Chuck E. Cheese...

The same day we went to see Santa the girls were invited to a birthday party at Chuck E. Cheese.  To say that they were fired up about the party is an understatement.

Because I am a huge germ-o-phob, the girls have never been to Chuck E. Cheese before.  They have seen commercials on tv so they kind of knew what to expect.  I'm also convinced that Chuck E. Cheese is Satan himself, but that is another story.  And yes, they were bathed in purell the moment we got into the car and went pretty much from the car into the bathtub when we got home.

The girls had a blast.  Trying to get them to hold still long enough for photos was not an easy task.  Here are a few of the best ones.

Santa....

This past Saturday we had breakfast with Santa.  The girls were in love and had a great time!

I'm not sure who is loving Christmas more this year...Me or the kiddos?  They are at the perfect age where everything is so exciting.  Watching them experience the magic of the holidays melts my heart a million times over!  I really do wish I could bottle their innocence!

As we were driving to meet Santa I was prepping the kiddos as to what we were going to do.  Alexis has been a little skeptical and I wasn't sure about her.  I explained to the girls we were going to go have pancakes with Santa.  Alexis looks at me and says "Mommy does it take a long time to drive to the North Pole?"  Love her!!  She thought we were going to the North Pole, where Santa lives for breakfast.  I explained to her that Santa was coming here to visit us so he could make sure he had their list correct for the Elves.  Everything went great and this year there were zero tears!!!

Here are a few pictures:

Hello Kitty face/hand painting by the Elves.

This is one of my favorite pictures.  Alexis saw Santa for the first time and her eyes were so huge!  Watching her talk to him literally brought tears to my eyes.

This Santa was amazing!!!  We happened to catch him just at the right time.  He was walking around the mall and no one else was around.  So my kiddos got a little extra one on one time with the big guy!

Another one of my favs.  I love the innocence of these pictures.  Can't they stay little forever???

Not the best photo but we had to attempt a family shot!

Everyone Poops...

After reading the girls one of their favorite books last night I had an idea....


Yes, I know....."Everyone Poops" shouldn't be a three year olds favorite book.  Joe the Elf  is having a great time playing with the barbie furniture.

Meet Joe....

It may be hard to tell from the above photo but this is "Joe".  He is our African American Elf.

Our Elf was gifted to us four years ago by a family member who purchased him at an after Christmas clearance sale.  "Joe" has been in storage until the girls were old enough to play along.  Imagine my surprise when opening the box this year to find he wasn't Caucasian.  No big deal, right?  I had no idea that the Elf on the Shelf came in different genders and/or races. 

Addison decided upon the name Joe.  I can't really recall how exactly the name came about, but it was Addison who picked his name.

Joe has been up to a lot recently. I don't believe in making Joe be naughty like a lot of the photos I've been seeing recently on Facebook.  In my opinion, it's not right for the Elf to be able to be mischievous but my kiddos cannot because Santa is watching. 

Joe has been known to hang from the ceiling fan, eat a candy cane from the Christmas tree, eat a banana, leave a note on the magnadoodle, take a flight in the Little People airplane, hang out in our stockings....and several more.  At first the girls did NOT like the idea of Joe playing with their toys. 

Just like Mommy, Joe is tired.  I'm running out of ideas that don't involve him being ill-behaved.  Last night Joe was just too tired to be creative!!!

(Apparently he was too lazy to cover himself with the blanket as well!)

Funny Face...

The girls have show and tell every Friday at school.  Every week show and tell is the next letter of the alphabet....meaning they bring something that starts with that weeks letter.

It's getting harder and harder to find two different items that are unique.

A few weeks ago (again with the playing catch up) the letter was "F".....

Funny Faces was the best I could do.

Love these little goof balls to pieces!!!

Jingle Rails....

The Friday after Thanksgiving (yes I'm still playing catch up) I was fortunate to have the day off work.  We decided to take the girls to the Eiteljorg Museum to see their annual "Jingle Rails" exhibit.  Neither Terry or I have ever been to the Eiteljorg, but the girls went to this exhibit last year with their Ga Ga and Pop Pop and loved it.  Since my girls love for trains continues, I thought this would be a fun thing for us to do to get into the holiday spirit.  They loved looking at all of the model trains running throughout the Christmas display.  But I think they loved the attention they were getting even more.  We let the girls wear their "conductor" hats that they got last year at the exhibit.  We probably heard at least a 100 times how adorable they looked.  I have to agree!!  :-)

Since I had never been to the Eiteljorg I wasn't quite sure what to expect.  The Eiteljorg is the museum of American Indians and Western Art.  They had a few cute interactive displays for the kids. 

I'm not sure that we will be going back anytime soon, but it was fun nevertheless.  I love having family days with the four of us. 

MAX AND RUBY!!!

Last Sunday, December 2nd the girls Ga Ga took them and their cousin Oliver to see Max and Ruby.  The girls were in love!  Max and Ruby is one of their favorite shows so when I told them we were going to meet Max and Ruby they were pretty fired up.  Ga Ga got awesome seats for the show and included in her fabulous ticket package was a meet and great with Max and Ruby prior to the show. 

Here are some pictures:

Here are the kiddos showing off their VIP passes. 

Waiting in the VIP room for Max and Ruby with Ga.

At first Addison was scared of Max & Ruby. 

But finally we were able to get her to pose for a quick picture.

We seriously had amazing seats and the girls had a fantastic time. 

I love this video of Alexis.  She was so excited most of the show. 

Playing "KETCHUP"

Please excuse my blogging absence.  I've been in kind of a funk lately and my blog has taken a backseat for a while.  I mentioned to Terry last night that I have a million photos on the camera that I need to download.  I told him that I needed to spend a little time in the office playing "catch up".  Addison then asked me why I needed to take the ketchup into the office?  Out of the mouth of babes, right?

We've been busy around our house trying to take in all the local holiday festivities that our town has to offer.  I plan to spend some time in the next week or so getting my blog up to date with a ton of photos.  I will leave you with a few photos from my phone today.....

An attempt to get a photo of all the cousins together on Thanksgiving!!  And yes, It was that warm that my kiddos are wearing skirts and some of the other kids are wearing shorts.

Left to right:  Georgia, Greta, Alexis, Amelia, Oliver, Addison and Lila

Doing a little Christmas shopping.  Addison had to stop and take a photo op with the zebra print hat she found.  She knows Aunt Sandy likes "zebra stuff".

Trimming the tree!  Saturday after Thanksgiving the girls help me put up the tree.  Shortly after they went to bed I re-decorated the tree.  They did a good job but being the control freak that I am....I just couldn't stand all 200 ornaments right next to each other.

Helper...

Lately the girls have been wanting to "help".  They want to help cook, help do laundry, help with the dishes...just about anything.  I try to remember that even though their helping really technically doesn't help all that much....there will be days in the future that I will be begging for them to help me!

Addison helping with the dishes this evening.

Addison was washing dishes while Alexis and I were folding laundry.  After they went to bed, Daddy re-washed the dishes and I refolded the clothes.  :-)

HOMEMADE FINGER PAINT...

The weather here in Indiana has gotten REALLY cold really fast.  I'm always looking for new ideas to keep my super active kiddos entertained while indoors.  While in our basement searching for something I saw the girls house that Aunt Paula had gotten them for their birthday.  Their cardboard house has taken a beating and was barely standing.  They loved this thing but it has definitely seen it's better days.  It's been drawn on with crayons and markers and probably has over 50 stickers on it.  I figured what better way to send it to the dumpster than covered in finger paint.  And what better way to spend a chilly afternoon indoors? 

I told the kiddos that after their naps we were going to paint....to my surprise our finger paint was gone?!?!?  We obviously have some kind of ghost in our house who makes numerous things disappear.  I grabbed the Ipad and googled homemade finger paint.  Every recipe called for corn starch....which I did not have.  I was able to find one recipe that called for kool-aid, flour, salt, oil and water.  It served it's purpose but I will not be using it again.  I will make sure that I have corn starch in the pantry!!

It was rather thick, no matter how much water I put in it.

The girls were excited to paint but kept asking me where the paint brushes were because they didn't want to get their hands messy. 

Here they are hard at work:

After a little convincing....I talked Addison into painting with her hands.

Alexis resorted to painting her hand with the paintbrush and then making "prints".

I thought I had taken a photo of the finished project before it hit the garbage can, but I guess I didn't.  The finger paint was a big hit with the girls but wasn't what I had hoped.  It took more than 24 hours to dry and the color was not as vibrant as I had hoped.  Trial and error, I guess!  The good thing about it was, it didn't stain their hands or their clothing and we all had a great time doing it.

Would love to hear your ideas and/or recipes for homemade items and crafts to do with kiddos!!

Please comment or email me at:  cardinalsfan0718@netzero.com

The Wedding Weekend, Part Three....

The weather the weekend of Sandy's wedding was gorgeous!  They seriously could not of asked for a better weekend to get hitched!  This is the last post about the wedding weekend...I promise!  :-)

Sunday afternoon Sandy and Mike met over at my parents house to open their gifts and count their loot!  My Mom made a small lunch spread but it was too beautiful to sit inside and eat.  We all decided to hang out outside on the picnic tables.  This also allowed for the kiddos to play and run around outside.

Love their "day after" shirts.

My girls did this with their Cousin Luke for hours.  Only to result in me having to run out and by some benadryl for Addison that night.  Her arms welted up with hives.  Nothing major, but the whole process of trying to buy benadryl in the meth capital of the world (my hometown) was enough to drive anyone crazy!

Monday's weather was not nearly as nice.  We had planned on going to a few local parks but the rain and storms that morning did not allow.  Later in the afternoon it did clear up for a couple of hours....just long enough for us to run off some excess energy....

Alexis thought this goat was a riot! 

Love this photo!  The fall colors were so beautiful this weekend!

Feeding the ducks!

Playing on the playground!

Getting kisses from Gramma!

And for whatever reason they thought walking on this ledge was really fun!

We all had a great extended weekend but we were definitely ready to get back home and get back on our schedule.

Congrats again to Sandy and Mike!!!

A Vacation....

People wonder why I say shopping without my two mini-me's is like a mini vacation......

Maybe this photo can provide some insight. 

It's gettting more and more difficult to find room in the cart for my purchases. 



HALLOWEEN 2012...

I love looking back at the photos we take every year of the girls.  It once again reminds me of how far they have come and how blessed we truly are.  Halloween 2008 was the day we got the phone call that confirmed we were officially pregnant.  I will never forget that day or the look on Terry's face. 

*****

This year the girls were hot dog and ketchup. 

A fellow preemie mommy asked me how we decided who was going to be what.  Alexis just kind of decided when the costumes were delivered that she was going to be the hot dog and luckily Addison went along with it.

My pictures this year aren't that great because my kiddos were so excited to get outside and say "trick or treat smell my feet".....yes, their Dad's influence, not mine!

Unfortunately, the weather on Halloween evening was very chilly.  We didn't stay out for too long.  Just long enough for the girls to tell me that their pumpkins were getting too heavy.

Getting ready to go outside! Barely able to stand still for this picture.

The girls were really into ringing the doorbells this year.  I was having trouble keeping track of whose turn it was to ring the bell.

One last attempt to get a good photo.