Friendships and Fun

The kids are becoming little buddies more and more every day. I can see their friendship developing, and I have to tell you that it makes me so happy. It's funny how Greyson is in charge right now due to the fact that he's bigger and verbal, but I can see it changing. I can't wait to hear what she has to say.

I FINALLY caught the girl riding AND screaming at the same time (a favorite of hers)...she is such a cowgirl (or in this case zebra girl). Greyson thought it would be funny to make a game of putting Hannah in time out for various occurrences...she thinks it pretty funny right now, but I'm sure that will change. This time out pad thing may be more of a toy than a punishment for a while :-).
The weather took a turn for the better for the last few days so we have spent as much time as possible soaking up the glorious sunshine. We went to a FABULOUS family picnic for our Mommy's group Saturday, and we had such a great time. Hannah was up to her usual climbing...
Greyson LOVED his friend Jack's swing set...We decided to go to the Dallas Zoo to take in some wildlife with Uncle Toby, Aunt Tammy, and Cousin Cody. Hannah was literally squealing with delight when we arrived.
Cody and Greyson before we got started. This is literally the ONLY picture I got of the two of them sitting still the whole day. They were running in all directions...they had so much fun! Look at those little stinkers :-).
We got tired of pushing the stroller so we thought we'd let the boys do some work for a while. They loved it, but it got a little dangerous since they couldn't see OVER the stroller to steer (small detail).
I was all ready for Hannah to LOVE riding the ponies like she did the last time we went, but she had different ideas. It's so interesting to see her awareness of her surroundings grow...and with that...her fear of the unfamiliar. She used to just do anything without thinking about the consequences or realizing what was happening, but she's really becoming a little girl and less of a baby :-(.
We had to bribe the boys with rides on the carousel to get them to leave...
They HAD to ride a 2nd time, and they LOVED this spinning nest thing on it. They were having such a blast!
Gosh...it feels like I have enough pictures for like a few weeks of activities, but this has all occurred in the last 2 days. We've been busy, and as I said before....I am going to be better with my picture taking. I close with a shot of my big boy riding his tricycle this evening...he's still getting the hang of the whole pedaling thing so it was really hard for us to get him to look up instead of staring at his feet the whole time. They're both growing up so fast....they bring so much love and joy to our lives, and I feel very blessed to be their mother.

Random Cuteness and Naughtyness...

What a bad Mommy I have been lately.....I have COMPLETELY neglected my camera and alas....I have very few pics of such exciting times. Oh well, I will now attempt to be better, but there are no guarantees. I suffer from the dilemma of whether I should simply enjoy the moment and be present or should I have a camera plastered in front of me and get great photos. I vote for the latter and so there will be more pictures in the future. We have had quite a fun week here in the land of Shelton. I must first address my "wild dog" furniture eating, cabinet reorganizer, bathroom trash digger, super adorable big girl, Hannah. We can now add a new title to that list, and that is CLIMBER! The girl is TROUBLE!

This, my friends, is the "weapon" or assistance device of choice right now. James and I got this for her 1st birthday present. We got it thinking it would be cute to have a Princess ride-on toy to work up to riding around the house over the next year. Let me tell you...she is putting this thing to WORK. She simply hikes a leg up to it and climbs upon it to use as a fashionable step stool to the world. I look away for two seconds, and where do I find her but up on a table, on top of the shelving unit, on top of the play kitchen, up in a chair. You get the idea...the girl is SMART, and she is crafty. I have got my work cut out for me over the next oh I don't know....16 years and 11 months til the girl is 18...probably longer than that. Here she is in the beginning stages of a climb. I'm just waiting for her to fall face first on the tile floor or something. I wish I was quick enough and/or brave enough to take pictures once I catch her on top of something, but I'm always too afraid she will fall. I'll try to get some photographic evidence so I can show her later what a little daredevil she was. She LOVES to get on the bounce and spin zebra all by herself and start bouncing up and down and yelling.

We went to visit Grandma and Papa, and she proved that she is equally talented sans Princess ride-on toy. I was quickly checking my phone for fun new webby mail stuff (I got my first internet capable phone the other day - YAY), and I looked up to see this...

Does that look like she's playing innocent or what? This was one situation where I took a picture of her naughtiness before I removed her from peril.

Hannah has also discovered a love of all things "faffle" (aka - waffle, but Greyson still calls them faffles) just like her brother. It makes breakfast really easy....except for the syrup and butter hair festival that always follows. She sure smells sweet for the rest of the day :-).

We had the opportunity to go to a special train museum in Plano for story time with our Mommy group. We had such a fabulous time! It was really the first time where I have taken Greyson to a reading/interactive type activity that completely held his attention. The kids got to look at the museum first...
Perform some experiments...
Then it was time for story time. The woman in charge did a great job using puppets, books, songs, etc to keep them entertained. Here is Anders, Ryan, Hayden, and Greyson enjoying the action!
The babies were busy playing together, and Hannah kept busy trying to empty the storyteller's bag. They are SO cute!
We followed up with a quick play at the park time to end the event. I was glad to have a positive outing experience this time as they can sometimes go south in a hurry....especially when I am on my own without Grandma.

I feel like I am stuck on Hannah right now, and she is stuck to me. The girl is just ridiculous. I have had to find ways to keep her involved in my daily duties in order to protect her from her own curiosity. She has a new favorite chore...she loves to help me load the dryer with each article of clothing from the washer. This sometimes involves emptying the dryer as fast as I can fill it, but it somehow works. She's my special little helper.
James and I were able to enjoy a special belated Valentine's date night at our FAVE restaurant in the world....the Melting Pot. We LOVE to fondue, and we always have such a great time. It's so nice and completely wonderful to be able to talk to each other uninterrupted for a few hours. I forget how much we don't get to do that. Greyson wanted to take a picture with us before we left...he was all ready for his night with Grandma.
We had our 1st ever soccer practice for Greyson's 1st ever team sport, GO ORANGE CRUSH! Get ready for some David Beckham skills people... :-). James and I were so busy trying to get him to participate in the practice that we got NO pictures. This will not happen again. He was SO excited about it, and I think we have many great memories in store as the season progresses. Coach Jason was having them do a few little drills to warm up. It is so incredibly cute to watch our little boy play and have fun doing something new. I wish I could accurately describe the hilarious things that kept happening, but I don't think I could do them justice. Let me just tell you that I WILL get video of him "running"...I WILL get video of him "scoring," and I will DEFINITELY get video of him picking daisies. Until then...toodles (I watch WAY too much Mickey Mouse Clubhouse)!

Craziness...

The days are literally FLYING by it seems....minutes turn into hours....hours turn into days....weeks....months! Where is it going....I don't know if I can take this warp speed business much longer. Greyson has turned into a big boy before my eyes, and Hannah is a toddler/wild animal. Speaking of wild animals...one apparently was let loose in Hannah's bed as there has been some "damage" to it lately . I went in to get her from a "nap" the other day to discover said evidence...
I think some wild dogs jumped in her bed and used the side rails for chew toys or something. The girl is destroying the oh to expensive furniture at an alarming rate. You'd think we don't feed her or something ;-). She is just a Hurricane of mess....into every cabinet, reorganizing drawers, chewing on electrical cords, terrorizing poor Chi Chi...you name it, she's doing it. She's not a solid walker yet, but I don't think it will be long. The world is no longer safe...


On a lighter note, Greyson LOVED Valentine's Day. He kept telling me that he wanted it to be "Valleytine's" day so he could get pink and red hearts. As usual, I was in charge of the party at MDO, and it went great! We made a cute little Valentine for the Mommies and ate WAY too many frosted sugar cookies.


Even Hannah had THREE before the end of it....what can I say...the girl likes cookies. She is her mother's daughter.
Later that evening, she had an "incident with her turtleneck, and what was left but a throwback to Flash Dance. She's a maniac....maniac on the floor!
It's so fun to watch them play together at the mall now....Greyson wants her to be right there with him. He decided the needed to "go fishing" in this life boat at Town East (from hence forth) known as "ghetto mall." They have this really cool train for the kids to ride now, but guess where it is. Where would you put a kid's ride.....next to a toy store....oh no!....an Old Navy....no.....not here.....wait for it. It's located right next to Fredericks of Hollywood with bare behinds all up in the windows. It's AWESOME! So far Greyson hasn't said anything about it, but I know it's coming.
I did my usual grocery shopping run while Greyson was at MDO the other day, but Hannah had other ideas. She was having NO part of it! I was forced to use drastic measures....I dug in my diaper bag for something fabulous....something hidden...forbidden....that may keep her attention so she wasn't attempting to climb out of the seat CONSTANTLY. I found...at the bottom of the bag....a sugar free sucker from our pediatrician's office that I forgot about.....it was LIFESAVER. Stick a bib on her and call her happy! She was busy with that thing for the whole trip. She finished it off right when we got to the car...I gave her a bottle, and BAM. SUCCESS! Hopefully this is the magic weapon for which I have been searching. We'll see.
She's quite the entertainer these days. She is now the peek-a-booer instead of me....she just says "DA!" when she "uncovers" her face. Da seems to mean a lot of things, but you can really tell she's trying....it's super cute!
Her face is fully covered....it's like she's not even there ;-).
DA!
Again with the disappearing act...where does she go?
I had one of those crazy ideas that I wanted to cute Hannah's hair yesterday. I had no plan, no appointment, and Greyson had to be picked up in 25 minutes. In my past experience, this is when I get the best results. It is when I plan and coordinate things that I am disappointed. So...I decided to break my first cardinal rule of parenting...."never wake a sleeping baby/child." Silly me...she didn't even get up when I took her out of the car. She was snoring away, and I just dragged her into Cool Cuts anyways. I figured maybe this would be the golden ticket to getting her to cooperate.
She was dazed and confused....she moved around a little, but she was groggy.
It was PERFECT! She didn't have a chance to really freak out or be a Hurricane.
She loved getting her first professional "blowout."
My big girl's first do! Look at those cheeks...I feel this cute really accentuates her best assets :-). Destiny (the hairstylist) added a little product and she was ready for her close up.
You can't even tell that I like it or anything. I look like some stretched out scary freak or something. Oh well...I was excited! I can't believe she is getting so big, and she's not my little infant anymore. She surprises me every day with something new. Greyson is just too smart for his own good, and I have my work cut out for me. The 3's are looking much more terrible than the 2's, but he too gives me little surprises every day. Last night when Hannah was having a fit on the way home, he told her "It's ok baby...don't cry....I'm right here.....I love you."

I cannot express how great it is to see the bond and love grow between them. They are so much fun, and I am never at a loss for something to do. Until next time...

Birthdays, birthdays, birthdays

What a busy couple of weeks! Greyson's party at the Museum of Nature and Science was a blast! We had a Dinosaur party, and the kids got to explore the whole Children's museum.

Mommy tested out her mad Martha skills and put together this fab dinosaur cupcake cake :-). I'm looking forward to many more baking challenges with each birthday.

There were so many things for them to do, and we had such a great time.Greyson was able to test out his milking skills, and he was a pro!They played in the "water table room" made a mess.Greyson did his usual "blowing out the candles" trick....someday he'll do this correctly, I promise.What can I say the kids loves icing....he must get that from his Aunt TammyThey did a dinosaur dig to look for buried bones and artifacts.

It was our first "friend" party, and we are SO thankful for all of the great friends we have made. This was truly a birthday to remember, and I am looking forward to celebrating every year together.

Next up was Hannah Banana's BIG 1st Birthday bash with family. Of course I had to go for something completely nontraditional baby theme with hot pink and zebra print.
We built the theme around an outfit that I found in Canton especially for her birthday. It even had her name on it with extra jewels.Greyson got to open a special present from Great Grandpa at Hannah's party....a big remote control fire truck!
Then came the Blizzard of 2010...over a foot of snow fell here in 24 hours. That's the most snow EVER recorded so it was quite the momentous occasion. Greyson LOVED playing outside, and he even got to build his first snow man. Of course we had to get nice and bundled up before we went out. He got to put on his rain boots for the first time, and they seem to now be a permanent fixture with ALL outfits.
Look at the depth of the snow guys.....that is UNHEARD OF!Greyson and Daddy built snow man in the back yard...
Mommy and Greyson built one in the front...

Snowball making was quite a hit!
And he got right down in the snow and made a special snow angel with NO prompting from me...maybe we live in the wrong place ;-).

Hannah was quite the ham at her 1st year checkup....3 shots, but she was still being goofy as usual!

Greyson's imagination is in full swing, and he told me he was a super hero. This is what we came up with for a costume to fit his character....

And last but certainly not least was a HUGE step for Hannah....check it out! There is no safe place.....Hurricane Hannah has made landfall, and the world is at her fingertips. It's a scary thought, but it's also exciting! Until next time...