Busy Bee

With big sister spending some one-on-one time with the Grandparents, Aubrey had the run of the house and the toys.

Aubrey reading a few books

She will turn the pages and read (in jibberish). 

Today's magical toy: Mommy's empty pocketbook

 She carried it around and filled it with goodies.

She and Reese checking out her loot.

Psalm 100

¹ Shout for joy to the LORD, all the earth. 

 ² Worship the LORD with gladness;

come before him with joyful songs.

 ³ Know that the LORD is God. 

It is he who made us, and we are his;    

we are his people, the sheep of his pasture.

 ⁴ Enter his gates with thanksgiving 

and his courts with praise;

give thanks to him and praise his name. 

 ⁵ For the LORD is good and his love endures forever; 

his faithfulness continues through all generations.

Up Peas

Aubrey decided to play musical chairs today at Ikea.  

Only her rules include 3 chairs and 1 person.

 She switched chairs about 10 times.

She uses "up peas" for getting up and down.

 Lily Kate decided to hide out in the circus tent.

Mustache Bash/Field Day

Stephen participated in Movember this year.  He and several co-workers grew beards this month and then trimmed them into a mustache of his choosing for the Mustache Bash.  Our group was raising money for Shelter Health Services of Charlotte.  It's a great cause and the guys really had fun sporting their mustaches.  Friday night we met at Sauceman's for the final voting.  They even had trophies!  

Jon Buice, Stephen, Paras Mehta

The Peds crew 

Mark Henin, Nick Glomb, Stephen Renfrow

A huge shout out to Melanie, who kept the girls so we could attend!  Thank you so much!  You were a lifesaver!

 Saturday morning, we had our family pictures taken at Freedom park and then stuck around for the Peds Field Day.  After some delicious BBQ from Q Shack, the games began- cornhole, T-ball, ladderball, soccer, flag football and the main event: kickball.

Aubrey enjoyed playing with the Ten Cup Toss Game

 The faculty faced off against the residents in a game of kickball.  It was a blast!

  Lily Kate helped Daddy play catcher. 

 After he kicked, he carried her all the way around the bases.

Turkey How To

I've said before, all my best ideas are borrowed.  Well here are the directions of how I made these turkey hairbows

What you need:

Grosgrain Ribbon 3/8"

Brown: ~25"

Yellow: ~16"

Orange: ~16" +scrap for beak

Red: ~8" +scrap for the wattle

2 Googly eyes

1 Metal All Purpose Hair Clip (I bought mine at Sally Beauty)

Hot glue gun

Fabric scissors

Cut ribbon for feathers: one 3.5" piece and one 4" piece for each feather

You need 2 yellow feathers, 2 orange feathers and 1 red one.

Cut brown ribbon for the body: one 3" piece, two 3.5" piece, 

one 4" piece, one 5" piece to wrap hair clip

Cut beak and wattle.

Loop 3.5" piece and put small drop of glue at base to hold.

 Loop 4" piece around smaller loop using glue drops as needed to secure.  

I then put one of the extra hair clips on the loop to hold it while it dries.

Repeat for all 5 feathers.

 Glue and wrap hair clip with largest brown ribbon piece.

Make turkey's body just like feathers, the body consists of 3 loops.

Make the turkey's head (see photo) and glue to body.

 Add beak and wattle using small drops of hot glue.

 Arrange feathers and attach to clip with hot glue.  Attach feathers to clip end (not base).

 Glue body and head to feathers.

Finally attach eyes

Please let me know if any of the steps need more clarity.  I hope yours turn out super cute!

Wordless Wednesday

Paging Dr. Renfrow!

Now that she's mastered walking-
she won't stay still

Inspired

So I'm completely and totally hooked to Pinterest!  I love all the cute ideas and inspiration that I find there!  Here are 3 ideas I am going to attempt for the girls.  I'll post pictures once I complete them :

Decorative Hairbow Holder:

Source: alyashcreations.blogspot.com via Tracie on Pinterest

Turkey Hairbow- this will be adorable, I need to get to work so they can wear them for Turkey Day!

Source: etsy.com via Tracie on Pinterest

Lily Kate LOVES Tangled, so when Disney Store sold out of the braid, I decided I could make one.  Isn't this cute!

Source: andbabiesmakefour.com via Tracie on Pinterest

These are the Best Days of My Life

Today I'm thankful for the ordinary.  We haven't been doing anything terribly exciting lately, but here are some fun memories that we captured on camera.  I love my life.

Waiting for Daddy to get home- our favorite time of day!

It's much cooler to wear your veggies than to eat them

My two little turkeys ;)

Sample anyone?

I'll admit- I've been in a lunch rut for quite some time now.  We either eat leftovers or peanut butter and jelly sandwiches.  There is nothing wrong with this, but it is fun to change it up occasionally.

One of the girls favorite lunches is samples from Sam's club.  I love it too- they get a variety and I don't have to do any of the clean-up :)

The past two times we have been the samples haven't been ready yet.  So we get one or two in store and then come home and I make samples for the girls.

Today we had a chicken nugget (leftover), a slice of cheese, slice of apple and pretzel stick, granola bar, cucumber slices, apple cider, mac n cheese and a bite of cupcake for dessert.

Is this a little labor intensive for lunch, maybe.  But the girls LOVE it and they eat more this way than if I had served it to them all on a plate.

So get out your dixie cups and beverage napkins.  Happy sampling!

Nice Night for a Stroll

Now that Aubrey is walking it is her favorite pastime.  Last week, she "played fetch" with herself, walking all over the house to get the ball she threw.  This week she likes to push her baby doll in her stroller.

Trunk-or-Treat/Trick-or-Treat

It is kind of insane the number of Halloween/Fall Festivals we were a part of this year.  Especially since Halloween is my least favorite holiday (I had a traumatic experience as a young child and hate being scared ever since).

Sunday afternoon, we got to hang out with some of our sweet friends from play group at their Halloween Party.  We don't get to see these sweet friends enough, but I always love when we do see each other.

Our attempt at a group shot

Silly Faces

Tink decided to flutter by

Proud that she is a big girl now

 After our little festivities we walked down the street to Candlewyck Baptist Church to enjoy their Trunk-or-Treat.

 After the first trunk, Aubrey got the hang of it.  She walked fearlessly up to the different cars to get her goodies.  She would search through the bowl for a dum dum.

 Monday was Halloween and we continued two family traditions.  In the morning we dressed up (LK chose to dress up like a wolf using her ears from Great Wolf Lodge- not sure where that came from) and reverse trick-or-treated at Daddy's work.  We walked around and gave candy mostly to his co-workers.  Stephen decided to dress in costume this year and spent the morning as Mario! (complete with ring tone sound effects).

Aubrey wasn't so sure of him in the Mario costume, but she loves her daddy and gave him lots of kisses when he got home from work:

 That night we drove over to Gastonia so Lily Kate could help Pa (Stephen's dad) pass out candy. (Family Tradition #2).

We trick or treated to 5 houses in their neighborhood, then Lily Kate spent the rest of the night sitting on the porch with Pa.

 I'm not sure who enjoyed it more- Lily Kate or Pa.

I love my Mario!