Ellis

Every once in a while my kids say something really funny and I feel like I need to write it down. This happened on Saturday. Brandon took Finley to a birthday party Saturday morning so Ellis and I ran to Northpark to return something and pick up a few things.  While I was there, I thought I would try on some dresses at Nordstrom. I have a work event coming up and would love to get something new, but unfortunately all of the pretty dresses I was trying on were not in my budget! :(  It was still fun and maybe one will go on sale in the next few weeks.

Anyway, Ellis was having just as much fun in the dressing room with me; telling me which dresses she liked and telling me that I looked like a princess. :) After our fun was over, I start putting my regular clothes back on.  My regular clothes being a long sleeve t-shirt and yoga pants (my weekend outfit). Ellis looks at me says, "You going back to being a mommy again?"  I start cracking up and say, "Yes, Ellis. Mommy can't be a princess anymore, I have to put my mommy clothes back on."

She is so sweet and funny!

Ellis's first haircut

Ellis is 2 1/2 years old and we finally took her to get her hair cut today. She did very well, nothing to it! Finley had just gotten a haircut a couple weeks ago, but really wanted to get a haircut to show Ellis how it's done. Haircuts all around!

Why Skylights are a Bad Idea

On June 13, 2012, a freak hail storm hit Dallas, especially East Dallas. Unfortunately, our neighborhood was one of the hardest hit areas. We were not at home, we were on our way home from dinner when it started to rain. Shortly after, the hail began and we quickly realized we needed to pull over. We pulled under a tree and listened to the hail hit the car. Neither Brandon nor I have ever seen hail that big (confirmed softball and baseball size) and I don’t know if we ever will again. Luckily, my car wasn’t damaged too much thanks to the tree we were under, but I did have to get a new windshield and I am still on the wait list at Caliber Collision for the other damage. We made it home finally and found three busted skylights upstairs and hail and glass all over our house.  I'm glad we were not home because I think the girls would have been really freaked out by the skylights breaking in our house. 

Results:

Farmers Insurance has been great – we have already gotten a new roof, we will get new carpet upstairs, paint and drywall repairs, deck and fence repairs, new gutters, windows and paint outside, etc.  The only hiccup is trying to pry our insurance money from Wells Fargo.  They have our mortgage, therefore want to be involved in all repairs which adds several layers of complication.  We can’t get repairs completed without an inspector, 20 notarized forms and all kinds of bureaucracy.  Wish us luck, hopefully we can get all of the work done by Christmas!    

Ellis

As much as Finley is my rule follower, Ellis is not!  She is my laid back kid, so sweet, but could care less about most things.  She is my cuddle bug and she is the class clown.  Her favorite thing to say when she is getting into trouble is "I funny"!  She has gotten so big, but she still loves to be the baby.  I still have not cut her hair, although I think it is time.  Her hair was so dark when she was born and now it is so blonde, lighter than Finley's hair.  She is talking so much more, but I still have to ask Finley to translate sometimes when I can't understand what she is saying.  Finley usually knows.  Ellis has really come out of her shell over the past six months.  Overall, she is a mess, but its so hard to get mad at her when she grins at you and looks at you with her big sweet eyes!

Finley

Finley has grown so much this past year.  We call her our little police officer because she is such a rule follower (which I secretly love, because I am too).  She had a great year at the CDC and graduated from the Star's class in May.  She is attending a summer creative arts camp at school that she absolutely loves, making new friends and learning so many things.  The creative arts camp is at the same school where she will attend Pre-K in September so we thought is would be a great transition for her since she has been at the CDC since she was 6 months old.  We can't believe she will start Pre-K in a couple months, but she is so ready.  She reminds Ellis every day that she is too big to go to the CDC, she is in Summer Camp and Pre-K!

In addition to the great experience at creative arts camp, Finley goes to swim lessons every day at school.  We had a rough start, she wouldn't even get in the water and cried every day.  I would ask her if she wanted to go back and she said yes so I kept taking her.  Finally, by the end of the first week, she would get in the water and play by the ladder.  Then, before I knew it, she put her head under water, then all of the sudden after two weeks, she actually started swimming.  It has been four weeks and she is jumping off the diving board and was moved up to the intermediate swim group.  We are so proud of her!

Give me back my bunny!

We have a DVD player in our car and usually let the girls watch something on the way to and from school.  It's not a terribly far drive, but sometimes we can get stuck in traffic, its nice to have them entertained so I can listen to the radio.  Unfortuately, our DVD player hasn't been working very well so Finley usually asks to listen to her songs, which means the kid's music CD I keep in my car. This may make me a terrible mom, but I dread when she asks to listen to her music because it means 25 minutes of kid music - you know, the usual, "I've been working on the Railroad", "Row, Row, Row your Boat", etc.  A while back we were listening to her CD and she told me she wanted to hear "Give me back my bunny".  I didn't know what song she was referring to so we went through the entire CD until we came to the song she was talking about. 

This was the song:

My Bonnie lies over the ocean
My Bonnie lies over the sea
My Bonnie lies over the ocean
Oh, bring back my Bonnie to me

REFRAIN:
Bring back, bring back
Bring back my Bonnie to me, to me
Bring back, bring back
Bring back my Bonnie to me

From this, she got "Give me back my bunny"!  She makes me laugh!

Fish Bites

We were in the car the other day (I was on the phone with Brandon) when we drove past a McDonald's. I saw this huge sign that said Fish Bites and I said, "Yuck, they have Fish Bites at McDonald's" to Brandon. This was two weeks ago, I didn't even think Finley was paying attention, but I should know better by now. Tonight at bedtime, she randomly says, "why do they have mean fish at McDonald's", I said, "what to you mean?" then she says, "you said they have fish that bite, I don't want to go there". She has probably been thinking about this for the past two weeks, worrying about all of the mean fish at McDonald's biting everyone. Sweet Fin!

Happy Halloween

Finley insisted on being Tinkerbell for Halloween, she was so excited about her costume. We were able to recycle one of Finley's old costumes for Ellis since she doesn't really care yet. I think we may have one more year before she really starts to care. Brandon was thrilled to pull out the TCU cheerleader costume again. Finley wore it two years ago. They had a Hallween parade at School and then we went Trick or Treating in our neighborhood.

Ellis was so excited to pull candy out of our bowl and put it into her pumpkin...



We tried to convince her we were going to get more candy outside, but she was having so much fun...



Still not happy...



Fin, ready to go...

Finally over it...

Brilliant costume choice by our neighbor...Yo Gabba Gabba! Hilarious!

Wedding

Brandon's sister, Virginia (Ginger to us and Aunt G to the girls) got married on October 1, 2011 in their hometown of Sherman. It was a beautiful weekend with lots of family and friends celebrating Ginger and Steve. We all couldn't be happier to Aunt G, but it is very bittersweet. Ginger is going from living a couple blocks away from us in Dallas to Connecticut! We will miss her very much and I know she will miss the girls, but we are so excited for her and Steve to start their lives together.

The Rehearsal dinner was at a beautiful restaurant on Lake Texoma, unfortunately it was a parent’s nightmare – concrete patio with railing that overlooked a 20 foot drop off. Brandon and I spent most the night playing defense and making sure the girls didn’t slip through the rails. We ended up with a few falls and one bump of the head from the concrete, no permanent damage. It was a beautiful night and the girls had a blast – we were exhausted!

I can't wait for the professional photos to be ready. I am keeping my fingers crossed for a Christmas Card!

Momo and her girls...

Finley and Ellis were the flower girls in the wedding. Finley was really into it and followed instructions beautifully. She’s my rule follower! Ellis, on the other hand, was the wild card and we knew that going into it. Even the minister looked a little nervous when we showed up with our mini flower girl. The girls started out down the aisle and Finley was perfect, dropping her petals like a pro. Ellis toddled behind and instead of dropping the flowers from her basket, she bent down and started picking up the flowers that had been dropped and putting them back in her basket. She continued doing this until about half way down the aisle when she finally looked up and realized there was a lot of people in the church watching her. At this point, Ellis quickly turned her basket over, dumped her petals, dropped her basket and ran back to the door where my mom was waiting to catch her in case she tried to make a run for it. She watched the wedding from the back, which was probably the best place for her to be.

The entire Ellis clan...

The beautiful bride...

Ballet Class

Finley started dance again this fall and she still loves it!

Mimi and her girls...

Beach Trip

We went to Gulf Shores, AL again this year with my family and it was just as pretty as I remembered. We stayed in the same resort this year, except we had to get a house because of our extra passenger Ellis. The house was wonderful plus it came with a golf cart! We spent our days going back and forth between the beach and pool, driving the golf cart and napping. Ellis had a great time on her first beach trip, but kept us all on our toes. Finley became a little fish and wanted to spend most of her time at the pool after an unfortunate run in with baby jellyfish on our first day at the beach. We can't wait to go back again!

When we made it home, Finley didn't quite understand that our vacation was over. She asked if we could take the golf cart and go to the pool. It broke my heart to tell her that we no longer have a golf cart or a pool. Brandon took her swimming at his gym, but I don't think she was very impressed. We all had a hard time adjusting back to the real world, but poor Fin really missed the beach!