Little Gym

Today was the last class for this semester of Little Gym. The girls really enjoy LG. Clearly they mostly just run around and such, but that's part of what they love. Face it...at home, they can't just run around and eeeekkkk, etc. (If we had that bigger house I'm after with a basement for a playroom, well, that would be another story....aaaaahhhh....for now I'll just dream.) Anyway, they have actually learned a few things though. They know how to forward roll. They can walk on a balance beam (assisted of course). And this is their big chance for interaction with other kids which I love. And to continue along those lines, we've started having Joanna take them to story time twice per week at our local libraries. Anyway, since today was the final class, they call it "show" day. I use the term "show" VERY loosely. It basically just meant that you could bring your cameras and that they got a medal at the end.

Here are some shots from today's class:

Nicole with the bells at the beginning of class.

Kaitlyn with the bells. They really love these bells too. When it's time to put them away, they just keep shakin'.

Nicole with some LG friends.

Kaitlyn climbing on something. Finally a place where I'm allowed to climb and it's encouaraged mom. :-)


Holy cow. Can you imagine how excited I was to actually snap a photo of them both doing what I wanted them to do at the same time!!!! (That goodness for that quick shutter speed camera that I got last Christmas.) Look at them hang on the bars. Woo Hoo.

Kaitlyn getting her medal.

Nicole getting her medal.

Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving photos first and a few others from November. Enjoy!!

Kaitlyn outside on Thanksgiving day. Cute coat!!! They have matching hats too. What a good find Mommy.

Nicole in her cute coat as well. And notice that Nature Nicole is back...picking up all the fallen leaves. Maybe we won't need to rake in our yard. HA! :-)

Daddy and the girls with Great Grandma and Great Grandpa.

Gamma showing the girls and cousin Mackenzie how to work the horn on Great Grandpa's wheelchair. What fun!

PaPa and all his Grandkids. Definitely something to be thankful for.

Thanksgiving evening - Kaitlyn chillin' with her cousin Brett.

Other random November photos below:

Nicole clapping in the tub.

Kaitlyn smiling as usual for the camera.

Daddy was trying to teach Nicole to "cover her ears." I think she got that message. :-)

Jeana the human jungle gym. The only one missing is Minnie. Can you blame her? I think she runs the other direction almost every time our kids enter a room. Poor pups....

In the process of gearing up for Christmas (which will involve moving a few pieces of furniture), we freed up the space in front of this chair which was previously blocked by toys, etc. You'd think we just got them a new toy. They can't stop climbing on this chair now.

See what I mean. So cute. And see Nicole with our car keys...another favorite "toy" around our house. Truly, Mike and I don't know why we even purchase toys. Remote controls, the phone and car keys are by far the favorites around our house. :-)

Going to see Santa tonight, so maybe a new picture posting in the next day or so.

Halloween

Yeah, finally the Halloween post. There are photos of the pumpkin patch that we visited, the church we visited to actually buy our pumpkin (the ones that the pumpkin patch were a bit on the expensive side), and our neighborhood's Halloween parade. There are no photos of actual Halloween night because my mom took them trick or treating with their cousins since Mike and I were in Florida for a funeral. If I were a betting woman, I'd say Ceylese probably took some photos though. :-)

On the hayride.

Pickin' out pumpkins with DaDa.

At the church buying a reasonably priced pumpkin, sitting on a bail of hay.

Nicole wandering around.

Kaitlyn stopping to smile pretty for the camera. She's such a ham for the camera.

The church had this nice photo opp. Cute.

Kaitlyn in costume for the Second Annual Stoneybrook Halloween Parade.

Nicole in costume for the parade.

Parading down to the clubhouse.

Pictures!!!

This isn't the post I promised, but at least it's a post with photos. I promised Halloween, and I still haven't had a chance to download the pictures from my camera. Maybe later today...my work deadlines ended yesterday so I finally have a chance to catch up on my personal life.

Anyway, we had our holiday photos taken on Saturday. Yes, that early!!! Portrait Innovations is crazy in December as we learned last year (having had to reschedule our initial appt for another day since they were almost TWO HOURS behind schedule). Let me tell you, early November isn't that much better. This was only the second weekend that they had their holiday backdrop available, and it was already a zoo. Luckily Mike and I have learned that you don't go to Portrait Innovations on a weekend without two cars. As soon as the shoot is over, Mike goes home with the kids and I stay to pick out the pictures, get them printed and pay which can take up to another hour. And that my friends is why we take two cars. No way Kaitlyn and Nicole would have been "happy" just hanging out in a photo studio for another hour.

Since they give me a CD with my shoot, no downloading required!!! An easy picture post. Yippie. Here are a few. Oh, and don't you just love the cute outfits I picked. I found them at Children's Place. You can't see Nicole's skirt really well in any of these photos, but the outfits are the inverse of each other. Dressing girls is the best!



Above: The whole time, Kaitlyn kept putting her hands up to her face, which we of course didn't want. But then we wouldn't have ended up with this adorable photo!!! How cute!

Above: Hard to get a smile out of Nicole when she sees a camera. She smiles plenty in person. There's just something about the camera, but I think this was a pretty cute expression.

Above: We didn't order this one since the finger is in the way. It could be cropped, but then the quality would go down. It was just such a cute picture though, so I wanted to at least put it on the blog.

Above: And there's our Nicole again...not smiling. That's so "her" when it comes time for pictures though, so they're still cute pictures in my eyes.

Coming Soon...

...a post!!! I promise. Hopefully I can upload some photos during lunch. I've been SO busy at work with quarter end and our press release and 10Q. Then, on top of that, Mike's step father passed away suddenly on Monday, October 27th. He immediately went to Florida to be with his mom, and I made it down on Friday for the service only to turn right back around on Saturday to come home. Ordinarily my boss would have been really understanding and I probably could have taken more time to be with Mike and his mom; however, his dad passed away in his sleep Tuesday morning. So, basically the only two people at my company who do the quarterly SEC reporting both had family tragedies. Instead of him covering for me, it kind of turned out the opposite. I worked really hard last week to cover his absence but was still able to take one day to be with Mike's family where I needed to be.

Anyway, that's a long story for something that was supposed to be short....a post is on the way.

Pumpkins and Doctors

We've had a lot of both lately.

First, lots and lots of pumpkins at Berry Patch Farms. We went there on Saturday with my mom, Ceylese, her mom, Brad, Mackenzie and Blake. It was a perfect fall day and the sun was shining. Good times. We did Burt's Farm last year and I guess the feedback is that we'd rather go back to Burt's next year, but Berry Patch was just fine for this year. And who am I kidding, Kaitlyn and Nicole had absolutely no idea what was going on. They just enjoy running around outside. I'll have photos to post tomorrow hopefully (have to get them off the camera).

Second, the doctors. As I mentioned, we were advised to see both an orthapedist for Kaitlyn's funny walking and a speech therapy exam for both girls not talking. Kaitlyn's walking appt was Friday. What a disaster. Apparently they have 3 Atlanta office locations and I showed up at the wrong one, thus missing my appt with the correct doctor. Nice of them to tell me that there are three offices and that I made my appt for the one in Roswell. Why would a family in Mableton want to drive all the way to Roswell for an appt? I would have if this was "the guy" to see obviously, but they need to tell me that. Anyway, so at the office I thought I was supposed to be at, they were able to get me an appt later in the day...TWO HOURS later. So, we missed afternoon nap because of the mix up and I now had two hours to kill. Whatever.

Anyway, Kaitlyn is fine. They think that she'll grow out of this. He said plenty of first time walkers walk funny because they don't know the difference. Eventually they figure it out. Good news.

And then, the speech evaluation is set for a week from today. Again, I'm hoping that it turns out to be nothing. I know two people with children with autism. From what I gather from their stories and having read up on autism, I'd really be surprised if that's the diagnosis. Anything is possible though and we'll face that challenge if that's what it is. It could be aprexia (sp?) which is a fancy word for severe speech delay. I have no idea what a diagnosis like that means for them? Therapy, just read to them more, talk to them all the time??? No clue. Or it could be that they're just taking their time. Nicole is actually coming around, and I'm even seeing encouraging signs from Kaitlyn. After all, they both babble constantly. It just doesn't come out as purposeful words. We'll see.

Yes, We Went Again!

Sorry for yet another Six Flags post. I just really don't have any other recent pictures to put up on the blog, so it seems that's all I have to talk about again.

Oh wait, on a side note, I got the girls their Halloween costumes. Nicole is going to be a lion. I think I told you before that she can roar if you ask her what a lion says. So, this costume was perfect. Never mind the fact that she seems to have quit roaring. Don't know why either? It's just as if she stopped one day. Well, we're working on getting it going again before Halloween. And Kaitlyn is going to be a horse. Again, a strategic choice because we've taught her to make a noise like a horse. The noise is pretty much the sticking your tongue betweeen your lips and blowing noise (not a Neeeaaahhh). It's still cute. So, that's why I picked what I picked. Cute, cute, cute.

Below: Just a reminder of how cute and adorable they were last year (Nicole then Kaitlyn):

Back to Six Flags: This time our Six Flags trip was an action packed, friend packed experience. Jeana came with Jaden and Chandler, and Brad and Ceylese brought Mackenzie. Ceylese had her own camera, so sadly, I don't have any pictures of them. I do, however, have a few of Jeana and the boys as well as some of Kaitlyn and Nicole.

We really had a great time. Those of you who think the twins are just way too young for Six Flags probably haven't been there in a while. There are several kids rides. Granted, a child Jaden's age can do even more, but there is still stuff for the little ones to do. And with school back in session, the lines are minimal (if at all). I completely agree that Kaitlyn and Nicole would lose it and not even be able to stand in a 20-30 minute line, so that's why we didn't do this in the middle of summer. Plus, with long lines, the money isn't worth it to ride only a few things. But again, this time of year, we definitely got our money's worth.

Enjoy the photos.

And finally, just a random photo of Kaitlyn pushing around her doll stroller. She really LOVES to do this.

David and Goliath

The girls had their 15 month checkup today.

**Nicole is 90/90/90 (height, weight and head).

**Kaitlyn is 45/20/60 (height, weight and head).

Between Kaitlyn (David) and Nicole (Goliath) there is a whopping:

-FIVE POUND difference - 20lb 15oz versus 26lb even, and a
-TWO INCH difference - 30 inches versus 32 inches.

WOW!!!!!!!!!!!!! I'll say it again...WOW!!!!! It's funny to know that these two girls are twins and both have DNA from the same parents, yet they are so different. Of course in time, these differences could obviously moderate, but it sure is obvious right now that they are quite different in size.

Also, Kaitlyn walks funny and we're being sent to have an evaluation of her hip. We used to think it was her foot, but after further examination of her walking over the past several weeks, it's almost like she turns her hip out which makes it look like she's dragging her leg. Guess we'll see whenever we get to have that appointment. Something tells me that it's going to take WEEKS to get into see a doctor like this. Maybe I'll be wrong and pleasantly surprised.

Lastly, they both really only have one word still - DaDa. They still make a few animal sounds if you ask them, but it's somewhat sporadic. So, since the state has a free program to have someone come to your house and just do an evaluation, the doctor said why not. She's a firm believer that you can never go wrong with early intervention. If it turns out to be nothing (which she thinks it is), then great. If it turns out to be something, then we've caught it early.

I'll keep you posted.

What Haven't We Done Lately?

Not much!!! We're only 1/2 way through September, and the girls have already had such a busy month.
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We've been to the lake for Labor Day. And the photos we have are from a walk across the dam to let water out of the lake as needed. What a view!

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We've been to Centennial Park to walk around and play (on the grass and on a playground). Then, we've been to CNN Center for some cool air. You'll notice in the park pictures that their little faces were getting pretty red. HOTLANTA, that's right!!!!

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We've been to Little Gym. We do that weekly, but hey, it still counts as an activity. You'll notice the LG influence in several of the pictures I've chosen for this blog entry. At LG, they have learned how to forward roll. Well, it's quite hysterical (and possibly embarrassing, but how could any mom be embarrassed by her kids...love them). It doesn't matter where we are...they will just stop and bend over and "tuck their heads" (that's the famous line we use when we forward roll...tuck your head). They can't complete the roll on their own. I guess they don't know how to propel their feet over their heads yet, so they just end up standing there with their heads toward the floor in a pike position, where ever we are. Too cute and too funny! They both do it too.

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We've been to Sesame Street LIVE! That was a fun one. And it brought about a second trip to CNN Center in only 5 days. Wow! They're downtown pros at this point. :-) They definitely enjoyed this, decked out in their new Elmo shirts that were purchased just for this occassion. And just when it was was looking as if all hope may have been lost due to a wiggly Kaitlyn, they called for intermission. PERFECT! They got to get out of the seats and walk around, thus mentally preparing for the second half. And it wasn't crowded to begin with, and many left at intermission. So, there was a bit more room for the second half. They both applauded at times. I don't know if they were expressing their appreciation or just applauding when they saw others do it, but it was cute. Good times. And up past their bedtime. NO PROBLEM! YEAH!
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We've had our second trip to Six Flags.

Katilyn getting ready to forward roll just outside the area for the Merry Go Round.

Both getting ready to forward roll in Thomas Town.
Nature Nicole with her stick.

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We've been to a neighborhood playground in Mableton a few times. What they like most about the playground isn't the actual playground (although they do love the swings). The parking lot is in a wooded area, so it looks like they blow the leaves to the curb fairly regularly. They both loved stomping on the leaves, listening to them crunch. And of course my nature lover Nicole would look for just the right leaf to pick up and carry around. :-) You'll notice in a lot of shots (where ever we are) that she'll probably have a leaf or a stick in her hand - see above. She loves them!

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We've been to our friend Nolan's birthday party (where Nicole fussed from the inside of the screened in porch because she wanted to get back outside)!

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Here's a borning one...we've been to the doctor since we both got colds around Labor Day that turned into coughs. And it turns out that Nicole had a mild ear infection in both ears. So, that marks our first and second ear infections for either one of them. Not bad to have made it 15 months. And it didn't and doesn't even seem to bother her. The doctors told us they were so mild and since she wasn't miserable that we didn't even have to go with an antibiotic unless we wanted to. We opted for the medicine though.
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And we've had both the first UGA game and Falcons game of the season. They didn't go to the games or anything crazy like that, but they dressed for the occassion. :-)

What a month, and we've still got a ways to go. Who knows what the rest of September holds for the Barbree Family? Oh, and there are WAY too many pictures to capture all of these fun events thus far. I can't possibly put them all on the blog. Here's a link to a shared album in Snapfish if you want to see some more (coming soon...not finished with it yet...check back later).