I'm back!!

In my last post when I said I didn't know when I would be able to post again I had no idea it would be two weeks! It has been quite hectic around here. I can not imagine what it will be like as the holidays draw even closer.

A brief update on all that has been going on...

Samantha had her 6 month checkup. I still can't believe she is 6 months old already! What I knew to be true was confirmed - Samantha is a big, big girl!! She is 27-1/2 inches tall and 18 lbs. 13 ounces!! Can you believe she is almost 19 lbs!!! Since her visit was two weeks she is most likely 19 lbs. by now. Such a big girl!

Samantha has been working really hard to get on her knees as well. She travels quite well around the house with rolling and doing a sort of army crawl and pushing and pulling with her legs and arms on the furniture around her. She gets into everything - already. Once she is crawling I will definitely have to set the playpen up again to contain her when I can't keep my eye on her. She is going to be handful! She hasn't quite gotten completely on her knees but yesterday came the closest to it so far. I joke that her belly is to big to lift off the floor.

Gabrielle has been up to her usual. We're dealing with the "trying three's" at the moment. Eventually this phase will end and we'll have our sweet, good listener back - right????

This week I took the girls to have their portrait made. It was Samantha's 6 month portrait, Gabrielle's 3 year portrait and their first picture together. The session got off to a rough start but we came home with some very cute photos so I'm happy. Unfortunately I was not able to get a cd of the pictures or else I would definitely post them. If only I had a scanner!! (hint, hint Santa)

Life is still very busy so it may be a few days before I am able to post again but hopefully I won't be gone quite so long this time. Until then here are some photos of the girls recently...

Gabrielle and Samantha are able to really play together more and more. There have even been times when Gabrielle has asked if Samantha can play with her in her room.


Gabrielle playing in Ed's shoes. The girl LOVES shoes!

It's kind of difficult to tell from this picture but Samantha is actually holding herself up off the floor. Her right leg isn't quite turned out but she is getting closer.

She is getting more and more determined to get to things out of her reach. I don't think any of us are ready for a crawler yet though!

Trick-or-Treatin' Fun!

It was a very busy weekend and I have a very busy week ahead but I wanted to take a few minutes to post some Halloween pics especially since I'm not sure when I'll have the chance to post anything after this.

We went to Ed's hometown for the weekend to visit Ed's dad. On Saturday night we dressed the girls up and took them trick-or-treating in Ed's old neighborhood. I thought it was kind of cool for the girls to go to the same houses and some of the same people that Ed did as a child. Gabrielle loved it and kept saying "I want all the treats!" Samantha only made it to the third house. As we were standing on the porch talking to some family friends she passed out on my shoulder. Poor thing!! I wish we had the camera with us at that point because she looked absolutely pitiful!

All in all it was a fun and successful Halloween. We now have more candy than any toddler could ever eat and way too much temptation for this Momma!

This photo was taken at Walmart. Ed and his dad were printing some pictures and Walmart had this set up. The girl working the photo lab came over and offered to take Gabrielle's picture as well. They gave us a free 5x7 which actually is much better than this one that I took.

Samantha the panda and Gabrielle as Angelina Ballerina. I pinned a pink bow on Samantha's costume but very few people noticed it so she was called "little buddy", "little brother", and "he" all night. Oh well! Next year I'll make sure she is dressed a little more girly.

Gabrielle kept asking us what we were dressing up as. I decided we were going as exhausted, overtired, overworked parents. Ha ha ha! Maybe next year I'll try to be a little more creative with my costume but I highly doubt I can get Ed to dress up as anything other than himself. Notice in the picture at 6 months Samantha is already trying to get into her sister's stuff. Only a small hint of what's to come I'm sure!

Painting Pumpkins & More!

Yesterday Gabrielle and I painted our small pumpkins. Gabrielle didn't want a face on hers. She said she wanted to paint it with rainbow colors. It started out with all different colors but as with most of her artwork ended up more of a grayish-greenish-blackish color. But we did add some glitter and some pink puff paint to liven it up a bit.




This week all the dance classes where Gabrielle takes ballet were asked to dress like their favorite character or in their Halloween costume. I waited until the last possible minute (last night) to get Gabrielle's costume made but I managed to get it done. Gabrielle decided to be her absolute favorite character Angelina Ballerina, who is a mouse for those of you unfamiliar with the character. We already had the tutu and leotard so I only had to make some ears and a tail. Gabrielle was so excited last night when I got them done and the first thing she asked about this morning was her costume.


I can't wait to see Samantha in her costume on Saturday. I hope with the warm weather we're expecting on Saturday that she doesn't get too hot in her costume.

Jack-o-lanterns!

Tonight our pumpkins became jack-o-lanterns! This was the first for all of us. Ed and I as kids had each carved pumpkins with our parents but never had we carved one together. We've always gotten pumpkins to set on our porch for decoration but never carved them. We figured Gabrielle is at the age that she would be excited about it even if she couldn't help with a lot of the process yet.

I found some templates online. Gabrielle's favorites were the most intricate designs. Fortunately she is still easily persuaded out of her opinion most of the time.

Samantha has her pumpkin ready to go!

And the cutting begins. I don't think Gabrielle quite understood what we were doing at this point.

I apparently am raising a prissy little girl. The one part of the process she could do which I thought she would love, she did not like at all. She did not like the slimy feel of the pumpkin "guts" and would not help scoop the stuff out.

When asked what she was making while she stirred the seeds and pumpkin "guts" she answered "a jack-o-lantern".

Ta-da! My pumpkin is on the left and Ed's is on the right.

I never realized how difficult taking a picture of a lit jack-o-lantern would be. This is the best out of the dozen we took. This is also the point at which Gabrielle finally went "ooh" and "aah" and actually understood what we were making.

We decided to only carve the two bigger pumpkins. I told Gabrielle she could paint the two smaller ones tomorrow. She is still insistent on making a pie so we will buy a couple of small pumpkins from the grocery store and make a pie at some point.