Baby's First Tailgate

This weekend we had a fun family day of tailgating. Micah's sister, Rachel and her husband Blaine, as well as his cousin Josiah and his new wife Sarah all came down from Arkansas to hang out. We loaded up the cars and headed out for some good ol' tailgating. The girls were phenomenal! I must admit, I was a little leery of taking them to hang out in a parking lot for hours on end, but they were loving it! Thanks to everyone who pitched in to help out with them!


We managed to break not one, but two of our camp chairs!

#1



#2



By the end, Grace needed to stretch her legs and all she wanted to do was walk up and down the strip of grass.



Annalee loved hanging out in the back of Rachel's car in the shade.




Ready to go in our Ranger shirt....good thing it still fits (mostly) Papa!

Where's Waldo?

Last weekend Micah and I participated in the Great Urban Race that benefits St. Jude Hospital. Basically, it's a race/scavenger hunt through the city. You're required to dress like your teammate and costumes are highly recommended. We went as Waldo because it was cheap and comfy. The race took us through downtown and into the cultural district and back. We covered about 8 miles in all and it took us just under 3 hours. We had to solve clues and riddles to find all of the locations and then perform a task at each location in order to get proof that we were there. It was lots of fun, but I was definitely sore the next day. Of course, Micah was yelled at repeatedly by people who had "found" Waldo. He also had lots of pictures taken of him.


Where's Waldo?

Take your picture feeding each other a cookie...check.

Take your picture pretending to dive into a fountain...check

Take your picture with 2 strangers near a Texas flag...check

There's Waldo again!

And again.

Many of you know my BFF Summer. We've been friends for 20 years! She has two precious boys and now her family is on a journey to adopt a sweet baby girl from Ethiopia. This month marks 3 months that they've been on the waiting list. They have partnered with another adoptive family to raise funds for the two trips they will have to make in order to finalize the adoption. Check out her blog to see easy ways that you can help support them. She is doing several give-aways this month, so be sure to see how you can win something!

http://coxragamuffins.blogspot.com/

Happy October 1st!!

Is anyone else totally pumped that it's finally October!! I love, love, love fall! Today we kicked off a great start to the October month-o-fun by meeting up with the Maxeys for a little pumpkin pickin' and decorating. We let the girls each pick out a pumpkin to paint. Who knew you could have so much fun at Calloways (that was our patch of choice today!)

We didn't intend for the girls to match today, but aren't they adorable! Check out Karson's blog for a hilarious picture of me and Karson from back in our teaching days...we wore the exact same outfit to school one day on accident. Teaching Twinkies we were.

The lovely pumpkin creations!

We had such a fun day today Karson! Thanks for hosting our first pumpkin day of the year! And thanks for the great pics!

Then, for dinner Annalee was able to experience her first Free Birds burrito. She was a huge fan. Of course, we had to make some foil creations!

Nice sunglasses and ring!

My Girlies

Grace loves herself some bananas!! This child could eat them all day. As soon as we round the corner from her room into the kitchen after nap time or first thing in the morning she starts saying "Ba" "Ba" and pointing to the basket of bananas. It's a sad day when we're out of them! She thinks she is big stuff if I give her the whole thing to take bites from. Such a sweetie. And, in case you were wondering...she has finally decided that walking is way cooler than crawling. I would officially call her a walker as of September 13th.

And here's my number one 3 year old searching for a cat in some bushes! Annalee has been sweet as pie and stubborn as a mule all in the same day..make that hour. Anyone else out there have a stubborn one on their hands? Suggestions welcomed. Today we had a complete meltdown over the amount and placement of the syrup on her waffle. Sheesh.

Rock On!

Maybe I'm ok with Grace not having a lot of hair...especially if this is what it would look like if she did have a ton of it!



Someone please write a funny quote for this picture!! (She's looking at herself in the bathroom mirror.)




As you can see, we had some fun with our new Van Halen wig! You'll have to wait until Halloween to see why we made this purchase tonight. :)

The Flood

Last Wednesday I woke up to the sound of our wet/dry vacuum at 6:30am. At first I thought Micah was sharpening pencils (love how your sleepy mind works!), but as I walked into the living room and found water covering my floor, I soon realized that tropical storm Hermine had graced our house with her presence. It had rained so much that one of our flowerbeds in the front yard was flooding, sending the overflow into our living room. We cleaned up the mess and Micah started problem solving outside to see what could be done to prevent it. Everything seemed under control, the girls woke up at their usual time (thankfully not during the initial cleanup), Micah headed to Home Depot for supplies, and I started feeding the girls breakfast. Well...it started raining again and within minutes, the living room was filling up. This time, however, I was alone with two busy girls and there was no end in sight. Luckily Micah showed up after just a few minutes and he quickly got to work outside to relieve the rising waters. Of course it was a major inconvenience, but we are blessed to have had minimal damage. All in all, we had about an inch of water in about half of our living room. Our poor yard suffered the most. Micah called in the troops...his dad, brother, Justin and Ryan....and they were able to dig a trench in our yard to install a french drain before dinner time. I'm so thankful for family and friends who will drop everything and come to our aid. I'm also thankful that Micah discovered the water before he left for work and that all of this didn't happen on our first day of school.

The trench...we're still working on getting things back to normal out there.

First Day of School

Well, today was another first day of school. This year Annalee is in the junior Pre-K class and Grace is in the Toddler class (although she isn't full-fledged on the whole "toddling" thing yet!) It was also my first day in my new position. It was a little weird not being in the classroom, but I am loving my new role as Department Lead over our Pre-K. All in all, the day went rather smoothly. Grace cried when I dropped her off, but I think she recovered fairly quickly. Lucky for her, her teacher from last year moved up, so there is already a bond there. Annalee was so excited about school starting back up. She's been talking about it for weeks. Her favorite friend from last year sits with her at her table and she has the sweetest teachers! We love our little school and are so thankful for the experience for the girls and a little part-time job for Mommy.




Micah thinks her backpack is gargantuous, but we have to have one big enough for all her stuff!



Grace's backpack is the same size as Annalee's, so there's no way she would have been able to stand up if I'd put it on her!



Ready for another great year!

That time of year again...

I must be a glutton for punishment. Although I am a very dedicated "Just Between Friender", today was almost too much for me. I missed my early shopping time (due to a VERY important birthday party, love you Karson!). However, due to this double booking in my schedule, I was forced to shop with.....the public! It started out just fine as usual and then came the time to get in line to check-out. I looked at my phone when I began my journey and it was 2:08....when I finally reached the register it was 4:45!!! A major bonus to that insanely long wait time was that I got to spend it with my sister-in-law. We did take a couple of breaks and do some extra shopping while the other held our place. It's a good thing the next sale isn't until the spring because I was a little beat down after today. The only reason I waited in that ginormous line was because I had a killin' in my basket and there's no way I could ever get this many clothing items for the girls for what I paid today.

Annalee's stash. She was most excited about her sparkle pumpkin shirt for Halloween. She also thought that it was pretty funny that I bought her a shirt that says Sassy on it. I call her Sassy Molassy sometimes when she is acting too big for her britches.

And Grace's stash...lots smaller than sister's because she is stocked with hand-me-downs.

And because they're cute, the two I was shopping for today...

And, yes, Grace has a mullet because her hair refuses to grow in the front!

We love our dentist!

I love it how kids just surprise you sometimes! Today, Annalee had her second dentist visit. This time we were there for x-rays and a real cleaning...I know, big girl stuff, right? :) I have never seen a child so giddy and excited about going to the dentist, even after they started working on her. If you live in my part of town and need a dentist, I would highly reccomend ours. Their entire staff is adorable and so nice and kid friendly. Her dental assistant took lots of time to get to know Annalee and show her all the tools (with super cute and funny names like Mr. Thirsty for the spit sucker thing). Annalee was eating it all up. She would scrunch her nose and giggle at everything this lady said. She gladly put on her zebra print sunglasses and bib with her name written on it and just laid back and let them clean away at her teeth. I am so proud of you Annalee! What a big girl you are!

Mini (long overdue) Vacation

Micah and I were so fortunate to get a few days to escape the heat and celebrate our 8th wedding anniversary. One of our favorite places to visit is Colorado and this trip didn't disappoint. We stayed at our little creekside bed-and-breakfast that we love, went to a fabulous Nora Jones concert at Red Rocks Ampitheater, and spent the rest of the time relaxing, reading, and eating yummy food.

That's Micah in the background reading one morning...we loved the fact that we had to wear fleeces at night and in the morning.



Our romantic paddle boat! Kinda funny, but we had a good time.



This was the view from the boat.



We had a great dinner at a steakhouse in downtown Denver one night.



Micah loved having his picture taken by this pig...ha. I had to get it though, because I have the same one of Annalee from 2 years ago.

Thanks Grammy and JoJo for taking such good care of the girls while we were gone!

Lazy Saturday

We had a lazy Saturday this weekend. The girls swam in our awesome and classy plastic pool for over an hour and then we all napped, woke up and watched a movie and ate pizza. Good times.

Micah's sister and her husband were in town, so they joined us (along with JoJo and Papa!)

Uncle Blaine was a good sport and let Annalee dump water on his head....she was loving it!

Then, the other day, Grace was confused and thought she was Bitty Baby Doll.

More Steps

Grace is taking more and more steps everyday, but still prefers to crawl to most destinations.