A slumber party with Baylee...

This past weekend we got to keep Baylee for Friday nigt and Saturday while her mommy and daddy went to a marriage conference! My girls we SO excited to have her come and spend the night...Baylee however wasn't so sure about the idea! God bless her sweet heart- she is so much like her aunT (that is me) its not funny!! Growing up, I was SUCH a momma's girl and a homebody! I can honestly say that I was much older before I started spending the night away from home (and enjoying it!) Chad and Ronni brought Baylee to my work Friday afternoon and then we headed to get Bren and Avery from Neicy's house! She was great on the ride home...and it wasn't really until after dinner that she had a come apart! We were all playing together, having a greand ole' time, and she just LOST it! Sobbing, the kind that you can't catch your breath...Another little tidbit about my niece is that she is "addicted" to mice (we aren't sure where this has come from, but she loves them...in fact my sister in law just posted this about her mouse obsession) so when she started crying we had to make sure that we had ALL of her mice (and even the one's that she found at our house...I promise the child was carrying around AT LEAST 6 mice at one time!!) and she would be okay for 30-45 mins. and then she would start thinking about her momma and daddy and lose it all over again! Around 8:00, I decided that she was EXHAUSTED and put her to bed! She slept great and woke up on Sat. and she was FINE! Never shed a tear! We had SOOO much fun with Baylee Boop Boops and so glad that she got to come spend the night! I had to take pictures and even add a video so that you know she WAS happy to be with us! (Notice the MICE in the picture above :) Thank you Uncle Chad and Aunt Ronni for letting us have her for Friday and Saturday! We can't wait for you to ask us again!

Sorry about the quality of the video, the lighting was horrible but her laugh was so darn cute that I had to hurry and get the camera...and who needs a quality video when you can hear that laugh!!!

First haircut, ear infection...

all in the same 24 hour period!
We were SO ready to get the girls haircut...they were starting to look a little ratty, maybe even a little homeless! So I called Nonna (my cousin Jenni) and begged and even pleaded that she would let us come in! She allowed us to come in Tuesday night and even stayed late so that she could take care of both of them!! Thanks so much Nonna, they look absolutely precious and I can't believe that my baby is old enough to need a haircut :(
This is the before shot

This is after...to precious!


However you must keep in mind that Avery was not feeling good at all..even had a slight fever..so she wasn't overjoyed about this haircut experience at all, but she did great...sat in my lap and let Nonna work her magic...







Aren't they both just precious! and doesn't Brenly look so grown up with short hair! I love it!

Nonna decided that since she had to get the shop closed up, that Brenly needed to sweep...and she thoroughly enjoyed it! And she did a pretty good job! If only I could get her to use the vacuum like that:)




This however is what she was REALLY thinking about the whole experience...


and with good reason...we woke up Wednesday and she had a pretty high fever. We took her into the doctor and he said that she had a pretty bad ear infection...so now we are on antibiotics, tylenol and motrin and lots of snuggling! Hopefully she will be back to normal very soon! We miss her when she is sick!

Happy "Balentime's" Day!

That would be Valentine's for all of you that don't have children! Saturday morning we all woke up (Brenly and Maci and I woke up first!) and Brenly had decided that because Maci was our guest that she got to pick the order in which we did things for the day! (Brenly was just so glad to have a visitor out in the country she was willing to do just about anything to keep her happy...she loves living in the country, but she certainly misses having friends who will come and visit :) Maci decided that we were going to make a "balentime" craft first! I get all the supplies together so that we could start on our first craft of the day (I had several planned:)


We made heart flowers and the girls got to write what they loved about the person they were giving them too! They were so cute...however after the first flower--they were done with that creative project...Now they were hungry! So I quickly clean up our mess so that I can get to the kitchen and make "balentime" pancakes...I made Heart Pancakes as well as "i <3 u " pancakes and they were pretty darn cute, if I might say so myself! They loved them and gobbled them up!




then all the girls decided that they needed to get there picture taken before we started the next craft...candy necklaces!!










we then ended up the day with "balentime's" dinner...at Sonic! Ray had to work so I loaded all of the girls in the car and headed to dinner!

and it just so happened that everybody wanted Ice cream for dessert..and who can resist little girls!
We had a great day and hope that all of you had a great "balentime's day as well!

Lions and Tigers and Bears...

Oh my! However it was more like elephants and tigers and ponies...that just didn't sound as good! This weekend was CRAZY, but we had a lot of fun (I'm not sure that I have caught up on my lack of sleep, but who needs sleep, right?) Friday night we (the girls and I) were suppose to meet up with Misty and her children and go to the circus at the Agricenter...Friday morning Misty let me know that she was REAL sick and would not be making it to work much less to the circus...but that her mom was thinking about taking her two up there! So instead we met Nana, Maci and CJ at the circus and we had the best time...Avery was ready to go half way through, but we made it to the end! Maci was going to spend the night with us to give Misty a little break, at least from one of them :) We didn't leave Cordova until 10:20 which means that we didn't get home until 11:30ish. The girls were exhausted, but didn't actually get to bed until 12:00ish! What a night!

A Game Warden for a husband...

often involves very different and unique stories that make up what he does! I had mentioned here and here that being the wife (or in Brenly's case-a child) of a game warden is a very interesting role! Yesterday, for instance, Ray walks in the house carrying a plastic bag...only to unveil THIS...

YES...it is the HEAD OF AN ALLIGATOR!!
Ray had gotten a call from a lady who said that her dog had brought this 'alligator head' up in her yard and she didn't know what to do with it! Ray goes to check on the situation and ends up bringing this 'creature' home with him! I ask him what he was going to do with it...and his response..."I'm gonna keep it!" My response. "FOR REAL? and do what with it?" I'm gonna let it dry out in the garage...and just save it!
So here goes another 'creature' (or part of a creature) that has taken up permanent residence in our garage...We gonna be like a museum soon, perhaps I should start charging admission!!

It was a small celebration...

but it was still lots of fun! Yesterday Avery turned 2! I took off work to spend the day with girls and am so glad that I did! It's days like yesterday that allow me to make memories that will last forever...I woke up and made Happy birthday blueberry muffins and waited for Avery to wake up...I mean, this is my child who wakes up with the chickens...and it was 9:00 before she opened her eyes...I mean she was taking advantage of the opportunity to be able to sleep (we are usually out the door by 6:25am) We ate blueberry muffins and chocolate milk (her favorite) and then Brenly woke up and we got to give her a little present


(the big present is the fact that they are sharing their birthday party at Pump It Up next month!)Then we went outside and played...It was windy, but it was warm...I was determined to get fresh air...we came inside, ate lunch and laid the birthday girl down for a nap! While she was sleeping, Brenly and I decided that we were going to make Avery's birthday cake...Brenly had already suggested that we make a blueberry cake (not for the taste, but because her favorite color is BLUE! In Brenly's world everything is blue...if it is good, it has to be blue!) So I suggested that instead of a blueberry cake, why didn't we make blue icing with blue food coloring...she was amazed by my crafty-ness! (Doesn't take much to impressed that girl of mine!)

WE then proceeded to make homemade chicken nuggets and macaroni and cheese (that is really the only thing that Avery LOVES to eat...don't get me wrong she will eat ANYTHING...we call her our own personal vacuum...if you don't want it...give it to Avery!)
So we ate a yummy dinner and then we got to eat our BLUE cake!






We had a fun day, just us as a little family, celebrating one of God's greatest gifts...Avery Ray!!