Feeling it

Last night was the first night that Grace has ever spent the night away from us.  She stayed with my parents while we enjoyed dinner out with a group of friends from church.  When we arrived home from dinner, we decided to meet up with some of our neighborhood friends who were also child free for the night.  Long story short, we didn't arrive home again until 4AM after playing Rockband for hours at our friends Todd and Angelique's house.  It was so much fun.  I really didn't even have that much to drink, but you wouldn't know it by the way I was tearing it up on the microphone.  Wish we had taken video.  Priceless stuff.  But, after only four hours of sleep, I am feeling every day of my thirty six years of existence.

Pool Party

The girls (Gracyn and Grace) were reunited last week after almost two weeks apart.  I wish I had taped them as they were running toward each other with uncontainable excitement.  Huge hugs and "I missed yous" were exchanged, then within about 10 minutes, their clothes were exchanged as well. They played so well together-not the usual bickering over so-and-so not sharing.


They spent a good chunk of their time together playing in an imaginary pool-sharing the goggles that Aunt Deb gave Grace in her Easter basket, jumping off the step ladder into "the pool" and swimming in the water that is our blue carpeting.

 I think we need to make another trip to the real pool again soon.

Egg Hunt 2012

Our friends, The Blasys, were generous enough to host an Easter egg hunt at their house this afternoon.  They have such a beautiful property-a huge, gorgeous lawn, a pond full of perch, and woods that go on for many, many acres.  It was the perfect setting to hunt for eggs.  All the kids were so well behaved and had a blast filling their baskets, jumping in the bouncer, playing baseball and fishing. 

 

 

 

Pajama Party

I never thought at age three Grace would be going to her first sleep over, but she did and we both had a great time.  Krista (Gracyn's mom) hosted the party and did an amazing job. She curled and styled the girls' hair, did their make-up, and also served as a tattoo artist.  The girls ate more twizzlers, cookies and popcorn than I thought was possible while Krista and I watched Ryan Gosling in The Ides of March.

At ten o' clock, after hours of playing "shark" in the basement, the girls crawled into their sleeping bags and hit the hay- everyone but Grace.  She tossed and turned with me by her side, then finally she told me I could go upstairs (to the guest bed).  It wasn't five minutes later when I heard the pitter-patter of two little feet coming up the steps.  (I was kind of hoping she would come up).  I didn't have the most restful night (every little noise the girls made downstairs woke me up), but it was worth it and they all made it through the night. 

Dancing to the Shake it Up theme song

The princesses enjoying their dinner (pizza)

Gracyn

Mia and her sister Sophie live right behind us.

Libby, Sophie, Caty, Gracyn, Mia and Grace

Putting on her own show

Sophie and Mia

First Snow Day

Tuesday night we got over six inches of snow and fortunately for Dave, he had his first snow day of the year.  Grace was super excited about the chance to play outside, but didn't last long after repeatedly taking off her mittens, trying to make snowballs with bare hands and then crying about how cold her hands were.  Not sure it was worth the hour it took to get both Grace and Graceyn ready for what seemed like five minutes spent outside.  But I'm on the hunt for some 3/4 length mittens and determined that next time will be way more fun.

The Fair 2011

Grace's birthday kicked off fair week in Midland.  We spent an evening there with our neighbors, Krista and Mike (Graceyn's parents).   The girls of course loved the animals, but they also really liked some of the rides, too.  They even went on a couple of them by themselves as we all watched from the sidelines.

 They loved the little jeeps...

and the carousel...

and the horses!

(I was glad Grace got the runt of the bunch)

Blueberries 2011

One of my favorite memories from last summer was picking blueberries.  We went out a couple of times and picked upwards of 10 pounds of berries-enough to get us through the entire winter.  Last night we headed out to Russell's Blueberry Farm in Freeland.  We thought it would be fun to take Grace's BFF, Graceyn, along with us. 

The girls were well-behaved for the most part, but things quickly spiraled out of control when they both decided they needed to pee while picking.  Before I could stop them, they took off their clothes and squatted on the grass-Grace, peeing all over the outfit she was wearing.  She then proceeded to take off all of her peed-on clothing and run around naked.  I wish I could say we had the place to ourselves, but there were other "pickers" there as well.  As soon as things seemed to calm down, Graceyn said  had to poop.  They always have such great timing.

Fortunately we managed to pick 5lbs of berries before we called it a night.  And, fortunately, we got out of there without any little children falling into the port-a-john.  

By the time we left, neither one had any berries left in her bucket

"Best Friends"

The occasional tiff

Graceyn tried to sneak a few from Dave's bucket