Chuck E. Cheese

We've had a pretty uneventful week, but I thought I'd write a little blog about taking the girls to Chuck E. Cheese the other day.  Stephen was in Dallas, and I knew I'd have the girls all day (and night) to myself, so I thought we'd go on a little adventure Tuesday morning. 

We got to Chuck E. Cheese right when it opened at 9 AM, and we had the whole place to ourselves!  We bought 40 tokens, which lasted right about an hour (which was great timing, because 3 camp groups came in at 10 AM).  Let me tell you, that was $10 very well spent.  The girls had a great time... Taylor didn't understand the concept of most games that weren't allowed to be riden on, but she had fun running around and looking at the lights.

Probably the only horse Sydney will come close to... ever!

She's not so sure...

We hit some bonus and won 80 tickets.

Sydney was quite excited.



Taylor was so worn out she took a 2 hour nap when we got home.  Plus, the toys they got from trading in their tickets kept them entertained a lot of the day.  And, we had a good time!  A win for everybody.

4th Weekend

We spent the weekend up at the mountain house, to celebrate the 4th of July!  This is a fun weekend when everyone and their brother (literally) come up to their family's cabins.  My whole family was there, including my brother and his fam from Nashville.  We enjoyed the lake, got some sun, read some books, enjoyed the picnic/squaredance, and had lots of family time.  Sydney and her cousin, Olivia (who turned 4 this past week) had a blast swimming together, playing dress up, running around the house, and being "best friends".  We got to celebrate Olivia's birthday this weekend with a fun b-day party!

I wasn't great about taking pictures this weekend, but here are a few that I took:

Taylor getting ready for some lake time.

Olivia putting ice down Grandmom's shirt... teehee... though she didn't really mind because it was HOT!

Sydney with Grandmom's glasses.  Such an intellectual.

Uncle Bill and Taylor.

Taylor checking out the squaredancing madness.

Me and Taylor. 

A relaxing morning walk... a view of the river.

It's so beautiful up there!

Earning it

This summer, Stephen and I have started Sydney with a "chore chart".  We wanted to teach her responsibility and about the rewards/costs that occur if you don't do what you're supposed to do.

So, what chores can a 3 year-old be responsible for?  Laundry?  Naah.  Unloading the dishes?  Probably not.  We came up with 5 basic things that we wanted Sydney to do on a daily basis.  I made a chart with coordinating pictures to represent each chore.  At the end of each day, she gets a sticker next to the picture for doing the chore.  Then, she gets paid one nickel for each thing she does.  A potential $.25 per day investment... something I can handle.

Her chores are:
1.  Cleaning up the toys downstairs.
2.  Taking her plate/cup/silverware to the sink after every meal.
3.  Cleaning up her room.
4.  Being nice to her sister.
5.  Not sucking her thumb.

Ok, that last one isn't exactly a chore, per se, but it's been a nice addition to the list. :)

These are her first couple of chore charts:

Pretty good overall, minus the thumb-sucking and the occasional not being nice to her sister.  Things have improved in the thumb-sucking department with the removal of Monkey... yes, that's right... Stephen has banned Sydney from Monkey and she has been surprisingly okay with it.  As Sydney says, Monkey "makes her suck her thumb" and sometimes even "puts her thumb in her mouth" himself.  Bad Monkey. 

It's been a pretty cool thing to do... Sydney loves putting her nickels in her piggy bank, which has gotten to be ridiculously heavy.  We finally decided to cash it in, and, although there was a bunch of coins/dollar bills in there from before the whole chore thing got started, there was a total of a little over $20!

We ventured to Walmart to spend the money.  After spending $2 in the Walmart game room...

...and after walking the aisles and asking the price on nearly every item in the toy department, this is what she decided on:

She spent right at $20 total!

I love not having to clean up after the girls downstairs or in Sydney's room.  Cha-ching!

Photography Session

I took the girls to do a photography session a couple of weeks ago.  The photographer (she's the one who does the girls' daycare photos, and she happens to go to our church) sent me the link to all the photos today.  I love them!  Taylor was so not a happy camper for the first half of the session, but some cereal and a brief drive seemed to make her happier.  And, it's amazing how Taylor doesn't look as upset as she was (I'm talking, full-out tantrum, rolling around on the grass and everything).

If you want to check them out, here's the link! http://eseephotography.photobiz.com/cart/  The password is sisters.

Stephen and I already met with the photographer and picked out the ones we're going to order.  My favorite one is IMG_2119.  I also love IMG_1950, IMG_2002, and IMG_2133.  We ordered about 8 different poses... it was hard to decide!

Happy Fourth!

Happy 4th of July!!

We had a fun day, just with the K-Bash clan.  All our friends/neighbors/family were out of town, so we decided to make it a fun-filled family day. 

We started off by going to the parade in downtown Loganville.  We didn't really know what to expect, but it definitely exceeded anything I would have imagined!  The paper said it started at 9:30 at an elementary school and would end up downtown at 9:50, so I was thinking it would be some low-key, few-floats kind of parade.  An hour and a half later, we are dragging two grouchy girls away from the parade.  It was definitely a cool family experience- we saw motorcycles, policemen, fire trucks, ambulances, tractors, hot-rod cars, old-timey cars, a helicopter flyover, high school marching bands, dance teams, pageant winners, congressmen, and more!

The rest of the day, we played, both inside and outside (I swear, I can't handle this heat!).  Stephen went to the driving range, I got some stuff done around the house.  We grilled hamburgers and made brownies for dinner.  Bathtime was definitely a necessity- for all of us- and we hung out in Sydney's bed, talking and hanging out.  A great end to a good (and long!) day.  I hope I can keep my eyes open past about 8:30.

Here are some pics!

Comparison

Can you tell what is probably my favorite maternity outfit to wear? 

14 weeks

20.5 weeks

26.5 weeks

Yowzas!

19 Months!

Taylor is 19 months old!

7-1-2012

This month's accomplishments include:

• Moving from the high chair to the booster seat at home!
• Lots of new words: "juice", "ewwww!", "hot", "vitamin", "picture", "cheese" (in reference to the actual food, not just for pictures), "hat", "alright", "outside" (her favorite place to be!), "Sissy" (for Sydney).
• Singing "Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star" (her own version).
• She'll hold the phone up to her ear and say, " 'o?"
• Taylor said her first "sentences"- "Hold joo, Daddy!" and "Anoo Daddy!" ("I want Daddy!") (Can you tell who is chopped liver in the family?)
• She is Miss Manners- she says "thank you" (or "dey doo") after anything is given to her.  And, of course, "peese!".
• She loves climbing up on Sydney's bed.  Now, if she would just learn to sit on it and not stand and jump, mommy would be a lot more comfortable with this new feat.
• Visiting Florida for the first time.
• Climbing on everything- this girl is non-stop!  She has conquered our twirly desk chair and is trying to climb up on the kitchen table chairs (which are bar height).  We have to keep such an eye on her, because they will fall over really easily.
• Climbing up the ladder on the playground all by herself.  I always stand behind her, of course, but I know if that girl has 30 unwatched seconds, she will be up at the top of that playground in a flash.
• Climbing the stairs all by herself.  She probably has been able to do this for a couple of months, but I'm always paranoid.  However, scatter-brained mommy has left the gate opened a couple of times this month, and Taylor will all of a sudden be calling me from upstairs.  Oops.
• For whatever reason, Taylor loves carrying her toothbrush and toothpaste around.
• She's really started to show her jealous side, if Stephen or I are paying more attention to each other/Sydney than her.  I think we're in for it when the baby arrives!

Here are some pictures from this month!

Love this girl!