Christmas Tree

It is hard to believe that it is time to decorate the tree! It feels like yesterday that we were at the pool! The girls love decorating the tree, and it is always a huge deal in our house! They love hearing the stories of some of our old ornaments for the millionth time. I think everyone in our house is already sick of hearing me play Christmas music. The tree topper always starts a huge fight, so Claire got to put it on and Abby got to straighten it. (I don't think they will always be this easy to appease!"

Human Totem Pole

My sis-in-law and her family came up from Atlanta for Thanksgiving again this year. The kids always have a fun week, with plenty of craziness! Here are some pics of Sarah being a human totem pole. As you can see in the pictures, it was hilarious! I don't think she could mover her head for a couple of days!

Halloween!

This year both girls wanted to go as Disney characters. Claire chose Tinker Bell, which fits her perfectly because she looks like a little Tinker Bell.


Poor Abby had spiked a temp of 103 the night before and had thrown up all night. I took her to the doctor that morning and she has the flu (H1N1) and an ear infection, which the doctor said is very odd! This is the first time she has ever had the flu and WOW was she sick. She was so sick she could have cared less that she was missing Halloween. She did feel better enough that evening to sit on the couch and watch the kids get candy. The picture below is kind of deceiving because she does not look that sick...believe me, she was! We promised her we would take her out next weekend in her costume to do something fun.



Claire and her buddy Gilbert.


She totally got into trick or treating this year!! After every house she would run back to us and say "I got ANOTHER piece of candy!" That girl loves herself some candy!

It got a little chilly as the night went on, but she lasted the entire 2 hours with only one small pit stop to go to the bathroom and get bundled up more. She filled both her bucket and Abby's!

pumpkins and plays

I posted this one just cuz it is cute. Claire had said something crazy (shocking) that made Abby crack up!



Abby's class did the five little pumpkins play on Friday. Abby was the third pumpkin: "but we don't care!" She did awesome. My shy little Abby was not shy as all, and said her line very well. I couldn't get the video camera to work to get video of it :(. It is hard to believe that this is just hours before she got stricken with H1N1!




Here are some pictures from carving pumpkins. Here is Abby all into it. She decided not to carve hers she just drew all over it with marker.


And of course, Claire freaked out and wouldn't put her hands inside the pumpkin!

Big Girl Bed

I put it off as long as I possibly could... but the poor girl could barely move in her crib. So, over Ryan's fall break we decided to put Claire in her big girl bed. I had been dreading this day for a while now. Partially because it makes me sad to think of her no longer as a "baby," and the other part is, I love being able to contain her in her crib :). We took Abby out of her crib much to early and regretted it for a long time. I swore that Claire would have to be able to consistently flip herself out of it before I changed beds. She actually has done better than what I thought she would, and hasn't figured out that she could climb out of bed if she wanted to. She still sits up in the bed and yells for me at the top of her lungs just like she did when she was in her crib.
She is so proud of her new room and wants to play in it all the time.

updates

To say that things have been crazy here in our household would be an enormous understatement. As many of you know, Ryan's principal unexpectedly "left" (um yeah, that is all I am going to say about that!) So Ryan is now the new principal of Heather Hills! He has been putting in LONG hours, trying to get acclimated to the new job. He could use a lot of prayers right now! I am trying to be as supportive as I can possibly be, I am getting a taste of what single parenthood is like. Hopefully within the next couple of weeks, things will get back into a normal routine.

There have been some other major decisions/steps made in our family that started right before he got the new job. We like to clump all major life decisions right together so we can make them as stressful as possible :). Stay tuned for a major announcement when things are a little further along. (no, I am not pregnant!)

Here are some pictures from this weekend at Anderson orchard. Our weekends have become even more precious to us these last couple of weeks. We try to make them as fun as possible for the girls!

Rainy Day

The Fair

Seriously?!?

Seriously....Can we say lazy?!?

Kindergarten!

Abby had her first day of kindergarten on Monday!! I kept waiting for her to get nervous, but she was nothing but excited! I think it helped that Ryan goes to school everyday, and we go and visit him there alot. She picked out a new outfit for the first day, and of course a new backpack and lunch bag! I have been much more emotional about her leaving than she is (which is a good thing)! Claire surprised me when she started crying when we walked Abby in. I think this is going to be as big of an adjusment for Claire as it is for Abby.

While Abby was in school, Claire and I went to the zoo for the morning. I spent the entire day looking at the clock, thinking about what she was doing right then.

Here is Abby after school. We went to Steak n Shake to get milkshakes in celebration of the first day. She said she had a good day and her favorite part of the day was library (imagine that). It is going to take some time getting used to a day with just Claire. I am loving the fact that I get a 2 hour break while Claire takes a nap (we'll see how long that lasts!)

End of Summer!

We have had a crazy last month of summer vacation. We went down to Atlanta to visit Ryan's sister and her family. It is a 8+ hour car ride and we were very nervous about the girls...but they did much better than expected. We had a great trip and the girls had a blast playing with their cousins. The best part of the trip was going to six flags! We got flash passes and got to skip the 2 hour line and hop right on the ride. "It was the best amusement park day ever in my life!!" according to Ryan.



When we got back we celebrated my 30th birthday with a surprise trip to Chicago. I am in love with Chicago and could not think of a better way to celebrate my birthday! We saw Blue Man Group-they were awesome! Of course, when we got back we all ended up with the flu, which took us about a week to recover from :(. I was bummed I was sick and had to cancel the fun day my 3 oldest (time wise, not age) BFF's had planned for me. We will make it up soon though.

Ryan is back to work now, which always comes with mixed emotions for me. I am always ready for the house to get back into its normal routine. It always takes me a couple of weeks to get used to having the girls all by myself again. Although this school year will be so different because Abby is now a big kindergartner :(.

New Bathroom

I decided that the girls were too old for yellow ducks, so we redid their bathroom. The nice thing about having two girls is that you can go 100% girly! Since my Dad is in Mongolia and my mom was in Ohio, I did the painting myself (It was the first thing I had painted myself and probably the last) I had a hard time finding pictures to match, so I had them each paint their own onto canvas (total price $15 for paint and everything). They had fun doing them and are very proud that their artwork is hanging in their bathroom. Next project....the kitchen!

Abby's birthday and the 4th

Abby decided that instead of a big party this year, she wanted to have her cousin come over and spend the night. We went to Dunkin Donuts for breakfast. Then we went to Great Times and had fettuccine for lunch. That evening we had family over for pizza and cake. Olivia spent the night that night and the next day Abby wanted to go to the pool. Here is Abby with her Barbie cake (cuz every girls needs a Barbie cake). Ryan baked the cake (he is a self proclaimed master baker) and I constructed and decorated it.

We went up to my sister's house for the 4th. We set off some fireworks of our own then we were able to see the Geist fireworks from their front porch. It was the perfect place to watch them since it was pouring!

Abby's 5th Birthday!

My Abigail turns 5 years old today! We are so proud of her and love her so much! She is such a lovable, easy going child. Here are some things about her...
~Her favorite colors are purple and orange(she despises any "boring"color) ~She has always been obsessed with shoes and clothes ~She loves board games ~She is shy ~She acts so much like Ryan that it is scary! ~She is a rule follower, and gets mad when someone else does not follow "the rules" ~She loves to cook with me and helps me everyday ~She loves to play dress up ~Her favorite movie right now is Charlie and the Chocolate Factory ~She has not slept through the night in 5 years ~She loves anything to do with technology ~She has an unbelievable memory ~Her favorite book is pinkalicious ~Her favorite thing to do with Claire is play "house" ~She is a daddy's girl to the core ~ She loves vegetables ~Her favorite food is fettachini alfredo~ Her little sister can make her laugh like noone else can ~She is SO sensitive. But the thing that I love most about Abby is that she has the biggest heart of anyone I know!!

1st Birthday
2nd Birthday

3rd Birthday

4th Birthday

Camping

We went down to Brown County to spend a couple of days camping. If was our first camping trip since Claire was born, and we were not sure how well the girls would do. They ended up doing awesome! They loved it. We took our bikes and went on a long bike ride. We decided to take the road that led to a lake. Little did we know that the road to get their was very steep. Their was a sign that warned that bikers should get off their bikes before going down this hill. I about had a heart attack watching Ryan flying down these hills with the girls in tow! I do not know what we were thinking because we then had to climb back up these hills to get back. I really did not think I was going to be able to make it. It took us an hour just to climb the road back up to the park. Poor Ryan had to pull an extra 80 pounds behind him. Of course the favorite part of the trip was the campfire. We had fun, but are all exhausted!