My Sleeper

Cora fell asleep after me changing her diaper. I think I got occupied with Kayley and she was enjoying being by herself, then just decided to take a nap...she's pretty easy going.

Kayley & Ashlyn: Buddies

It sure was cute to watch Kayley try and pull Ashlyn...it was pretty hard for her, not because Ashlyn is fat, but because she would start trying when it was uphill. They both had a blast!

Kayley and Ashlyn are always up for some fun when they head to Grandma's house. And of course, whatever Kayley does, Ashlyn comes too. They love Grandma's wagon and Kayley loves pushing Ashlyn. They stopped for a split second to pose for a picture!

Shannon & John's Wedding Reception

Ok...So I'm a little late in puting these pics up...but better late than never. These are from Shannon and John's reception in January at Willard. Don't they look like they should already have kids? If our kids weren't so perfect, maybe we'd loan ours out to them!

The reception was lots of fun with lots of neat decorations! We were all really impressed and of course it was great catching up with everyone!

December 2007 Events

Well, December was quite the busy month...I think we were gone almost every weekend!! To start, Quentin came home from his mission the first weekend. We all met in Springfield at the airport. It was a sweet time to see him home and see Arlaine and Randy be so excited to have him home. He got to meet quite a few new people he had not ever met in person. This family was busy while he was on his mission. He met Ashlyn, Marchelle, Cora, and John all in one day! Kayley was the only niece born before he left and she was only 3 months left, so I guess he also got to meet who she was now for the first time as well!
The following week we headed to St. Louis for John and Shannon's wedding at the Temple. It was FREEZING! Middle of December and yes, it had to start snowing. It made for great pictures for Shannon and John, but boy was it cold! I was just glad that we could bundle up with coats! Then after the wedding it was off to Columbia for their reception that night. Funny story with it all, Grandma Weekes ended up burning something in the oven right before the reception and the whole building stunk! We had to make a mad dash to Walmart for some air freshener to help the smell a bit, but it still stunk! She felt really bad! But in her defense it was a crazy day and we had lots of food warming up, etc in preparation. It ended up being a great time and for the most part, admist all the snow/weather, there were quite a few people who ended up showing up!

Admist all of this traveling, my girls continued to grow and reach huge milestones. Cora is now 4 months and has learned how to roll over! Kayley still loves to play with her on the floor as well and I have to say it's really cute! Kayley reached a huge milestone and was amazing at it as well! She was potty-trained this month! In 1 1/2 weeks too at that...even with all our traveling! She is one smart cookie! The weekend of Thanksgiving, the Carles were getting ready to leave and Edward got out the new Elmo potty (it was brand new) and started playing with it, Kayley told him that wasn't what he was supposed to do with it and proceeded to go into the bathroom, take off her footie PJ's and went potty in the toilet all by herself! I decided that we would go for it and put big girl undies on her, even while everyone thought I was crazy for doing it with the holidays and all the traveling we had planned! But she had everything down almost immediately and amongst all the traveling each weekend only had a few accidents, I think only at most 2 each weekend we were gone...pretty impressive if you ask me! We are so proud of her! She was pretty proud of herself too!

Then we had a great Christmas. We went to Michelle's for Christmas Eve as most of the Bell family came up for the celebration. We got some cute pictures of all the Bell cousins and of the girls.

Then for Christmas Day we went to the Walker's again to do some Christmas presents. I actually forgot to take any still pictures of the girls for Christmas morning, but we had a great Christmas at home before we headed to Michelle's house. Cora got her bouncy seat, which she loves and Kayley got some new Ariel stuff, which she loves! Then we had a great visit with everyone at the Walker's.

Then a few days later we headed to my Mom's house in Jeff City. The Reall's got to come as well as almost everyone else. The only one's we didn't get to see were the Sanders, they were greatly missed, but it was fun with everyone else there! It was fun to get most of the babies born in 2007 together for some pictures. It still amazes me that all of my siblings that could be pregnant that year were and all of us had girls!

November 2007 Events

For the sake of journaling for my family's history, I will be doing posts for each month of the year with all the events we did that month. Here is Novembers' events:


At the beginning we went to Silver Dollar City. Again I had a blast riding the adult rides as I had to sit out on all of them while I was pregnant with Cora. Cora is not big enough to ride the little kid rides yet being only, but Kayley had a blast and we had a blast riding with her. Her favorite was the frogs...they really jump quite high for a kid's ride! Kayley and Ashlyn of course also had tons of fun playing at Grandma's house in her wagon outside.

My girls continue to grow...FAST...as most kids do! Cora is now 3 months old and Kayley is 2 years old and 3 months...err whatever you want to call that age!! :) Cora is pretty much sitting up almost all by herself with small assistance from the couch and the bumbo. Kayley loves to sit with her. She also likes to remind us that she is still our baby by dressing herself in Cora's clothes (bottom left). We've also been working on rebuilding a car for Quentin as he will be returning from his mission in December. Here's Kayley enjoying the view from the doorless passenger side of his new Honda Civic!

Also in November we got a surprise visit from some cousins. Nick's Aunt Wilma came from Ohio and brought Roreigh (Jake's daughter) who is only one week younger than Kayley. Nick's other Aunt Nomi from Kansas came with Nickolette who loves to play with Kayley and Ashlyn and now Cora and of course Roreigh during the visit. She is really great with all the girls! And of course the little girls adore Nickolette!! We all went to Legends to eat/shop, etc. Cabella's is located there where Nomi and Wilma love to get fudge and Nebraska Furniture Mart is also there where we got a new couch for a great deal! We all ate at Famous Dave's for dinner and had a blast! It sure is great to have cousins and extended cousins!

November also was Cora's first Thanksgiving! JT was currently living with us while Jess was back in Pittsburgh trying to get their house sold, so the Carles came to our house for the holidays to spend Thanksgiving. Andrew and Sarah came over from Columbia as well as Tyson and Mary. I believe Mary and Tyson were getting close to engagement, but can't remember for sure. It was the first time he had met any of the Carles as we knew him from living in Columbia earlier. It was a fun day as we (Jess and I...but mainly Jess) did the Turkey. It was my first Turkey and I think it turned out pretty good. Then we had the usuals of a Felker Thanksgiving...which always has the famous Cheese Grits...yum!! It was fun to have all the cousins together to play with one another!

I promised Nick this year that I wouldn't put up the Christmas tree until after Thanksgiving, although I desperately wanted it up for everyone to see it up during Thanksgiving (not that it's much to look at only being 7 ft high)...but it's also our first thanksgiving in this house so I was excited to have a house to decorate for the holidays! So Kayley was my big helper and loved every minute of it. I had to make sure that the non-breakable ornaments were at reaching level for her and the breakable ones were up high as they were very intriguing for her, but she was a great help and it turned out great! Cora just sat and watched with amazement while we decorated and next year she will probably enjoy it more!

Halloween 2007

Cora had her first Halloween this year. We had fun a couple of nights before Halloween carving pumpkins. Kayley did NOT like to get her hands dirty, so good thing Daddy was there to help her! Cora just sat by watching and enjoying the entertainment.
Here are the girls dressed up. We went to Liberty to go trick or treating with Ashlyn. Cora was our bunny and Kayley was our cow and Ashlyn was a bear. We had quite the animal collection going! We had lots of fun watching our cute girls trick or treating. I felt crazy holding a bag for Cora as I knew most people probably thought, "this baby can't eat any of this candy yet!" Oh well, we all got to enjoy it anyway!! :) It was a fun halloween!

Audrey's 2nd Birthday Party

Audrey had her 2nd birthday in October. We went over to Columbia to celebrate with her. We had fun on Friday night going to a pumpkin patch with the Felkers. The drive was a bit more than we expected so when we got there our time was limited, but we ended up having a lot of fun. I actually forgot to take any pictures of Cora even though it was her first pumpkin patch experience...must be 2nd child syndrome that Mommy has!! :) But, Kayley and Audrey had fun playing in the playhouse and seeing all the different looking pumpkins.

Saturday evening Tyson and Mary came over to have fun and help decorate cookies for Audrey's birthday party.

Sunday was Audrey's birthday so we all went to church and Kayley went to nursery with Audrey without crying for the first time!! I think it did the trick as she loves going to nursery now!! But afterwards, Mom and Otto and Mary and Tyson came over along with a few other friends of Andrew and Sarah and we had fun eating cake and ice cream and celebrating Audrey's birthday. Mom gave the girls their birthday presents since Kayley's was only about 2 months beforehand. They got matching fuzzy purses, fuzzy ear-muffs (displayed) and lots of necklaces and other girlie things! Thanks Grandma Jani and Papa Otto! It was a fun weekend with family!

Kayley & Cora Best Friends

Kayley loves having a baby sister. She is really a big help. She loves to bring me wipes and diapers and is also very willing to put away the dirty diaper in the diaper pail for us. Cora just loves watching her sister play. She is mastering a pretty cute smile now as she is now a little over 2 months old. She really is a happy baby and is already starting to sleep through the night for me. She's usually asleep in between 9 and 10 and then she'll stay asleep until about 6am and then I'll nurse her and she'll go back to sleep for a few more hours. I couldn't ask for a more perfect baby...plus she's just so darn cute!! We really are blessed to have such cute and fun girls!

Cora's Blessing Weekend

This weekend we were able to have Cora's blessing weekend. It was so much fun having family around and spending time with one another to celebrate this special event in our life and Cora's life. The first night everyone was together we all got together and had dinner at O'Charley's for dinner since they have free kids meals...with all the kids on my side of the family...this really pays off!
Then Sunday was Cora's blessing. It was extra special as it also happened to fall on my Mom's birthday...September 30th. So we also had a little birthday celebration with her as well. We all had tons of fun with all the kids playing together and eating pizza and eating cake and enjoying each other's company. Cora was great for her blessing and there were lots of people in her circle. Included in the circle were Nick (who gave her the blessing), Otto Hildebrand, Randy Bell, Jud Carle, Edward Felker, Andrew Felker, and Kendall Walker. We were so greatful for those that were able to come and celebrate this special day with us!

Cora's Blessing and as mentioned before, Nick was the one to give her the blessing: Parts of it are a bit choppy as the recorder was a bit fuzzy for part of the recording, so I've added what your Dad said to those fishy parts.

"Our dear Father in Heaven, by the authority of the Melchezidek Priesthood, we come before Thee at this time to give this child a name that shall be had upon the records of the church. The name which we give her is Cora Anne Bell. Cora at this time your Heavenly Father wants you to know that the sweet spirit you are and how much He loves you and appreciates you. He wants you to know how much joy you bring into your family's life....at this time He gives you a blessing that you will be able to be a strength throughout your life...that you will be able to be looked upon for guidance...so that you will be able to help those in need...that you have a special gift...we bless you with these things in the name of Jesus Christ, amen."

Nick said "you were blessed with a spirit to recognize the needs of others and that this was a gift you would use this to serve others and reach out to them throughout your life."

Cora Anne 1 1/2 months

Cora likes her swing...although she sometimes gets a bit top-heavy and slides to one side or the other. The blanket sometimes helps, but it didn't this time as she kept sliding over. But, she was still happy...so I snapped a shot!