma a new car seat for my car at a nearly 50% savings which was awesome. I surfed the web looking for deals but didn't find too much. Overall we had a good trip and I think the girls enjoyed themselves. Caitlin didn't want to leave Papa's house and was very upset when we left. We ended up coming back on Saturday to avoid all of the holiday traffic.

Today we spent the day decorating for Christmas. We'll probably go buy our tree one night during the week. The only other news to report is that Caitlin is becoming quite the photographer. We gave her Toni's old digital camera and she loves running around the house taking pictures. While we certainly get our fair share of pictures of the floor or her hand covering the lens, she's actually taken some pretty good ones. The picture of Emma is actually one that she took!

This week should be pretty busy. We need to go get our tree and then I have some prep work to do for a crown molding job on Saturday. Sunday we're hoping to take the girls to have their pictures taken with Santa. Hope everyone has a great week!

Early Thanksgiving

This week went pretty smooth. This weekend we had an early Thanksgiving dinner here with my family which was nice. Emma is doing great with eating and is enjoying trying new foods. She especially likes graham crackers which seem to be her favorite. :-) She's also started standing up on her own without holding onto anything! She's able to stand by herself pretty well but still hasn't taken that first step. I think it'll be any day now though. Caitlin is also doing good. As you can see in the picture, she's practicing putting on makeup. This weekend at church she also enjoyed riding on the toy horse.

This week should be pretty quick. We're off on Wednesday and are heading to Brownsville to spend Thanksgiving with her family. I'm going to keep this post short this week but we want to wish everyone a Happy Thanksgiving!

Slow week

This week there wasn't much to report for a change which was nice. :) The girls are both doing great! Caitlin is starting to get excited about Santa coming next month and Emma seems like she's going to start walking any day now. Last night we went to church with a friend of mine from work and then went out for pizza. We had a good time getting out of the house. Today Toni went and got her spa treatment done. I had bought it for her several months ago on Groupon. She said it was relaxing and really enjoyed it. The only other news this week is that we've started looking at mini-vans for Toni. I don't know when we'll get one but we've started looking to see what's out there. With both of the girls, it's become pretty apparent that a mini-van would definitely make things easier. Hopefully this next week is as slow as this week was. I'll be on call and usually my on call weeks are pretty rough. Hopefully this one will be nice and quiet. :-)

"Don't I look pretty?"

This was a mixed week for us. On Monday morning (Halloween) I woke up very sick and ended up staying home from work. I spent the entire day sleeping and by the time Toni and the girls got home, I wasn't feeling much better. Nana Bev, Aunt Sarah, Uncle Dan and cousins Maddie and Ryan came over to go trick or treating. We had a good time and Caitlin and Maddie seemed to really enjoy themselves. I didn't last long walking around and unfortunately could only walk a couple of streets before I was worn out. Caitlin was extremely proud of all her candy she was able to get and I think she had fun having so many people join us. Besides being sick, it was a good time.

Caitlin has started wanting to wear makeup already. As you can see in her first picture she's applying it herself already. :-) She was very proud of herself and came running over to me saying, "Look at me Daddy! Don't I look pretty?" Emma's doing great too, she's starting standing on her own for several seconds without holding onto anything. She's doing really good and I think she's going to start walking on her own very soon.

This weekend we stayed around the house for the most part. Toni has been sewing and is making a tree skirt for our Christmas tree this year and spent the day working with my mom on a dress for Caitlin. It's coming out really nice and once it's done I'll put some pics when she's done. Hope everyone has a great week!

Happy 40th birthday Toni!!!!!!!!

Happy 40th birthday Toni!

This was a big week for the Vargas family. This weekend Toni hit a major milestone in her life by celebrating her 40th birthday! To celebrate we took Friday off work and started the day with Toni throwing out her back moving a box of clothes while looking for a jacket for Emma. :-( That night we went out to a club/bar called Cabo's for some drinks and dancing (for Toni at least). Toni's back was still hurting her but the margarita's seemed to help take the edge off. :-) We had a good time and it was a nice celebration. Then to continue the celebration, we had dinner with family last night at Toni's favorite place - Shogun. Me and the girls got her a new sewing machine and a bunch of supplies for it. She's really enjoying sewing and hopefully it'll provide her with many years of enjoyment.

Yesterday we started the day early with Toni going to the doctor for her back and it looks like she pulled it pretty bad. The Doctor did some stretching and put her back into alignment and that seemed to help her with the pain. In the afternoon we went to the kid's school for the Halloween Fall Festival. The girls had a lot of fun dressing up in their Halloween outfits. Caitlin was Rapunzel and Emma was Tinkerbell. Caitlin had a lot of fun doing crafts, she made a Jack-O-Lantern from paper cut outs and enjoyed playing with the playdough making a castle. Emma had fun in the room that they could decorate cupcakes and then spent a lot of time walking around pushing a chair for balance! She's doing great with her walking and I think it won't be long before she lets go completely and starts walking on her own. She's also doing great holding her bottle and drinking by herself! The only other news to report is that she's starting to try table foods. She enjoyed some of the rice at Shogun last night and really enjoys Honey Nut Cheerios. She's got another 3 teeth about to come out to add to the 5 that are currently out. The girls school pictures came out this week and they came out great! The pictures I've posted are pictures that I took with my phone so they're not really indicative of the quality.

Looking back, it's hard to believe sometimes how fast time has gone by. When Toni and I met, she had just turned 29! I look at the life we've created and am thankful for everything we have. Happy birthday Honey, I hope we have at least another 40 together! :-)

So much to report!

This was a busy and extremely eventful week! The week started out on a bad note. I started the week sick and didn't really get to feeling back to myself until the last couple of days. I ended up coming home early on Monday and staying home sick on Tuesday. On Wednesday night around 12:30am, Caitlin came running into our room and started throwing up. :-( After she was done, she seemed in good spirits and wanted to drink a little water and went back to bed. Within half an hour, she was back in our room throwing up again. We decided to keep her in our room and about every 20-30 minutes she would wake up and start throwing up small amounts. We were up the rest of the night with her and by the time I went to work, she still wasn't doing better. Toni was taking Emma to the Doctor to get her flu shot and took Caitlin in as well. Luckily the Doctor was able to fit her in and the diagnosis was a stomach virus. Caitlin was finally able to keep some liquid down and pee so we let her try to get some rest the rest of the day. The next day (Friday) I stayed home with her. She still didn't have an appetite and didn't want to drink too much but by the end of the day was back to her old self. She was so cute telling me about her Doctor appointment. She kept telling me that the Doctor pushed on her stomach and patted the bottoms of her feet. Watching her act out the visit was cute. Thankfully she seems to be back to 100% now.

Emma kept us pretty busy throughout the week as well. This week saw a lot of "firsts" for her. She has started waving which is cute because she does it whenever she sees anyone now. As we were walking toward the pumpkin patch she was waving hello to everyone. :-) She also started nodding her head to say yes now which is cool. I asked her if she wanted a bottle and she kept nodding her head yes! The biggest thing she started doing though is holding her bottle by herself! We got some handles for her bottle and she'll now hold it all by herself while she's eating. She's growing up so fast!

This weekend we didn't do too much. We did take the girls to the Pumpkin patch which was fun. Caitlin didn't seem too interested in it because she had gone with her school on Tuesday for a field trip. Toni had taken the day off to go with her and said that she had fun. We also went to church on Saturday night and Caitlin had fun coloring pictures and was very proud of her binoculars that she made out of toilet paper rolls. :-)

This week we also saw my Playstation 3 die. I'm pretty bummed out because I use it all the time as our blu-ray player and to watch Netflix on so hopefully there will be some good sales during the holidays and I'll be able to replace it. This week I also bought Toni's birthday present for her which she has already opened and started using! I got her a really nice sewing machine that also does embroidery. She's been enjoying sewing with my mom's old machine and I think she'll get a lot of use out of it. She spent the afternoon with my mom sewing a dress for Caitlin. I'll post pics of it once she's done.

This is going to be a big week for us. On Saturday, Toni will celebrate her 40th birthday! We're taking Friday off and Toni wants to go to a club to celebrate! Hope everyone has a great week!

10 months!

This was a BUSY week for us. Monday marked Emma's 10 month birthday and to mark the occasion, I had to leave work early because Emma's fever that she had been fighting since the weekend re-appeared. I took her home and then took her to the Doctor. The Doctor couldn't find anything wrong and gave us the option to give Emma a catheter to do a urine collection so she could check for a urinary tract infection. I quickly turned down this option because her fever wasn't constant and she was in good spirits. The Doctor agreed and said to continue monitoring her and if the fever was still around on Thursday or if her fever hit 104, we'd have to look at doing it. I didn't want her to go through a catheter and figured that if it came down to it, I'd figure another way to get a urine sample for the Doctor if she needed it. I stayed home with her again on Tuesday because her fever was hovering around 101-102. By Wednesday everything seemed to have cleared up until the end of the day and hasn't been back since. I think she just had a virus or was teething.

Caitlin this week has insisted that we call her "She-Hulk". Besides the Hulk cartoon, she also enjoys an old cartoon from the 1990's called "Reboot", which she pronounces "Ree-dee-boot" :-) It's amazing how fast she learns, she can now even say the days of the week in Spanish! It's cute to listen to her run around the house saying them.

Friday I had my followup appointment with the Urologist and everything looks good! There was no more microscopic blood in my urine and they're writing off the incident as a small kidney stone! :-) It's such a relief to be able to put this whole thing behind me! I've been on call all week which hasn't been any fun at all. Of the 6 nights I've been on call so far, I've been woken up after midnight on 5 of them... Thankfully tomorrow I'll be turning over on call duty. :-)

This week should be nice. Toni has a couple of days off and is going on a class field trip to the pumpkin patch with Caitlin on Tuesday. Then we're going again next weekend to get our pumpkin. Thursday she's taking another vacation day to take Emma to another Doctor appointment. Hopefully she'll be able to relax a little and enjoy her time off. Hope everyone has a great week!

Trying to walk!

This week went by pretty fast. The biggest news was that Emma started trying to walk with support of a walker this week. She didn't do it for very long but she made it a few feet by herself. I don't think it'll be much longer before she's walking. She's growing so fast and now has 2 top teeth out and 3 coming out on the bottom! She's been fighting a fever this weekend which seems like it's cleared up now. We've been keeping cool wash cloths on her head and giving her Tylenol. If she's has a fever in the morning, we'll call and schedule an appointment with the Doctor.

Caitlin is doing good too. She's found a new favorite food - bowtie pasta which she calls "Butterflies". The girls had pictures taken at school this week and we should get to see how they came out very soon.

This week should be busy. Friday I'm off work. I have my followup with the Urologist which I'm a little nervous about but I'm hoping it goes well and I can put this whole incident behind me. I'll also be running errands and we're having DirecTV installed Friday afternoon. Hopefully if the weather and my on-call cooperates, we'll take the girls to the pumpkin patch next weekend. Hope everyone has a great week!

Happy birthday Star!

This was a pretty busy week for us. We'd like to wish Caitlin and Emma's Cousin Star a Happy 15th birthday! This weekend we went to Corpus Christi for Star's quinceanera. We all had a good time and the girls seemed to enjoy the party. Caitlin had a lot of fun dancing and by the end of the night, both girls were fast asleep! Caitlin was extremely sociable this week as you can see by the pictures. She sat and read a book with another kid and his mom at Barnes and Noble and then started talking to another man about his dog. She definitely seems like she's coming out of her shell! Emma had another good week. She's such a happy baby! She now definitely knows her name and whenever we say it, she'll look at us. She's also doing good walking with help and I think it won't be long before she tries to take a couple of steps on her own. I'm going to keep this post short today. Hope everyone has a great week!