Fall Allergies & Colds

This week our family is either dealing with fall allergies or passing around a cold - I'm still undecided which it may be. But to play it safe I kept Gabrielle home from school yesterday and canceled a play date for today. This means I've had to find ways to try to keep everyone busy and happy.

Yesterday I let the girls paint. This was a first for Samantha. The first thing Samantha did of course was put her fingers in her mouth to taste the paint. After crying and spitting - apparently finger paint is not tasty - she had fun getting creative and messy.

From My Little Sunbeams

From My Little Sunbeams

From My Little Sunbeams

Gabrielle loves all activities artsy and crafty. Yesterday she was experimenting mixing her colors together to see what "new" colors she could create.

From My Little Sunbeams

From My Little Sunbeams

And here are the masterpieces on display on the fridge -

From My Little Sunbeams

Two things about the photo below crack me up. First Samantha is such a copy cat and has to be just like her big sister so now she will only eat her banana if I let her hold it in the peel and all. Second, every time she sees a camera lately she makes this cheesy grin and says "cheeeee". She is such a little clown!

From My Little Sunbeams

This morning our keeping busy activity was play-doh - another first for Samantha. She actually accidentally got a hold of a piece of play-doh at our first trip to the lake with our friend Casey. Of course it immediately went into her mouth and once again must have tasted horrible. Today she did a little better. She did have a small taste at first, once again did not like it, but for the rest of play-doh time kept it away from her mouth. She not capable of doing much with it yet but she had fun trying - and then had fun throwing everything on to the floor.

From My Little Sunbeams

From My Little Sunbeams

A Busy, Busy Week

And I can already tell the weeks to come will be busy as well!

Last week was not only the first week of school for Gabrielle but ballet started back up again as well. She was very excited. We are signed up for a night class this year and the atmosphere at the dance studio is quite different! Last year we had a Wednesday morning class and there were only two other little girls in Gabrielle's class. It was very quiet and relaxed. This year she is one of eight in the class and all the studios are full with classes. With such full classes the waiting rooms and hallways are full of parents and sibling as well. It is anything but quiet and relaxed. Gabrielle enjoyed her class though and while I wish at least one of the girls from last year could have been in there with her, I'm sure she'll make some new friends.

From My Little Sunbeams

From My Little Sunbeams

On Saturday we had a birthday party to go to - Will, one of Gabrielle's friends. He had a monster truck themed party and as a surprise they had a monster truck bounce house. It was very cool and as we walked to the car after the party Gabrielle talked about how much fun she had. I wish I had remembered my camera!!

Ed and I had an early birthday surprise for Gabrielle that afternoon. We took her to Lowe's to pick out paint swatches for her Barbie house and then went to Toys'r'us to let her pick out some furniture as well. The house is one my daddy made for me. It is one of the few childhood toys I saved and I'm so glad I did. After being stored all these years it definitely needs some work but I think once it is done, both girls will have as much fun with it as I did as a child.

From My Little Sunbeams

From My Little Sunbeams

From My Little Sunbeams

Some how in addition to the Barbie furniture I was talked into also getting this big stuffed Rainbow Dash as an early birthday gift. She loves, loves My Little Pony and loves, loves, loves stuffed animals. I really couldn't say no!! I'm a sucker!

Today was a busy and exciting day as well. Instead of going from Sunday School to the nursery, Gabrielle is now old enough to go to "big church" and then Kids' Kingdom. She was very excited because her friend Lilly has been old enough for a couple of months now and Gabrielle was missing having her friend in the nursery. Gabrielle did surprisingly well during church before it was time for Kids' Kingdom. Tonight she went to her first practice of Children's Choir at church as well. I was really excited for her and she was all smiles when I picked her up. I can not wait for the Children's Christmas Cantata this year to see my little girl up on stage singing her little heart out!!!

From My Little Sunbeams

Trying to be fair we bought Samantha a Pound Puppy while we were at Toys'r'us. I was trying to get her picture holding her new puppy but instead got several shots of her making this face after throwing down her puppy! LOL

So I guess this is what our fall is going to look like - busy, busy, busy!!! But fun, fun, and more fun for sure!!!

On Thursday while Gabrielle was in school Samantha and I did some grocery shopping at Target. I had two hours to do shopping with just one child with me - it was a surreal experience! I took my time browsing and found these cute backpacks on clearance. They were marked down to $3.74!! At first I only had one in the cart but I could tell Samantha was getting really attached to it so I ended up picking another one up even though right now it is way too big for Samantha. I figure it would be a good car bag or trip bag until she grows into it. But of course when Gabrielle is toting her bag Samantha has to be just like big sister!!

From My Little Sunbeams

From My Little Sunbeams

And for the last photo I just had to share, here is Samantha in the driver's seat picking up Gabrielle from school on Thursday. :)

From My Little Sunbeams

First Day of School

I am officially the mom of a preschooler! The anticipation and eagerness for all of us was building up all summer. Finally last week we had open house so we could see Gabrielle's classroom and meet her teachers. Gabrielle enjoyed open house so much she threw a fit when it was time to leave. After open house we only had the long weekend to get through.

On Monday we decorated Gabrielle's school bag with iron-on's and buttons of her favorite things - a ballerina, My Little Pony, a princess bunny, rainbows and more. We still have some heart jewels to glue on. What can I say - my girl loves bling!!! Knowing the next day, "tomorrow", would be her first day of school, Gabrielle asked repeatedly throughout the day, "Is it tomorrow yet?"

Tuesday finally arrived. We all woke up bright and early. It was obvious we were all very excited when we were all dressed and ready to go out the door 30 minutes early rather than being rushed and running our typical 5-10 minutes late. After a couple of photos we headed to school.

From My Little Sunbeams

From My Little Sunbeams

Gabrielle proudly showed her very own bag to anyone who would stop and look as we were walking into her school.

From My Little Sunbeams

Here she is standing right outside her classroom.

From My Little Sunbeams

Gabrielle "signing in" to her classroom.

From My Little Sunbeams

Finding her cubby.

I stayed only a couple of minutes. It was obvious Gabrielle was comfortable and ready for the school day to begin. I felt myself choking up and decided I needed to say bye before I could no longer hold back the tears. "Mommy is going to say bye now," I said. "Okay." was Gabrielle's reply. "Can I have a hug?" I asked. "Okay." And off I went, barely holding it together all the way to the car.

It definitely was a little weird being home with just Samantha. I tried to get as much cleaning done as I could. Samantha was a little lonely I think. She acted like she was looking for Gabrielle part of the time and just plain bored the other part. Here she is sitting in the laundry basket having a snack.

From My Little Sunbeams

The time went by quickly. The first thing Gabrielle said as I picked her up was "I'm really thirsty and hungry." I had to laugh. Of course she had snack and water while she was at school but my girl thinks she should be drinking and eating all morning - a bad habit I'll be happy to see broken. After her juice and a special treat of McDonald's for lunch she was happy to talk about her day and continued to tell me tidbits about her morning throughout the day.

Her first day went great and needless to say she is eager for "tomorrow" to be here again.

Ummm.....

Ed and I will be celebrating our 6th wedding anniversary in just a few weeks. We were together almost 2 years before that and never, absolutely never, other than a few old photos, have I seen Ed look like this -

Prepare yourself....

Before -

and after -



He said it had been 12 years since he was clean shaven. I'm not sure what prompted him to shave now other than I'm sure his face needed to finally "breathe". But here is.

He shaved after Samantha was already in bed. I told him not to be surprised if she did not run to him, arms open, when he gets home from work like she usually does.

Gabrielle just laughed and said he looked silly and "not like a daddy anymore." She got a kick out of feeling of his newly smooth face and giggled when giving him a night-night kiss. She said she doesn't want him to shave anymore. I have to agree with her on that. It's not that I think this look is a bad look for him, I just like the full beard better personally.



Fortunately with Ed the full beard will be back in probably 3 days!!!