Everly with her bath book

Lately, in the bathtub, Everly will open and close and look at this little bath book again and again as she plays. She will point to it and talk and I tell her what the animals are and what they say. I just think it is funny how babies will get so into one little toy. So, tonight, I took some pictures of her. So cute. Just so cute.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Friday Favorites: (For the past month!)

Here's what has been happening recently:

ONE (Bachelor)

A few weekends ago, we went to DFW for a quick weekend. The kids went to stay at Grandma and Pop's for the night, while Vic, Everly and Charley hung out at Ana & Charley's apartment so Ana & I could go to a party! Since I never do things like this, I had really been looking forward to it. As you may know, Ana & I love to follow Mix and Match Mama's blog. She is Shay Shull, who is the sister to a former Bachelor, Sean Lowe. I found her blog back when he was the bachelor, but then after Bachelor was over, I started following it because her life is so fun to follow. It's about adoption, travel, recipes, life with kids, etc. Plus, she has this group of friends who have similar blogs and I love to follow them all. Of course, Ana & I are pretty sure that one day we will all live in McKinney and be friends with this whole group! Anyways, we saw on her blog that her sis-in-law, Catherine (who married Sean!) was having a one year anniversary party for her stationary company, LoweCo. She was advertising on her social media, and you could buy tickets, so we did! It was at a venue in Dallas. We arrived and it was pretty scarce of people, although we spotted Mix and Match Mama and her friends right away! We also saw Catherine and Sean. The room wasn't big; there was a bar and some snacks and a raffle table of goodies. And there were 5 pinatas hung up that were later hit until goodies dropped out. But, we were super surprised more people were not there. We guessed about 70 were there? Maybe a few more. It was kind of awkward sometimes because there wasn't really anything to do but hang out. There was a fun photo booth! You could dance, which is right up Ana's alley, but there was not a lot of dancing happening. I just expected 100's of people to be at this thing, but it seemed like about 75% her friends and 25% bachelor fans! (or for us, also MMM fans!) Anyways, once of MMM's friends, Kara, befriended us to go dance and we found out she was an Aggie! (then, after I got back that weekend, and posted a pic, my friend Taylor said they were roommates in college! how crazy is that!?). We really wanted to go visit with Shay, but again - all kind of awkward and she was having fun with her friends. So, Ana realized we might run into her in the bathroom and we did! We told her we'd come find her, but didn't until we realized they were all leaving early. So, we ran up, introduced ourselves, took a quick picture and then left after they did. Looking back, we really should have gone up sooner. She seemed super nice and I bet she would have visited a little. I also met Erika, her friend, and we visited with her. Anyways, this post is mostly for my memories, but it was still a fun night! Oh and Catherine seemed super fun too! We saw Sean, but he seemed to hang out in the background so we didn't try a picture with him. Anyways, fun night! I'd do it again but I would be braver! ha!

And while we had a night out, the kids had way too much fun with Grandma and Pop!

TWO (100 days of school)

A couple of weeks ago on a Wednesday was the 100th day of school for Atticus. On Monday, they sent home a note to let the kids dress up like a 100 year old person. So, I had less than 2 days to figure something out. Well, I ran to pick up suspenders and a hat, but that's as far as we got. I didn't have any glasses for him to wear or a cane. We really needed an old person to borrow from! And we put on gray eyebrows and a mustache, but he did not like the feeling of paint on his face so he wanted it off. Oh well! He has been so excited about this countdown to 100 days since the beginning of kindergarten. Constantly, throughout the year, he would come home and tell me what day it was. So, Wednesday was a fun day for him! And here he is, although he looks more like Super Mario Brothers in the first picture and more of a 1920's newspaper man in the second picture. Still a cutie!

THREE (Co-sleeping)

Vic was gone Sunday through Wednesday a couple of weeks ago. 2 of the 3 nights, I had kids come into my room throughout the night and get into bed with me. I actually don't mind it at all, but when Vic is here, he prefers they be in their own beds. And 4 of us do not fit great, so I agree. But, if just one sneaks in, it doesn't usually bother me. Anyways, they were pretty cute when I would get up each morning.

FOUR (our snuggle bunny)

This girl loves her daddy and gives the sweetest snuggles!

FIVE (Date with Atticus)

A couple of Friday's ago, Vic had to come home for the afternoon to talk to the Dish Network guy so I went to pick up Atticus from Kindergarten alone. As soon as I got there, he asked me what Blue Baker was and then asked if we could go there. So, we had a spontaneous date! I remembered they had cookies and so I thought it would be fun to just take him and then run a couple quick shopping errands. And it was fun! He is really growing up so much and is so smart and inquisitive. He ordered the biggest cupcake they had with chocolate milk and just talked and talked. Oh and apparently. his teacher had a drink from Blue Baker which is why he even knew about the place!

SIX (Fun in the car)

The kids LOVE to play in the car after school or have me drive them around our neighborhood without seat belts. On this day, they were being so silly and I just had to have a picture. Everly was being a seat belted, well behaved baby in the back.

SEVEN (Grace Plays)

I just want to keep recording how much Grace play. Atticus is really into Star Wars toys and building his own Lego ship creations right now, but this girl is always into playing something "girlish" as she says. Princesses, baby dolls, dress-up, you name it, she plays it. Oh and I may have mentioned in the past her love of playing "Mrs. Summer and Hallie". Last year in preschool, she would come home wanting to play teacher/student and would use her friend's name and her teacher's name for us to pretend to be. Well, one of her current "best friends" is Hadley so it's recently changed to Mrs. Summer and Hadley. But, we play whatever it is in the moment she has on her mind. Many times, she just pretends to come to school and bring a toy or tell me (Mrs Summer) about made up scenarios of what is happening in her life or she will sing songs. And in the past when Atticus would play, his name would be "Crosby" (another friend last year) and she will still incorporate him into playing even when he is not here. She is just so funny! And she is into playing with Everly but also getting VERY upset now that Everly crawls to wherever Grace is to play with her toys. Grace will yell about it when Everly is at least 10 feet away. I am trying, over and over, to tell Grace that Everly might not even touch her toys and that there is no reason to scream everytime. Ah...little sisters! 

EIGHT (Dinosaur Zoo)

Atticus's friend, Greer, gave us tickets to see the Dinosaur Zoo this past Sunday. It ended up being only me and Atticus going, but I loved having another date with him. They were giant puppets but it was a cute show.

NINE (Swings)

2 -3 afternoons per week, we will stay at Atticus's school after he gets out and play at the park. To the side is this little tiny park with one slide and two baby swings. Grace still fits so she and Everly got to swing and Atticus pushed. It was such a fun afternoon. Everly couldn't stop laughing and LOVED being pushed. Her weight kept getting pushed to the front of the swing and it was so funny to watch her hang there. I have pictures and video of Atticus and Grace (when Grace was around Everly's age) and it's funny to realize how long it has been since we've been to this park to play.

 Happy Friday Everyone!

Dinosaur Videos

So, as I mentioned yesterday, Atticus is into dinosaur videos. Check out these links below...

I took this one back in January right after he got into extinct and endangered animals. I love his names he used for the dinosaurs before he learned them better....

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DNSsRsTD1GA&feature=youtu.be

And this is the first dinosaur video he made and he was so shy. This was in June.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yYFHFc1wtg0&feature=youtu.be 

And this was his video from just the other day. This first one had his little sister interrupting him....it's tough to be a big brother. Notice how I tried to bribe her at the end with a fruit snack.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NO9n9ZPZ7og&feature=youtu.be

And one day we will actually complete a video, but here is one on my phone that didn't have enough memory! It's pretty similar to the other one. I was so sad it stopped filming. But, it's still a fun memory. :)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zgaBDcvpHy0&feature=youtu.be

Atticus' 4th Birthday

Atticus loves birthdays. He likes everyone's birthdays as long as he gets a piece of cake. And this year from age 3 to age 4 has been no different. All of our birthdays are in the spring from February to April, with his being last. So, when he started asking about his birthday last fall, I had to explain to him that he had to wait for Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas, Daddy's Birthday, Mommy's Birthday, Grace's Birthday and then his birthday and I can't tell you how many times we had to discuss the list of events to get to his birthday. After becoming obsessed with dinosaurs after after Christmas, he decided he wanted a dinosaur birthday party. Again, I decided the specifics of his party a couple weeks before. We decided to invite some of his friends and a few of our adult friends and then GG also came, as we thought she was the only family member that could come (still so sorry Ana!!). So, we set our birthday party for our house on May 2nd, at 10:30 am.

First, I should tell you that he enjoyed white powdered donuts for a birthday breakfast on Thursday, his actual birthday. He had preschool that day, which also happened to be the "Mud Day" so he had a really fun day at school. We ended his school day with a dinosaur cookie cake for his class. He opened a few gifts that night.

For his birthday party, the three of us (Vic, GG, and myself) made a banner and dinosaur garland. We decorated the back porch with dinosaurs wearing party hats and laminated dinosaurs stapled on the back fence. We served pizza, dino chicken nuggets, fruit and veggies, dinosaur eggs, iced sugar cookies, and of course cake. Vic made clay volcanoes with baking powder inside them. During the party, one of our events was to let each kid pour red food colored vinegar into the volcano so it would erupt. We also dug for fossils in the sandbox and filled up some posters of dinosaur skeletons. We also made dinosaur eggs filled with little plastic dinosaurs that we hid for the kids. Vic and I made them a couple of nights before - they were a mixture of salt, flour, top soil and water and we just molded them around the plastic dinosaurs. They dried well enough to hold together and after the kids gathered all the eggs, they got to break into them and find the toys. And to fill a few minutes of time, we played "Carnivore, Herbivore, Fossil" - a dinosaur themed game of freeze tag! WE opened gifts and Atticus was given so many nice things. And we blew out birthday candles. We had little goodie bags of sticker books, stamps, dinosaurs, and fruit snacks. I LOVE a theme party and it was so much fun to put together with GG and Vic. It was also really fun to visit with some of my mama friends that I don't see often enough! Those in attendance were: Meghan/Lizzy/Lane, Megan/Cole/Nathan, Heather/Gage/McKenna, Katie/Kirsten, Katerina, Chris/Katherine/Olivia, Russell/Austin/Aubrey and Wei/Xiaoling/Patrick/Nini/Daniel. It was a really fun group!! Atticus was so excited and it was too funny that he was helping us decorate that morning. He kept asking for jobs and wanted to help. And I was very proud of him during the party for saying thank you and sharing his new toys. It is so hard for him to share his dinosaurs - I mean, he loves them all so much! And he got so many fun new ones, but with some help and coaxing, he did a good job. It's tough to have so much going on and be the center of attention and remember to say thank you and be gracious. But, I was proud of him. Here's some fun photos to show you the party! The first two are of him opening gifts on his birthday  night.

 

 

 

 

Atticus had a really great birthday party! And I cannot tell you how happy he is to be 4 now! He tells everyone he "is four now! I passed three!"