23 months

Temple is almost TWO!  I can't believe it! Fast two years!  

 

I love her elbow dimple!

She doesn't lack in sass. For sure!

She loves Elmo!

She loves anything that has a danger factor. Danger Baby!  She jumps off this chair and also loves to play "trust fall" with Daddy where she turns around and falls into his arms off. 

Well hello there! Where ya going?

She is the mess-makingest child!! She requires constant super vision or she'll write on your new furniture with ink pen. Thankfully I got it mostly out. 

Regardless of her mischief, she is easy going. She just wants to be a part of the action. 

But the closer we get to two, all bets are off. 

Cheer

I know everyone thinks I have an agenda with this cheer thing, but I promise I don't. Does it make me smile huge? Heck yes. 

Honestly about the time I was down in the dumps feeling like a bad mother and really needing to get the girls involved in something, a friend from preschool told us about this cheer squad. I mentally put it on my to do list. Fast forward who even knows how long and I was on a walk through downtown and I saw a sign about the same team saying "now registering".  I whipped out my trusty phone (love that thing!) and called right then. 

I took the girls to a trial camp. Teagan loved it. She was definitely in.  Mostly because she found her buddy from school. 

Presley said she'd pass but later changed her mind when she found out they got to be in the Fourth of July parade. They also were in the homecoming parade, mums and all.  Bonus!  

Even though they both gripe every practice, they have enjoyed it once they are there. We still have a lot left of the season, and we'll see how it ends before we sign them up for next year!

Teagan's last day of Pre-K

Teagan is officially done with pre-k. I am so thankful for another great year there, learning so much from great teachers and making sweet friends! I look forward to taking Temple there in another year or so! (But for now I'm going to enjoy the break - cha-ching! That was the fourth year in a row!)

Big Kid School, here we come! Praying for just the right teacher for both girls! And good classmates!

But for now, we are going to enjoy the heck out of this summer!

So proud and excited for my Weegie!

Teagan showing Temple her award. So sweet.

Happy Mother's Day

These pics are from Mother's Day. I had a lovely week celebrating. You heard it. Week! I felt the love and received the greatest homemade gifts! There's no job I'd rather do!

(Photo bombed by Duck Dynasty. Oh wait that's just Heath.)

Mimi and Honey, thank you for the love and sacrifice of being a mother. I appreciate you both more and more each day. We love you!

Florals

Perseverance, determination and endurance. Blood, sweat, tears. Maybe a little creativity and flexibility. I'm not talking about a marathon. But it IS similar to a triathlon...of sorts.

I'm talking about getting three girls ready for church. Not including myself. It just. ain't. easy. But so worth it.

Price declared he never expects us all to be in a good mood at the same time. Someone's always grumpy. Poor him. He's got it rough being in a house full of girls.

Anywho, a few weeks back we snapped these pictures after church. All the girls in their pretty floral dresses! I love them all gussied up. But I also love them stinky and ratty-haired too!

Happy Father's Day!

This one goes out to the one I love...

Happy Father's Day, Babe! Thank you, love you, you're awesome, we're lucky. Amen.

And thank you to two other great fathers, Papa and Poppa. We love you!!
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We went to lunch after church with Price's family and then headed straight to Kenzie's for dinner with my family. It was an all day well deserved celebration of Dads!

Presley's 7!

Presley Anne is officially another year older. She woke up to presents and then that night we had a last minute trip to Amazing Jakes with whatever family members were available and wanted to go.

When asked if she felt older, she replied, "not really, I just feel really happy inside." Birthdays are great. She didn't come across anyone we knew or didn't know, that she didn't tell it was her birthday. For about three days before and five days after!

That weekend, we had her party at the local natatorium. No sunscreen. Yay!! Plus it had awesome diving boards! I really wanted to jump off the high five myself!! Maybe at open swim one day this summer if we go.

Presley loves movies! Her favorite is Oz the Great and Powerful. She's obsessed with Glenda. And she likes the kissing scenes a little too much for my liking. She also likes to record movies that she directs and stars in.

She loves to author and illustrate self made and assembled books. She STILL loves to pack up a bunch of stuff in a bag and take it with her wherever she goes. Mostly it just ends up in my car.

Her favorite thing is to pitch the little tent in our room and sleep in the tent - something we reserve for the weekends. By the end of just a couple days, there's so much crap in there it looks like she's been living in there for a few weeks. It's ridiculous.

She still loves bugs. One day she said she wanted to be a snail helper when she grows up. Because she finds them and helps them have a better place to live. (I doubt they agree...)

She can't pass a mirror without checking herself out. Even in the dead of sleep when I have to go get her and lead her to the bathroom because she doesn't wake fully up, she still looks in the mirror a few seconds. IN HER SLEEP!

She can talk to anyone. She's not shy when it comes to conversation. She gets that from her daddy. (I need a drink to help me!) And yet she has gotten a little more reserved and shy around crowds of her peers she doesn't know.

She's creative and inventive, and loves all types of gadgets. She's really into playing Spy right now.

She is an entrepreneur! She loves to make things and take them out front and sell them. They've made marshmallow skewers that sold for a dollar each, many original art master pieces, of course lemonade, and anything else she could find to sell. One day she wanted a home gymnastics place for kids they could charge admission for, but was devastated when Price and I couldn't bring her idea alive. She also likes to play store where you come in a buy stuff.

I love all these things that make her unique and so much more! Even though she chooses to talk back, forget her manners and is inappropriate and contrary at times, she still has a sweet heart. I enjoyed celebrating her on (as well as before and after) her birthday this year!

Vegas recap

Price and I decided to spend our 10th wedding anniversary in Vegas. Our friends were going to be there and we decided to join them.

We arrived to Caesar's on Friday. We gambled a little bit, then met the Dercks and Blakelys next door at the Mirage for drinks. We ate dinner at Mon Ami Gabi at Paris Casino and sat on the patio across from the Bellagio water show. We were full, tired and ready to go to bed!

Saturday we had a massage, met the crew at the pool where another couple, Lindsay and Adam joined the party. Then we hit the Love Cirque du Soleil show. Then we ate at Lavo at the Palazzo Casino. We briefly enjoyed Lavo's club upstairs before we gambled a little more.

Sunday we went to Bare pool (think European-style sunbathing) at the Mirage and had a fun cabana. We drank, ate and enjoyed the pool. We ALL enjoyed ourselves! Maybe a little too much! We grabbed a burger from BLT Burger, played craps and black jack and then headed back to sleep!

Monday we leisurely got up, ate the breakfast buffet and then fed money to a slot machine. Too much. Then we went to eat at Nobu. Best food ever!! Then we went to see the Jabbawockeez at Luxor. It was a great production! Fun, entertaining and interactive. We also strolled through the Titanic exhibit. So sad.

It was a great trip! Lots of fun memories made and a great time with my boo to recharge our batteries! A BIG thanks to my sisters and mom who watched our babes so we could go! No easy task!

Patriot Half Marathon

On Memorial Day, and at the end of twelve weeks of training, I successfully ran a half marathon. By successfully, I mean that I finished!! I had two blisters and a medal to show for it! And the feeling of accomplishing a goal. Which is the reason I wanted to run one in the first place. When I first told Price I wanted to run one, he looked at me confused, paused and finally asked "Why?" I answered with a shrug, "it's good to have a goal".

Alison, who's known ironically for saying once, "My goal is to do nothing", also ran the Patriot Half.

I would have never made it through the training without a running buddy. We made it up to ten miles in training and decided to let adrenaline and the running high carry us through the last 3.1 miles.

Rockwall is hilly if you didn't know. So it was a pretty rough route! These numbers will really mean nothing to most, but we trained about an 11:40 minute mile. That allowed us to gab endlessly about the kids, the husbands, c-scope, the perils of domesticating, preschool, big school, private school, food, real estate, work, to do lists, weekend recaps, dogs, etc. It was pretty much like a coffee date. Just really early, all breathy and no coffee.

Well I decided for race day I wanted to not gab and run faster at a 10:40 minute mile that would allow me to finish at 2:20 (hr:min). So on race day, I found my pace group and stuck like glue to them. Until about mile 6. They could drink water without stopping I guess. I had to stop and take a second. It would get me even more out of breath to drink and then I'd have to catch up and that was making me struggle a bit. Then at the beginning of mile seven it started getting really hilly. And then I could never catch back up to them. I could still seen them for a while but I had to say to myself, "let it go, just run to finish".

At the top of that first major hill, was my sweet marathon-running friend, Maria Paula. Oh not a better time in the whole race to see her face! It gave me some umph! Well she continued to show up here and then, yelling and screaming like mad for ME! It was awesome. She also found Alison along the way too!

During the last four miles, it got kinda lonely. I was kinda regretting my decision to run without my buddy. Thoughts that kept coming into my head were:

1. Veterans and military peeps are awesome. Signs along the way said 'thank a veteran today'. And I did. All the ones we knew, Price and I thanked that day.

2. How do people run a WHOLE marathon? Those people are crazy! How on earth do they do it? I could NEVER do a whole marathon. (But I'm not going to say never...)

3. A dog is beating me. The cutest little golden Pomeranian dog. Made me think of Foxy.

4. Why the hell did they pick such a hilly route?

5. We got so lucky on weather! The sun stayed behind clouds most of the whole run. It was humid a little but it was May! We expected that.

And then 1-5 again. And again. And multiply that by 5... at least! It's hard to think at all during long runs.

Then at mile 12.5 or so, there's Maria Paula again. She ran me all the way back to my family which were just yards from the finish. Yelling and screaming again like mad! In case you didn't know, she's pretty high energy. Again, that gave me the umph I needed! Seeing my peeps? Double umph! Presley handed me some Gatorade, I finished strong. I was handed a medal, I sat on the curb a sec, chugged the Gatorade and (somewhat) gathered my senses. I hobbled back just in time to see Alison finish.

So my exact time was 2:28:44. Just eight minutes past my "goal". I'll take it!

We celebrated afterwards at La Madeline where I enjoyed a double entree of a veggie omlette and crepes. And I polished off both plates.

After a brief turn around at home it was business as usual. We went and enjoyed the rest of the afternoon at Aunt Shelly's. I knew if I stopped for too long I would get stiff. The big kids swam, Temp frolicked in the water here in there. We cooked out and then it was back home to hit the hay. Ironically I couldn't sleep. I finally got up, popped some Advil and FINALLY drifted off to sleep.

It was a good day!

Juicy

I didn't blog last week.  Here are my excuses.

We got a ruku.  As if this family needs to watch any MORE TV!  But alas.  Price and I watched a couple documentaries last week.  Enter, freak out mode.  What are we eating?  What is in our food?  What are we allowing the girls to eat?  What is our world going to be like when our kids are old?  Sigh. 

The first one we watched was Fat, Sick, and Nearly Dead.  So we ordered a juicer and started juicing.  So where was all my free time last week?  At the grocery store.  Price and I went on a three day juice fast.  We lasted until the second night.  And then we juiced most of the third day, just ate dinner that night.  I decided to just eat normally until after my race this Monday!  (eeeeeeek)  But I might jump back on board afterwards.  We'll see....  Swim suit season is upon us. 

The second documentary was Vegucated.  It was about vegan eating.  I would like to think I could eat no animal products.  I would just like to experiment and see how I felt.  I come from a long line of indigestion sufferers.  But just don't know if I have it in me to do it. 

We started another one, but I didn't allow myself to get too involved in it.  I was still in double freak out mode from the other too.  I feel better this week.  My head is almost buried back in the sand.  A place that feels most comfortable for me.  Actually I'm tightening up on the diet of the wee ones, avoiding diet cokes, and trying to not eat out as much.  Even if the process of the grocery store makes me want to poke my eyeballs out.  I can do hard things.  It's my domesticating duty. 

Now, if you'll excuse me.  I must go hydrate with some good old fashioned H2O.

Maverick

Maverick.  Oh my. 

We finally made the difficult decision to rehomed Maverick thru an aussie rescue group.  And I just found out today that he's been adopted!  We've prayed that he'll be with just the right owners for him.  Poor little crazy dog!

We'll miss him. 

Pinterest

Pinterest inspired me to cook.

And then all my domesticating hopes and dreams ended with four hard, dry chicken breasts and burnt stove top stuffing.

One pinner never said, "If you really want to waste your time going to the grocery store for these ingredients, throw it all in the crock pot, and then return to find something that'll surely break your teeth, make this!"  And my husband definitely didn't think it was "the best thing he ever ate!"  Because he never tried it.  But he did take us to dinner.