Happy Halloween

HAPPY HALLOWEEN EVERYONE!

Tonight, my 2 little goblins will be dressing up and embarking on their first "real" trick-or-treating adventure. Pics of that tomorrow. In the meantime, let's look at the adventures that they experienced as we brought Halloween festivities to their preschool.

No festival is complete without a petting zoo. The Alpaca was the hit of the day. It towered over the kids. Big A thought this chicken was a little more interesting. She really enjoyed picking it up and carrying it around. We've now dubbed her "The Chicken Whisperer".

Little A kept a watchful eye on the Alpaca.

The bunnies were also a big hit. Big A is convinced that she's going to hide one in her coat to bring home later.

Little A was a little less enthralled with the bunnies.

Next, was the pumpkin patch that the volunteers created. Kids love hay and pumpkins. Little A staked her claim next to the pumpkin she wanted to bring home.

Little A is cold, but excited nonetheless to have picked out her very special pumpkin.

Then, it was Big A's class who took their turn at the patch. They first listened to a story before they descended upon the gourds. This group was a little rougher with the pumpkins. much to the teachers chagrin.

Big A poses with "Ms. Pumpkin" and her chosen pumpkin to bring home.

The girls then hit the playground for some energy burning after a festive party full of tricks and treats. We all had a ball! This is probably my 2nd favorite activity that the girls' school does every year. My first favorite is the Milk & Cookies with Santa. Imagine that.

Friday's Foto Finish Fiesta

These are my little dress up divas. They like to put as many things on from our dress up box as they can. I see 2 budding fashionistas here.

For more foto fun, please check out Candid Carrie who lovingly hosts this fine fiesta every Friday!

Bicycle...bicycle...BICYCLE!

So, the big gift request for the birthday this year was a bicycle. Big A was ready to upgrade from her big wheel. After every gift that she opening at her celebrations, she continually reminded us that "it's not the bike that I really want". So, after her party last weekend, my father-in-law took her to the store and let her pick out her new bike.

Here she is, all smiles, with her new bike

So, we headed to a large empty parking lot, which provided the perfect training ground for a new rider. Daddy gives some instructions.
Little A happily took over the captain position of the big wheel
Daddy shows us the WRONG way to man the big wheel. At least he's wearing a helmet.
Big A rides around with her Pappy
Little A enjoys some time on the swings

This capped off the birthday celebrations for this year. No more birthday talk until next April. Now THAT'S something to celebrate!

Is That All There Is?

Oh, to have the complicated life of a 4 year old. As I said last week, Big A had a big birthday and it seemed like the celebration lasted for days and days. It seemed like no matter what we presented her with, she wanted something different. Something more. Good grief, the entitlement has already started. However, you'll have to come back tomorrow to see what it is she wanted that she ended up getting. In the meantime, here are a few pics of the celebration that I especially love.

Here she is getting her annual birthday flowers from Daddy. This is a tradition that I really love.

This girl loves to play dress up. She got a new purse and gloves that she's been wearing non-stop.
Here's the birthday cake that I made for her. See, I can actually bake something without burning it.
At her big party, she was surrounded by friends who gave her lots more princess dress up stuff. The house is now teeming with feather boas and tiaras.
And her friends look on as she examines a new Cinderella figurine set that she can't wait to tear into.
All in all, we had lots of fun and it was definitely a momentous birthday. However, with the opening of each present, she kept saying one thing over and over. "But it isn't the _____ that I wanted."

Happy Birthday, My Darling Girl

My Precious Girl,

It's unbelievable to me that just 4 short years ago today, I was lying in a hospital bed, staring at your perfect little face, and frightened of the fact that I was now your mommy. Despite the fact that I had waited so long to finally meet you, it seems like the moment came and went far too quickly.

Nobody can warn you of the immense joy and pain that surrounds the job of raising a child. You love milestones and curse them for leaving in the blink of an eye. You relish first words and are then annoyed when they repeat the ones you don't want to hear. You treasure hugs and sweet whispers of "I love you mommy" and weep at the thought of teen drama erasing those words from her memory.

There is no greater joy in my life than being your mom. Your sweet smile, your loving nature, & your generous spirit are just a few of the things that make you so incredibly special to this world and to me. Thank you for being you!

As we celebrate your 4th year today, I thank my lucky stars that you landed in our lives, to change it for so much better. Happy Birthday My Darling!
Love Always & Forever,

Mommy

Fall Festival Madness

Our local Ronald McDonald House holds a Fall Festival fundraiser each October. We've been the last 3 years and let me tell ya, these people know what makes kids happy. As soon as we arrived on the premises, the girls were off.

First stop: One of the 5 bounce houses there. They had this almost all to themselves, which they loved.

And then, Big A wanted a pony ride. Er, make that a horse ride. She was a little unnerved at the fact that this was a full size horse, but she loved it, nonetheless.

Little A was all smiles during her daring adventure ride.

Then the face painting commenced. Big A chose a butterfly.

And Miss "sly grin" chose a rainbow

Off to the petting zoo! Big A has a close encounter with a chicken.

Little A was excited when I pointed out the bunnies on the table. She made a bee-line to them.

These wooden cutouts were pretty funny. Big A enjoyed this quite a bit, especially after she saw her picture.

Little A didn't want to miss out on the fun. Although, Daddy had to help because the cutout was a little too much for her to handle alone.

Our final stop were some of the carnival games. Big A showed off her disc throwing prowess. That girl can throw!

Little A was not going to be outdone.

The girls had a ball and we survived the ridiculously warm Fall temperatures. Afterwards, we headed home and enjoyed popsicles before crashing for an afternoon nap. Ah, I love Fall!

Ladies Lunching

Recently, we've been trying to teach the girls a little about how money works. Big A is convinced that it just appears in my wallet every time she sees something that she can't live without. Which is often.

Ever since our last visit to the Aquarium, she's been pining for a sting ray stuffed animal. We gave her some cash as she helped us with things around the house. Soon, her piggy bank was full and she was ready to cash it in. After an elated visit to the gift shop, I took my girls to lunch. Just us girls.

I'm so thankful for restaurants that provide crayons and coloring pages. Big A creates a masterpiece.

Little A is also working hard on her picture.

Big A shows off her new best friend, Stingray. She named it Laura.

Little A (who has perfected this sly grin) enjoyed a new Shark, who she appropriately named Shark.

And this was my new friend for that day. Chocolate. Yummy.

I'm so grateful that my girls are VERY well behaved when we go out to eat. On this day, I was especially happy because the service was awful and the food (aside from the shake) pretty well sucked. Oh well. At least I had great company!

A Week of Firsts: The Fx4 Edition

This week was very exciting here, as we had a couple of firsts with Big A. On Tuesday, she had her first "Stay Day" at school, which meant she got to pack her lunch and stay with the big kids until I came to pick her up in the afternoon. (She normally comes home at lunchtime with Little A) Big A had been looking forward to this for a while and I swear, she grew up at least a year in the 2 extra hours that she stayed at school!

The second big event this week was her first trip to the dentist. Her dentist rocks! The staff was WAY cool and super nice and they suggested that I stay out in the waiting room until she got settled. She had a few tears, but she was a champ! Here she is showing off her pretty teeth.

And I must point out that this dentist is a pediatric dentist, which I'm now convinced makes him especially qualified to pick out appropriate goody bags and toys to send his patients home with. According to Big A, he hit it out of the park. This pic shows her new Dora toothbrush and the goody bag full of traditional dental goodies, such as toothpaste and floss, as well as 3 small toys that she's really been enjoying. Oh, and not pictured is the Winnie the Pooh mylar balloon that hasn't left her hand in the last 24 hours. Way to go Dr. B, way to go.

For more Fx4 fun this week, please check out Candid Carrie, who is the best gal I know!

Birthday Parties for Dummies

Am I the only mom out there who spends WAY too much time & effort planning a kid's birthday party? Big A is turning 4 next week (which is simply unbelievable to me) and I slept nary a wink last night due to worry about the invitations not yet going out for her party next weekend. And so, I sit here feverishly addressing invites and looking everywhere for my address list because I keep thinking of one more person that I want to invite. (And my friends wonder how I end up with 40 people at an event)

I've secured the venue, am mailing out invites today and am ready to order the cake. Now, for the REAL problem. The birthday favor for the guests. Gah!!! This is something that I hate coming up with. I even boycotted favors for the last 2 parties because I was over it. However, I really want to send the kids home from the party with something cool, so here I sit in a cold sweat, hoping that a great idea will hit me like a bolt of lightening...and soon.

So, does anyone have a great party favor idea that doesn't include ordering cheap crap from Oriental Trading Company?

School Daze

*I'm prefacing this by saying that I've worked on this entry for a week now and I've HAD IT. Blogger formatting SUCKS. Ok, let's move on.

After reading all the "first day of school" posts last week, I am finally throwing mine into the hat. Both of my girls go to preschool and it's curriculum based, so they're learning far more there, than they do sitting at home watching me blog all day long. Ok, maybe not ALL day long. They do still nap sometimes.

Anyway, here are the first day pics for you to enjoy. This is of course, more about the outfit selection than anything.

Here's Little A on her very first day of preschool. She was so excited! She's been wanting to go ever since we dropped off Big A for her first day last year. She even picked out this adorable dress from the sale rack at Gap Kids. See, I am teaching them a useful skill. Discount shopping.

Here's Big A in her adorable polka dot dress (again from the Gap Kids sale aisle). She's VERY excited to be starting back to school.

My girls together. Do you know that people ask me ALL the time if they are twins? Sometimes I feel like I'm on an episode of Little People, Big World. If you've seen the show, you'll know what I'm alluding to. If not, explaining it would cancel out the humor of it.

Here's Little A in front of her school. What, you mean she's in a different outfit? Oh my, you're right! You see, I got them all dressed up on the first day for what turned out to be me filling out paperwork for an hour while they destroyed 2 classrooms. Ha! That'll teach you to dupe me into not having my first day of freedom without the kids. Oops. Did I say that out loud? Moving on.

This is her ACTUAL first day of school. Where I actually got to leave and go to Starbucks without kids in tow. A whole new experience.

And here's Big A on her REAL first day. Recognize the dress? It made it's debut appearance in this post. See, I did get the green icing out!

I'm happy to report that both girls are having a ball with school and mommy is a little less stressed with her minimal amounts of free time so far. Once phase-in is complete, mommy will have ample opportunity to hit the gym and stop making excuses for never having time to get things done. That is until she takes on 3 new things to do and then wonders why her stress level is off the charts again. Ah, school daze is here!

A Hair Raising Adventure

This past weekend marked a big milestone in my girls lives. They each had their very first haircut. This has been a long time coming. Big A is creeping up on 4 years old and her hair (as you'll see) was completely out of control. Little A, at 2 years old, just needed some evening out of her wisps.


Little A wasn't too thrilled with the lady who had to comb out the mega-tangles from her hair. Maybe NOW she'll let me do it the easy way at home.










Big A finally got over her fear of having her hair cut. She was actually jovial during this little event.












Little A was pretty good at following directions. She only moved her head about 100 times, instead of the 150 that she normally would have. Consequently, we have a little uneven line in the back. Oh well.










Check out the length of Big A's hair. CRAZY. She was born with a head full and we have great hair genes in my family. Contrary to popular belief, we do not put Miracle-Gro on our kids hair.
















Here's Little A after her trim. That face! She finally has even bangs and pretty even length. She couldn't wait to jump out of that chair.











Big A is getting the final amount of length taken off. We opted for no bangs and only had about 3 inches of length taken off. Just enough to even it all out.
















Little A got a gold star for her bravery. Not her listening skills.
















Big A got a gold star too, for finally being a big girl and getting that first haircut. We're so proud!