Christmas in July

Well, we will get to celebrate Christmas twice within the next year. Once in December as normal and we will get a special Christmas in July with the addition of our 3rd child. We are 10 weeks along now. Baby is doing well and thankfully there is only one in there. I was feeling a lot more movement and I've already started to show as early as 10 weeks (which is abnormal for me as even with Cora I didn't start to show until at least 16-18 weeks), so with those symptoms as well as my family history of my brother and sister being fraternal twins and my mom's sisters also being fraternal twins, the doctor decided to do an ultrasound to make sure there was only one. We would have thankfully accepted having twins, but I'm a bit relieved!! :) When I told my mom I was pregnant and thinking it was twins, she just laughed! Then when I told her it was only one, she was like, "well, somebody has to have them!" So, Mary or Sarah, I think it's up to you guys!! :) Baby was measuring right on schedule and everything looks good. I'm still feeling quite a bit of nausea and I hope that goes away soon. I'm feeling a lot more tired with this one than any of the other two, but I guess part of that has to do with the fact that I'm also chasing around 2 instead of 1 or none this time.

Last weekend was when Randy and Marchelle were in town for their Christmas weekend so all the Bell siblings were in town as well. So we decided to tell his family that weekend. What was also funny was that we told the girls in the car on the way to Michelle and Kendall's house, as that was the only time that weekend we had alone with the girls to let them know before we told the rest of Nick's family in person, Kayley responded, "I know there's a baby, Cora already told me in a bedtime story one night." Then they went back and forth on if they wanted a boy or a girl, they have both settled on wanting a baby sister. Then as soon as we got to Michelle's house Kayley told Ashlyn her mommy has a baby in her belly and Ashlyn immediately said, "No, my mommy has a baby in her tummy!" They got into a small argument about who's Mommy had a baby in their tummy. It was cute, but I had to hush Kayley as we still hadn't made the big announcement to everyone, but all went well.

We are excited and anxiously, but patiently awaiting July 9th. The fun part is my cousin who's birthday is one day before mine is due the same day with their first one. That would be really cool if both of them were born on the same day. I would even take it early on Grandpa Sargent's birthday, July 3rd! :) Too bad they don't live by us!! So Olivia and Nathan I think you need to start heading towards Missouri before July 9th so our kids can be best friends!! :)

Christmas is Here at the Bell House

Santa Claus came to our house a couple of weeks ago. The city of Grain Valley has a group of volunteers that drive around in Santa's sleigh house to house in Grain Valley on Saturdays starting after Thanksgiving up until Christmas. They have police escorts and everything! I was excited this year as Cora did not scream as much as last year when Santa came to our house! Plus we couldn't have asked for a better day as the weather was perfect!! Poor Santa Claus and Mrs Claus was probably hot! Santa Claus also gives out toys to the children from his sack after they sit on his lap and tell them what they want for Christmas. The girls each got a bear from him. It was cute because Kayley was like, "I have never had a real teddy bear before, how did Santa know!?" I always worry that they are going to expect Santa to get them what they have asked for all year right there instead of on Christmas morning. So far that connection has not hit thankfully!

We also put up our Christmas tree a few days later. The girls were so excited to get it up. We waited until Nick got home to put it up as it's always been a big thing in my family to put the tree up together as a family. My Dad's cousin has always given us (my siblings) a handful of ornaments each year for Christmas and now she continues that tradition with our own kids. She always puts our names on them so we know which ones are ours. So it is always fun to open the ornaments each year and reminisce on all the memories and now that my girls are a little bit bigger this is their favorite part. We had a lot of fun putting it up and it's getting more fun each year as the girls get bigger and get more excited each year about Christmas.

Here's our finished product! It's small, but it's our tree! :)

Last of our gymnastics

The girls' gymnastic class is officially over now, but we had so much fun doing it! They are both really good at listening to instructions from the teacher and doing the moves. We were really impressed. They both were the best behaved students in their classes. Here's a fun video of Cora doing one of her moves...I sometimes think she was meant to be a monkey! It's cute! We now know that they both enjoy this and are good at it, so we might do it next year with Kayley as she won't start school for another year and a half.

Grandma Edna

For those of you who know people in my family have probably already heard or read about this, but I haven't gotten a chance to blog about it yet. About almost a month ago now my Grandma Edna passed away, rather unexpectedly of a heart attack. It was a bitter sweet passing for me. For one I was super glad that we got to see her in September only 3 weeks before she passed on our way down to New Orleans. I was so glad for this visit as I now have the assurance that hopefully for sure Kayley will and hopefully Cora will have some remembrance of her. However as I was gathering all the pictures I have of Grandma (at least digital ones) I noticed that I regretfully don't have any pictures of Cora with Grandma or Grandpa for that matter! I was going to take a picture of them with Grandma in September when we were visiting her then, but I didn't think about it until right before we left and Grandma had been in the middle of taking a nap. We had to wake her up to say good-bye...I didn't want to shove a camera in her face as she just woke up! But, Cora does have her own special connection with Grandma with her name. We had originally decided on Cora's name based on the fact that it was Greek (Nick is part Greek) and then as we decided on it, Grandma informed us that she had an aunt named Cora...so it's a family name after all!

With Grandma's passing I've had many great memories come to mind as well as happy thoughts. I remember at Grandpa's funeral, the saddest part for me was to watch Grandma say good-bye to Grandpa at his casket. I could also hear the saddness in Grandma's voice everytime I talked to her on the phone. When I heard of her passing, my thoughts immediately went to the thought that she is now with Grandpa and the happiness they are sharing together!

But some other fun memories that I have of my Grandma was going over there almost every Sunday after church to play with cousins. Grandma would always make us tuna of some sort with tomato soup (no stranger to me as this is what the Felker's ate every Sunday too!) But Grandma made the best tuna melts, which we never got at home! We would also have cousin sleepovers and Grandma would willingly sleep out on the couch with us so we wouldn't get scared in the living room. It also didn't take much begging from me to have Little Cesar's Pizza at Grandma's house! Yummy!! I remember when I was younger and Grandma would take each grandkid shopping for their birthday. I remember walking the old mall in Sikeston with Grandma on my birthday and enjoying that special time with just her! I also remember going to McDonald's with her every now and then. When we'd go she'd let me get a happy meal if I wanted, but oftentimes I would want to get a chicken salad so I could be like her. After we were done with our meal I remember her often letting me get an apple pie. When I would get to spend the night at Grandma and Grandpa's house by myself I got to sleep in their bed. Grandma would sleep in the middle so she could be by Grandpa and I would sleep on the outside. Grandma would always put a chair next to me so I wouldn't fall off...I would often end up in the chair when I woke up! Grandma also had her special stash of trident gum and candy (chocolate!) She would often let us pick out some gum or some candy. Grandpa would often go to the store to buy us some food while we were there and come back with all the different kinds of foods....some funky type foods too...Grandma would always roll her eyes and always say, "Oh Daddy!" Grandma also loved the Cardinals...I remember her always drinking Diet Coke in her cardinals cup and she didn't like ice in it. She and Grandpa would also let us have our own pop...my favorite was purple crush at their house. Grandma and Grandpa were also some of my biggest fans at my sporting events in high school. They would come to pretty much all of my home games and almost all of my away games. If for whatever reason my mom couldn't make it, I would ride home with them and talk to them about my performance. I hope they knew how much I really appreciated this support from them. Sports were a big part of my high school life and it was difficult at times to not have my Dad there to watch me as sports were his passion. To have the support of them meant so much to me and I hope they know how grateful I am to them for that! One of Grandma's favorite desserts from fast food was the frosty from Wendy's. I remember coming home to visit once and Nick and I went to go get her a frosty...she just loved it so much that we thought of her and brought that back for her! There are other many memories of my Grandma, she was a wonderful Grandma and I will miss her dearly! However I am so glad that she has been able to be a part of many important stages in my life, single and married.

Grandma and Grandpa got to go to my wedding in 2003. They were both their during my sealing. My Grandpa of course was known by his black cowboy hat and his mustache...which Grandma teased him saying she wouldn't kiss him unless he shaved it off. Grandpa would reply, "why do you think I grow it out." They always had a teasing way of showing affection towards each other.

They also got to meet Kayley almost right after she was born. Grandma kept saying she was so beautiful and said she was going to be the next Miss Sikeston! She also kept apologizing for giving Kayley a double crown. I'm glad that Kayley has one as she can say she has a double crown like Grandma Edna.

Grandma and Grandpa also got to come up for Kayley's blessing. Grandpa was able to stand in the circle and that was such a neat experience for me to have both of them there for that great moment in mine and Nick's life...and Kayley's too! :)

We also got to go visit them a couple of times down in Memphis after they moved in with the Hathaways. What a blessing they were to them and our family! They took such great care of them! This was during the time when Grandpa was growing out his hair for locks of love. Another teasing moment for Grandma and Grandpa!

Grandma and Grandpa also came up to Columbia a few times in addition to the blessing weekend. This was just a random visit I believe. I can't remember what they were up here for, but we got to go visit them at their hotel.

Another visit later the following year also in Columbia. Kayley didn't quite know who they were so it was a bit overwhelming for her and Audrey, but we are glad they got to visit with us.

Then, of course this is during the dinner after Grandpa's funeral. I should have thought to get pictures with her then of us, but didn't think about it as there were so many cousins there and so much going on it slipped my mind!

Then these are pictures of Grandma's funeral weekend. We had so much fun getting to catch up with so many cousins we hadn't seen in a while and our kids got to play with their kids! It was tons of fun! These first two groups are of all the kids swimming at the Drury Inn. Almost all of my family were staying there, but even the ones who didn't stay there bombarded the pool and the Drury people probably didn't know what hit them! Check out Nick's attire for getting the girls to swim!! :) Jack, Mary, & Andrew were the only brave ones...well Jack and Mary were the ones in the freezing cold pool water...Andrew enjoyed the nice hot tub water!! :)

More swimming at the pool...

Taking Nick, Kayley, and Cora to Kirby's for the first time! It was good, but a little more expensive than I remember it being...I guess that's just b/c I'm an adult with my own finances now instead of relying on Mom and Dads! We also toured a bit of Downtown Sikeston at the Train Station/Museum. Carrie Yanson had quite a bit of items there on display from Yanson's Jeweler's. It was neat to see that part of Sikeston/history and to show Nick and my girls. We also got to see Carrie's new dog Liberty...who was so cute and sweet! I'm sure she's much bigger now! We also got to see Mrs. Johnson and got a picture of all of us and Mom with her. She was our maid/babysitter when we were younger. She was almost like our third Grandma to us and us to her. Her whole family is really special to our family!

Just some other fun pictures of the event. All of the Sargent cousins were there except one and her husband and one of our cousin's husband was also not there, but everyone else was and it was so neat to get everyone together again! I wish it could have lasted longer!

More fun pics...What a great reunion it was! Family sure is a great blessing and I'm so thankful for mine...all of them!!

Halloween 2009 and other events

For some reason I can't stay up to date on my blog...it must be that I'm spending too much time on the computer getting ready for Christmas!! Anyway, here are pics from Halloween and other things we have been up to lately.

As some of you may already know, Kayley is really into Dorothy right now! She loves Dorothy everything. So, we dressed up as a Wizard of Oz family this year for Halloween. Kayley was obviously Dorothy, Cora was the Wicked Witch of the West, I was Glenda the good witch and Nick was the scarecrow. The costumes weren't too extravagant as I was just lucky to get Nick to dress up in general!! :) I did however spend a lot of time (a whole night in fact) fixing Cora's green gloves, which she refused to wear half the time! The wicked witch's skin is bright green so I searched everywhere for green gloves and green socks as I knew if I were to paint her face or skin, that wouldn't go over very well. The only green gloves I could find were adult gardening gloves at Target...luckily the were only 50 cents so if I did mess them up, I wasn't wasting much money. But I made them smaller to fit her hands, which did take literally all night! It was cute though as she would say "I'm going to get you my pretty and your little dog too!" I can't type it as cute as she would say it, but it was cute! So here is all of us at the ward party before Halloween! And of course Cora refused to wear her gloves in this pic, but they are on in other pics below.

These are pics of the Halloween party at Michelle's house. They did a bunch of fun games and here are pics of the cake walk type game and the broom/pumpkin game (not really sure what the official names of the games were, but the kids had fun doing them!

Here's some more pics of the girls' costumes. We went trick or treating with the Carles, I mean the transformer (Edward), the southern Belle (Olivia), The mad scientist (Judson), and Tinkerbell (Katrina). The kids had fun, but we didn't get to go as long as we wanted to as they got hungry fast. But it was fun to do it with friends and family.

Then I have to admit that these pictures are actually taken a whole week after Hallowwen! yes we didn't have our pumpkins carved in time for Halloween, but the kids didn't seem to mind at all! We of course couldn't get the girls to even touch the inside, but it was still fun. Nick told the girls stories with the pumpkin telling it. The pumpkin's name was Harry I believe, but it was cute cause we had the lights off with the candle in it and the girls really thought the pumpkin was the storyteller!

Also a couple of weeks ago we went down to Willard and took another trip to Silver Dollar City. I've never seen it so packed in my life! It was the opening day of their Christmas festivities and it was nuts! We waited 20 min just to park our car! So we had to decide/cut down our plans for the day on rides/shows. We did fit in one ride on the frogs with the girls (their fav ride!) then the living nativity show, then we split and I took Cora on the butterfly ride and Nick took Kayley on the elephant ride, then we met and did the Frosty the snowman show. Then we squeezed in for a spot for the light parade. After the parade was over, the police officer was behind the last light display and behind him was a mob of people, so we grabbed all our stuff and walked right behind the police officer, it again took us 20 min to get out of the park and to our car...but it was fun and the girls had fun so it made for some fun memories!

This month the girls have also been doing Gymnastics. It has been so fun watching them do their classes! Kayley does the class with the teacher and Cora is in parent/tot class where one of us have to be with her throughout the class. The teacher has been great and the girls have loved every bit of their classes. It's cute to watch them get all ready in their gymnastics clothes and get excited to go to their class. Here are some pics of their classes.

Audrey's Birthday Party

Almost 2 weeks ago Audrey had her Dorothy Birthday Party in Columbia. It was so much fun and Sarah did such a great job planning it! Kayley was beside herself with it being a Dorothy party! With me being a doof, I completely forgot about it being Dorothy themed and forgot to have Kayley wear her dress...so I'm not sure how she did it, but she bribed sweet Lauren to let her wear her Dorothy dress. Luckily Lauren is young enough and found another dress-up dress and fit right in with the other cousins that were dressed up! The decorations were so cute! Sarah made a great cake with a yellow brick road on it and a homemade pinata of a rainbow, a painting of the wicked witch, painting of a tinman, a huge apple tree cutout, homemade witches brooms, a cute, cute set up/display of the wicked witch of the east! It was so cute! Here are all the pictures from it!

This is of the decorations and of Audrey's cake.
The Apple Tree throwing game.

The witch race game.

The wicked witch/melting game with water balloon throwing to melt her. Pin the heart on the Tin Man game. Hot ToTo game as well.

The Rainbow Pinata.

The walking puzzle board...Sarah had each game set up to receive a clue at the end to a piece of the puzzle. Nick was our puzzle board and the puzzle made a picture of the Wicked Witch of the East. She had it by the side of their house just like the house had fallen on top of her like in the movie. Of course Dorothy's shoes were there...so the kids had to go find Dorothy to give her her shoes.

Dorothy is here!! The kids were so cute and couldn't believe Dorothy was actually here! Audrey and Kayley loved it! Kayley followed Dorothy around like a sick puppy!

Then we had yummy cake and then presents! It was a great party! Then ironically that night we went out to eat at El Maguey's with Nick's cousin who was in town and there was a couple that showed up dressed as the Tin Man and the Scarecrow! Kayley was beside herself, but wasn't brave enough to take a picture with them...so I got a pic of them from far away. That's them in the lower left hand corner. It was a fun day!

Yearly Appointments

Ok...I have been behind a lot lately on posting...so I'll hopefully be posting quite a few posts to catch up! Anyway, this is a picture of the girls and their yearly appointment back in September. I knew that they would hopefully both be able to get the flu shot, but I couldn't remember if either one of them were due for any vaccinations or not. We prepped the girls letting them know that they might be getting some shots. Nick and I had already put the girls to bed and Nick heard Kayley crying, very quietly. He went in and found out that she was crying because she was scared to go the doctor. So Nick decided to try and pinch Kayley to help her get prepped on how it would feel. That seemed to calm her down at least until we got there.

Cora was first and did great! She only had to have the flu shot and of course cried for that, but she usually cries when the doctor checks her out with the stethoscope and she didn't cry a bit, she even laughed with him when he was being funny. Then we had to do a finger stick to check her lead and she did not even cry the whole time! I was really impressed with her!

Kayley was next. She did fine with the stethoscope, etc part. She also had fun with our doctor as well when he would joke with her. However when the nurse came in with the box of shots she went bilistic! She had to have all of her kindergarten shots PLUS her flu shot! She doesn't start school until a little less than 2 years from now, but they suggested her getting them now as it would be easier to hold her down, etc! She had to have a total of 5 shots! Then we also had to get her finger stuck as well which you can imagine was also interesting as she screamed the whole time!

Needless to say, the appointment went well and all was well with both the girls. They both got to go to the store to pick out a toy for being so brave. Kayley did get to pick out a more expensive one since she was hit with 5 shots at once. Poor thing was limping for about 2 days after the appointment. I felt bad for her. I'm just glad that we are good for another year!

This was another incentive for them to get through the doctor...to be able to see Ashlyn & Preston!

I Love to See the Temple

I am so glad that I got a video of this as it doesn't happen very often anymore. Cora is now 2 and 3 months and just now sleeping in Kayley's room, within the last 2 weeks maybe. My baby is all grown up! But for the longest time we tried to get her to sleep in there every now and then and she would refuse and say it wasn't her room. She wanted to sleep in her room and in her bed! However she would still fight us to go to sleep. So oftentimes during this short period she would request Kayley sing her to sleep. It was so sweet! I hope the video works for you! My girls are growing up way too fast!

Ross's Gator Crusaders

About 2 weeks ago the Felker's came up from Farmington to do a walk for the Juvenile Diabetes Foundation with the rest of my family as well as some of the Wright family. This foundation raises funds to find a cure for type 1 diabetes. For those who may not know our nephew Ross Felker was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes about 5-6 months ago at age 10. He has been quite the example in this diagnosis as he gives himself his own shots and sets health goals, etc. He is such a great big nephew and a great example to our girls and to myself! So, he wanted to have a goal of raising $1000 for the race. Well they definitely met that within a few weeks and by the time of the race they had raised almost $4000!! It was very impressive!

So that Saturday we all ventured out to Legends and joined to complete the 2 mile walk! It was so stinkin' cold!! We all bundled up as best we could and braved the weather! The walk went well even admist passing around and taking turns with holding fussy kids! They were so miserable and weren't old enough to understand...it was hard to see them so cold! But after the walk we were able to enjoy some of the free food very quickly and then dispersed to find heat while all the big kids and Stephanie braved the cold and enjoyed the fun games! My kids did not stay so I didn't get any picks of the fun games, but I heard they were the only ones there! They even closed up shop early and the nieces and nephews were upset cause they didn't get to do all they wanted to do! It was a lot of fun and we are looking forward to doing this again next year for Ross! We are blessed to have such a great nephew! :)

Einstein's new buy

Ok...we have learned that we are a bit more couple of dog lovers than we thought! Or at least dog lovers of our dog! We did something that we thought we'd never do in our life and made fun of all the people who would do this, but we bought a coat for Einstein!! I know it sounds crazy, but he really did need it! The poor dog has very thin hair and almost no hair at all on his belly! (We're not sure why as his type of dog is bred to be hunting dogs!) But he would shiver like crazy outside even inside his dog house and then when we'd bring him inside, even after an hour of being inside he'd still be shivering. So we broke down and did the inevitable. But I do have to say it looks cute on him! We call it his Sherlock Holmes coat! All we need now is a pipe and hat to match it! :)