Merry Christmas to me!

I got my Christmas present early this year! Taylor gave me a new camera (a Canon Rebel) so that I would have it for the girls' 1st birthday and the holidays. I love it! The pictures are amazing! Today we had a little photo shoot for fun and here are some of my favorites. I will say it's quite hard to pose two curious little girls AND snap a picture before they move! But, I look forward to practicing a lot and playing dress up with the girls. Thanks, honey! What a great gift! Now invest in Hobby Lobby because we'll be buying lots of frames!

Sick and Tired

Well, we almost made it to the girls' first birthday without being sick. Almost! This past week MM started waking up in the middle of the night and we assumed it was teething. Then she started losing her appetite and was noticably clingy which is SO not her personality. Finally on Thursday she started running a low grade fever and pulling at her ear. Our pediatrician was out on Friday, so I took MM to Dr. Weiland and she said that MM's left ear has an infection. Taylor and I, Lanie, and Nana have all recently passed around a sinus infection that gave us all the same symptoms - a nasty cough, low fever, and nasty sinus. So, I figure it's just finally made its way to the girls. I thought Kennedy had escaped unscathed, but yesterday she started running a fever, too. Needless to say, I have no cute pictures to post of the weekend. We've been pretty much camped out in the house all weekend in our PJs doing lots of rocking, kissing, and regular partaking of medicine. Taylor did tackle painting the kitchen for me, though, and I did get to escape to Mistletoe for a little on Saturday. Have I mentioned lately what an awesome husband he is? I love, love, love the kitchen color and can't wait to paint some more (or assist Taylor, rather!). It was nice to get out and peruse the boutiques at Mistletoe even though I didn't walk away with much. Pretty low key weekend. Hopefully the girls will be back on top in time for pictures with Jeanelle this week for Christmas cards!

Update: Took the girls back to the doctor this morning. MM has the croup and got a decadron shot. Kennedy has an upper respiratory infection and got an antibiotic. Poor little babies! Hopefully we're on the road to recovery now.

Fall Festival

This has been a fun and busy weekend for everyone. I never realized how much goes on during Halloween until I had kids. It seems like everyone is going to a million festivals, field trips, parties and more. The girls are still too young to really enjoy much of it, but we still stayed pretty busy. I was in charge of our church's fall festival on Friday night. We had a bouncy house, games, candy, and lots of fun! The girls came for a little while but left with Lanie early so they could still make bedtime. They spent the night at Lanie and Pop's since we didn't leave until it was over and so we could sleep off all the hard work the next morning. That was SO needed and awesome. Yesterday we grocery shopped and caught up on football. Go State! Another SEC win! The girls dressed up as cheerleaders and welcomed our trick-or-treaters. I think they were confused why people were continuously knocking on our door. Today was church and a little afternoon shopping, followed by, you guessed it, more football! We did work in 2 photo shoots today - one after church and one in our fall outfits.

We've also been working on adding more table food in the girl's diets. This weekend they ate smashed up carrots, a cinnamon roll, and mashed potatoes! Now we need to work on breaking their new habit - spitting! They are both seeing how far they can push us when they're eating - they like to spit their food at us! It is SO hard to keep a straight face and tell them No!

Game Day

What a fun day! Today was our first family trip for game day in Starkville! We couldn't have asked for more perfect weather - 60s, perfectly cool, the sun was shining, the wind not blowing too much and everyone was ready for some football! We started the day with a trip to the Lodge and then stopped for some Shipley's donuts. Then we walked from our hotel to the tailgate - this is like a 30 minute hike! We set up our tailgate at our usual spot with the Thomases and crew and had a great day listening to the cowbells ring. The girls were SO well behaved. They had a great time watching some boys next to us throw the football and lots of people stopped to talk to us because the girls are so cute. They especially loved watching everyone ring their cowbells at the Florida Gators while they rode by on their way to the stadium. It was a great family day! I packed the girls up right before the game since it was a night game and we went back to the hotel while Taylor went to the game. The girls are sleeping off the excitement while I watch the disappointing loss on TV. Oh well, there's always next year, right?

Family photo...aren't those mums amazing?

My little bulldogs
MM crawled away while Kennedy was flirting with strangers

Tailgating is fun!

We love Starkville!

Jonathan thinks our girls are the best (and they are)!

Angelia made us pumpkin cookies

Chillin'

Angelia and MM

Too much excitement

The Jesus Book by Stephen Elkins and Illustrated by Claudine Gevry

The Jesus Book is a children's book that explains the Who, What, When, Where, Why, and How of Jesus's life. The Jesus Book introduces kids to the life, teaching, wonder, and amazing love of Jesus. The focus of the book is on Christ's life while here on Earth. I love how it presents Jesus as a man, a friend, and a Savior. One of the most popular children questions is "Why"? There is a whole section in this book dedicated to the "Why" questions children ask about Jesus. I also love that all of the questions also contain a reference to scripture in their answer. All of our answers should come from scripture!

The layout of this book is simplified and thorough. It is illustrated beautifully, especially with detailed maps that young children can understand. The book show the specific places where Jesus spent his days on Earth and allows children to retrace his footsteps. The "When" section of this book is also unique by answering questions about when key events happened in correlation to each other. There is a timeline that lays out the order of history for children to understand when things happened in Jesus's life.

The book is also accompanied by a wonderful CD that has some of my all time favorites. It is a glorious blend of great hymns such as Blessed Assurance along with popular kids songs from my past such as Deep and Wide. Some songs you just want to make sure are implanted in your kid's life and this CD covers a good bit of them.

Overall, this is a fantastic book in presenting Jesus to young children. I look forward to sharing it with my children in the years to come!

On the Move

Staycation Part 2

Fall means fair! The second part of the week we decided to take the girls to the fair. We got a break from the rain, but it was HOT so we didn't last too long. The girls got to smell the smells and take in some of the lights while we got to eat some fried goodness.

Sweet sisters looking out the window

Who left these babies at the fair?

Seriously, what does one do with a stuffed banana?

Taylor and his dream car...'76 Corvette

Chillin' out in the AC