Whirlwind Birthday Weekend

This past was one of the best Birthday's I've ever had, bar none! Friday afternoon my mom came over and made one of my favorite meals of all times, corned beef, mashed potatoes and corn. My dad joined us for dinner and brought another favorite-JELL-O cake!! We all ate and then watched the girls play downstairs the rest of the evening, it was a nice evening. I am so blessed to have such a wonderful family!

Gerrad and the girls gave me the gifts from them Friday night, even though it wasn't technically my birthday. Gerrad and Macie were both just chomping at the bit to have me open my presents, it was so cute to see both of them so excited. I'm sure Addaline would have been as well had she realized what was going on. From Gerrad I got some 'Bump Its', I'm sure you have all seen that commercial a few times.


EVERY time it comes on I always exclaim 'I want to try those', I think he got the hint and got them for me. I started cracking up because I never imagined that's what he'd get me for my birthday, too funny. I have tried them out but haven't been able to perfect them yet, they've got some crazy examples in the brochure that came with them, WOW! I'm all about a little poof for a cute ponytail or updo, but not a bee hive thank you very much. I'll post a pic once I finally figure them out.

From the girls I got the most beautiful 'Open Hearts' charm bracelet. Its by far one of my favorite gifts to date. So far it only has the 'Open Heart' charm on it but Gerrad said we can go in and order a few more charms sometime this week. He said there is a charm that reminded him of Macie, its a little girl with ballet shoes on. And there is a charm that reminded him of Addaline, which is a little girl with a huge hair bow in her hair. Too cute, can't wait to go check them out! This is the closest picture I could find on Kay's website of a similar bracelet. Picture this a full bracelet with the charm dangling instead of connecting the bracelet loops.

I had told my mom a few weeks ago about this necklace I had seen that I adored. I honestly didn't even think she was listening to me when I was telling her about it, but she obviously was paying very close attention because she got me one for my birthday! Its also a charm necklace. This isn't the exact necklace but it is close to the one I have. I took pictures but they're still on my camera (at home) so this will have to do until I can get those uploaded. Mine is bigger for sure and holds a lot more charms. The concept of the necklace is so neat, its like a see through locket in a way. You just open the necklace, and put the charms free standing in the glass. She got me one charm that says 'daughter' on it, I thought that was really special. I went Saturday morning and got a charm of each of the girls' birth stones and a cross to put into it.

** Ok I updated this picture and snapped one with my cell phone of my actual necklace instead of the one I found online**

Saturday late afternoon Gerrad and I headed to Kansas City to shop for a little bit before dinner and the movie. Some how as usual I managed to buy the girls a few things without even LOOKING for myself. Its amazing what being a mother does to your shopping life, ha ha!! The dinner and a movie experience was truly one of a kind, soooo nice! I think Gerrad and both decided we are going to try to make it an every few months date night. The theatre was awesome, so nice and classy. The cinema suites are 21+ only which is not anything we're used to in our home town theatre that's for sure! The movie we saw, 'Inglourious Basterds', was a phenomenal movie and I would highly recommend it to anyone who asked! Here's a view of the theatre seats that we enjoyed, SO relaxing!

Last night we went to dinner just the 4 of us at Red Robin to use my free birthday burger coupon... let me just add that our family of 4 all ate for only $6!! The girls shared a kids meal and Gerrad and I shared a burger. You fill up SO much from their fries there is no need to get your own meal! Then we went to my in-laws for some cake and ice cream which was delicious as well. My in-laws and my dad both gave me $$ which is MUCH appreciated. I haven't decided how I'm going to spend it yet... I'm thinking of putting it towards my camera fund, but shopping for myself sounds kind of nice too. Hmmm???

Thanks everyone for the wonderful birthday wishes and to my family for their generous gifts!!

Go Shorty, its ya Birthday!!

Guess who is turning a whopping 26 tomorrow?? Any takers??

ME!!!

I feel like I've been SO preoccupied lately with planning the girls' birthday party (they're having a joint b-day party), doing all of Macie's birthday activities, planning a million baby showers, making tutu outfits and hair bows almost every night (thanks everyone for your orders), getting the daycare ready, shopping for the daycare, thinking about the daycare 24/7... that I almost forgot it was even my birthday. GEEZE!!

Gerrad and I are going to Kansas City tomorrow afternoon to shop around for a little while and then he's taking me to this place. I'm so excited about it! We love going to movies and try to as often as possible, its a nice few hours that we get to spend together alone (will 100 other people in the theater of course). This theatre is especially different because you are served dinner while watching the movie (or before, we're not sure of the order). You sit in reclining leather chairs and are waited on hand and foot basically, just what I need!

This is more on the topic of the girls' party but this is the color scheme I'm going for. I want to do cookies for their party for something different, they will look similar to one's pictured on the top left with each of the girls initial on the cookie. We'll do half with an 'M' and half with an 'A'.

I LOVE these cookies and can't wait to see how they turn out.

On a different note, I dressed the girls a like today for the first time since Addaline was born and let me be the first to say they look ADORABLE! They both have their Kansas Jayhawk shirts on and matching hair bows. Here is Macie showing off her hair bow, she thought she looked pretty cute! I'll get a better picture of them together tonight, I took these with my cell phone obviously!

Addaline kept saying 'CHEESE' over and over, too funny!!

This post is all over the place today, I apologize... This is what I am hoping I get for my birthday. I'm hoping between my husband and parents I can buy this and start getting in to photography a little bit. I LOVE taking pictures and editing them, and will hopefully be able to do this with a new camera SOON =) Hint Hint honey, if you're reading this! My camera which is only not even 2 years old, has officially shot craps so I'm hoping that is another selling point as to why I NEED this camera, ha ah!

Happy Friday everyone! I'll update about our busy weekend Sunday or Monday!

'Dishing Divas'

The 'Dishing Divas' kicked off our first get together this past weekend, and let me just say we had a BLAST! One of my besties and I got this fabulous idea of a themed girls night from our blogger friend Ashley. Her and her girlfriends have a girls night called 'Kitchen Queens' and they do all kinds of fun things. That's where we will get SOME of our ideas, I'm super excited about this new tradition some of my girls and I have started. We started out pretty small with just a group of 6 girls, but will probably add a few gals here and there along the way to include more people in the fun.

We decided that we're going to try to do a theme every month and stick with it as best as we can. Our first months theme was 'Mexican', because who doesn't love some yummy home cooked Mexican food?! I made chicken enchiladas and the rest of the gals brought equally delicious dishes. The month of September is pretty busy for everyone so there will only be 4 of us girls participating in that month, so we're just going to do dinner and a movie out on the town. In October my friend Lindsey is in a play/musical (I really have no idea what to call it, sorry Linds) and since its kind of a Halloween theme that will fit perfect for our girls night, and we can support our friend at the same time!

This group of girls is hilarious and I laughed harder Saturday night, than I have in a while! So thanks ladies for a FABULOUS, or should I say DIVA'licious night!!

Here are all of us girls with the picture/frame that I made to pass on to each gal when its her turn to be the hostess. Me, Kela, Lindsey, Katie, Chelsey and Jenna

The table decorations, we all love pink and green!!

Here is Katie really getting into Chelsey's yummy salsa =) You're never too old to act like a kid and take silly pictures!

Here are my delicious chicken enchiladas

More of the table decorations

Lindsey really loved Jenna's dessert, it was SO good!

Stay tuned for monthly pictures of the girls from our 'Dishing Diva' nights!!

Cha Cha Changes...

So after much careful talk and consideration... my husband and I decided that I am going to be a stay at home mommy, while running a SMALL in home daycare. I am SOOO excited and can't even put into words how elated I am to do this. I have wanted to stay home for quite some time with the girls and have really been feeling like this is something that has been laid on my heart over the past few months. One day I was thinking about ways I could stay home with the girls and it just clicked, like a light bulb went off in my head and there it was!

I've decided I'm going to keep it fairly small for starters to feel out how I like it and what works for each kiddo. Maybe a year or two down the road when I get the hang of it and am a little more confident I'll take on a few more kids, MAYBE! I'm going to become registered with our state instead of becoming licensed for now. I wanted to make sure everything was going to work out and fall in to place before I started any of the process. With being registered I am allowed to watch up to 6 kids including my own and have officially filled all of my spots.

I gave my 2 weeks notice to my current job today and couldn't have been more nervous this morning before I turned it in. I literally thought I was going to have to vomit in my supervisors trash can while talking to her. I have too kind of a heart and hate letting people down, by quitting I felt this burden that I was letting her down. She was very supportive and assured me they would hate to see me go and will miss me so much. I've also been told MANY times that if the time ever comes when my kiddos are grown and I want to re-enter the work world I'd be more than welcome to come back to my agency. I thought that was super sweet.

I spent a good chunk of the day yesterday shopping for all kinds of daycare goods. I'll be posting pictures of my progress over the next few weeks, don't worry! We decided we're going to turn our formal living room into the daycare so last night was spent reorganizing and redecorating the basement family room where we spend a majority of our time. We moved the chair down to the basement from the living room and it fits perfectly and looks GREAT! I also got rid of all the sports theme decor, while twisting my husbands arm with my hubby's permission first of course. I'm SO pleased with how that room turned out as well. Now I have to tackle the new daycare room, I definitely have my work cut out for me.

I just wanted to share my excitement with all my awesome blog readers and can't wait for you to see the transformation in our house and in my life!

7 Years Ago Today

7 years ago today my life was forever changed. 7 years ago today at this exact moment I was in labor and wondering what her beautiful face would look like. 7 years ago today I was smiling through my epidural loving the fact that I wasn't feeling a single labor pain =) And then...7 years ago today at 10:32am ,Gerrad and I welcome Macie Rene into our family. Our lives were impacted more than we could have ever imagined, by this miracle baby that changed me forever. 4 hour labor and out she was, a 7 lbs 15 oz beautiful baby!

What you are up to these days Macie:

*You LOVE to sing and dance, it seems like that's all you do around the house. I hope you are able to use your talent for dancing when you get older

*You like to play volleyball and are really good for someone your age. I was shocked one day when I watched you play with some of our friends (who are in their 20's) and you were just as good as they were at volleying the ball back and forth!

*You are obsessed with school and missed it all summer. You LOVE school work and play it all the time at home. You don't play with any toys and spend most your evenings playing outside or pretending to give lesson plans to your fake students (your sister).

*You are the BEST big sister that any little sister could EVER ask for. You are so kind and gentle with Addaline and have been from day 1. You have never been jealous or mean to your sister, and you tell her you love her all the time. It melts my heart to see the 2 of you playing every day and night

*You used to be a momma's girl but have slowly become a daddy's girl and adore your dad more than I could have ever imagined. Kind of makes me a little sad but I LOVE that you guys have that special bond ;)

*You are a kid after my own heart, you LOVE shoes and can never have enough pairs. You ask for shoes all the time when we go shopping and try to correct me when you think something doesn't match. You are a true DIVA which cracks me up, and drives your dad nuts!

*You love listening to Christian music and it makes me so proud to see you riding your scooter down the sidewalk singing 'You are the Everlasting God'. You love to pray and make sure we always do so before most meals.

Macie,

I want you to know how much you are truly loved and adored by so many people. You have truly changed my life and made me a better person. You have such a genuine spirit and truly care how people are feeling. You are such a tender hearted kiddo and worry about the safety of your family and every one's well being all the time. You want to make sure everyone is happy and things are running smoothly (you get that from your mother). You cry sometimes when you hear about peoples hurts, families heath problems or even about children you don't know that are sick, here and in foreign countries. I hope some day you grow up and further that love for nurturing in your own children, or children of the world!

I can't squeeze all the ways I feel about you into this blog posting, but know that I love you to the moon and back!!!

Blog Hop- Favorite Recipe

This week for the 'Blog Hop' the topic is favorite recipe again since it was such a hit the first time... This is one of my all time favorite recipes, and even better news... it's a weight watchers recipe. Still SOOO yummy!! It calls for ground turkey but I am NOT a fan so I use lean ground beef instead. Give it a try, you'll love it!

Ingredients

1 lb lean ground beef
1/2cup diced onion
1/2cup diced red/green pepper
1 8oz package crescent rolls
1 can pinto beans,drained (I use red kidney beans instead)
1 pkt taco seasoning
2-8oz cans tomato sauce
1 cup fat free cheddar cheese

Directions

Preheat oven 375 deg

Brown meat, onion, pepper, drain

spray 9x13" baking dish w/cooking spray. Unroll Crescent rolls. Pinch together to make crust. Bake for 6 min.

Add tomato sauce, beans, and taco seasoning to beef: mix thoroughly. Top crust with meat mixture and bake an additional 10min. Top with cheese and bake an additional 5 minutes.

Yum!!! Makes 8 servings.......5pts each (for weight watcher participants only does that part matter)

Number of Servings: 8

This has been the most requested theme, so we are going to do it again.Please put up a post with your favorite recipe, or if you don't have the recipe, a photo of your favorite dish and a description. I WILL CREATE A MckLinky RECIPE BOOK, and online recipe center after this Blog Hop, AND MAKE IT AVAILABLE TO ALL BLOG HOPPERS FOR FREE!

Not Me Monday

Welcome to Not Me! Monday! This blog carnival was created by MckMama. You can head over to her blog to read what she and everyone else have not been doing this week.


This weekend does NOT seem like it went by in a whirlwind because we were NOT pretty much on the go the whole time.

Friday night Gerrad and I did NOT take the girls to eat at Red Robin and did NOT devour entirely too many french fries for supposedly being on a 'diet'. Nope, NOT us, we would never break our diet and go hog wild with the fries and campfire sauce! I did NOT even contemplate dipping my finger in the sauce when the fries ran out, that would be totally ridiculous of me wouldn't it?!

I have NOT been having the hardest time trying to get my soon to be 7 yr old to tell me what she wants for her birthday, nope, she is NOT stubborn like that! She has also NOT insisted that the only thing she wants for her birthday is 'real makeup'... dream on girl, you're only 7 (almost)!!! I did NOT head to Target only to buy her totally random and boring things (to her) such as underwear, a volleyball, clothes and a super cute pair of boots for fall/winter. She's NOT going to think I am so lame when she opens her gifts.


I have NOT been attempting to get Addaline to notice the potty chair this past week; and since I haven't... then I wouldn't be able to tell you that she did NOT poop on the floor in the hallway upstairs Saturday morning. I did NOT run downstairs to fetch something from the dryer and hear Macie screaming 'MOM!!!!!!! MY SISTER POOPED ON THE CARPET' and go back upstairs to find 2 little piles and Addaline standing over them saying 'NOOOOOOOOOOO!!!'. Wow, I should have snapped a pic to put in her baby book to embarrass her when she gets older, but I was too worried about getting the spots off my carpet.


I did NOT schedule Addaline an appointment with an ENT after finding out she had her 3rd ear infection within 2 months (technically only 2 infections, one never cleared up). I'm NOT secretly hoping they'll just go ahead and do tubes so she can stop being miserable when she gets the infections. I also do NOT think I totally jinxed her a few months ago when I proudly exclaimed that she had NEVER had an ear infection before. Sorry baby girl =(


Macie did NOT pose ridiculously as usual for all the pictures I took of her on her first day of 2nd grade, see... (she actually didn't pose for one of them)





What have you NOT been up to the past few weeks? Don't be shy, give it a try!!

Tutu Giveaway Winner!!!

Sorry for the delay in announcing this... I have been dealing with another ear infection with my toddler so I've been a little out of sorts. I'm happy to announce the winner of the tutu is Christie @ http://kegginskrew.blogspot.com/!!!

Christie... please get with me (mollyhall24@yahoo.com) and let me know the colors and size that you would like!!

Thanks to everyone who entered!! If you didn't win and you're interested in purchasing a tutu anyhow, email me at the above listed email address and we can talk color and size. The tutus are $16 for newborn-infant, and $20 for toddler-child.

Show Us Your Life- Favorite Vacation Spot

This week over at Kelly's Korner is another edition of 'Show Us Your Life' and this week is favorite vacation spot... I actually have 2!!

My first and MOST favorite vacation spot is a place we just visited the first week of June this year. We went to Ocho Rios, Jamaica and had the time of our lives. I've already blogged about this so I'll keep my recap kind of short... This is a view from the beach where we laid out a few times and enjoyed the company of some friends that joined us on the vacation.

Here is a picture of Gerrad and I before dinner one night. I LOVED being in Jamaica and wearing fun little sun dresses every night. It was so nice to be away for 6 days without a care in the world. I missed my babies like crazy but also enjoyed the time with my husband and our friends. I would totally live in Jamaica one day if I could!

This is the very first thing you see when you enter the RIU Resort... it's absolutely breath taking!!!

This was the view off our balcony... beautiful as well!

I love this picture of my feet and the sand and sea... Oh how I heart Jamaica!!

My 2nd favorite vacation spot is also considered 'The Happiest Place on Earth'... can you guess what that is??? DISNEY WORLD!! We took a family trip in May 2008 with my in-laws and had a blast. We went to Disney for 4 days; Universal Studios and Islands of Adventure for 2 days; our small family of 4 went to Sea World one day, then we just had kind of a down day. My youngest daughter and niece were only 7 and 8 months old but they did SO well in their strollers and front carriers you barely knew they were there. My father in law doesn't like to ride any rides so he sat with the babies all the time while all of us 'big kids' rode everything we possibly could. Macie was was a trooper and rode EVERYTHING she was allowed (height requirements, thank goodness she's TALL), that kid loved every roller coaster she came into contact with- she takes after her mom and dad!! Here is a family picture of us the first day at Disney headed into Magic Kingdom.

Here is a sweaty picture of the girls and I on the Safari at Animal Kingdom... it was HOT and steamy that day!!

The cutest little Minnie Mouse EVER =)

A family picture at Epcot, notice Addaline is knocked out in her stroller? That's how she spent most of the trip!

At Universal Studios, I LOVE Macie's face in this picture... such drama!

Thanks for stopping by! I hope you enjoyed the pictures of my 2 favorite vacation spots... how I miss them so!

2nd Grade

So I'm going to save my big, long, sappy post for next Thursday when this gal turns 7... for today I'll shorten it up a bit.

Macie started 2nd grade today, my how the years have flown. We took all of her school supplies to the school last night to get everything organized and write her name on it all, oh and to meet her teacher too. Her teacher is SO sweet, she was actually one of my good friends grade school teacher as well so that makes me feel better as well. I NEVER thought I would like anyone as much as I loved Macie's 1st grade teacher, but so far the new one seems ok =) I had already purchased all of Macie's school supplies a few weeks ago but she and her grandfather came up with a plan that she needed a new, nicer, more expensive backpack that was going to be purchased by Grandpa... because mommy and daddy were perfectly happy with the backpack she already had! You know how grandparents can be, only the best for their grand kids! This is the backpack my little gal picked out, only hers is two different shades of pink and then gray. I took quite a few pictures of her this morning before school so I'll try to post those later this evening.

If you think these pictures of Macie posing are funny, just wait until I post the school pictures. She is doing the SAME thing only its a full body shot, that girl is a hoot!

Macie: I hope you have a WONDERFUL first day at school and enjoy this year as much as the last!

Blog Hop- Current Favorite Photo

So this weeks 'Blog Hop' is entitled 'Favorite Photo'... this is a rather new favorite of mine. I just took it this weekend when we took the girls to Deanna Rose Farmstead in Kansas City. They had a great time and I snapped LOTS of cute pictures, but this was my FAVORITE!! Enjoy =)

Not Me Monday

**Don't forget to enter my TUTU GIVEAWAY here**

Welcome to Not Me! Monday! This blog carnival was created by MckMama. You can head over to her blog to read what she and everyone else have not been doing this week.

Friday night we did NOT have a wonderful time at a friends house for dinner and an important proposition was NOT made to me about some fun things concerning our Wednesday night children's church... stay tuned for more info on that when it's all finalized.

Saturday we did NOT head to Kansas City first thing in the morning to enjoy a wonderful time at Deanna Rose Farmstead with the girls. They did NOT have a great time feeding goats, petting rabbits, climbing on toys, mining for treasures and playing in the water, nope NOT them! I did NOT take entirely too many pictures of the girls having a ball and will NOT be posting them SOON!

We did NOT head to Chick-Fil-A for lunch after we were done and Addaline did NOT proceed to break out in hives while eating. She was dipping her fries in ranch dressing, so I thought maybe there was something in there maybe she was having a reaction to, after studying the label for nearly 5 minutes I discovered on her chicken nugget box they fry all their chicken and fries in 100% pure recycled peanut oil... how could I have missed that on the menu. Addaline is allergic to peanuts/peanut butter. Needless to say I did NOT feel like mother of the year for missing that one and seeing my baby girl get hives from eating her french fries. She did NOT end up eating fresh fruit for lunch instead.

I did NOT make a rockin' Michael Jackson CD last night while Gerrad went to see 'G.I. Joe' and was NOT super anxious to drop the girls off this morning so I could blast it in the car and sing along. *On a serious note about 'ol MJ, yes he was kind of kooky, but the man could SING!!*

SO what have you NOT been doing this past week? Don't be shy, give it a try!