Halloween!

Halloween was a perfect and relaxing day at our house, just what you need to be energized and ready for a night out trick-or-treating! In the morning I took Halli and Peyton to a photography class, and it was SO great! I learned some stuff about lighting that I think will really help. Anywho, here are some of my favorite pics from the morning, cause I know you all think it's so fun to look at them!:)

Halli, looking great! All the kids there were toddlers, so Halli had to be the subject for the majority of the time, cause she'd do what she was told to do.


The rest of the photos are all backlit, cause I LOVE that effect! Peyton didn't want to take pictures at first, so I'm glad that when she finally warmed up to the idea I got a couple decent photos.

My adorable niece Kylie, I love how her curls look in that light.

My other niece, Savannah, this is when we were almost done, and she just leaned against her mom and kept smiling at me, so cute!

This little guy is Lincoln, he's in my ward, and he's adorable! Just playing with his horse on the bridge, in the perfect light.

Now, on to Halloween night. The girls were beyond excited to dress up and head out for the evening. First stop was my sister-in-laws house for pizza, and lots of yummy drinks. The kids played and enjoyed hanging out with all their cousins.

I got a few pictures of the girls, but to be honest, they were much more interested in trick-or-treating, so ya take what you can get!

Halli was princess Erika from a Barbie movie, she looked beautiful in her blue dress, and she loved being able to wear make-up!

Peyton was princess Annaliese from the same Barbie movie, the only difference is that she wears a pink dress.

Here's our little 50's girl. She did NOT want to be in any pictures and prefered to be held all night. Although she would let us put her down as long as there was candy in her hand. :)

Another shot of our princesses

A group shot of all the kiddos there. Talk about a big group! Halli was the oldest, and the rest, all 14 of them, were 4 and under.

Out trick-or-treating, they couldn't get to the next house fast enough.

I have no idea why I even took this last photo, but seriously Jamie, you couldn't even wait till you got home to ransack the kids candy? :)

We had a great evening with some great people, and have WAY too much candy in our house now. The only thing that could have made anything better would have been if my girls understood daylight savings time. Really, you'd think they'd be so tired they'd sleep in a little bit!

Pumpkins, Pumpkins, everywhere!

We have been busy this month, especially on the weekends. But you can't have a year go by without heading out to the pumpkin patch. So on saturday, after the primary activity, and after Kevin was done with lawn aerations for young men, and after Lexie had had her nap, off we went.

We didn't go to the oil ranch this year, which is way more fun, but also farther away. Insead we stayed close to home and went to a smaller pumpkin patch, and it was busy. But the girls had a blast, we rode the train, they played on some bounce houses, and I took as many pictures as they would let me take.

All three of the girls together, I'll tell ya, it's getting hard to get all three of them smiling and looking at the camera at the same time. Lexie raised her arms up all on her own, I have no idea why she did it, but it was cute.

Our three little pumpkins, looking adorable!

(Peyton didn't want her picture taken, and their were flies on the pumpkins so she didn't want to sit on it, so when she finally did sit on one, this was the face I got, Love it though!)

Lexie would NOT sit still, so while Kevin was off chasing her around, I got these two to pose for me. They really are great friends, I love when I get to see them treating each other like they really do love one another.

on the train, waiting to get started.

One of the few pictures of me with the girls, Kevin did a good job though, guess I should hand the camera over more often!

Then this last monday for FHE, we carved pumpkins. Halli was beyond excited, and Peyton was caught up in Halli's excitement. Kevin, who has had bronchitis for the past three weeks and finally got a steroid shot that morning, was there and did his best to be excited and happy. Considering that he was all drugged up and tired he did a great job! Lexie on the other hand cried her way through the whole evening.

All the pumpkins lined up. The girls, meaning Halli, drew what they wanted us to carve on their pumpkins.

This is a little blurry, but I loved how fascinated the girls were with the candles.

This was our sad sweet Lexie for the evening. she would get distracted every now and then, but would always start crying again. At least she still looked adorable through the tears!

The finished product.

Now we're just waiting for the excitment of Halloween. Halli is dutifully counting down the days!

Ahhh, motherhood

Today is one of those days, and no, not the bad kind. Kevin is gone doing lawn aeration with the young men today, so it's just me and the girlies. We spent the morning cleaning, eating breakfast and hanging out. After Lexie's nap, it was off to go shopping.

I loaded up all three girls to head to the mall, on a Saturday, by myself. We went to the food court for lunch, and surprisingly enough, they ate everything, something Peyton is not very good at doing. While we were cleaning up, Halli said she wanted to make a wish in the fountain, and she wouldn't tell me what she wished for.

We went to a couple stores, and were walking past build-a-bear, and a lady standing outside the store handed Halli a sticker, which she LOVED, and a coupon. Then we were walking past a kiosk and a man gave all three girls a balloon, they were in heaven! As we were leaving the mall Halli says, "my wish almost came true!!!" in her most excited Halli voice.

So I made a guess, "did you wish for the best day every?" to which she replied, "how did you know?" You see, Halli always has the best day ever. She either has a bad memory, low expectations, or I am just an awesome mom!:)

At that moment though, I was just in love. My girls are amazing, and I am so blessed to get to spend so much time with them . Yes, they're exhausting, and they require alot of work, but how lucky am I to get to be the one to take care of them. Because I also get to have all the hugs, kisses, and laughter that they can dish out. All three of them are truly a joy to have in my life, and I am so grateful that I get to be their mother forever!

The only thing that could have made today better would have been to have Kevin there too, in which case, there is no way we would have been at the mall. :) It'll be nice to have some family time tonight though, hopefully the fun we've had so far today won't rub off before then!

Lil Pumpkin

Last week, my sisters-in-law and I got together to throw a fabulous baby shower for Jessica and her baby boy, who will be here in december. They hadn't picked out a name, (and still haven't as far as I know), and they didn't have anything really picked out for the nursery, so we went with an easy lil' pumpkin theme, since it was october, and pumpkins are easily found. Not to mention, Jamie has a plethora of fall decor, so this made decorating for the party a piece of cake!

So there wasn't much to it, no games, just some really great food, some awesome people and lots of baby boy gifts, gotta love it. Sorry, but there are a ton of photos ahead. Enjoy the party, we sure did!

The lil' pumpkin invite

Jenina, my sister-in-law, is a great cook, and she had some seriously fabulous food for this party. There were pumpkin pie tarts, pumpkin cinnamon rolls, and the most delicious fall salad ever!

Some of her yummy cinnamon rolls. The ones I brought home were gone quick, Kevin loves those things, and I NEVER make them!

Jamie has a friend that made this awesome cake! It was delish, and looked absolutley amazing.

Jamie made this cute cheese ball, funny thing is Jamie hates them and wouldn't even try it.:)

My mother-in-law went all out and made this awesome fruit display. Fruit on skewers, stuck in a pumpkin. It looked great, and I'm sure took her awhile to do it too.

This is what I make, chocolate covered pretzels, Kevin was very happy when I brought a bunch of them home.

Some of the cute decor we had for the party. Jamie put bows on everything, so cute!

Every guest of honor needs their very own pumpkin patch, don't they? Alot of my time preparing for the shower, was spent painting pumpkins, glittering pumpkins, and putting ribbon on them.

The party favors were these seed bags filled with seasoned pumpkin seeds. The tag said, "grow your own pumpkin baby", love it!

Some of the fun glitter pumpkins. They were so easy to do, and I love how they turned out!

Even the silverware was festive! Or would that be plasticware?

The fireplace mantel. Jamie hand drew "it's a boy" on the pumpkins, while holding her 4 month old son in the baby carrier. She's talented!

Some more fun displays by the drinks, and a photo of Jess's belly, with her "pumpkin baby!"

The guest of honor opening gifts, sorry for the grainy photo, but she looks beautiful anyway!

While preparing for the shower, I made my own "lil pumpkin" scrapbook kit, which really came in handy for a few of the things I did for the shower. So, here it is for you to enjoy, feel free to check out Hopscotch Studios Designs, and download it for free!

Congrats Jess, we can't wait to meet the little guy!

A fabulous family-filled weekend!

This past weekend, we were able to welcome my parents, and my grandparents to town for my newest nieces blessing. It was SO great to have them here, and the girls absolutely LOVED all the attention. My parents were here thursday and friday, then that evening they headed up to college station to stay with their newest granddaughter.

Saturday everyone really did their own thing, my grandma's mother is from waller county, so my grandparents took the day to go exploring. I hear they had a great time and were able to find some of her family members at the local cemetery there. Once they got back they had the joy of accompanying us on all our errands, I'm sure they enjoyed it, I know the girls loved having someone else to hang all over for the weekend.

Then on sunday we headed up to College Station for the main event. LaNea looked beautiful, as did Jill, and Eric did a wonderful job with the blessing. There was great food, lots of fun, and some good cartoons, (what else do you do when it's raining outside and your in a small duplex with three little girls and 11 adults? Actually we all fit in there pretty well!)

Then with all that, monday morning I was taking my grandparents to the airport and they were off. It was a short trip, but one that really ment alot. I don't get alot of one-on-one time with my grandparents, and neither do my kids. But this weekend, we all got to spend time together, even if it was only in the evening or in the car driving. I was able to learn alot about my great-grandparents, both here in Texas, or from Holland. It was so interesting and its stuff I would never have learned otherwise, thank goodness they felt like talking about it all to me! I'm very grateful for the time I've had to spend with them this past weekend, and especially the chance our girls have had to get to know their great grandparents. That isn't something that too many children get to do, and Peyton is still talking about her Grandpa Joe and her Grandma George, (georgine). Thanks for making the trip you guys, and maybe we'll see y'all at the next baby blessing!

Finally, here are some fun pictures of the weekend and the baby of honor.

The happy family, so cute!

My sweet niece. I know most babies don't smile till they're 6 weeks to 2 months old, but she's only 3 weeks, and her smiles, aren't cause of gas. She is adorable, and will really smile at you if you make eye contact!

Looking beautiful, her dress was amazing! I wish I could have done a better job photographing it.

The happy mom, and the back of that amazing dress.

My dad and Lexie, she really wanted a cookie, so she would hand him the box, and he'd open it, then close it and hand it back to her. I think they did that for a good 15 minutes before she gave up.

Lexie and my mom, (who was teaching her how to be a princess. I think she liked the lesson.) Really the other girls were there too, they were just off playing and having fun!

All the great-granddaughters, and my grandparents. I believe LaNea made #17 for them, and they have two more due early next year.

My parents with the new family

Great-grandma, and her newest great-grandbaby, very sweet, and great picture by my mom, I love it!

This is what we all felt like doing every night, except grandpa is the only one who did!:) Sound asleep on the couch, I think cheetah likes it!

We had a great weekend, and wish we were able to get together with my family more often. We miss everyone, luckily I think we're heading to cali for thanksgiving, yeah!!!!

So much to do, so little time

The past few weeks have been BUSY to say the least. My brother and his wife are blessing their baby this weekend, so there's family coming to town (actually, half of them are here, and the other half are on their way here from the airport as we speak, yeah!). So we've been getting the house ready for a few visitors.

In the meantime, life's been busy with the same old stuff, you know, the stuff we love, but don't always remember cause it's mundane, well, here's some of the busy stuff that I love.

Lexie's been torturing the cats. Especially this one. She's in heat, and when cat's are in heat they want to be around people, so it won't run away from Lexie, which she LOVES!

Peyton has been very busy as well. She's started a new home preschool once a week, goes to playgroup with grandma once a week, and got to go to bring a friend day at her cousins gymnastics class. More on this later, she had a blast, and is sad we're not signing her up.

I've been missing Halli lately. School is in full swing, and I feel like I never see her anymore. But I love that when I do see her, I get notice of all the fun stuff going on at school, like 50's day. So last night I just threw together this fun poodle skirt so she could wear it to school today, (Okay, I could only throw it together so easily because I had my lovely mother here to guide me through it.) It really was easy, but had she not been here, I would have made it much more difficult for myself.

This last tuesday my sisters-in-law and I threw a fun "lil' pumpkin" baby shower for our other sister-in-law Jessica, who is due with her first boy in december. Much more on this later, I know, you're excited!:)

And last, but certainly not least, our biggest project of all. A master bedroom makeover! I made it really easy for myself by kicking Kevin out, so he didn't get to see it till it was done. I know what you're thinking, I did a beadboard ceiling all by myself, I'm amazing!:) But no, we have the most amazing friends, and I borrowed my best friends hubby for a few nights, and he basically did it all, while Allie and I watched the kiddos, and Kevin got to make a million trips to home depot, and occasionally one of us girls would go help Sean hold up a piece of molding. I love the room though, it's by far my favorite place in the house!

I'm sure I'll have much more on this later too, once I can take some better pictures of it. By the way, this photo was for my photography class too, we're supposed to keep the camera by the bed and take a couple pictures first thing in the morning, with morning light. Hence the messy bed.

We've been busy, and loving every minute of it. Once the baby blessing is done, and family heads out, I'll be back, but till then, this is a short update on all we've been up to, and I'm off to chill with the fam!