Girlfriends are the Best

Last Thursday, I flew to New Jersey to spend some much needed time with my favorite girls. Leslie lives in New Jersey, about 30 miles from New York City, so we decided that would be a great place for our girls trip this year. Here we all are at our hotel before dinner Saturday night. I love each one of these girls so much and am so thankful for their friendship over the years. All of these pictures are from phones, mostly Kim's phone. Thankful for phones so I have these memories in photographs.

Before we went to NYC, we spent some time in Leslie's cute little town. I finally got to meet her adorable little girl, Alexandra, who's almost 3!

We got to NYC after 4:00ish on Friday. It was raining and pretty nasty. We spent a little time huddled under our umbrellas in Times Square.

I took this picture for Cade because he loves baseball. I tried to find him a yoyo and never did find one. Bummer.

We had too much fun at the M&M store. It's really the only store we went in at Times Square. A few comedy people stopped to talk to us/give us tickets to shows and we walked around a bit before we had to head back to the hotel to change for dinner.

I took this for Emalyn who loves yellow and also loves M&Ms. We all got our kids souvenirs from M&M store.

This blue M&M was a pervert in a costume. He kept coming up behind us and patting us or hugging us. Weird...

We had a wonderful dinner Saturday night and after dinner it was pouring down rain and we couldn't find a cab, so we gave up and went back to the hotel to hang out. We were soaked by the time we got back to the room. We took a little quiz about how well know we each other and had a lot of laughs in our room that night. Sunday morning we were thrilled it wasn't raining and we explored the city a little. We had so much fun in Chinatown. Here we are carrying our new designer (knockoff) handbags. It was still fun shopping, but not as adventurous because now they show you pictures or you go online and then they bring you a bag to look at. You can barely look at it because they are afraid the police will catch them. It was much more fun when they'd lead you to their secret warehouses.

After our adventures with our personal tour guide, Lee (aka China Man), we stopped for some lunch in Little Italy. It was the worst lunch ever. Terrible pizza, terrible service, but I was glad I was with good friends. There was a festival going on too and we walked around the festival for a while. I couldn't decide if I should get cheesecake or not and eventually got a fried Snicker's bar. It was pretty good, but I don't think I'll have another one anytime soon.

This was an actor Kim met in Little Italy.

Again we had trouble finding a cab, so we ventured to the subway to get back to our hotel. There was a wonderful Asian man who helped us figure it all out. We got back to the hotel and then drove back to Leslie's house. We had a tasty dinner Les made for us and then hung out and watched Bridesmaids (terrible movie, btw).

Sunday morning we all flew home to our families. It was a quick but wonderful weekend that I so badly needed. Brett sent me some texts of my little cuties while I was gone. Here they are before they came to pick me up from the airport.

Emalyn's pajamas she picked out and put on herself. She loves yellow, followed closely by green and purple.

And here she is with her many spoons eating applesauce. The kids had a blast with their Daddy. Cade said he didn't even miss me. Brett is so supportive of me getting time away and for that, I'm forever grateful.

I had to throw this one in too after seeing it on my phone while downloading other pictures. Cade is going to be an old man for Halloween this year. It's pretty funny. We'll see if he changes his mind in the next 30 days or not.

Three for Thursday

1. This was Miss Thing throwing a fit last week. I don't remember what it was about, but probably something important in her world, like she wanted 4 spoons and she only had 2. The kid loves applesauce and wants to eat it with multiple spoons. These pictures of her fussing and pouting make me laugh and we have to remember to laugh with a child this age. She's not even two yet, we have a fun year ahead, I'm sure :)




2. I pulled the blocks up from the basement for playgroup last week and Emalyn has played with them every day since. She loves to play blocks with Bubba. I love that she loves something that Cade also enjoys. She'll make him get off the couch in the mornings and play with her. It goes something like "Bubba, blocks" "off" (as she's pulling him off the couch) "Yellow, blue, green, red blocks with Bubba". Then she'll point out all of the blocks she thinks Cocoa has chewed or "broken" as she calls them. There are 2 or 3 blocks that Cocoa chewed part of. Emma thinks if the blocks won't fit on right then it's broken because Cocoa chewed it. Lots of OCD tendencies. So many things she talks about all the time over and over like: Ellie, frog, basement, bye bye (there were frogs in the window wells and she was freaked out and Cade told her Ellie took them bye bye); pink swing, towel, uh oh, birds (she thinks if she's going to swing there's going to be bird poo on the swing and we'll have to clean it with a towel); it broken, horsie (the horse she'd ride at Meijer is gone and I told her it's broken and she talks about it all the time); Cocoa, backpack, sissy (we saw a back pack at the store with a dog that looks like Cooca and I took a picture for sissy to see). Maybe it's normal for these things at this age, I just don't remember. I guess time will tell if she outgrows this or not.



3. Emma loves her sissy and Cocoa. This picture was so funny because Maddi and Emma look cute but Cocoa is licking her nose. We were cracking up when we looked at the pictures.

Fun Times

Somebody just celebrated their last birthday in their 30s! He even shared his cookies with the kids. Emma was super excited that it was "Daddas bappy"! She looks very happy to have a cookie. Funny thing is that she held onto it all night and never even took a bite.

The birthday boy with his girls.

I love this picture of those three.

Brett's dad sent him the sports themed chocolate covered strawberries and baseball cookies. The kids and I got him a Reeces Blizzard cake. We had plenty of sweets to celebrate the big birthday. All of my pictures of the kids with Brett had Emma making crazy faces at Cade. She must think he's a nutcase, they way she's always looking at him. So funny!

I love how Brett and Emma are looking at each other and smiling/laughing. She is feeling better and is back to to her happy and silly self. Soooo thankful!

Make a wish! I really can't believe Brett just turned 39. I remember my mom turning 40 and helping my dad decorate her office for her 40th. I thought she was pretty old to be turning 40. Ha! Now I realize how young 40 really is. Our gift to Brett was seeing Robert Earl Keen in Chicago Thursday night. He went with a few guys from work and stayed at our friends condo downtown. He had a great night and he deserved it. Happy Birthday Brettley!

Saturday afternoon, Cade had another baseball game. Tuesday night we froze at the game, but Saturday was beautiful! Maddi wanted to bring Cocoa, so she did. Two sweet girls cheering for their Bubba.

Cade's first at bat, he got hit by a pitch. He's had trouble hitting this season, so he was probably a little happy to get hit so he got on base.

On first base...

Now he's warming up playing first base. They were winning 13-3 after the first 2 innings but ended up losing the game.

He's playing with 4th and 5th graders and is the youngest kid on the team, so he's feeling a little down on his abilities. He looks good though :) He's doing great defensively, and hopefully his batting will improve this week after a few trips to the batting cages.

How cute are these girls?!? Emalyn loves her pigtails and asks for them all the time. She always says, "I want pigtails. Two yellow didtails." When I put them in, she looks at herself in the mirror and shakes her head side to side and smiles. Complete cuteness!

We went to Sweet Tomatoes for dinner. They have the perfect size ice cream cones for her. Bubba made this cone for her. She enjoyed it for a while and then had enough and said she was all done.

After dinner, we took advantage of the gorgeous weather and went for a walk. They are building a house around the corner, where they tore down the sales office. We have enjoyed going in the house to see how they are building it. Makes me sad to think back to our house we were building in Allen...and never moved into. I like it here and try not to think about what it would have been like if we had moved in that house instead of here. After our walk, Brett and Cade threw the baseball around.

Cade is pitching at the game Wednesday, so they were practicing.

Maddi and Emma played bubbles.

So much fun!


It was nice to have a low key weekend and have some quality time together as a family.

Sunday we enjoyed watching the coverage of the 10th Anniversary of 9-11. The kids had learned about it at school but still had a lot of questions. It's crazy how I can't remember what I did last week, but I remember that day like it was yesterday. Brett had work in Hickory, North Carolina and Maddi and I went with him. Maddi was 10 1/2 months old and I wasn't working, so it was easy to tag along. We ended up stranded in North Carolina for a few days but I was so thankful to be together with our little family. Such a terrible tragedy that happened. It's still hard to wrap my mind around it. I'm going to New York in a few days and I'm looking forward to seeing the memorial in person. It looks beautiful.

Phone Purge

It seems I've only taken pictures on my phone lately. Here are the funny and cute things that have gone on in the last week: Emalyn has been riding Cade's old spiderman scooter. She saw Maddi on her razor scooter and wanted to ride it but Em's too little for it so I pulled out spider man. She kept saying "Bubba, scooter". How did she know it was for boys? Sorry baby girl, you're going to have to ride a "boy" scooter. We gave away Maddi's Barbie scooter many years ago because we never thought we'd have a little girl to pass it down to.

Speaking of never knowing we'd have another baby to pass things down to...since Emma was our "bonus baby", we were lucky enough to be given all kinds of baby gear from friends and family. We decided it was time to clear some space in our basement and say goodbye to the baby gear. We're pretty sure we're done with babies in our house (God might have another plan) so we don't need the swings, etc. anymore. We decided to participate in the community garage sale this past weekend to get rid of the stuff. Most places won't take donations of anything a baby sits in because of liability reasons, so this was the best way to get it off our hands. After we moved things out into the garage to prepare, Emma was thrilled, thinking we moved it out for her to play with. She said "chairs, basement" when she first saw it all. Then she started playing with everything. I was sorting out the clothes and she found this outfit and insisted on taking it inside. Brett had no idea what is was and helped her put it on. It was a 0-3 month outfit but somehow he managed to get her almost 22 month old body into it!

She was so happy and proud! Oh, yeah, she picked out both of her bows too. Yellow has become her favorite color. She always says "I want a yellow bow", no matter what she's wearing. Miss Thing has a mind of her own, for sure!

She tried to enjoy the swing, but she was just too big.

A backside view of the lovely outfit. Such a funny girl. She hasn't been feeling well lately and this was the first time that we had seen her happy and silly. We all really enjoyed seeing her funny and happy again.

Then it was time for the high chair. Emma thinks she's big like Maddi and Cade and won't sit in the chair anymore. It was fun to play in it in the garage though.

She wanted to try out the car seat too, but she was just too big. Kind of sad. The garage sale went pretty well. We had it a few hours on Friday and Saturday and then ended up putting all the leftover things by the curb with signs that said "free". Most everything was gone in no time.

Friday afternoon, Emma was pretty happy and was messing around in the kitchen. She found the bag of "b pops" in the cabinet and helped herself to all of them. She unwrapped them all and then came over to me and said "b pops"!

She was quite proud of herself!

She never even licked one of them, she just enjoyed unwrapping them and then put the wrappers in the trash. I gave her a bag to put the b pops in and then she threw the bag in the trash. I immediately pulled the bag out of the trash. She randomly asks for the b pops now and she'll take a few licks and then want to throw them away. Oh, Emalyn, such a stinker.

She's rounding the corner and feeling better and having happy moments here and there. Saturday night she went to bed at 5:45 and slept until 7:00 Sunday morning. We had a babysitter that night and she never even saw Emma. Sunday she had two naps of over two hours each. Poor baby girl is either growing a ton or really trying to get over whatever little virus she has had.

Sunday night we went over to our friends house for a cookout. It's always fun getting together with their crew.

The kids had a blast finding sticks for the fire pit and playing in their creek.

Emalyn and Dawson enjoyed the bounce house in the basement.

Cocoa needed more dog food, so we thought it would be fun to go to the pet store that has puppies to get her food. We always have to remind Maddi that we are only going to play with the puppies, we aren't bringing one home. Well, today, Cade was nearly in tears because we wouldn't buy the $1499 plus $249 mandatory microchip package puppy that he fell in love with. It was an adorable little Yorkie and the kids had named him Brownie and everything. So sorry Cade. We were shocked to see Cade so attached to a dog and also surprised that he liked that type of dog so much.

The kids also liked this little collie. We also played with a labradoodle to see if Emalyn was allergic to it. She was. She broke out in hives on her face at our friends house the other night after she pet their dogs. She got all red and puffy on her face today too. Secretly, I'm so glad she's allergic to big dogs. She was scared of the labradoodle too because it was big and hyper. Emalyn LOVED the little yorkie that Cade loved too. She would grab it and pick it up and hold it. That little puppy was so tolerant of her. We promised the kids when Emma is 4 or so we will get another little puppy. We want Emalyn to be old enough to remember getting a puppy and by then Cocoa will be older and it will be a very sad day when Cocoa goes. We declared it Cocoa Appreciation Day after we left the pet store with sad kids so they could be reminded how lucky they are to have a good pet in Cocoa.