Bathtime Fun

Captain Bubble Beard

Another Will Made of Iron

Grace is taking ballet on Mondays from 5:30-6:30pm. Lyla has to sit in the waiting area with me during this hour. She's done really great, mainly because there is a whole toy box for kids to play with and a snack bar! The first picture is of Lyla eating her apple from the snack bar last Monday. After she finished her apple and got tired of the toys she started trying to jump on the furniture in the waiting room though. There is even a sign telling parents not to let their children do this! I told her to stop and explained that it will mess up the furniture. I even pointed out the sign to her and read it to her. She tried it again. I stopped her again. When she tried it a third time I looked her in the eye and told her that we will not be able to stay if she decides to continue.

Me: "Do you want to stay and play with toys or wait in the van for Grace?"
Lyla: "Stay and play with toys"
Me: "Then you need to decide to stay off of the furniture. What do you want to do?"
Lyla: "Stay and play"

What did she do next? She looked right at me and jumped from one couch to the other! The 2nd picture is of her screaming in her carseat for the last 10 minutes of Grace's ballet class! So fun!

Daddy's Chain Gang

I was in the kitchen fixing dinner and Lyla came running in and went straight to her playroom. She went running back out seconds later with her safety goggles from her toy tool bench. Eric came to the door and said to get the camera and come outside. This is what I found. Eric was digging small trenches to lay railroad ties to go around the swing set in our new backyard and the girls had gotten into the action. Lyla, in her pajamas, got serious about it and decided she needed her goggles! They were serious about their work. It was pretty cute!

Easter Morning

My pictures from Easter morning are NOT good! I was so disappointed. The girls were decked out in their fancy dresses, hats and gloves but I could not get a good shot. We were running late for church, of course, so I didn't have time to change locations and the lighting on the piano bench was awful as you can tell. They were excited about their Easter baskets of goodies though. Unfortunately, the morning was quite stressful though. After running late and not being able to get a good picture of my beautiful girls, we had a complete meltdown at church in the middle of the aisle on the most crowded Sunday morning of the year!

I'm only writing this story so that I can remember the stressful times when my girls ask me when they have kids if I remember how hard having kids is. My mom always says she doesn't remember having the same problems with me and my sisters that I have with my girls. I think she's just forgotten. So, this story is so I don't forget.

After we finally got to church, and my blood pressure was already high, we found a pew in the rapidly filling auditorium. For some reason Grace did not like the seat we chose. I don't know if it was because it was in a different section than we usually sit, but she was not pleased. She has a will made of iron, so she decided to protest right then and there. She refused to enter the pew to sit. She just stood in the aisle and kept trying to argue us into moving. Well, within about 5 minutes the place was packed and we couldn't have moved even if we wanted to. She did not accept that though. When she realized we weren't moving, and church started to begin, she began crying! Of course, they usually pray pretty close to the beginning so it got really quiet and she was getting really loud. She finally came into our pew but she was not settling down. I finally had to take her and Lyla out. I was taking Lyla to the nursery to play and Grace out just to get her settled down. We went to the bathroom that was right beside the nursery. Grace's fit got louder while in the bathroom. (I will let myself forget the details of our time in the bathroom.) By the time I got Lyla to her nursery, the nursery workers were snickering at me. Luckily, I knew them and didn't feel too bad. They assured me they have been in my position many times with their own daughter. By the time I got back into church it was just about over and I left feeling like I needed to stay for 2nd service....by myself!

Easter at the Ezell's - a Harpeth Hills tradition

Every year at Harpeth Hills church of Christ the Ezell family hosts an Easter egg hunt at their beautiful home for all preschool families at church. The children LOVE it mainly because the Ezells basically have a full blown park in their yard. They have a pirate ship with a sand pit, a swing set, a 2-story fort, an adorable little girl's playhouse, plus a hammock and a couple little ponds as well. It is just amazing! Anyway, these are my pictures from that morning at the Ezell's home. I didn't get many pics of them playing b/c they were moving too fast from one thing to another! I think I captured a few good ones though. The girls are having a hard time giving the camera a natural smile when asked to though. ha ha For those that don't know G and L too well, their smiles in some of these pictures just don't do them justice. ha ha

Lyla was funny during the hunt though. She sat her bucket down and would walk around and pick up an arm full of eggs and bring them back to the bucket. The bucket, by the way, is from Christmas. Notice it is green and red? I had an Easter bucket for her but she wanted the one with her name on it. I'm glad I didn't waste $20 bucks on some fancy basket!

All Dressed Up

Grace loves to get dressed up! This is a picture of her in her Easter attire on Saturday. She just couldn't wait to wear it. I think she wore her dress about 5 times before Easter ever arrived. Papoo (my dad) is posing with her. She was so proud of all her dressy things. It was hard to convince her that she shouldn't ride her bike, play with the new dog, and swing with her clean, Easter clothes and shoes on. She would wear this every day if she could.

Meet Sophie!

This is Sophie! My mom and dad came to visit last weekend and brought their new puppy, a golden retriever. The girls were so excited to pet and hold a puppy. As you can see from the pictures above, G tried to force Sophie to be her baby. Sophie was a good sport by sitting in the doll bed and riding in the doll stroller for a little while.