Halloween 2010: Al and Sk's 1st

I am getting really excited about Halloween. I have been wanting to have a little get together with a few friends like we did last year. I really love making Halloween treats. There's this awesome pumpkin shaped cake I want to make. I also want to make some candied apples. I have been looking at lots of things that I want to do for a small Halloween party. Anyway, here are a few pics of our get together last year...

This is just a regular rice krispy treats with candy corn on top.

Jack-o-lantern made from carrots, cucumbers, and broccoli with ranch dip.

Our cute little table. Some of our guests brought a nice treat too.

Josh and me. He was a farmer.

Al and Sk were his farm animals. I was a witch. Nothing to do with their costumes. Ha!

The cutest little lamb and bunny in the whole world.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 I think I am going to make their costumes myself this year. I have an idea of what I want to do, but you will have to stayed tuned because I am not revealing it yet! Hehehe! I just love Halloween. It's such a fun holiday!

We Need to Get Out Of This House

Okay, so the girls and I sit at the house entirely too much. I want to find a Mommy's day out program to give me a break and to give them other kids their age to play with. I only have one friend that I hang out with that has a baby their age. I would also like to have a mommy and me class. I want to meet other parents. I want friends with kids their age. I want my girls to have friends. If we had a class or something fun like that it would give us reason to leave the house. When Josh is off work we try to go do fun things like the park or go for a walk. Most days we sit home and I turn the toddler music channel on the TV. They also watch a few programs on Sprout. I am starting to feel like it's too much TV though. I really have been trying to keep it on music mostly. Well hopefully I will nip this in the bud soon. I have been calling and emailing places about mommy's day out all day. Maybe I will find out more tomorrow. As for the mommy and me classes I have been looking at this Auburn mommies program. They meet up once or twice a week for a playgroup and then they have a mommy's night out once a month. Sounds interesting... Anyway, wish me luck on finding the right places for me and my little ones!!

 

Playing at the park a couple of weeks ago!

The Things That They Do

I have  been meaning to write all these things down lately, so I figured I would just blog about it. What better way to do it? Anyway, here are a few of the cutesy things done by Al and Sk:

 

1. Sophie loves to give her "sissy" hugs. Except now not only does she hug her she tackles her. Aleah thinks its so funny. They end up wrestling and rough housing for a little bit but not in a boy way, in a cute baby girl kind of way. It's cute and funny!

 

 2. They both love having conversations with me and they like to talk on the phone. They talk to my mom a lot. Ma is good at having phone conversations with them. Sk especially loves to talk on the phone.  Then when I am having a conversation with them, they talk their little jibberish and I respond with something off the wall. We keep it going as if it's a real conversation. To us it is real. I love their sweet little voices.
3. Aleah has been bringing me books when I ask her to. I usually ask her to "bring mama a book" before bed. She will go pick out a book and climb into the rocking chair into my lap. Sometimes without me even asking her she brings a book to me and climbs in my lap. They both love books which is great because that's what I want for them. I someimes see them sitting in the floor just flipping through a book. Sophie even "reads" out loud.
4. Sophie can tell me where her head, mouth, ears and belly button are. She can also touch her toes. Aleah can tell me where her head, eyes, mouth and nose are. I believe they both know all of them but only choose to answer correctly for those few haha!

5. They can both blow kisses. It's oh too sweet! They can both give me big, wide mouthed kisses. The best wettest kisses in the world. I haven't asked for one for the past week due to them having strep but we are almost back in business for the kisses. They give me the best, squeezyest hugs ever. Yeah, I know squeezyest is not a word but, that is the best way to describe those sweet hugs. Those hugs melt my heart.
6. Yesterday, they discovered they could climb up their highchairs. Let's see, I blame Aleah because she did it first. Sophie saw her and decided she should give it a try. Ugh! In one way I am proud of them for climbing that high and sitting correctly in their highchairs. Mostly, I am annoyed and worried. I don't want them to fall from that high up on that hard floor. I also don't want them climbing onto the counters from there. They can find knives and all kinds of bad things if they get up that high. Between the kitchen table, the blinds and the highchairs I am about ready to get rid of any and all of our furniture and just sit in the floor. I say the blinds because they climb onto the couch everyday and the first thing they go for is the blinds. They only do it for my reaction. They think it's funny when I tell them no. I don't get it!

 

 

 7. Sophie can dance to the Wiggles "Rock a Bye Your Bear". I am so impressed by this. She does all the little moves. I can even sing it to her myself and she will do the moves. Aleah does her little "Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes"dance. I have that one on a video. It's on an earlier post. They impress me with their dancing skills. I can't wait to get them in ballet lessons.

8. Aleah likes to lay on top of me on the couch. She will just lay there for the longest time. I love our little cuddly time. Occasionally they will both get up on the couch and lay with me and watch a little TV. I love cuddling on the couch with my little snuggle bunnies. I have to cherish those little moments because for the most part they cannot be still. 

 

They were both on top of me!

 

 9. Aleah can say a whole sentence. She says "I did it!" and it counts as a three word sentence. Even though originally she was just rambling some jibber jabber and something she said sounded like "I did it." But now I will say "Aleah say I did it" and she will spit out this little sentence. Seriously, she says it. Whether she knows what it means is beside the point. I will try to get a video up of her saying it.

10.They come with me when I say "who's ready for a nap". Also, when I say "Let's go take a bath" or "Let's go bye bye". I love that they can follow simple commands. It let's me know that my girls are pretty smart cookies.
11. I love that they both LOVE their blankets. Every morning when I go get them out of their cribs they both have their  blankies in hand, which adds an extra 10 pounds to my load. My hands are already full enough and now I have big blankets covering my face so I can't even see where I am going. I wouldn't change it for the world though. I think it is sweet they love their blankies like that. As long as they keep loving me more than we are doing just fine. Oh and just FYI Aleah loves her blankie a little bit more than Sophie. Just a little something I've noticed from observation.
12. This is one of my faves. Last night Sk fell face first into a chest in their room (this part is not my fave) and she started crying of course. I went over and picked her up and tried to comfort her. Aleah spotted where I had put the paci's and she quickly grabbed hers and ran over to give Soph her paci. It was such a sweet moment. Al knew her sis was hurt and she knew that if she was hurt and crying she would want her paci too. That's not the only time I have seen that happen. I have seen Sk be the one to bring Al her paci when she was crying too. I have seen them bring each other their paci's quite a few times. They really love each other. It really warms my heart to see such an act of kindness towards each other.

13. I have such helpful little tots on my hands. The other day I was doing some laundry. As soon as I open the dryer two baby girls always run up and try to jump in. They are amazed by the dryer and also the dishwasher, but I will get to that in a minute. So I thought maybe i could ask them to help. I had read before that toddlers like to help. So I grabbed some clothes out of the washer and handed them to each baby and asked them to put them in the dryer for me. It worked! I was so impressed. Also, every time I open the dishwasher, once again I have two little ones run up and try to climb on the door (which drives me nuts) and try to grab everything out (which also gets to me). I have to make the best of the situation so I grab the silverware out (so they don't grab knives) and they start grabbing out plates and I ask them to "give mama the plate" and they hand them to me and I start putting them away. They continue to grab stuff out and hand it to me. It's nice to have a few extra hands even if it slows the whole process down a bit haha!

 

 

 

 14.  A couple of days ago we walked into the bathroom for bath time (which happens to be a pretty chaotic time for me) and Al grabbed their toothbrushes which happened to be pretty close to the edge of the sink. She handed Sk hers and they began brushing their own teeth. I was pretty impressed. They were both really brushing their teeth and not just chewing on the toothbrush. Of course I re-brushed them later with toothpaste. 

 

These 2 pics aren't from the tooth brushing in the story. These are a few months old. 

 

 

 15. Lastly, for today anyway, last week sometime Aleah reached up and got my cup of milk of the table. There wasn't very much in it luckily but she didn't spill it anyway. She drank it! I was very impressed with her grown up cup skills. So I decided it would not hurt a thing if I let them practice drinking out of a "big girl cup" as long as we stayed in the kitchen. Al is a professional at drinking from a "big girl cup", Sophie on the other hand wanted to stick her hands in the cup. When Sk did actually drink it she did good though. She practices in the bathtub a lot.

 

 

  Okay, that's all for now. I am sure I will think of more of those things that they do for next time.

Grocery Shopping Trip

                  

Today, I took the girls shopping all by myself. I must say I am quite proud of myself. That was the first time I have ever taken them grocery shopping without Josh with us. Don't get me wrong we go other places that we don't need a shopping cart for. I am not completely incapable of taking them anywhere. Grocery shopping is just a big challenge for me with two tiny tots in tow. It was a challenge, but in the end I felt really great about it.


First off, I had to get us all ready, but believe me I am a professional at that now. I know exactly what I have to do. It really only took an hour to get everyone fed, dressed, packed, and out the door. Before I decided on what everyone was going to wear I went outside to see what it felt like. It was a little chilly, so I decided to put long sleeves under the girls Auburn pillowcase dress/shirt. (Al has a pillowcase shirt with pants.) I even put tights under Sk's dress. So we get outside and get in the car and it is HOT! I hate the weather sometimes. I mean pick one or the other. So I pulled of all their hot underclothes and after about 5 more minutes got them hooked into their seats. I had to run back in and get different shoes for all three of us. Then finally we were off to Kroger!

We have to go to Kroger in Tiger Town, which is a little farther away from us than all the other stores, but they are the only place in the Auburn/Opelika area with double shopping carts! I mean, not even Walmart has them. It's totally cool though because I really like that Kroger. So we get to Kroger and I parked beside a shopping cart return area that has a double shopping cart parked in it. It takes me about 5 min to get the covers but on the carts and the girls loaded and buckled in.


As soon as we get into Kroger, Sophie starts acting up. She turned around in her seat and tried so hard to get out. She started being all whiny. I am thinking great, just great, we haven't even got the first grocery in the cart and we are already about to have to leave. I get so worried when we are out that they will pitch an ugly fit. I embarrass way too easy. I have been reading all these horror stories of how it will eventually happen, because it happens to every parent, the tantrum in the grocery store episode. Also, I already can't stand when people stare. It makes my nerves bad. I know that as soon as it happens everyone in the store is going to stare at me and my little ones and shake their heads at us. Ugh! I dread that. Anyway, Al and Sk are pretty good for the most part and really today went well. I calmed Sophie down. I let her hold my pen and list for the most part and when that quit working I let them hold canned items, as long as they didn't put their mouths on it. We made it through the store in about 30 minutes. It wasn't so bad at all. We only had one lady stop to ask about the girls being twins. She wanted to know how old they were and what their names were. She asked me if they were identical. Ha! That was after she distinguished they had different color hair. She just couldn't believe it when I told her they were fraternal. She said that was so unlikely because usual only boys were fraternal. Hmm.. Never heard that one. I believe that is false, but anyway she was sweet.


Yeah, I am proud of that accomplishment. I think it's acceptable to be proud of myself whenever I take the girls anywhere by myself. They are a more than a handful. That is for sure!

The Versatile Blogger Award!

   I am honored to say that I have been awarded the Versatile Blogger Award! It was awarded to me a few days ago but I have been away from my computer for awhile due to my girls being sick. Not to mention some days I don't even get a chance to check my email, much less blog. My little ones keep my busy!
                      

There are some Rules with this Award:

Rule 1: Thank the person who gave you the award. :) Plus Link back to them in your post.

 

 Thank you so much to Ashley at There is no place like homemade!

 I am so glad to know that there is someone out there that reads my blog. Hopefully I can get my blog out there and start posting more often! Also i wanted to say congrats to you for also receiving this award because you really deserve it!

 

 

 

Rule 2: Share 7 things about yourself...

 

1. I am sometimes still in shock that I have twins- Al and Sk, 16 months.

2. I love 80's music.

3. I was a server for 5 years and a bartender for about 3 years. 

4. I have always wanted to live in New York. I am obsessed with everything about it.

5. I hate spiders more than anything!

6. I recently started sewing and I love it. I am pretty good at it too. 

7. My favorite food is pizza.

Rule 3: Pass the award on to 15 blogs (that were recently discovered - and contact them to let them know)

Okay so here's the part where I really had to do my research. I am like the worst blogger ever. I only follow a few blogs. I know, I know this is terrible but this award has really been a great way for me to subscribe to more blogs and maybe I can even get a few followers out of it.  The best part will be all the fun things I can learn from other peoples blogs. Okay here it goes:

 

1.  Pickled Blu

2. With Grace

 3. The crafingfiend

 4. Speak it into Existence

5. Sew Ingenious

6. Mom of Good Intentions

 

Okay so I only came up with 6. I could of had more but Ashley had already awarded them. The good news is I am now following exactly 15 blogs. I know, I know that's the exact number I needed but like I said Ashley had already given it to them. Anyway, I am really happy about all these new blogs I am following. You should really check out these six! 

The First Time Taigating

    Al and Sk tailgated the first time last year. It was LSU vs. Auburn! We really had such an awesome time introducing our little bundles of joy to the Auburn tradition. Getting to do those things with our girls really makes me want to stay here in Auburn forever.  I really would love to raise my girls here. It's so awesome living here and feeling the Auburn spirit! I would love for the girls to experience that. There's nothing like game day. Here are the pictures from that lovely day of tailgating last year!

Joshy

   Last Saturday, after the Auburn/Miss St. game, I took Al and Sk tailgating. My cousin Adam, who lives in NOLA, drives up for every Auburn game. We went and tailgated with him and some great people that we met through him.

Sadly all the pics of me I am wearing glasses.

   My friends Heather and Chris went with me. Chris is an Alabama fan but he came along anyway. I am so glad they came because they helped me with the girls.

Aubie! Someone is holding there LSU hate in front of him.

    It was hard work taking the girls. They cannot ever be still. Al was running one way and Sk was running in the complete opposite direction.

Precious Aleah

   I really do enjoy taking them tailgating because it'll be a great story when there older but I don't know if I can take them to many more games this year. Haha! It would probably not be as bad if Josh is there next time.

Precious Sophie

    It was really fun and I am glad we got to go for a little while. I was just really worn out after we got home and for the whole next day.

If you look hard enough you will see Cam!

    Josh and I are going to try and go to the next home game when we play Florida Atlantic. He just so happens to be off work that weekend.

I can't believe how muh Sk's hair has grown.

    We are getting a babysitter for sure if we do go to that game. Haha!

I love this!

   Also, I think we may be going to the Florida game too. Meme and Dan were talking about coming to that one.

My cousin Adam!

   I am sorry for all my rambling. I am just so excited that it's football season. I get excited when I think about tailgating and going to games.

My Aunt Linda!

   Especially when it gives me a little break from my little Frick and Frack. Just Kidding! I love them!

We also got the chance to hang out with one of my best friends Lucy!

    Anyway I hope you enjoyed the pics of my little babies. Man I can't believe how little they were last year.

I miss this girl! She lives in ATL.

 

9/11 10 year Anniversary

   I can't believe it's been ten years since our country went through the worst tragedy ever. Oh man what terrible feelings come back when thinking about that horrible day. I was only 14. I will never forget the moment I found out that the north tower had been hit by a plane. I was in Mrs. Cooper's math class. We turned the TV on and watched this terrible thing. Than seeing the second tower get hit and realizing that our country had been attacked. It was so scary. Those feelings I had that day were indescribable. Thinking back on that day it still gives me chills. I will never forget the people we lost from that terrible tragedy. They are all heroes. Every single person who lost their life that day is a hero! I just want to say thank you to all those people who gave their lives that day. Thank you to our awesome military for fighting for this wonderful country of ours. We are all really truly blessed to live in this country.  We are blessed for having a military who will fight for us! God Bless America!!

Happy Birthday Daddy!!

  Today is my dad's birthday. He would of been 61 if he was still here with us. I never stop missing him everyday. I wish he was still here so I could celebrate his birthday with him. The last birthday he was here for I remember making his birthday cake for him. He knew how much I loved to bake cakes so we always had cake mix in our house. That's just a random fact about us that makes me smile to think about. We had such a good night on his birthday. He just seemed so healthy then but I think he was sick then too. I always think of what it would be like if he was here right now. I wish he would have been able to meet my babies. He would have loved them so much just like he loved all his grandchildren. Today he and my mom have 9 grandchildren. He would be so proud. I just wish I would have been able to see him holding Aleah and Sophie. People always say it gets better with time. That really used to make me mad. I don't think it ever gets better. It gets acceptable. I will never stop missing my dad but I have finally accepted that this is how it's going to be. He's in a better place where he is healthy and smiling watching down on all of us. I know he sees all of us growing up. I know he is proud. I love you Dad! War Eagle!

Fall Is In The Air

I am so excited about football season being here. I am sad to see summer go but loving this cooler weather today. It makes it feel more like football season. Not only football season but pumpkin spice latte weather. Mmmmm! Yum! I am looking forward to all the festivities fall has to offer. Pumpkin patches, carving pumpkins, making costumes and Halloween dresses, making fun little Halloween treats, etc.. Halloween just happens to be one of my very favorite holidays! I also can't wait to make chili, stew, and soup mixed with this nice cool weather = awesome nights. I am getting excited about tailgating and/or going to Auburn football games. War Damn Eagle!! Fall is just such an awesome season with so many things to look forward to. I am getting excited thinking about doing all these fun things with Aleah and Sophie. Sorry about all the rambling, my mind is racing thinking about all these fun things!

My sweet family watching the first Au game!