Easter Egg Dying

We had an impromptu egg dying session on sunday night with the girls and our buddy george. they all did great and stayed focused for quite awhile. i highly recommend the egg markers, it was much easier for the little ones to use and see immediate results, they weren't as into the traditional dye. stickers were also a huge hit. rory loved it and was very intent on getting the perfect shade of color with each egg. i was just impressed that we managed 3 kids with only 2 adults and the worst of the mess was lucy's blue hands. well-done!

4 or 14?

no pictures for this post, but i thought i should write this down, b/c i will forget it and it is just sooooo Rory! Lately when I put Lucy down for her afternoon nap, Rory chooses to play quietly instead of laying down and napping, often waiting for me to get done so i can play with her. Today she says, ‎"Mom, today while lucy naps, instead of playing with you, I think i am going to listen to your ipod in my room and dance". For the next hour she DANCED (well, i think it was dancing, it sounded like a herd of elephants) with her door closed and the music loud (well as loud as an iphone can get). She came out twice for costume changes, and several times to see if lucy was up yet." She reported that Eric (yes, from little mermaid fame) was there and he was "rock and roll dancing" She is currently wearing high-heeled dress up shoes, a tiara, a tutu and wings and just came out quoting katy perry. Pretty cute, and I guess I better start editing what's on my ipod!

Easter party at Play Boutique

We hit the Play Boutique Easter party today and hung out with mr. bunny himself. Lucy showed no fear and crawled right into his lap. George was hesitant but very curious and Rory walked straight to him, pushing Lucy in front of her human shield style, the entire time. All in all a really fun morning.

serious hiatus.

I suck. I just stopped blogging for no real reason. I could go into how crazy the holidays were and then feb-march birthday onslaught, but instead of making excuses I am just going to try and make it better. This is the only record of my children's upbringing, so i vow to get back on track and at least add it back to my to-do list. Blog on!

mall pics

I am realizing just how spoiled i have gotten when it comes to professional style pics of my kids. These are some we took at the mall, and i think they are cute, but just don't capture the kids the way my friend pk has over the years. What I really did like was the experience of getting them dressed in cooridating outfits, heading to the mall with my mom and pat's mom and spending a day together eating lunch, etc. it brought back memories of brady and me with my mom and grandma. we would go every 6 months or so. so for the sake of tradition, it was really fun and i am glad i did it. on the other hand, it may be time to schedule a playdate with pk!

a little late.

Just thought i would throw rory's school pic up for fun. It is now several months old, and a scanned version- but this way i can look at it long after i have lost the original.

Visit with Santa

The girls' school hosted a holiday party on sat. with lots of art projects, cookie decorating, ornament making, and a visit from santa. both of them did great with santa and while lucy didn't smile, she did communicate her desire for him to bring her a new baby doll. she really grasped the whole thing much better then i would have expected. i had to scan the pictures so they are a bit grainy, but you get the idea. no tears- so that was good.

halloween craziness.

This is one of those posts that i envisioned spending lots of time recalling the details of the whirlwind of a weekend and retelling the story of all the events that took place. the reality is that if i do that, this will never get posted and i have exactly one friend left who is not on fb, that i promised i would update the blog with halloween pics, so for her sake i am going to just post the pics and get it done. the gist is that we attended a party at rory's school, hosted a party at our house for 11 kids and 30ish adults, participated in the crazy neighborhood parade, and trick or treated. the girls loved it all and did well w/ no major melt downs. we even seemed to manage the sugar intake. (well, except for this- it was lucy's first attempt at helping bake cupcakes- i had to let her)

We once again found ourselves surrounded by so many wonderful family and friends, it was a really fun day.

littlest crabs

My parents bought a boat, so this week we went on our first crabbing trip with the girls. I grew up crabbing out of Waldport, on my grandparent's boat, so it was cool for me to see my girls getting that same opportunity. It was an absolutely beautiful day to be on the water. sunny, no wind, not a lot of people. We only spent about an hour and a half on the boat, then we took the dog for a run on the beach, had some lunch and headed home. The girls loved the boat, but i think i was the one having the most fun. I love crabbing! we only caught one keeper- lots of almosts. While on the beach, the girls decided to collect shells. rory chose some really pretty ones and lucy just picked up anything in her vicinity.

grandpa faithfully collected them all and rory spent lots of that time with soap and water cleaning each one. they also loved running from the waves (who doesn't?) After such a long day of outside adventure we got to eat the crab we caught and had to deal with the 2 littlest crabs that live with me. over all super fun and worth a little evening meltdown. thanks grandma and grandpa- can't wait for more boating adventures!

Pumpkin fun with friends

We again hit the pumpkin patch with Jaime, Tate and Lexi and my mom. It was warm day with lots of sun, fun, and silly kiddos. Lucy and Rory both loved the slides, the bounce house, feeding the goats, picking out little pumpkins, and getting to try candy corn. there were 4 wk old puppies for sale that almost came home with us, and both girls loved this giant bull mastiff puppy named bulldozer. such a fun day, one of my favorite fall activities.