Wordless Wednesday

Photos courtesy of Julie Paisley Photography

Did Someone Say FREE?!?!?!?

So last week I was doing my nightly ritual of reading blogs I saw that Kerri posted about getting 50 FREE Shutterfly Christmas cards. Seriously, FREE Christmas cards Santa had come early. I LOVE to make our Christmas card every year since we had Olivia. It's so much fun but also so stressful, which picture to use.

I've used Shutterfly in the past to print pictures of my sweet Olivia, the quality is great and shipping is quick. While persuing Shutterfly to look for the perfect card I happened upon photo calendars, I think we may be getting one of these to see how Olivia has grown over the past year and the memories we've made. I also took a look at the photo mugs, what a cute idea for the coffee drinker in your life. I've also used their servies the past two years for our family Christmas card with lots of compliments. Here are some of my favorites this year, there were so many to pick from so you may or may not see one of them in a mailbox near you.

Now that I've looked at all my choices and narrowed it down, a little, I can't wait to see the rest of our Christmas photos we had taken a few weeks ago!!

Spur Of The Moment Trip

This morning while getting ready I had a wonderful thought, why don't we go to the zoo? So, I looked over at Paul and asked him to go with us. Why not go...we have a zoo pass, it was a beautiful day, and we haven't been in a while? My quick little trip turned into a 3 hour trip but we had a great time. I'll let the pictures tell the story...there are a lot of pictures in no particular order and you will notice the difference in size, I tried something new when uploading and didn't realize how big they were until I was about half way done-oh well!

Enjoy the highlights of our day!!

Looonnngg Overdue

This post is looonnnggg overdue. I've been trying to post for weeks but there just aren't enough hours in the day. I looked at the last time I posted, August 10, wow that was almost three months ago. So what have we been doing for the past three months you ask-work, play, work, life. We've been busy, busy, busy to say the least. Since I last posted I've returned to work which was pretty overwhelming the first few weeks. I felt like this year has been more stressful then the past few due to all of the new testing and stuff we are required to do. Well, enough about work you don't want to hear about that.

On to the good stuff--our exciting family life. We have been doing so much and having tons fo fun doing it. Olivia has started preschool and LOVES it. We started off rocky, as I posted a while back, but now she's doing great. She looks forward to going to school every Tuesday and Thursday. I love to hear all of the fun things she does at school. I hate that I have to work and can't take or pick her up but that's just part of life. I am excited that I have today off and will be able to drop her off and pick her up, I'm sure her teacher will be shocked to see me-heck to meet me.

Halloween was a few weeks ago and this year was so much fun. Olivia had her first Halloween party at school, which I had to miss. Luckily, Paul is able to go to all her school events and take LOTS of pictures for me. She dressed up with all of her little classmates and had a little party.





We also went trick or treating with Kelly, Russell, and Grady. Olivia had the best time trick or treating this year. She was so great at saying trick or treat at every door we went to and was always sure to use good manners and say thank you. She is so polite! Olivia and Grady wore themselves out running down the street with their candy bags. But after about 30 minutes they wanted to be carried and I'm sure wanted to go home. But they were troopers they stuck it out for another 30 minutes. Needless to say we got a pretty good bit of candy the kids had fun and we were all TIRED!



Isn't she just the cutest pirate you've ever seen?!?!?

If A Cat Can Have One So Can Olivia

One of Olivia's favorite books is If You Give a Cat a Cupcake so of course since we read it almost everynight she insisted on making cupcakes WITH sprinkles like the cat. What fun we had!!! We started in the morning and made the batter to bake them, she just thought that was fantastic. She had a smile on her face the entire time. Once she woke up from her nap the cupcakes were cooled and ready for frosting and sprinkles. Olivia tried, notice I said tried, to help ...what she really did was make one heck of a mess. But hey it was all in good fun and we've had yummy snacks for the past few days.

Look at all those sprinklesPoking holes in cupcakes before they were frosted. I think she was trying to put the frosting from her hands on the cupcakes to help me.

Why put just a few sprinkles on a cupcake when you can pour the entire bowl of sprinkles on it.

She then decided to takea bite of the cupcake, well at least lick the frosting off of it. What a funny face:)

First, I LOVE this photo. I don't know why I just do. She was washing down all of those sprinkles, way too much sugar.

We are now pool people, yep we got an above ground pool. We just love good deals especially when they're FREE. Olivia has been a fish since we got the pool. She has even gotten comfortable enough to swim with her swimmies not just her lifejacket. Of course every night we have to race Daddy around the pool, for some reason he loses everytime;)

Smiling from ear to ear while swimming with Daddy.

Wordless Wednesday

She's not afraid of the *jumpy house* anymore!!! She loves it!

You Never Forget The First Day

Last week Colby spent the night with us and boy did we have a good time. He was such a good kid and even encouraged Olivia to pee pee on the potty. Way to go!! I did however learn why God has only blessed me with one child right now, or at least why he didn't bless me with twins. Having two 2 year olds running around really wore me out. I was beat at the end of the day. Believe me another baby is not in the works anytime soon, especially after last week:) Today was Olivia's first day at preschool. I've, we've been looking forward to this day for months. When we first went to check it out she was excited and wanted to stay. We've been getting her psyched to start in August. Heck, she would even tell people *I'm going to school in August* Talk about getting her ready. Well nothing I could have said or done could have prepared her for what was to come bright and early this morning. When I woke her up she jumped out of bed and announced *I'm going to school today* to say she was pumped was an understatment.
Her backpack all packed and ready to go for the day.

Walking in with Daddy, she had to show him where and point too(look at that little finger). Notice she's wearing her backpack. She insisted on wearing it, but you don't see Mommy carrying all the junk she needed for school(rest mat, blanket, pillow) and taking pictures.

So we walked in Olivia saw the toys and she was off. While I was turning in all our paperwork she kept telling Paul that's my classroom I want to go in. She was super pumped about the day. I had to call her away from playing to get a kiss.

Well the day wasn't all smiles and excitement. Around 11 the school called and told me that she was crying and wouldn't stop(she was fine for about an hour after we left) which resulted in her getting sick quite a few times. She then preceded to tell me I had to come and get her--WHAT THE HECK!!! I couldn't believe she was so upset. Once I got there she ran to me, practically climbed up my leg and wanted to go home. The Mommy in me wanted to take my baby away from the scary place and love her BUT the teacher in me knew that was not right and I've told parents a million times not to do it. Soooo, we sat down at the lunch table with her class ate lunch and followed all the rules, went back to the classroom to get ready for naptime. I convinced Olivia to lay down with her blanket and I would be right back after I talked to someone. I waited for about 15 minutes outside the door to make sure she was ok and left. It worked she fell asleep until it was time to go home. But when I got to the door to pick her up at 2 I could hear her screaming at the door(her classroom is about 10 ft from the entrance). I think the reality of Mommy and Daddy leaving set in and set her off. Needless to say we're going back on Thursday. I think after a few weeks she'll LOVE school, well let's hope she does or it'll be a long school year for us all;)