Halloween 2010

Since this was Emalyn's first Halloween, we took a ton of pictures of her. This was Emalyn playing after Maddi's birthday party and before Trick or Treating.

She's such a chunk, and we just love it. She's so cute waddling around pushing her baby doll.

Time to get naked and get her costume on.

Still working on getting her clothes off...

So far she thinks this is fun.

What a cute little fairy!

She was so cooperative and was even so good about keeping her big fairy bow on.

A fairy has to put her gold sparkly shoes on, of course.

Maddi was a surgeon and Cade was an unknown phantom. Maddi was pretty worn out after having her party but she was determined to go trick or treating too. Cade loved his costume and the fact that he could see out but nobody could see in.

We decided Halloween was a good time to let Emalyn experience her first lollipop. She LOVED it! Ellie and Emma are checking each other out.

Two little cuties!

Emalyn never took the lollipop out of her mouth after she first put it in.

She was drooling lollipop all over herself.

Her little costume had lolli drool all over it. It was killing me for her to get so messy, but she was enjoying it so much, so I tried my best to just let her enjoy it.

The McDonald and Ball kids. From left to right, Maddi (surgeon), Emma (fairy), Grace (50s girl) holding Ellie (bunny), Cade (phantom) behind Grace, Jack (darth vader) on the ground, and Andrew (giraffe). We are so glad to have such nice and fun neighbors.

Then we went over to another neighbors for a little bit before heading out to trick or treat.

Emalyn got smarties at the first house and she wouldn't let go of them.

Look at that face! She was LOVING Halloween.

Now she got a lollipop. yeah!

Serious face as she's checking her bucket to make sure her candy is still in there.

Emalyn and I went to 3 houses before going back home to hand out candy. Emalyn only had the one lollipop and the rest of the night she was happy to just play in the candy. Brett and the kids came back after a while and they were checking out the candy they got. We had so many kids come that we were just about out of candy, so the kids gave up some of their not so favorite candies to hand out.

It got a little chilly as the day went on so the fairy had to wear a jacket and gloves.

This smile says it all...it was a great day!

Girls Weekend!

I took Emalyn with me to Texas for a Girls Weekend. I was meeting my bffs from college for a night in Austin and then we went to Fredericksburg for a wedding. Before I met up with my girlfriends, I spent some time with some of my other favorite girls in my life. First I met up with my cousin, Alexa, who happened to be in town from Colorado with her girls. My mom, Aunt Shirley, Alexa, Ella, Quinn, Emalyn and I had a wonderful lunch at one of my favorite Mexican Restaurants, Mexican Manhattan.

This is Emalyn meeting her cousins Ella and Quinn for the first time.

Ella is such a funny girl. One of the funniest things she said was that she's never getting married unless he's a hunk and LOVES Texas! She is in first grade, but she acts much older, and she totally reminds me of my cousin Alexa!

Alexa with her sweet girls.

Emalyn had fun playing with Trey, my mom's neighbor. He was so sweet to her and I think they both enjoyed each other.

Omie had a shopping cart for Emalyn to play with.

Everyone loves Omie's House! I know Emalyn had a great time with Omie because she wasn't the least bit excited to see me when I got back. Maddi and Cade weren't too thrilled that Emalyn got to go to Omie's and they had to stay home and go to school. However, I think it was really a special time for Omie and Emalyn to spend some time alone together. I got to spend time with my friends, and the big kids got to spend time alone with Brett. Everyone had a great time together.

I am waiting for pictures from Leslie from our night in Austin with Kim, Dusti, Leslie and I. We had a lot of laughs together as always. I love those girls! Dusti didn't get to go to Fredericksburg for the wedding, but a lot of other sorrority sisters were there and we had so much fun! This was at the reception in a random room of animal heads.

These are my dates for the night, Leslie and my lil sis Tracy.

This was between the wedding and reception with me, the brides mom, Kim and Wendy.

Before the wedding, it was raining so they put us in this random room filled with guns and miniature manequins. We were trying to pose like the manequin.

Some of my sorrority sisters: Sonya, Kathy, Tracy, me, Wendy, Courtney and Jennifer. It was so much fun seeing all of these girls.

Great Aunt Shirley with Miss Emalyn.

Emalyn with her Omie.

Poor Emalyn started throwing up around 11:30 Sunday night. She was so sick and I was so worried about getting on a plane with her Monday morning at 7:00 a.m. The plane ride couldn't have been any more smooth. We got a row of 3 seats to ourselves and Emalyn fell asleep without making a peep before the plane took off. She slept the entire way and never got sick. I was so thankful it went as well as it did. I had grabbed some kitchen towels from my moms before we left in case Emalyn was vomiting. I laid them on the seats and little Emalyn was quite comfy. It was a fabulous trip with many great memories made!

Halloween at School

Emalyn and I went to a Halloween playdate at church. She looked so cute in her overalls that Maison passed down to her!

She had fun at the playdate doing crafts, but she really had fun playing with my decorative balls that she is not supposed to play with. Caught you, Stinker!

Cuteness!

This is Cade with some of the kids in his class. I went to his party and did the Bozo bucket game. It was fun and the kids were very excited, but not too crazy. I didn't get to see the parade because I was at home with Maddi, who was sick. Poor girl had to miss school that day because she was vomiting the night before. She also had to miss the Monster Mash Bash that night and Emalyn and I stayed home with her. Luckily Cade was still able to go with a friend. Brett was on a plane back from L.A. so he didn't go either so no pictures from the night, but Cade said it was a blast.

Fun before Bed

I continue to be amazed at how much Maddi and Cade love little Emalyn and how sweet they are with her. Emalyn discovered Maddi's room and can often be found playing in there if we are upstairs. I love this chunky little baby sitting in the chair. Maddi was pretending to make baby food with a necklace and pretend feeding it to Em with a hairbrush. Maddi was also singing to her and it was just so cute to watch them interact.

One reason Emalyn loves Maddi's room is because of this red dry erase marker. She knows Maddi keeps it on her table and Emalyn will get it and will scream when we take it away from her. She was practicing her handwriting :)

Maddi helped her write her name. Emalyn is paying close attention.

Now Emma wants to make sure we see what she's doing.

And now she's looking at Maddi like she is the greatest sister ever!

Cade wanted a turn with Emalyn too so he took her in his room and sat on his couch with her. Have you ever seen such chunky thighs?!?

Brother and Sister love! Cade is wearing this light that Brett got for him to read at night. Cade will not get out of his bed to turn off his light (I think he's scared of the dark). In the summer he'll just close his blinds after he reads by the sunlight. Now it's too dark, so he wears this goofy light, but it works and course my little goofball LOVES it!

On a different night we let Cocoa stay in Maddi's room when she went to bed. Brett went in later to get Cocoa out and he found that Maddi had moved to the end of her bed to be with Cocoa and covered Cocoa with a blanket.

Maddi loves Cocoa and I'm pretty sure Cocoa loves Maddi too!