Marbles Children's Museum

Debbie, Chrissy and I planned a morning out of the house, and as always, the museum is a great place to try new things and wear these little ones out!

Sad it's over!

There is nothing better than Christmas. The meaning of Christmas, the time spent with family, and the work searching for gifts that bring big smiles, and this year, the over the top excitement for Santa Claus! Girls were good because he definitely made it to our house!
Best story of the week leading up was my attempt to teach them about giving before the day of receiving came. We packed up clothes and toys, and went to the store to buy shampoo, lotions, diapers, items on the needed list at Raleigh Rescue Mission. This came about because Kate had a lot of questions about the people on the street that we give a little cash to here and there, and why are they hungry, why do they not have a home type of questions. (She is very 4 and very intuitive). Anyway, I arranged a tour of the mission instead if just a drop off for a better learning experience. I thought my plan was pretty cool to help others and teach my girls about giving in the same day, well.....it was an amazing experience, so much so that when we got in the car to leave, Kate said, "mommy, I want to live there!" Not exactly what I was going for, that turned into me having to explain if we live there, that means we are taking a spot for someone cold on the streets, and we already have beds and a roof over our heads. Lesson backfired a bit, but she at least comprehended the giving part, and Lyla told everyone she met, "Santa Claus coming to my house". She added smiles to many faces, and it was a wonderful day of giving!
We were so busy with cooking and playing the camera didn't make an appearance as often, but here are the few we did get!

Christmas Card time!

I LOVE Christmas cards, so much so that I save every one that each of you send to me and have an album put together with each year's photos and cards. I love pulling the album out at Christmas each year to look through the past cards. But today was the last day of the 40% off on Christmas cards, hate to miss that kind of deal so we had to rush to put together the best pictures all in the same color scheme of course so the card has a flow to it. With Lyla's wild personality, it's hard to get that girl to stop for a photo! She is beautiful, yet her smile sometimes is SO big, she seems to squint her eyes almost shut making a photo shoot not so easy. Then Kate, who loves the camera, has a cold and you can see it in her eyes! Oh the pressures of the perfect card right? Well, this year, no professional shoot, but special thanks to Chrissy and Drew for taking a few fun family pictures, and thanks to our girls for freezing outside in their dresses so I could get a few extras to get this order in on time. Here's a sneak peek, I think squinted eyes, sick eyes, none of it matters. They are just cute all of the time.

Stationery card

View the entire collection of cards.

My helpers

Not only did these girls help fold laundry and unload dishes today, they helped with every step of making dinner, and ATE stuffed peppers!

Technology upgrade

I changed from the android world to an iPhone, why did I not do this sooner? I can now post pics like this and post it all from my phone!

October is here, we love the fall!

Kate remembers EVERY detail of last year's visit to the pumpkin patch, and her first year when she was two. "Remember when I got my face painted?" (that was 2 years ago) "Remember when I went with Dylan to get pumpkins and we ate popcorn? Can we do that again?" "Can we go to the corn house?"
Yes, yes, and yes. Let's do it all again. We love it and we hope yesterday's visit is not our only one this month. This place is so much fun, loaded with things to do from a huge slide on potato sacks, a corn house that makes your skin silky smooth, a train ride, bouncy houses, swings, mazes, live goats, a hay ride to pick pumpkins and more.
We chose the coldest day yet this year, and we did get rained out at the end of our hay ride, but these three Kendziora girls had a great day.

 Lyla is still a bit small to get her head above the wheel! :) 

 That's Kate way ahead of Lyla and me peeking her head out 

 Loving their first hot chocolate. Warming their hands & their bellies! 

 The corn house- this is full of corn kernels. Makes your skin super soft, would love one of these at home (minus the worms they would attract).

 We are now wet and COLD! Bundling up in the wagon to get back to the car! 

Lyla & Annabel turning 2- Picnic Party

We decided to do a joint birthday with Debbie's little girl, Annabel, who is only 5 weeks older than Lyla. Yes, this means we have also been talking about Lyla's birthday for a full month, when she actually turns two this week. However, I learned a joint party is a wonderful way to go! Here are a few pictures from their picnic party at Pullen Park. My camera had a smudge on it, so they all have a little blur...oops.

This banner matched the invitations, hard to make out in the picture but it was really cute and festive! 

 Gift wagons. 

 Debbie packed these adorable sack lunches for all of the kids. 

 We had a row of 6 pictures from Lyla & Annabel's first year, again, a little blurry, but this was my favorite part to make it about the birthday girls. 

 Avery Jackson enjoying the park. 

 Poppy Jane Swindell on the other end of the see saw. 

 The Brewer girls, Lily is Lyla & Annabel's age. 

 The birthday girls and Kate enjoying their picnic lunch.