Santa Visit

This past weekend we had the big State Farm Santa visit. I really get a kick out of this because I remember doing this as a child with my dad. It has changed a little since then but not much, and I can still remember a couple of the gifts I got. We had debated this year about possibly just picking up the gifts and not going in as Kaylee is not a huge fan of Santa in person. In theory he is her BFF, yes I just typed BFF. Obviously Ainsley wouldn't really know if we went or not. As it got closer we decided we would go ahead and give it a try because it is free.

Kaylee explained to me that if she didn't want to see Santa she didn't have to, but if she changed her mind Daddy said that was fine and she could talk to Santa. If she didn't want to see him he would just throw her a present and she could get her Leapster that way. I explained she was not getting a Leapster at State Farm Santa. I also went in to we should be thankful for any gift, although she was fine with not getting the Leapster I still felt I would forge ahead with my lecture, and many boys and girls don't get presents. To which Kaylee replied "Because they aren't good and didn't make good choices". I then tried to clear that up.

We went on Saturday and she stood in line the whole time and then when it was our turn she opted to stand by Daddy while he took a photo of Ainsley and I. I'm so thrilled that I get to be in all of these Santa photos. Ainsley sat on my lap next to him but wouldn't sit on his lap. After the photos one of the helpers gave them their gifts and to MY SURPRISE Kaylee walked right up to Santa and said "thank you for my present Santa". I was so proud you would have thought she saved someone's life. I am teary eyed now blogging over it. This was such a huge step for her. After Santa we went to Carl's for lunch and home for nap. What an exciting morning! Here are the photos:

Kaylee was more interested in looking at her game then taking the photo.
Try again....I put the game behind my back so we wouldn't have such a distraction.

Snow Day!

Ok so Kaylee might be psychic! Thanksgiving weekend, on Saturday, she was talking about all of these games, that I'm pretty sure she made up, that you can play in the snow. Trying to be encouraging I said "those would be fun we just need some snow", the next morning we woke-up and had....SNOW! I couldn't believe it! Generally I am very in-the-know with the weather as it's part of Brad's job, sometimes I know TOO much about it. I had no idea this was coming. Kaylee was so excited! She immediately wanted to go play in it. We were going to Brad's parents that day, to celebrate his dad's birthday, so I convinced her to at least wait until we got there, thankfully she agreed, because it was able to warm up just a bit.

We got ALL the snow gear on. I have to admit I was waiting for the "I have to go potty" emergency, but much to my surprise there wasn't one. We headed out for some fun. Kaylee really wanted to make a snowman and we proceeded to make one, Abby (the dog), kept eating our snowman. Eventually we made a little one on top of a bush. Kaylee also enjoyed throwing snow at people, and even more so loved being hit by snow. It was a lot of fun! I can't remember the last time I had so much fun in the snow.

Poor Ainsley...as much as loved it she had such a hard time moving around. I remember Kaylee at that age and how hard it was for her. Bless her heart she kept on trying. Eventually she lost a boot and kept losing her mittens so Brad's mom took her in. Below are some photos from our Snow Day...


Attempting to make snow angels. Ainsley wasn't so sure about this!

I had thought of putting this as one of our Christmas card photos (I finally got them all mailed today), but there's a snowflake right in front of Kaylee's eye and it looks like a weird white spot, so it was out.

Kaylee with a snowball ready for a snow fight and again poor Ainsley who just can't seem to get around so well.

One of our many attempts to build a snowman and Ainsley who has lost her mittens, again.

Random

Just thought I would put some random photos and news in one blog. I have enough catching-up to do I am trying to be as efficient as possible! We are well into the Holiday Season and loving it! Needless to say we have been busy. We had a fun Thanksgiving. Although it was a little chilly we were still able to get out a little and even take a 4-wheeler ride, which we all love!

Aside from getting the tree up and all the Christmas decorations we were also able to take Kaylee to her first movie. We went to see Madagascar 2, now she's never seen Madagascar 1, but that's the great thing about these types of movies, it doesn't matter if you have seen both or not. Ainsley stayed with Mee-Maw as I didn't think she was quite ready.

Here she is eating some popcorn and waiting for the movie to start.
I took this picture by putting the camera directly in front of her. It's not the most flattering shot but she is very focused on the big screen!
The weekend before Thanksgiving we went to the Festival of Trees. She heard some of her friends from MCC were going to be there and was set on finding them, as it must have been a plan for everyone to go. Luckily we did find them and spent the majority of our time with them. What an interesting experience....before I know it Kaylee will just want us to drop her at the door. One of the activities was face painting. Here is her as a butterfly.

Ainsley has been busy as usual. Always ready for a dance party. As soon as she hears music she starts dancing. Many times she runs to the dress-up trunk and brings me something to put on her. Two of the more popular choices are her tu-tu, made by Stef who does Frostings, and a play dress. She enjoys twirling in them and will twirl and twirl until she can't stand-up.

She also likes to say "Cheese" to the camera and the below photo shows the expression I capture when taking the photo. It's really pretty cute!Occasionally Ainsley will sit still and hang out with me from time to time. Usually if I have food it's a good way to motivate her to sit with me. She's fun to snuggle with!Hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving! I'm sure you all have been as busy as us but at least you know some of the "random" things we've been doing!

Happy Halloween!

Happy belated Halloween! Wasn't the weather so nice? I recall many a Halloween growing-up when the weather was rainy and cold, which presented an interesting challenge when you are dressed as a punk rocker with spray color in your hair. We had actually gone to my mom's the weekend before to take the girls in their costumes to do some pre-trick-or-treating. What were the girls you might ask? Kaylee decided to be Batman, yes Batman. That's typical Kaylee if she likes it she likes it, gender is not an issue for her. She loves everything from princesses to Scooby-Doo to Batman. The costume choice is definitely more interesting when they get to pick their own. Kaylee had thought Ainsley should be Robin, which makes sense, however Ainsley is still young enough to not have as much of a preference so she was a Ladybug, which is a costume we had from Kaylee when she was Ainsley's age.

Before we got to the big night we needed to carve our pumpkins! We did this one night the week of Halloween. Here are the girls ready to turn the pumpkins into Jack-O-Lanterns.

Ainsley enjoyed playing with the top of her pumpkin. She liked to take it off and put it back on and so on and so forth.


Kaylee getting all of the seeds out. She was all about rolling up her sleeves and getting down to business. Ainsley working hard on scooping out the seeds.
The Jack-O-Lantern's. I did A's and Brad did K's. Kaylee wanted hers to be scary. Ainsley and I went for a more traditional approach. I did a lot of triangles because they are similar to an "A".
The weekend before Halloween we went to Mee-Maw and Paw-Paw's for early trick-or-treating. Here is our little lovely ladybug Ainsley.

Here is Kaylee flexing her Batman muscles!

This year we had a couple of firsts. Kaylee, who is in pre-school this year, had her first Halloween parade! I have attended these for the past 4 years, as I was working there then, but this was the first for her to participate and me to enjoy as a parent. My mom, dad, Brad, Brad's mom-Ginny, and I all met at MCC to watch it together. The children parade out and then come together to sing some Halloween songs. It is very cute! Kaylee had been practicing many of these for us at home in the weeks leading up to Halloween. I wasn't sure exactly how she would do. She can be a bit shy sometimes, especially walking out to many people staring at you. While she had been anxiously awaiting Halloweens arrival she was a little less than excited to get her costume on that morning. I think part of it was that Ainsley didn't have hers on and she had some fear that no one else would have a costume on either. When we got to school she saw other kids had their costumes on too and she was so excited, probably a little relieved too. She wasn't to sure about wearing her cape but apparently once at school she saw all these other costumes and was then inspired to put it on.

Here she is in all of her glory, cape and all! When she first came out she started wondering the wrong way, which cause everyone following her to go the wrong way. Poor Miss Michaels had to round them back-up and get them going in the right direction. Like watching a child chase a butterfly with Kaylee. She was more into everything around her rather than paying attention to what she should be doing.

All of the children getting ready to sing some spooktacular songs!
After school it was time to go up to Grandma and Grandpa Duffy's for Trick-or-Treating. This was our other first this year. Years passed we had always just gone to grandparent houses and then home. It has always been in the middle of the week which would equal a late night and when we would have to get up the next day it didn't seem worth it to me, as they were so young they wouldn't know the difference (zip it Melissa and Stefanie!-I know I'm a bad mom). Plus the grandparents are like a mini-Christmas on Halloween so it is way better then a mini-snickers. Since Kaylee was older this year and it was on a Friday we thought we would do it up right. We decided to go up do the big EP because it's a smaller town, we have family that lives there, and we could see the cousins.

Here are Kaylee and Ainsley with their cousins before we set out to trick-or-treat.

Here we are walking up to Uncle Matt's house. Who is that masked person? It's BATMAN!

Daddy following behind with Ainsley. She really enjoyed herself. She had her trick-or-treat bag but I didn't take her up to every house with Kaylee and Skyeler, however a lot of the houses we went to had "grandparent" type people their and the always sweetly insisted Ainsley get candy too. Some even felt Mom and Dad needed some. Very sweet.

Grandpa and Grandma Duffy got all the grandkids PJ's for Halloween and Kaylee got Batman one's that even light-up! She wore them to bed and almost the entire next day. We went to Brad's parents that Saturday for some more Halloween fun, and she opted to wear these instead of her costume. Who could blame her I am sure they were more comfortable. Fortunately Brad's parents got them PJ's too. So we gave them a bath there after dinner and I was able to get Kaylee to put on her other new PJ's. The Batmans have been washed.

Overall it was a fun Halloween with all the many activities and trick-or-treat spots. Kaylee was really ready to be done after an hour. So Brad drove the van with the girls while Skyeler and I hit a few more houses. We had one final stop to Miss Julie's, their tumbling teacher, which they both got a kick out of. She had special treats for them. It was cute. I have to say I overheard many parents say their kids were ready to be done, or I would hear the kids come back and ask if they could go home. For the most part they were younger kids, but it was rather amusing. We went back to my dad's and had chili and jack-o-lantern shaped pizza and of course dug in to our candy!

Fall Fun

Fall is in full swing and what a nice fall it has been. Despite my allergies being at their worst in the fall I have to say it's my favorite season! I love seeing the colors change and doing all of the fun activities that fall brings. I thought I would share some of the things we have been up to.

We made some candy apples. Here is Ainsley trying to eat the Carmel's that Kaylee had unwrapped.

Ainsley intently watching Kaylee, secretly planning how to get more Carmel's.

Kaylee hard at work. She unwrapped every Carmel in the bag. She is really into cooking right now and is willing to do any task!

Another fun fall activity is to jump in the leaves. Brad made this pile for them in the backyard. I love that we have mature trees that produce a lot of leaves and a big yard to make a big pile in. I also love that Brad got a leaf blower for his birthday so it makes making the pile easier.

Ainsley getting in on the fun of the leaves.

Here we buried Kaylee in the leaves and just her little face was sticking out. Daddy and his girls playing in the leaves. We also took a trip to the Apple Blossom Farm. It somewhat surprises me that we had better choices of places to go for pumpkin/apple farms when we lived in Chicago. I would think it would be opposite. We had not been here before so we went with Brad's mom and sister one weekend.

The girls walking around checking out the play area and animal cages.

Kaylee with her Aunt Kristin going down the big slide.

Taking a hayride out to the pumpkin patch.
This is one of my favorite photos. As we were waiting on the hay rack to come back and get us Ainsley went over and sat on the pumpkin.

I was trying to get a nice fall, outdoor photo of the girls. The sun was pretty bright and they were more interested in exploring then sitting for a photo.

Kaylee opted to sit on a pumpkin for a photo. I think this might have been where Ainsley got the idea from (referencing the above photo). Notice Kaylee's purse she's holding. She carried this the whole time and when we got out to the pumpkin patch she was more interested in getting small gourds and putting them in there. I have to say it makes it much easier to carry that way. Kaylee and I also had to take a walk to the back of the pumpkin patch as nature called and we weren't getting picked-up for another 10 minutes. Everyone has to learn the fine art of going to the bathroom outside.

This is a photo of Ainsley modeling one of the hats my friend Stef is selling with her hair products. I attached one of the flowers we had from her as well. You can clip different things on their to change it however you would like. I love them! Stef is slowly setting-up her website but feel free to view her Picasa site for now.We went out to Miller Park last weekend to help Stef get some photos for her website. Before everyone got their I took this photo of Kaylee. I love the bright colors on the trees in the back too.
Hope everyone has been enjoying their fall as much as we have. Hard to believe the cold weather will be here before we know it. I heard on the radio today that there are only 55 more days this year. WOW!!!

Ainsley

We went to the doctor's on Monday for Ainsley's 18 mos appointment. She has graduated to standing on the big scale now! Here's her stats:

Weight-21 lbs 4 oz (10%)

Height-32 inches (60%)

Head-I don't remember exactly what it was, I'll have to go back and look in my notebook, it was somewhere in the middle, so she's proportionate.

Not a huge gain, 1 pound, but still a gain and we will take it! She's now in double digits for her weight percent as well. Since she's consistently gaining the doctor was happy. Dr. Rosa said that she looks great and is very sharp. We will continue to do the vitamin, whole milk twice a day and then Pediasure or Boost (I think that's what it's called) once or twice a week. As long as she stays healthy we don't have to go back until she is 2. She got her finger pricked and didn't even flinch. Kaylee was there too. She was helping the nurse and doctors. Kaylee was trying to help instruct Ainsley on what to do. Isn't that always the way? The one who is less cooperative at times is always the first to tell everyone else what they should be doing. Both girls got flu shots. They did pretty well with them. Kaylee fought getting it, but once I got a good grip on her, which gets harder to do, she was fine. But with her there has to be some type of drama. I think Ainsley was more upset that Kaylee was upset then having the shot itself. We went to McDonald's and got juice boxes after so all was right with the world again!

Remodel!!!

My dear husband is very talented and really good at pretty much anything he does, with the exception of bowling. While this is frustrating at times it definitely comes in handy when we are doing work around the house. I am not allowed to use tools, which is probably good because it would end up being more work. I can't say enough about how hard he worked at getting all of this done. I also say a big "Thanks" to my father-n-law who also lent a hand. It turned out great and it's so nice to have it done! Many of you have already seen it but for those that haven't here are the photos, the before followed by the after. Drum roll please............

Downstairs Bathroom before:

A few photos of Kaylee assisting Daddy. This is one of my favorites. He was SO appreciative of the help. Actually he was a really good sport about it and enjoys having her do things with him. She even has her own tools.

The After:

The Living Room before:

The after:

The Dining Room before:

The after:

After shots of the kitchen. I didn't have very good before ones specifically for this, but I'm sure in some of the photos from my previous post you could see the before.