H-Town

Over the weekend we drove down to Houston to see our friends, the Bell's.  They are some of our best friends that we have known since college and it's so fun watching our children grow up together.  We absolutely love spending time with them and really wish we lived closer!  They are just those types of friends that you can laugh with for hours till your stomach hurts....or someone pees their pants, haha!!!  We got down their Friday evening, in time for dinner and of course the kids were pretty wired from sitting for 4 hours so they played hard!

After dinner we had some ice cream and Sharon gave Cole and Reagan these itty bitty ice cream cones, how cute are they!!!! 

Finley got right in on the action and loved playing with all these girly toys!

I guess it's bound to happen when you have a house full of girl toys, that the pink princess high heels are going to get worn.  However, I certainly won't show the picture of him wearing the heels AND the pink butterfly wings.  Oy!

Saturday morning, we went to a park and let the kids play.  There was a pond there so they could feed the ducks.  I don't think we have ever done this with Cole so he thought it was pretty cool!

 

Cole and his future bride...this will be a great picture for their wedding slide show :)

 

Saturday afternoon, Sharon and I went to a wedding shower and left the guys in charge of the kiddos.  We felt just a little bad taking off on them (just a little) but knew they could handle the chaos.  Luckily, all 3 kids took really long naps pretty much the whole time we were gone so they had it pretty easy.

Once we got home, we got the little pool out and let them play around in the water.  It wasn't too terribly warm outside so they didn't play too long because it got a little chilly.

 

Nick and Chris with their girls :)

 While the adults got dinner ready, the 3 kids played and played.  I thought this was super cute because all 3 of them are playing at the kitchen together.  Finley mostly just followed Cole and Reagan around and tried her hardest to play along with them, but obviously she couldn't quite keep up.  I can't wait to see how they play in a couple years...probably the little girls dressing up Cole in some princess costumes will be included!

 Sunday morning....these 2 watching some Mickey Mouse together.  Sharon and I kept saying how it's so funny how Cole and Reagan play so well together.  They are so sweet to each other, share their toys (for the most part) and are attached at the hip the whole time. 

We had such a fun trip, as always and can't wait to see them again soon!  Next time we see them they will have baby #2....baby boy Charlie.  We cannot wait to meet him!

Luckily on the way home, these two crashed and took a pretty good nap.  Yes, I am fully aware that we have Finley facing forward and she isn't quite a year yet.  BUT, if you had to listen to screaming and whining for 4 hours, you would flip her around too!  She does so much better when she faces forward so for this trip we decided to flip her around and she was much more pleasant! 

Now that we are home, I have to unpack, do laundry and repack.  Finley and I are headed to Colorado on Wednesday for a good friends funeral.  I hate that I'm going home for such a tragic reason but it will be so good to see some old friends and see family!

Weekend Fun

Another weekend has come and gone, but it sure was a good weekend! We started off the weekend with a playdate for Cole and Finley. My good friend Kelly hosted and it's so fun now because all the big kids are about the same age and a lot of us have baby girls so it's fun to see everyone play.

Cole loved this tool belt, I think I had to bribe him with a chocolate milk just to get it off him. Yes, mother of the year!

Finley trying to give Sophie a car :) Little Rowan is over there too, in that cute pink dress. I know these girls will be great friends growing up!

After our play date, I had to hurry home because Nick and I had a total last minute date with Beau and Stacey. They were going to The Gaylord to celebrate their anniversary, and Nick's parents were already planning on babysitting, so we totally crashed their celebration! :) So glad you guys got married!!! :)
As usual, we had so much fun....Nick and Beau talking sweet-nothings to each other, Stacey and I trying to solve all the world's problems, good times :)

Saturday, Emily, Tracy and I had a wedding shower for some friends. Tracy and Emily hosted it at a fabulous winery/antique shop in downtown Grapevine called Farina's. It was the coolest place and they definitely put on a great shower!!
Me and Emily before the guests arrived

Nick and his dad were in charge of the kids while the girls were out having fun and we so appreciate them watching them! Of course it's always nice to have some kid-free time!
We spent the rest of the day hanging out with friends and family and had a great time.

I also want to show off my new (early) Mother's Day gift that my sweet friend Bethany made me. She has a great Etsy site with lots of fun jewelry and bows called Clip Clip Hooray.
I love my necklace, thanks so much Bethany!!!

Finley Dances!

Finley has been a dancing maniac lately! Any time she hears music she starts dancing. Yesterday she, for the first time, would stand up on her own and stand for a long time and try to dance. Hilarious! This is the longest she has stood for so I'm guessing the walking will come pretty soon.
Oh, and sorry I get a bit excited and loud in this video :)

This video is from this morning and pretty typical for her.

I have blogged about how Cole is a crazy sleeper here, and he is still a crazy sleeper to this day. I love going in and checking on him after he has gone to sleep to see what kind of funny position he has gotten himself into. Yesterday when I put them both down for naps, this is how I found Cole.
Yes, this may be totally inappropriate, YES he has underwear on....but it might reveal a bit much so that's why I put a giant blob on the picture :)

THEN, I peeked in on Finley and this is how I found her. I guess she is taking after her brother :)

So excited for this weekend, we have some fun things going on. Hope everyone has a fantastic weekend!

11 Months

How is it, that in one short month we will be celebrating your 1st birthday? It's unbelievable how this year has flown by.

This month has been a fun one for sure, lots of new things!
When you went to get a shot last week, you weighed 21lbs. I guess since you are crawling all over the place you haven't been gaining much weight. Not sure of your height but you still seem very tall with monkey arms and legs.
Still wearing 12 month clothes and sometimes I wonder if you ever will get into 18 month clothes. I sure hope so because I have a lot of really cute summer clothes that are too big right now! :)
(Well that's not a very lady-like position)Wearing a size 4 diaper
Just started wearing some shoes this month and you are mostly wearing size 3's but they are a little small for you but 4's are too big.
Your sleep is still the same as it has been for the last 8 months (ha). You still pretty consistently wake up once during the night.
Bedtime is around 8pm, with usually a 3am wake up, then around 7:00am for the day.
Naps are still around 10am and 2pm. Some days you will sleep 1.5 hr naps and some days 30 min. Those 30 min naps are like a stab in the eye!!!:)
You now have 2 teeth on the bottom and about 6 on top. Your 2 top teeth are BIG! :) Those top ones seriously came in all at the same time, thank God it didn't seem to bother you too much, just a lot of drool and a little runny nose.
You are eating most foods now, the last week or so I've been giving you a lot more table foods, including spaghetti sauce which was a huge disaster but also so fun to watch! Like my friend Katie said, "it's like self tanning lotion gone bad!" :)
I haven't found any food that you don't like, as long as you can feed yourself. You don't eat a lot , just little bits all day long....kinda like your mama.
You are talking a lot more this month. Of course you say the typical "da-da" "mama" baby talk but you also say "nom nom" whenever you eat, so cute!
Not walking yet, but cruise the furniture like crazy. You will stand on your own without holding on to anything and when you finally realize you are standing, then you fall to your bottom.
You are climbing more this month, this is when I'm glad we don't have stairs :)
You wave bye-bye to people all the time, blow kisses and still claw me with those sharp nails.
People comment all the time about you stare people down. You would definitely win at a staring contest! It's pretty funny, especially if you don't know someone, you will just stare intently at them with a stone-face.
Cole is still super annoyed by you but you love nothing more than to be with him and play with his toys. You literally follow him around all day long and he runs from you all day long :) He really is pretty sweet to you though. When you aren't around or I take him somewhere without you, he always asks where you are.
You love getting into the dog food and water! If I'm in the kitchen, you always have to be in there with me and you go straight for the dog stuff. I've even had to get dog food out of your mouth a few times, yuck!

Overall, what a fun month we have had! I'm starting to get things prepared for your birthday party. We aren't going all crazy like we did for Cole's birthdays but it will still be fun! I can't wait to see how you like your birthday cake. :)
We love you Finley Marie!

Easter 2012 Weekend

We sure had a busy weekend, when we got home last night, I told Nick I felt like we have been out of town all weekend because our house was a disaster and we were literally gone all weekend. It sure was a blast though and I know the kids had a blast!

Saturday: We drove to Coppell Saturday morning so we could take Cole to the Easter Egg Hunt there. Last year we were about 5 minutes too late and as everyone knows, if you aren't there on time....too bad, so sad, everything is gone!!! So, we made sure we were on time this year and it was so fun to watch Cole gather his eggs :)

We were a little disappointed with the Easter Bunny this year because they just kind of plopped him on a metal chair, in the middle of everything, not a great photo opp but oh well. Last year they had the bunny on a cute bench so the kids could sit next to him so I'm not sure why they didn't do the same this year.

After the Egg Hunt, we grabbed a quick lunch then Granddad, Nick, Cole and I headed down to Ft. Worth to take Cole to see Mary Poppins the musical. If you have read my blog for awhile, you know Cole LOVES musicals, especially Mary Poppins. He was so excited to go! We got down there a little early so across the street from the Bass Performance Hall, there was a Cupcakery so we went and had a little treat before the performance. They even had Mary Poppins Cupcakes, how cute is that!?!

We had to get a couple pictures before we went in, of course

(this was from my phone, sorry such a bad picture!)
Again, we was so excited to be there and I think it was almost more fun for us to watch him that watch the actual play :)

The play was great, followed a very different story line, with many new songs but overall it was fantastic and definitely did not disappoint!
Granddad even got Cole a Mary Poppins "brumbrella", as Cole calls it. He has not stopped playing with it since he got it. He gets up on the couch and jumps off, I guess thinking he can fly like Mary Poppins. I told Granddad it's a good thing we don't have a 2-story house in case he tries to jump out the window with it....eeek!!!!

I even had to get in on the umbrella action :)

Sunday: We had to get up super early for Easter church service. They had 7 services to pick from, but because we had different things going on, the only one we could make was the 8:00am on Sunday. Even though it took a bit to get our family out the door, it still was a fantastic service and we definitely enjoyed it. After church we headed back to Nick's parents house because we had brunch reservations for 11:00am. Cole and Finley got to play with their Easter baskets and got some super fun things to play with :)

We went to the Gaylord for Easter brunch and they always do a wonderful job putting everything together. The food is unbelievable and they do some fun things for the kids. Cole had another little Easter egg hunt to participate in once we got there and then we took some family pictures while we waited for our reservation.

Here is King Uncle Blake and Queen Aunt Emily
(wonderful picture guys!)

Gigi and Granddad

Our family of 4

And me and the hubs

Once we were done with brunch, we all rolled ourselves back to Nick's parents house and put the kids down for naps. They both took long naps....and of course, Cole had to sleep with his "brumbrella"

While the kids slept, the adults played some Mexican Train and it was so fun and relaxing. We truly had such a fun weekend and appreciate all Granddad and Gigi did for us. We are so blessed! Hope everyone had a great Easter Holiday!

Some fun things

First off....don't let this adorable face fool you :) She may smile cute for the camera and act happy and goofy around other people, but lately....she has been the WHINIEST baby!! Especially around me, not sure why. When it's just us at home, she just follows me around, whining constantly, wanting me to hold her. I will say, that she has about 5-6 teeth coming in on the top but she isn't like that with other people!!!! Is it just a mom thing??

Hopefully it's just a phase, but all I can do right now is just hold her lots and give her extra attention which is fine with me, nothing I love more than baby snuggles....but every mom knows that the whining is hard to handle nonstop, all day long :)
Little stinker!!!

I mentioned that while Gigi and Granddad were in London, we watched Max. After we got back from Hawaii I went and picked up Max from the kennel and then we headed to pick up Cole from school right after that. Cole was SO excited to see Max and always says, "My Max!". Max loves Cole too and sat on his car seat with Cole the whole way home.

Since Gigi and Granddad got back into town this week, the kids have spent a lot of time with them. I'll admit it, I take advantage while they are around and take them up on their babysitting offers! :) They love spending time with the kids, the kids love being with them, it's a win-win situation, ha!
Yesterday, the kids and I headed to their house and had lunch with Granddad and then went to the park. The weather was perfect so it was so fun spending that time outside. Gigi and Granddad have a really cool park by their house called Kid Kountry and it's so fun!
Finley's first time down the slide....weeeeeee!!!!!

Later on that evening, Tracy, Cole, Auntie Em and I met our good friends Stacey and Grayson and Stacey's mom Earlene for a fun evening. A friend of ours, Elizabeth Loupas, just finished writing her 2nd book and was doing a book signing at a fun bookstore so before the book signing we all met up for dinner and had so much fun! Here are the grandma's with their cute grandsons. :)
Cole, Tracy, Grayson and Earlene

Like I said, this book store was adorable and had a great kids section so the boys had fun running around. We had such a fun night with these gals, and little boys. Can't wait to do it again soon!

We are looking forward to a fun Easter-filled weekend! Tomorrow we have an Easter Egg Hunt, then we are taking Cole to see Mary Poppins the musical. Cole absolutely loves Mary Poppins so we cannot wait to see his reaction! I'll try to take some video and lots of pictures!

Hope everyone has a blessed Easter!!

Bluebonnets....it only took 10 years

I have lived in Texas for over 10 years and for the first time, we took pictures in the Bluebonnets today! I guess I never really understood why people took pictures on the side of the highway next to some purple flowers. However, we found a great field by our house and it was gorgeous! Our one mistake...we went at the wrong time of the day so the sun was a bit intense and a lot of our pictures didn't turn out well. Oh well!

What a handsome guy!

Finley's little boyfriend James also came up and took some pictures. Of course we had to get some of the two of them. They were just precious! They would look at each other, wondering where the heck they were :)

And towards the end....we had just about had enough! Either that or James pinched her :)

We are coming off a great weekend! Friday night Blake and Emily came over and Blake did a little fish fry for us with fish he had caught and it was gooood! What a treat! We haven't seen Blake and Emily for awhile so Cole was so excited to see them! Cole even asked for Uncle Blake to put him to bed, which we all thought was hilarious because Blake doesn't have too much experience putting little kids to bed. Of course we watched on the video monitor and had lots of laughs!
Saturday, Cole and I had a birthday party for Emma and then Nick and I went out with our life group to Main Event. I haven't been to Main Event since before we were married and I forgot how fun it was!!! We had a blast! Nights out with our life group are always such a good time, we are blessed with some wonderful people in our lives!
Today....bluebonnets and taxes. Wild day huh?? We couldn't have asked for a better weekend and hopefully this coming week is just as fun :)