Trick or Treat!?!

Well, I know it's about 1 1/2 weeks late, but better late than never! Here are some pics of the girls trick or treating on Halloween night! We had a blast considering the situation...Cora ended up having a fever earlier that day and diarrhea and on top of that, Kayley woke up from her nap with the same things! Nick didn't want to go trick or treating with them being sick, but I told him he could be the one to tell Kayley that. She's been asking almost everyday for the past month and a half when "Halloween day" is? It's actually sunk in what trick or treating means! It didn't take Cora long to figure it out either. She would go up to the door and try to give them candy, then would immediately drop the candy and grab the candy the people gave her. It sure was cute and it was cute to see her dragging her candy bucket when it got too heavy (see pic above!) But, afterwards, she decided that the candy bucket was a stool as you can also see from the pics above. But, we had a fun night and the girls didn't act sick at all when they realized candy was involved! We ended up trick or treating for about an hour! I was impressed! Then the Carles came over to visit and compare loots!! :) We had a great Halloween and hope that everyone else did as well! Oh...and that's one of our sweet neighbors who helped us pose the girls for a pic at one of our first stops. She was cute!

Pumpkin Carving

We got to carve pumpkins a week ago with the Carle Family for Family Home Evening and the kids had a blast! Kayley actually got more into carving pumpkins this year than she did last year. Last year she wouldn't even touch the pumpkin at all. This year as you can see from the pictures, she actually did help a bit even though she still was a bit squimish on touching the pumpkin and it's innards!! :) We toasted the pumpkin seeds and everyone enjoyed them until the next morning. Kayley came to me in the middle of the night and told me she needed a drink and that her tummy hurt. She had such a hard time going to sleep earlier because she had so much fun with her cousins that I thought she was pulling my leg and just didn't want to sleep. Well, needless to say the next morning she woke up and had been sleeping in her throw-up. I felt AWFUL! I've learned to start listening to her more as I'm realizing that she is old enough to start understanding her body and what it is telling her. Anyway, luckily that was all the throw-ups we had to deal with that day as we only had the throw-ups about a month ago. Now I know that next year...no pumpkin seeds for Kayley! All in all it was a fun time carving pumpkins and we love that the Carle's live so close to do these kind of things together with them!!

Deanna Rose Farmstead

Today we went to Deanna Rose Farmstead, a free farm that has lots of animals and other fun things to do for kids in Overland Park, KS. It was a lot of fun and the weather couldn't have been any better being only jacket weather for the first part of it. We went with Michelle and Kendall and fam and Randy was still in town so he got to come along too. Here are a bunch of pics of our fun day!

As you can see from these pics above, Kayley and Cora are once again complete opposites as Kayley had to have Daddy hold her the whole time and didn't want much to do with the animals whereas Cora was beside herself and couldn't get enough of them. It sure is fun to see their personalities develop and see them learn and grow in their own way!

They had a whole bunch of tractors that kids could ride on and race each other. The kids loved them!! And there were baby goats and Cora loved them and ran freely in the gated area whereas once again, Kayley had to be held by Daddy again! She sure is cute though!

The kids got to milk a pretend cow and Kayley surprisingly loved this part. I thought for sure she'd be scared of this part too. Then we tried to get some good kid pictures, but found it more stressful to get them to all look at the same time and smiling too...I'm glad we weren't wanting professional pictures yet! :) Overall we had a fun time and recommend this place to anyone else in the area! http://www.opkansas.org/_Vis/Farmstead/index.cfm However sadly it is closed now for the season.

Happy Birthday Audrey!!

Our Sweet niece Audrey celebrated her 3rd birthday about a week and a 1/2 ago. We went with Jessica and Katrina to Columbia for the day to attend her birthday party. The girls had a blast! Kayley and Audrey seemed to pick up from where they left off in playing with each other. They were pretty good buddies in Columbia and it's neat to see that friendship still carry over even though they live apart from each other now. They are almost exactly 2 months apart and it was so fun to see them grow and learn together at the same rate in Columbia. Cousins are such a special thing! I remember growing up and being so close to some of my cousins and I hear tons of stories of Nick being close to some of his. That friendship bond is so special and strong...almost as strong as sibling bonds. I love that we have since been blessed to live by cousins even though we've moved as we live close to the Carles and the Walkers now. We miss the Columbia Felkers so much but are glad that they are only 1 1/2 hours away still. We love you so much Audrey and hope you had a special and happy birthday! Thanks for having such a fun party! Here are some pics of when Audrey was born...October 21st, 2005.

Olympics...Here We Come!

A couple of weeks ago, Kayley and Cora had a Parents as Teachers activity where we went to a Gym that does Gymnastic lessons. They opened it up for a hour or so for the children to play on the gymnastic equipment. I was way excited for Kayley to go to this event...don't get any ideas...I'm not trying to get her to be a cheerleader (those who know me, know my stance on this!), but I do like the sport Gymnastics and think that it is a good sport to do as I did gymnastics for a couple of years when I was younger. Kayley did not want to go at first, she cried getting into the car and on the way there. I think she was just tired as we were in a rush to get out the door that morning. I told her we were going to go and at least let Cora play and if she wanted to join in, she could. We got there and same attitude, until our Parents as Teachers Teacher convinced Kayley to participate. Boy was I glad and so was Kayley...she had a blast and did not want to leave! It took her a little courage to finally do the big trampoline, but she did do it and loved it too! We are looking forward to going again this next month!

Chuck 'e Cheese

Last week we were able to make an almost complete family outing with Nick's side. Shannon, Randy, and Quentin were all in town at the same time for various reasons and we all decided to celebrate by going to Chuck 'e Cheese for lunch. It was Kayley and Cora's first time and they both loved it! They both loved watching the puppets play music and they both loved the games. And even though they knew there were games awaiting them, they both ate very well before we played games.

Cora's favorite part were the tokens..she carried the little cup around they give you with tokens and she only had one token, but loved to carry it around with her. She didn't really want to play many games, she just wanted to hold the cup with the one token. She was pretty easy to please! Kayley loved the games. Her favorite was riding the cars. I guess she has realized that they are more fun when they work. (When we go to the mall at the play place, Nick and I just sort of shake the cars and pretend they are working instead of putting money in b/c we are too cheap to pay money to get them running since they are so expensive for 20 seconds of riding.) So, Kayley was in 7th heaven that she could ride all of them that she wanted.

Then came the time to redeem the tickets. We had to share them between 3 kiddos with Kayley, Ashlyn, and Cora...so we tried to make it to where they all got the same toys and there would be no arguing. Well, that worked until Kayley changed her mind and wanted a sucker. She turned in one prize for 2 suckers...she went and shared with Ashlyn very willingly...then Cora had to have a sucker, so she did the same and turned in one of her prizes, then problem solved and it was a great trip! We will look forward to trips there again!

Oh...and by the way, look for coupons in the newspaper (sunday's) and also you can go to http://www.dealigg.com/ and print off some more coupons. We found that lunchtime had the best coupon options, plus it's not as packed! Good luck!

Pigtail Debut!!

We have enough hair now for pigtails! I get so frustrated with her hair now looking all messy all the time going everywhere. So the other day I thought her hair might be long enough to put up in pigtails and yes they were! I just melted everytime I looked at her when they were up. Kayley's comment was, "Mommy she looks like Baby Katina!" (Baby Katrina...my sister Jessica's youngest.) Katrina wears her hair in pigtails a lot and I guess maybe she thinks they look alike too. Anyway, enjoy the piggies!! :)

Oh...and she does walk now...she's just crawling after me in these pictures b/c she was wanting to see her pictures on the camera right after I took them. I kept having to back up and take another one. Kids these days will not know anything but the latest technology, which means they will only think that digital cameras exist and nothing else, etc, etc...

My Growing Girls

These are just a couple of random pics of the girls recently and how they are growing up so fast!

Kayley as you can see is still way into princesses as she dresses up as one almost everyday! I have to set rules on when she wears them, otherwise she'd have them on 24/7. So, we don't get to wear them in public so they don't get ruined or to bed for the same reason. In fact this week we've been lucky to have Grandpa here to help Daddy with his truck and they have loved playing with him...I'll have to snap some pics of them and post them later! But, last night Papa asked Kayley which princess is her absolute favorite if she could only pick one which it would be and she replied with "Ariel, Sleeping Beauty, Snow White, and Cinderella." So, she loves so much she can't think of life without them. We have dress up clothes for all three except Ariel, so I'm waiting for after halloween and hopefully get a costume of it half price after the holiday! She is such a good big sister as you can see in the pic that she loves to help Cora with anything.

Cora is something else and getting so big. She loves to do anything her big sister is doing. She loves to play with babies as you can see in this pic. She's already learned how to juggle two kids at once...a true mother at heart at only the mere age of 14 1/2 months. She is starting to say words now and trying to imitate us with what we say. She can now say, mama, dada, please, princess, shoes, uh-oh, bye-bye, hi and newly learned papa. Of course, you have to prompt her on a few of these words, but she'll repeat them back to you fairly clearly. People can even understand her over the phone, which is another thing she loves to do now too. Oh and Cora got herself into Preston's walker without any help and was found just sitting there eating her snacks as happy as can be. It was cute!

It's hard to believe how big my girls are getting and how quickly. I just try to savor the moments now as much as I can b/c I know it will continue to go by faster and faster!

Biscuits n' Gravy Recipe

Here's a post of my biscuits n' gravy recipe...I had a couple of inquiries on how to make it....it's super easy! All it is is a box of the biscuits n' gravy mix from Sam's club...it's a red, white, and blue box...can't remember the brand. Follow those directions and add cooked pork flavored breakfast sausage and a couple of squares of chicken bouillon. Then cook whatever kind of biscuits you like to eat and enjoy. It is the best however with Highland Orange Juice...something we can't get up here in KC area. Maybe someday KC will come to their senses!! Hope you enjoy!

I'm SO glad last week is OVER

Well, you guessed it if you read Michelle's blog at all...we got the flu bug as well in our house this last week from Ashlyn...don't worry, we still love you Ashlyn!! It was a very long and boring, but exciting week. Boring b/c we didn't go anywhere for a whole week and exciting b/c it was always a guess as to who was to be sick next!

Without giving you too many disgusting details...Cora was the first that got hit. On Tuesday night about 11pm she started throwing up and then 4 times after that within the following hour. Then it was every hour on the hour from about midnight until 5am...which is when I started to throw up, but luckily only once more again at 6:30ish. But, the day wasn't that much better as we didn't feel very good all day. Luckily neither Cora nor I threw up the rest of the day. Then on Thursday as Cora and I were finally feeling up to par on our appetites and strength, Kayley starts throwing up. She came to me in the night and said her tummy hurt and she needed a drink, then she said her tummy hurt and she needed to go potty..so I thought here it comes but nothing. So she went to bed and I put the bucket by her bed and told her to try and throw up in the bucket if she needed to and then come get me. Well, she came and got me at about 1:30am and said "Mommy, I already throwed up." So, there we were with throw up all in her hair and on her bed. So I made a pallet next to our bed and she went to sleep while I went to work on the laundry and get her bed cleaned up. Not 5 minutes after I hit the pillow I heard someone in the bathroom and we were at it again, only luckily this time in the toilet. Then that day she woke up and only had one more incident. However throughout the day you wouldn't think she was too sick and she played like normal and wanted to eat like normal. I had to really limit what and how much she ate so we wouldn't have a relapse.

And to top it all off...you're probably wondering where Nick is in this picture. Well, of all weeks for us to get sick, he had to work as their were TWO people on vacation that week (which has NOT ever happened the 2 years he's worked there)...then on top of that, he was also on call once he did get home for the day...and his on call involves actually going in to the hospital for about an hour at a time for a callback. So, our biggest feat was to try and spare Nick from getting sick. Well, he was lucky and did not happen to get sick although there were a couple of times where he felt like he was. But, he was still good at helping me when he was home, even so much that one day he went to Walmart for me to get "sick" supplies instead of taking a shower before work...isn't he so sweet!?! So, needless to say, we are better now and feeling a lot better and glad to not be sick anymore.

These are pictures from when the girls were sick, but I couldn't tell that they looked sick at all. I guess they are always gracefully sick.