Thanksgiving Crafts

I am terrible at remembering to take pictures of crafts as we go... so I apologize. I only have pictures of the finished products. These are two super easy crafts, though, so you should be able to figure it out! lol

I saw this one on Pinterest and had to try it. And, I have to say, I think mine turned out better!

I simply traced each family members hand then cut them out (each on a different color paper). I drew the turkey body free-hand and cut that out, then added a beak and a waddle. The hands were then layered and glued onto a pretty piece of craft paper. The turkey body was glued on last. Finally, I wanted to have the year on there, so I used some self-stick scrapbook numbers. I framed it in an 8x10 matted frame that was on sale at AC Moore for $10! :)

 

 

I got the idea for the next craft from Lea's preschool. I saw these hanging in the window of the older kids room and wanted to try them. Again, I drew the corn cob and husk free-hand, then cut them out on yellow and green craft paper. I gave Lea some finger paint and told her to make "dots" on each corn cob. I think she did pretty good! We strung them together with yellow yarn (I punched holes in the tops of each cob) and we hung them from the fireplace mantle. :)

 

Compare

Here are two pictures of me at 3 months old and 6 months old...





Now, here are two pictures of Lea at the same ages...

 

And, finally, here are pictures of Emma at 3 & 6 months old...

 

 

I think it's safe to say we all come from the same gene pool. What do you think?!

Our Girls!

Have I mentioned that I LOVE having two girls?! It's so funny because when I was pregnant with my first, I was convinced she was a boy. I won't lie... I was a little disheartened to find out she was, in fact, a she.

It turned out to be the best thing to happen to me. And then I was lucky enough for it to happen again! ;)

I took my girls out, dressed in their matching outfits, in the hopes of getting one or two decent photos of them. Well, I got several great photos! M&M's certainly helped me coax Lea into cooperating and Lea helped me with Emma.

Here are some of the pictures...

 

And, for fun, here are some of the blooper shots!

This one just makes me giggle. Poor Emma!

And to stop Emma's crying fit, Lea ran circles around her....
Emma laughed so hard!

Playing with flowers. :)
 

Anniversary

Today is our seven year wedding anniversary. It was a gorgeous fall day, much like today, seven years ago that I married the love of my life... literally.

Kevin and I met in high school through mutual friends. He was the bass player in a rock band, had looong hair and all the girls had a crush on him. I was a theatre nerd and was very vocal about MY crush on Kevin. He worked at a restaurant near my house and I left notes on the hood of his car.

Fast forward about six years when we ran onto each other at a restaurant in our hometown. The sparks immediately started flying. I felt like a silly, nervous high school girl all over again! Well, we started dating right away and less than a year later, we were getting married.

We both knew, after only dating a few months, that we wanted to get married. In fact, on our first date, we talked about how we were ready to settle down and were done with the dating game.

Kevin proposed at a quaint bed & breakfast on the coast. I obviously knew what was going on...but he threw me for a little loop when he pulled out a letter for me to read. ?? He asked me to read it out loud. It was a letter that I wrote to him in high school! (one that I had left on the hood of his car) I couldn't believe he saved it!!! At the end of the letter, I had written how much I valued our friendship and I taped a gumball machine ring to the letter (that was the "thing" when I was in high school!). Well, when Kevin proposed, he said "here's a REAL ring..." :) We topped off the night with crab legs at a nearby restaurant. Yum!

Anyhow... I am truly blessed to have such a fantastic husband and provider for our family. And not to mention, an awesome daddy for our girls!

Holiday Family Picture Time

It's that time of year... time to get dressed up, in coordinating outfits, of course, and pose for pictures. Since it's not in our budget to hire a professional photographer, I usually enlist a family member to take our pictures. This year, it was my brother because he lives here now!!! (he moved back from NM about 6 months ago)  :)

We went up to my brother & sister-in-laws for dinner last night. While we were there, we headed out to their back yard for some pictures. (they live on a golf course) So, here are some of the shots we got yesterday.

This is my favorite pose...however, since Lea was NOT cooperating for this photo shoot
and kept running off, this is the only shot we got like it. She ran away right after this pic was taken...
which is why she looks all blurry. :(

We have a couple other good pictures, too, but I am not going to post them because one of them will be in our Christmas card! I just need to decide which one.

Also, I really wanted to get some pictures of just the girls, but we were running out of day light, Lea wasn't happy and, well, I just forgot! So, I guess I'll dress up the girls again this week and try to get some pictures of them, again. :)

6 months old

Miss Emma is 6 months old now. I can not believe it! I'm going to rattle off some random facts about her because, since she is a terrible sleeper, my brain isn't always functioning at 100% these days.

• She's been to the pediatrician four times in the past month (once b/c I thought she had an ear infection (she didn't), twice b/c of this terrible cold that she can not get rid of and again for a double pink eye infection!).

• She weighs a little over 14 lbs (her actual 6 mo well check isn't for another week).

• She is a very quiet baby...in terms of "talking". She doesn't talk much and when she does, it's pretty quiet. Sometimes she blows "raspberries".

• Did I mention that she doesn't sleep well? She doesn't. She only sleeps in 2 to 4 hour stretches (4 hours on a good night). It's exhausting. We've just started to "sleep train" her this week. It's so hard but it HAS to be done. I am loosing my mind and have no motivation. It's not fair to myself or our family. Wish us luck!

• Emma is a very hard baby to nurse. She only nurses for 5 min a time, therefore she is always hungry. There's nothing I can do about it...you can't force a baby to nurse longer! lol

• We just started giving her some baby cereal last week. The first attempt failed. She clenched her lips together and would not try a bite. The second day, she just stuck her tongue out to taste it. By the third day, though, she was taking small bites. This weekend we are going to give her some avocado. :)

• She has a tooth coming in! Front & center on the bottom. Lea only had two teeth on her first birthday, so this is early to us.

• Emma is sitting up on her own very well. She doesn't need any support anymore...however if she gets startled or excited )or just reaches too far for something), she will topple over.

• Emma has a lot more hair than Lea did at this age. It seems thicker and darker than Lea's. Emma still has blue eyes, too. (Lea's eyes are hazel)

Lea and Emma love to play together. Emma is so happy to just watch Lea and Lea loves the attention. No one can make Emma laugh out loud and giggle like Lea can! I love watching their friendship grow.

Oh, those blue eyes!

A tiny tooth!

She loves teething on cold celery.

My girls (all three!) cuddling on the sofa on a cold morning. :)

 

Yum!



Happy Halloween!

We had a great Halloween. Lea had a blast dressing up as Pippi Longstocking (all week!) and trick-or-treating. She wore her costume to dance class, story time at the library, preschool and a local festival... not to mention on actual Halloween! I finally perfected her Pippi pig tails just in time for trick-or-treating. :)

Emma was adorable, too. She was a cat, baby skeleton, a Winnie the Pooh flower and a giraffe (the giraffe was Lea's costume a couple years ago).

Lea really, REALLY enjoyed trick-or-treating. As she walked up to one of the first houses, she looked back at me from the steps and said, "I OK, mommy. You stay here. I not scared." What?! What ever happened to "hold my hand, mommy"?! She liked looking for houses that had a porch light on, because I explained that those were the only houses we could visit. And, if she really liked the person/candy at a house, she would say "That was a good trick-or-treater!!" as we walked away. She even liked a few so much that she asked to go back to them, again! After an hour of walking in the cold, Kevin took Emma and Bailey back to the house. I went with Lea to a few more houses and then convinced her to head home. We sat on the front steps and handed out candy before going inside and sorting through Lea's loot.

Here are some pics from our adventures...

Carving a pumpkin with Aunt Sarah.

Meow!

Outdoor Halloween story time at our library.

Emma was SO mad about sitting in the grass!

Lea loves to climb in this tree in our back yard.

Pippi Longstocking (notice I haven't perfected the pig tails, yet)

Baby Giraffe

My girls!

Pippi Longstocking!  (now those are Pippi pig tails!)

Winnie the Pooh flower head!



Pippi, ready to go trick-or-treating!







Ringing the bell by herself...per her request.

Going through her candy.