A Brief Glimpse of Fall

I will go back and finish July, August and the beginning of September eventually since we had some good trips in there; however, today I'm going to skip ahead quickly to the end of September. 

We had some pretty chilly weather for 5-6 days, making everyone here think that warmer weather had left us.  So, I scrambled for fall attire, and with kids, I'm learning that this means:  it's time to go shopping.  Since they grow so stinkin' much every season, you basically have to purchase an entire wardrobe each time the weather changes.  And forget about buying it the year before at the end of the season on clearance.  I've gotten burned too many times on that stunt when it turns out that they don't actually fit into what I bought the year before.  So, for now, I buy in the moment for the current season. 

Here are a few photos from this fall's shopping spree.  These outfits just turned out SO cute that I couldn't resist going to get the camera.  Enjoy!

More on our July Disney Trip

You know I am WAY behind on this blog when it's October and I'm still sharing photos from our July Disney trip (especially given the fact that we've since been on a Disney Cruise and more days at the Magic Kingdom).  So much to share...when will I ever catch up?  I'm trying.  Here are some more photos from July.  It was HOT!  Grandma and MeeMaw on the People Mover with the girls.

Oh, the People Mover...so scary!  :-)  Not at all...I have no idea what she was doing.

On the Tea Cups...probably their second favorite ride other than It's A Small World.  And they're at an age where they are very self aware of what they do and do not like.  Frankly, there are probably on 7-8 rides that they are "willing" to go on right now, so we do Tea Cups and Small World several times in one day.

More an awesome picture of the castle than an awesome picture of the girls, huh?  It was really pretty though.

More Disney

Ok, so I had just photos the last post.  Now for some commentary.  After the girls were well, we resumed potty training.  We had started in March only to be de-railed.  So, FIRST chance I got, I started again.  I have to say, honestly, part of me feels like a failure that I have three year olds that aren't potty trained.  It was time, which was why I started in March.  I was so discouraged that I had to stop.

We picked back up a few days before the long drive down to Orlando...literally only 3-4 days prior.  So, I wasn't sure how I wanted to handle the drive down.  I didn't want to resort back to diapers and send the wrong message, but with only a few days under our belt, I wasn't ready for panties.  One or more accidents early on with many, many hours to go wouldn't have been good.  We did pull ups.  Good compromise.  And we did portable potties in the back of the SUV.  So, the girls knew to tell us when they needed to go from the few prior days of training, so I was counting on that on the way down.  Sure enough, they did!  We made it ALL THE WAY TO ORLANDO in the same pull ups we left Atlanta in.  What I haven't told you....we stopped THIRTEEN TIMES!!!!  Two of those stops had nothing to do with potty, breakfast and lunch.  And there may have been a gas stop in there.  But, there were several false alarm stops from Kaitlyn.  None from Nicole; she meant business.  If she said she needed to go, she delivered.  The portable potties in the back were the only saving grace.  That meant that every stop didn't have to take 5-10 minutes and instead could be 1-2 minutes.  So, all in all, it still only took us maybe 8.5-9 hours to do a 7 hour drive.

We arrived and went to Downtown Disney to T-Rex for dinner the first night.  Those photos were the previous post.  The next morning, we woke up and went to Magic Kingdom.  And Nicole just didn't seem to be completely herself.  First clue:  she refused her chocolate milk!  What!  She never does that.

I, of course, had my plethera of medicinal crap with me.  I took her temperature, and I don't remember now, but it was above 100.  GREAT!  Why, oh why, can't our family EVER have one HEALTHY Disney trip?  Anyway, I asked Nicole if she still wanted to go see Mickey and she did.  And we did.  But she really wasn't herself the entire morning.  We always leave mid-day to go back for naps.  We did that again, and after nap, she seemed a bit better.  The open question was:  how long before this hits Kaitlyn too?

Here are some Magic Kingdom photos:

Not a whole lot of excitement yet...I blame Nicole not feeling well.  :-)  Think it rubbed off on Kaitlyn.

On It's A Small World...a bit of a smile.  That's the least I would expect on her FAVORITE ride.  And I mean Favorite by far.  In our March trip, we rode this three times in one day!!!!

On the Merry Go Round.

More to come later....

Disney Trip - July - Downtown Disney

Third Birthday Party

Got the girls to pose for a few quick shots in their cute birthday party outfits before we got changed into bathing suits and hit the water slide.  The dresses are a bit too big as you can see on Kaitlyn especially from the side in the second photo, but that's ok.  They can wear them again next summer.  :-)

Here is the big birthday extravaganza!!!  We rented a blow up water slide, and boy was it a hit!!!

Now, it's time to come inside for some cake!  Everyone sang Happy Birthday which was wonderful, and then it was time for the girls to blow out their candles.  Too bad some of the bigger boys (Carter and Nolan) thought they'd do it for them.  It was funny.  We had to light them again and let them try again.

The photos displayed behind the cake are their third birthday portraits that we had made.  They turned out SO cute.

The board the cake is sitting on says, "Princess Kaitlyn" on one corner, "Princess Nicole" on the other corner, and "Are 3!" across the bottom.  And the cake has three figurines on top of Belle (Beauty and the Beast), Cinderella and Aurora (Sleeping Beauty) on it that they got to keep and still "play" with.

And here's a good view of the side.  What fun!

Enjoying the tasty birthday cupcakes (or pup cakes as the girls still accidentally call them).

Ah...good times.  I have a video clip of the girls going down the water slide that I'm going to try to upload next time.  Stay tuned.

Birthday Party

We recently just had the girls' birthday party at the end of July.  It was postponed due to illness.  And I haven't updated or even mentioned this illness until now, but it was doozie!  The girls got a bacteria that we couldn't get rid of for almost THREE MONTHS.  On the outside, you would have never known they were sick (other than to change a diaper if you catch my drift).  And that is DEFINITELY something to be VERY thankful for.  On the inside though, we just couldn't kill this bacteria.  So, basically, the girls couldn't go to daycare for almost three months, which made Mike and I very thankful that they were only in part time daycare. 

I have often wondered what would have happened if they were in full time daycare and if we didn't have a flexible nanny who was able to pick up most of the slack.  It really could have resulted in either me or Mike losing our job.  Who knows?  Or a lot of imposing on family, which probably could have only carried us so far.  There were numerous doctor's appointments, and we finally ended up with a wonderful doctor.  It's past us now. 

The girls are healthy, and I hope they never get this bacteria again.  Most all of us carry this bacteria in our gut, but it just depends who it affects and who it doesn't. We were unlucky.  And antibiotic usage is what "wakes" it up, generally, if it's going to wake up.  The girls both had a sinus infection diagnosed on March 31st and started taking antibiotics for it.  Three months later, there we were cancelling their birthday party. 

So, anyway...back to the party.  We just had it, and let's just say it was worth the wait!  It was awesome!!!!  We rented one of those huge blow up things, but this wasn't a bouncer.  It blew up to be a huge water slide with a small pool at the bottom.  It was a BIG hit!  And we own a bounce house (not a commercial size one, but it's plenty for the kids), so we had that set up too.  It was supposed to rain that afternoon, which could have ruined the whole thing, but it only rained for about 5 minutes.  It wasn't a heavy rain, so some people didn't even go inside.  And that small rain shower actually turned out to be a blessing because it brought cloud cover with it for the rest of the evening, so the adults weren't roasting outside either.  It was actually quite nice and pleasant. 

I'll have photos for the next post.  Sorry...haven't downloaded them off the camera yet.  In the meantime, here are some other random summer photos that we have:

Various Summer Photos

At a kite festival in Centennial Olympic Park back in May.  They had about 4 or 5 bounce houses set up for free...for anyone to enjoy!  And boy did our girls enjoy them. 

Stopping for water....it was HOT and HUMID that day.  In Atlanta?  No way.  :-)

Another exciting day in May.  Eating fruit.  Why is that exciting?  Well, up until this BREAKTHROUGH day, our girls would only eat bananas and apples.  We had tried sporadically with other fruits.  Always with no luck.  Well, one day before dinner, they're begging me for any and every unhealthy treat.  I kept saying no and they would keep trying.  So, finally, I grabbed a "bucket" of fruit from the fridge and told them they could eat anything out of that bucket they wanted.  Anything at all.  To my surprise, they both started picking up fruit and eating it.  I was so excited that I grabbed the camera and called daddy.  What a day.  I truly think calling it a "bucket" and just letting them fish whatever they wanted out of there with their hands had a lot to do with it.  And that was it...now they love watermelon.  Cantelope and honeydew are still sometimes a challenge.  And recently, we got Kaitlyn to eat grapes.  Halleluia!

At the lake for their birthday weekend. 

Also at the lake for their birthday weekend...we went to see Toy Story 3.  That was their first movie in a real theater for full price.  Up until then, we had done dollar movies and generally would only make it for an hour or so.  They LOVE Toy Story and Toy Story 2, so we thought that this might be the real first opportunity for them to sit though an entire movie in a theater because they had a vested interest in the characters already.  Well, Nicole did pretty well.  Mike had to wrestle to keep Kaitlyn still for the last 30 minutes or so, but we all made it.

And finally, the actual night of their birthday back in Atlanta.  We went out to eat to celebrate and brought our own cake.