Frio River Trip

We have gone to the Frio River with Ryan for at least 3 of the last 4 years between Christmas and New Year's and this year was no exception. We were only there for 2 nights this year because of some of our other holiday plans, but we still had a great time. The girls shared a room, which gave Cory and I our own room. That was nice, but it didn't give us a better chance of sleeping in. Kacy was up and at 'em both mornings by 8am. The girls loved playing outside, looking for animals, and their favorite thing was riding in the mule (4 wheeler type thing). They played with their baby dolls, gathered rocks and sticks by the river, and pretended to be camping in their princess tent. I love that any time we go somewhere outdoorsy they love being outside. I hope one day we can have our own little cabin getaway or at least a camper. The weather was beautiful, and we even had a chance to take a quick walk in the freezing river. We love our Frio December trips!

Adilyn updates

My big 4 and 1/2 year old is growing up so fast! I can't believe that in about 8 months she will be starting kindergarten. She is getting to be so mature in some ways. I love talking to her about her day, her ideas, and her friends. She is still very sensitive, and she gets her feelings hurt very easily. She is silly, and she loves to make faces, dance, and play dress up. I can't believe how much she is learning to do on her own, sometimes it makes me sad that she doesn't need me as much, but other times I am proud of her for being so independent.

Here are some of my favorite things that Adilyn says and does these days...

*For some reason she calls where we live "our land." When we go somewhere new, she will say things like, "Do they have Target in this land?" She will also say things like, "How do they talk in this land?" We were at the Frio and she said, "Do they have unicorns and other horses in this land?" I don't why I think it's so cute, but I just love the way she thinks that we have lands like fairies or princesses do.

*It is amazing what Adilyn remembers! We watched a short 30 minute show on Tinker Bell and the Pixie Hollow games one day. It was basically a show about fairy Olympics. There was this one guy on there who was really cocky, and he kept yelling, "One for the thumb!" I was dozing off, but I think it was kind of like his little cheer that he did when he won an event. Anyway, about a week and a half later we were in the car, and Adilyn just busted out, "One for the thumb! One for the thumb!" It was hilarious to think that she remembered that simple little thing that we never talked about or anything! She kept saying it over and over, so it was kind of bugging me. I told her to stop saying it or it would get stuck in her head. She said, "Uh, Mommy, actually it's already stuck in my head, that's why I am saying it!" Of course, what was I thinking...

*She has gotten to be quite a little helper, as long as she is in the mood to help that is! She will get things for Cory, she will help Kacy reach things, and she will help me clean. Her teachers at school say that she helps them a lot, too. She came home and told me that she was "being the teacher" when Ms. Niroo went to the bathroom, and she sent Elijah and Micah to the back of the line because they were fighting. :)

*Although Adilyn is getting more mature, one thing that she is still doing that drives me crazy is screaming when Kacy bugs here. They will be playing just fine, then Kacy will take something from her or something, and Adilyn will scream at the top of her lungs. I am trying to teach her to just use normal words to tell Kacy what is bothering her, but we haven't quite gotten there yet.

*She will randomly sing some of her words when she is excited. She will say things like, "Tomorrow is Friiidaaay!" or "We are going to Mimi and Poooopppps'ss house."

*I feel like she used to be really timid about trying new things, but now when we go to parks, she is pretty brave. She will climb high ladders, jump off things, and try to go across things that would have scared her before. She still doesn't like playing with random kids at the park when we go, but I wouldn't want to either! I have a feeling that a lot of her personality is going to be like mine.

*She has been having random tantrums, which is new and unexpected! She flipped out when we were at the Frio, and she actually ended up punching me in the face. I couldn't believe it! She started out getting mad about something stupid, and she just wouldn't calm down. Finally, Cory came to the rescue, and I went to take a shower to calm down. He ended up making her go outside by herself to try to calm herself down. Finally she did, thank goodness! I think she throws those fits when she is really tired, at least that is what she says. Who knows?!? Ryan asked her later about why she threw a fit, and she said, "I was just really, really grumpy!"

*Adilyn had been wearing pull-ups to bed forever. I never really worried too much about it, but I really didn't want Kacy to start wearing panties before Adilyn did. All of a sudden, I noticed that her pull-ups were dry for a couple mornings in a row. I asked her if she wanted to wear panties to bed, and she was so excited! I fully expected there to be many, many accidents because she always slept through her peeing before. She had one accident the second night, and since then completely dry! What a relief. It just reminds me of that old saying, "And this too shall pass..." Every time I think that a certain phase will never end, it always does!

Kacy's Favorite Sayings

My sweet Kacy is talking all the time these days. She still has some things that are hard to understand, but she is almost at the point were she can have an entire conversation with her. Sometimes she gets excited, and she will come to me and tell me an entire story complete with hand gestures and laughter, and I won't understand a thing she said. Usually she doesn't care if I don't get everything she said, but just recently she gets really mad if I don't understand her.

Here are some of my favorite things Kacy says...

*Ever since she started sleeping in a big bed, she just comes downstairs when she wakes up. It's kind of nice because I don't have to go all the way upstairs to get her. On the other hand, it's a bit of a pain because the girl is a morning person! She wakes up, and she is up and ready to go! She will climb in our bed, get about one inch away from my face and say, "Good mooning, Mama. Good mooning!" It's too cute to not smile, even if all I want to do is turn around and go back to sleep.
*Anytime we talk about her taking a nap she will always say, "Kacy nap early." I don't know if she says that because she thinks that I will think she already napped or if she is trying to say that she will nap for a long time, but whatever she means, it's adorable.

*I think that one day recently she was eating a lot, and I said, "Man, Kacy you must be hungry today!" Now every time she is hungry she says, "I hungy today."

*Instead of saying, "My feet are cold." It's, "Cold, my feet!"
*For some odd reason, she has an irrational fear of bugs or other strange things in the bathroom. Every time she says that she has to go to the bathroom, I tell her to go. She always asks, "Mama, bugs?" I have cleaned and cleaned in there, and I have shown her that there are no bugs, but she still asks me almost every time.
*Cory was hunting for quite a few weekends, and every time Kacy came in the bedroom in the morning and she would notice he was gone she would say, "No, Daddy" in the sweetest little sing song voice.
*Kacy loves playing with her baby dolls, and her favorite thing is putting them to bed. Anytime she puts them to sleep, she will tell us, "Baby sleeping. Be quiet! No talking, guys!"

She is so lovable and such a cutie pie! I love her little personality. She is so stubborn yet determined, and she is so silly yet serious at times. I can't get enough of her :)

The Last Christmas Celebration - Our House

Cory and I were really worried that the girls were going to wake up ridiculously early on Christmas morning, but it really wasn't too bad. Kacy came downstairs first around 7:30ish, and she totally missed the whole set up that Santa left by the tree. She jumped in our bed and just relaxed for a little bit. I don't think she even knew/remembered about Christmas. Finally, she started asking about Adilyn, and she said that she was going to to get her. When she walked out to the living room, she noticed the Santa gifts. She came running in the room and said, "Mama, bicycle, bicycle!" She was talking about the scooter. I told her to go get Adilyn, but she said, "No, Mama, play toys." I got a little worried that she was just going to tear into the presents! I hopped out of bed, and we went to wake up Adilyn. Once she got downstairs, it was game on! Adilyn normally takes a while to wake up, but I guess the Christmas excitement woke her up quick. She started passing out presents, and they both dug right in. They actually stopped to look at each present and talk about it before opening another one. We got about halfway through, and they decided to stop and play with some of the toys for a little bit. It was a really fun morning! Cory cooked us a fantastic breakfast, and we ate once all the gifts were open. The rest of the day was spent opening up all the toys and playing with everything.

Some of my highlights of Christmas this year were Adilyn saying, "How did Santa know I wanted this?" after almost every single present. Most of the things that she was given were not even things that she had asked for, but she thought that everything was exactly what she had wanted. It was so cute. Kacy's favorite gift was a tiny little princess camera that Adilyn picked out for her and her very own chapstick. She put that chapstick on all morning long, and every single time I took out my camera, she would take hers out too.

The girls really enjoyed a little birthday cake and cookie set that I gave them. Each one can be decorated in different ways, so they enjoyed pretending with those. They would come around and be the cookie delivery service and give Cory and I tons of cookies. They also really enjoyed scooting around the house on their new scooter. The weather was cold and rainy, so we let them scoot inside for the day.

Christmas was really amazing this year. Everything from decorating the tree to writing the letter to Santa to all of our Christmas celebrations. I always loved the holidays, but now, with kids it is even more fun, more exciting, and more miraculous. I can only imagine what next year will be like with Adilyn and Kacy being older, and a new little one joining the crew. What more could I ask for?

Henderson Family Christmas

Cousin cuties, hiding in the presents! Kacy is obviously excited!

Connor just loved hanging out by the presents, eating the bows, and pulling tissue paper out of the bags.

The girls and Grandma with their new Easy Bake Oven!

Callie and Adilyn working on decorating cookies for Santa.

We celebrated Christmas with the Hendersons on Christmas Eve. Everyone was there except for Ashley and her family, so it was a full house as always! Kacy and Adilyn love to entertain or "babysit" for Connor who is almost a year old. They just think everything he does is hilarious. Sometimes he likes hanging out with them, but he is crawling and trying to walk now, so he is much too busy to just sit there and be cute for them. Kacy thinks it's so funny whenever he touches her, and each time he does, she runs to tell me all about it. We watched a Diego Christmas show, and we did a little dancing to the Fresh Beat Band. All three of the girls pulled all the cushions off the couch and made a huge pile to climb and jump on. Adilyn and Kacy did their Rudolph dance to entertain the crowd, then we opened presents. After presents we decorated cookies for Santa, and everyone was very generous with the sprinkles! Good thing Santa loves sprinkles :) It was getting pretty late, and Adilyn was pretty worried about not being home when Santa got there, so we headed home.

Fort Worth Christmas

I love our tradition of having Christmas with our Fort Worth family the weekend before actual Christmas. It's nice to know that we will get our holiday celebrations started with fun, laughter, and lots of love! We started off the festivities at Nammie and Pawpaw's house. Nammie went all out this year, and as soon as we got there the princess wrapping paper under the tree was overwhelming. Adilyn said, "Mommy, are all those princess presents for us?" We didn't waste any time, and got right to opening presents. As always, the stocking stuffers give everyone a laugh! Nammie got a Home Drug Test from the dollar store. I got a special bra that keep popping up in stockings each year. Cory got some coal. The girls both got some silly headbands. After we did presents, the girls wanted to play with everything, so Cory and Greg got out their knives and went to town trying to get all those plastic boxes open. Once everything was open and spread out all over the house, we ate dinner and played some more. The girls worked with Nammie to create a spectacular gingerbread house. We were smart this year, and decided to buy a house that was already put together and only needed decorating. Adilyn really wanted to try to make it look "just like the picture", and Kacy just wanted to eat all the candy. Imagine that! Eventually our fun had to end, and it was time to head over to Mimi and Pops's house.

We got to their house kind of late, so we pretty much just set up the beds and went to sleep. We were trying a new sleeping arrangement with Adilyn and Kacy in the same room, and I was a little nervous. I put Kacy on a pallet on the floor, but she seemed excited to be sleeping with Adilyn. They went to sleep pretty quick, but Kacy woke up crying at 3am saying, "No floor, Mama, no floor!" I tried to get her back to sleep there, but it wasn't happening. Finally, I gave in and brought her into our bed. Luckily, she slept soundly through the night the other two nights! The next morning, we woke up and everyone headed over around 10am. Every time we get together with our Fort Worth cousins it is tons of fun. Adilyn, Taylor, and Kacy were so silly with each other, and Terilyn just tried to keep up. It hilarious to watch them grow and learn to play with each other differently. Maren kept herself busy this time with her new baby brother, Ethan. We had a yummy breakfast/brunch/all day snack time as always with great food. We began the tradition of singing and dancing around the Christmas tree. The has always been done with Kris's family, and she decided it was time to expand this tradition. The little kids loved it, the older boys didn't want to hold hands, but fun was had by all (even if they don't want to admit it)! After the amazing display of singing and dancing talent, it was time to open presents. Once the present opening chaos ended, all the kids played with their new toys and had fun being silly with each other. Adilyn's favorite toy was the beauty salon set that Maren picked out for her, and Kacy's favorite toy was a tiny baby doll that Nina gave her. Everyone liked the hammer and nails set that Mimi and Pops got Kacy, and Taylor's golf set. I love spending time with everyone up there, it is so nice and relaxed.

(Thanks to Anne I have some pictures from the fun! I stole them for her blog. Thanks, Anne!)

A musical parade!

Maren, getting all beautiful! (Notice the apron...my favorite part of the little set.) Brandon obviously hopes that he is next in line!

Mimi was getting her eyeshadow done.

Cory always has the fire on the patio, and Maren had a few marshmallows.

All the little ones "sharing" the mini golf set.

PInocchio Field Trip

Adilyn's school has started taking the older kids on field trips every now and then which has been really fun for them. The first one was to Dewberry Farm Pumpkin Patch, and I didn't go because we had already planned to go that weekend with Carl and Sonja. Adilyn was okay with it, but she kept talking about all the other moms and dads that went with them. I felt a little guilty, so I told her that I would go with her next field trip. The next one turned out to be going to see a production of Pinocchio at a theater. My first thought was that 3 and 4 year olds might not be that excited about sitting through a one hour play, but nobody asked me! :) We went on a big charter bus, and Adilyn was so proud to have me there. Of course, she wanted me to sit right by her and she snuggled with me the whole time. We finally got to the play, and the kids were antsy even before it ever started. They all did pretty well, considering the play was pretty hard to follow - even for me! We were going to go to a park afterward, but the weather was not very good, so we headed back. Lunch was at McDonald's which was pretty crazy. Our kids took up the entire eating area! They had it set up ahead of time, so we didn't have to wait for food which was great. It was still quite choatic! Our bus went across the street to the Walmart parking lot, so nobody was expecting 35 or 40 pre-kindergarteners taking up the entire restaurant when they walked in. Most people got one look at the madness and walked right out! Everyone ate pretty quickly, and we went back to school. I was looking forward to having a couple hours to myself to get some things down, but on our way back to school Adilyn told me that she wanted to come home with me. I felt bad, so I decided whatever I had planned for myself could wait. Adilyn and I went home and relaxed there for a while until it was time to go get Kacy. I am really glad I went with her. I got a little insight into what her day is like, who her friends are, and what she is like at school. It was also very sweet to see how happy she was that I was there with her. I am glad that I get to experience some of these things with her!

My Little Dancing Reindeer

Adilyn has been doing a weekly dance class at her school this year, and she has absolutely loved it. A dance teacher comes to her school and teaches them tap and ballet. I have loved having it at her school because it means that we don't have to disrupt our nightly routines with a dance class. The bad part about it is that I never get to see her doing her thing, so I was really excited to hear that they were going to do a little Christmas program. Adilyn and her little friends all dressed up like little reindeer and did a dance to Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer. It was absolutely darling!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KHF4Tz4Npfo

24 Weeks

My 24 week appointment went well. I got to see Theodora, who is my favorite. She said the baby was growing well, and the heartbeat was perfect. I have been feeling okay, but this pregnancy is definitely rougher than the other two. I think there are a lot of reasons for feeling more aches and pains this time around. I have not been nearly as active as I was before. In fact, I was still running when I was this pregnant with Addy, and I can NOT imagine running for any length of time right now! Obviously, I am older and we all know that getting older also means the old body starts to fall apart :) Of course, I have two kids to take care of and play with while I try to keep the house semi-clean! Anyway, I hate to complain because I have none of the typical crazy pregnancy like heartburn or nausea, but still this pregnancy is a little bit more uncomfortable. I am trying to really savor each moment of this little miracle growing inside of me since this is my last time to grow one of these special miracles. :)

Catch up time!

So I have tons of things to blog about, and I am going to try to get them all done this week! We have had such a fun holiday season. I think it just gets more and more fun as the girls get older. It's been awesome to see the wonder in their eyes as they see a huge display of lights, watch as they learn about the real reason we celebrate Christmas, or see the excitement that they have as the open their presents. I love the fact that Christmas is so magical for them.

Here are some of my favorite things about the holidays this year -

*Every single time we are out at night, the girls yell "Christmas lights!!!" any time they see a house lit up. A couple of times we have been out late, and as they get more tired, their yell becomes a whisper from the backseat.

*Santa called our house, and it was amazing! So amazing, that it is worth an entire blog entry of its own!

*When we went to see Santa, neither girl even attempted to sit on his lap. In their defense, he was extra creepy and super old. I really would not have wanted to sit on his lap either!

*Adilyn loved looking at the presents that were wrapped under the tree. She knew immediately when there were new presents under there, and she had to go check them out.

*We went to "Celebration" at First Baptist Church, and Adilyn was totally into all the different story lines. She had so many questions about baby Jesus and all that she saw after it was over. I loved looking down the row of seats at her when something completely amazed her. Kacy was not so into it. Every single time a song finished, she would say, "Mama, done? Done now?" Yeah, she said that for almost 2 hours...

*I could not get a cute picture of them the entire holiday season! We tried to do Christmas card pictures in front of the tree, and all I got were ridiculous funny faces and wrestling.

Pictures of all our fun events and more holiday stories to come!

Christmas Decorations

For the last 3 or 4 years, we have gone to the Christmas tree farm to cut down our tree. Of course, the trees they have there are Texas "fake" pine trees that they trim into the shape of a Christmas tree They always look a little rough in the field, but once they are decorated they always look fine. The main problem we have with them is the fact that they are always so crooked. This year for whatever reason, they were really bad! I don't know if it was because of the drought, or just a randomly bad year - but we could not even find a decent one. They all looked great from far away, but when we would get up to them they looked awful! We noticed that they even spray painted them green this year, and you could see all the brown pine needles on the ground around it. It was very sad, but we finally decided just to leave and go to Houston Garden Center to get a "real" Christmas tree. Adilyn had a hard time understanding what was going on, but she was okay once we were on our way home with our beautifully straight, non-spray painted Fraser Fir. :)

Adilyn said, "I will chop this one down for my room."

Kacy was more interested in the ants than in looking for the perfect tree.

Santa is usually there, but he wasn't this year...one more reason to be disappointed! Cory and Adilyn decided to sit in his chair anyway and pretend.

Once we got home with the tree, the girls completely forgot about the Christmas tree farm failure and just had fun with all the decorations and trimming the tree. Since the whole ordeal had taken longer than expected, I had to get dinner started right when wegot home. I told Adilyn and Kacy that they could start decorating. About 10 minutes into it, Adilyn announced that they were finished decorating, and they just needed help putting the star on the top. This is what their finished product looked like. The bottom sure did look amazing!

I loved decorating the tree with the girls. Every time Adilyn opened an ornament, she would say, "Oh, I love this one!" or "I remember this one!" Every year it just gets more and more fun to celebrate this time of year with the girls! After some "reorganizing" of the ornaments, and actually using the other 75% of the ornaments that the girls didn't think were needed the tree ended up looking just beautiful! I always love getting a different tree every year because of the funny stories we have trying to find one that is perfect for our holiday season. It always turns out to be an adventure!

What a perfect beginning to our holidays!

Big Bed...Mission Complete, Kinda

Kacy has been in her big bed for a couple weeks now and things are much better. There have still been a few nights that she has gotten up a few times, but I think she has gotten the point that she is supposed to stay in there and go to sleep. The biggest problem we have now is that her sleep habits have changed so much! She used to be such a great sleeper. She would sleep in until 9am on the weekends, she never woke up too early, took great naps, and was pretty predictable in her sleep schedule. Now, the girl is crazy! You never know what she is going to do. Sometimes she wakes up at 6:15 in the morning and walks right downstairs completely wide awake. When she was in her crib, she was never, ever awake before I got her at 7am. Her naps went from two to three hours on the weekends to an hour/hour and a half if we are lucky. I think the main problem is that the minute she hears a noise, she is wide awake and decides to come downstairs to check it out. When she was in her crib, that was not an option, so she would just doze off again. Oh well, moving out of the crib had to happen one day, better deal with it now then when the new baby comes! At least I might get some sleep in the next 4 or 5 months :)