October 2014

Wow October seemed to fly by...where did the time go!  It was a fun and busy month.  We had some cooler weather so we enjoyed spending time outside.  We've gone to several parks, taken lots of walks, and made a trip to the zoo.  Speaking of the zoo, the last time we were there, we got to feed a flamingo.  SUPER COOL!!  They nibbled bird seed out of our hands which tickled, and we could feel how soft their neck was because it brushed against us.

My mom and I also took the girls to a small church pumpkin patch.  It happened to be HOT this day which is the reason for the sleeveless summery dresses.  LOL!  The girls were fairly cooperative to take pictures, and had fun looking at the scarecrows and picking a pumpkin.



My MOPS group also took a trip to a different pumpkin patch in McKinney.  It was just the right size for preschoolers and both girls had fun.  Hannah even surprised me by getting her face painted.  =)





This post would not be complete without Halloween costume pictures.  I love the idea and look of homemade costumes so I began searching for ideas back in August.  I knew if I let the girls pick the would join the masses of Anna's and Elsa's.  =)  I finally settled on Minnie Mouse for the girls and me and told Nathan he was going to be Mickey (poor guy never gets a choice either).  I ordered 8 spools of red tulle and my mom and I got to work making 3 tutus.  You'll be glad to know that we found our way out from underneath all of that tulle and the costumes turned our REALLY cute!



Lots of fun at our church's Fall Festival this year, but no good pictures. We didn't find time for my mom to take pictures of the whole family this year. So Nathan created a make shift tripod and we tried to snap a few Friday night before heading out to trick-or-treat.  We went to a few more houses this year than in the past and Hannah was actually tall enough to reach the doorbell.

Anniversary Trip to Austin

This blog mostly focuses on the girls and parenting for many reasons:
1) it is my digital scrapbook
2) I can update non local family on our lives
3) my girls are my life

While this particular post will mention the girls, the real focus is Nathan and me.  We celebrated our 10 year anniversary in July.  Some days it feels like way longer and others it can't possibly have been that long. =) We love doing family activities so we don't plan a lot of couple only things.  We try to at least have dinner alone 1-2 times a year and our ABF (Sunday School) class sometimes does fun social things that do not involve kids.  Nathan and I decided that 10 years definitely deserved a special celebration!  We did our usual dinner date in July but waited until September when it wasn't 1000 degrees to get away.  Our last big vacation was to Atlanta the summer of 2009 when I was pregnant with Hannah.

We wanted to go somewhere we had never been, but wasn't too far away.  Since we only had Friday - Sunday we didn't want to spend the whole time driving.  Also if there was some type of emergency with the girls we wanted to be able to get home quickly.  We (really I) did lots of internet searching and decided on Austin.

My parents have wanted the girls to spend the night for quite a while and we just hadn't planned anything. They kept Hannah when I was in the hospital giving birth to Abigail, but that's it.   Happy to report that everyone not only survived but also had fun!  There were a few tears and some fits by Abigail (aka Miss Strong Willed) but all in all they were really good.  We don't watch much TV or movies so those are a special treat.  They girls LOVED watching Mary Poppins throughout the course of the weekend.  In fact they have not stopped talking about it and spend lots of time pretending to be various characters.  They also baked cookies, went on walks, played at the school playground, painted, and of course read books and played with toys.  We are SO VERY grateful that my parents were willing to watch the girls for us.  They had so much fun and I know they created many special memories.

Nathan and I had a great trip!  We got to spend lots of time talking and not being interrupted (the downfall of 2 VERY verbal girls).  We checked out lots of small historical museums, toured the capitol, visited the zoo, and ate lots of yummy food!  We walked A TON so we didn't feel guilty going out for dessert in addition to dinner each night.  We ate dinner early and shared our entree so as not to completely stuff ourselves.  =)

Here's a few photos of our trip

We found this amazing mural while walking around downtown.  I can't imagine how many hours this took to create!
 

Loved all the free range peacocks and pea hens roaming the zoo.

Learned some interesting history from our tour guide.
 
Checked out the bats


All in all a great weekend!  We'll have to plan another get away in the future!

September 2014

Fall is in full swing...even if it is still hot outside.  Although we have had some cooler mornings lately and our highs haven't been 100.  I was more referring to all our activities kicking off again.  =)  Preschool choir and Bible Study have started and I decided to join MOPS (Mothers Of PreSchoolers) this year.  I am also teaching a Tiny Tots, mommy and me music class, this semester.  We are busy, but my girls are enjoying having lots to do and ask every day where we are going.

At the beginning of the month my mom told me we didn't have a "cover worthy" photo of Abigail yet for her photo memory book this year.  So on Labor Day was took Abigail by herself with THREE adults to do a mini photo session while Hannah played with G-Pa.  Abigail has very strong opinions about things and can be difficult to photograph.  We told her if she cooperated she could pick out a sticker.  She was SO VERY good and we got some ADORABLE photos.  Here's just a few of my favs.







Took a break from photos to look at the turtles swimming in the water.  Love this sweet Daddy moment!


On days we are at home I am trying to be more intentional and engaged in playing with the girls.  They are getting so good at playing together it's easy to just let them play while I work on the computer or around the house.  I still do that, but my goal is two or three days a week for about 30 minutes to work and/or play with them.  I started about a month ago and it's going really well so far.  There are TONS of cute crafts, learning games, etc. out there on the internet.  I spent time over the summer gathering info, planning, and preparing stuff.  Some weeks we focus on a specific letter, other times it's fine motor practice, sorting beads, counting pom poms or domino dots.  I'm having fun and so are the girls!!  They both love to learn and so I figure it might as well capitalize on that.  =)

One final photo...Hannah was enjoying looking out my parent's kitchen window and asked my mom to take her picture with her kitty.