End of September 2016

I volunteered again to help out at the elementary school during Kindergarten Lunch Time (again- at 10:30!)  It's a tight run ship during that half hour.  The kids just sit there and eat.  They aren't really allowed to get loud and talk a bunch.  Towards the end of lunch they will play some calm music as well but that's really it.  The kids are getting the hang of it - I was needed far less than the last time I came.

Landen

Avery

Mr. Dimple

His lunch is usually a slice of deli turkey, apples, cheese, snap peas, crackers or pirates booty, and some dried blueberries.

He is wiped out from those long days from 7:45 - 2:55

My car is always a mess, especially since now Emmalyn is big enough to contribute to the mess by bringing stuff into the car.  

I had one last work trip for the month - I went to a leadership summit for the Network of Executive Women in Orlando.  It was a great conference plus it was a lot of fun that I had a good group of friends from work there too.

Unfortunately, it appears that Emmalyn has gotten Hand Foot and Mouth Disease when she went to Britt's church (when Peter and I were in Chicago).  So it was hard to leave her knowing that she was sick.  

Kallie, Kari, Beth, Amy, Jessica, Stacey

Beth!!  Her office used to be right next to mine and it was great.

A couple of us went to Downtown Disney for dinner.  Dinner was just eh but it was fun to walk around and I got a couple of Disney shirts for the kids.

This musician was playing a didgeridoo.  It was impressive!

A picture I got of Emmalyn in the morning.  

Hanging with dad at Maxwell's tennis lessons.

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He's on the right side, smallest kiddo there.

Snapchat entertainment with dad

We had some time before the dinner gala so we went to get pampered!

I sat with Laura, who works for one of my clients, at dinner.  It has been fun building a friendship with her especially since she was pretty cold and aloof when I first joined the team.

Facetime at bedtime.  So glad I can still see my kids even when traveling!

Red carpet

We clearly were letting loose!

Kari Jessica and Beth

We decided to leave the party and go to Kari's favorite line dancing club.  We all piled into an Uber and it was non-stop laughs.

This line dancing place was like nothing I've ever experienced.  They lined danced to everything from country to Brittney Spears.  It was a ton of fun.

We had an epic time!

Amy Purdy was the keynote speaker in the morning.  She was great!

Never a shortage of cheese

Playing with one of the toys from Peter's birthday

We were "BOO'd" by our neighbors!  The kids were really excited!

A big moment happened this week.  On Sept 26th, it was the first morning that when Emmalyn woke up, I didn't nurse her.  It was time to be done nursing.  I was really proud that I nursed her past 2 1/2 years.  She was so upset with me.  I had even prepped her a few days ago and told her that she was a big girl now and didn't need Momma's milk.  In the saddest voice ever she goes, "I'm not a big girruhl... I'm not!...I'm not a big girruhl."  ("Girl" is a two syllable word for her.)  It was super sad.  Then when Peter came into the room she told him she wanted to nurse.  It was so hard for me not to give in!

The next day on the 27th was rough again.  She had slept horribly and was up at least 6 times crying and whining throughout the night.  When I said no, she yelled at me, "I...want...to...nurse!!!!" Multiple times.  She was so mad at me.  I felt awful :(

Emmalyn is such a Momma's girl and misses me a ton when I'm not there.  She just clings to me and begs to go to work or wherever with me.  She's getting feisty though too.  She hit me today when we were in the eyeglasses store because I was stopping her from running around. 

Maxwell still says, "Demember" instead of "Remember" and "Cucancumber" for "cucumber" and "panacake" for "pancakes".  I love these little things.  :)

Celebrating our 13th Anniversary

I had meetings with my team all week which meant early mornings, evening activities, and only seeing my kids awake in pictures.  

Emmalyn in her happy place - Hayden's beyblade stadium

He still won't swing on the swing on his bottom.  He prefers this way.

Peter sent me the absolute cutest group of videos.  I was only going to post one but each one makes me smile more and more.  I don't want to deprive you of lots of smiles - - - watch these!!!

Video 1 - Maxwell has determined the power he has upon his sister

Video 2 - those giggles are the best thing ever!

Video 3 - Got to keep her attention

Video 4 - Maxwell takes it to the next level in order to keep it going (clearly he enjoys making his sister laugh)

While I loved getting those videos, it stunk too because I was missing all this cuteness!!!  

My team and I were having our own kind of fun and that helped.

We did this great team builder called "The Go Game"  (It's awesome - if you have the budget for a awesome, but expensive, team builder... check it out)

That night I was down to my very last bag of frozen breast milk.  After that, Emmalyn would only get what I had that was fresh.  I was really happy to have made it this long past her birthday but it still stinks because if I really loved to have had more production at this point.  I had to remind myself that it's a win to go this long!  She was now to the point that I wouldn't have to use formula to supplement.  Sometimes it's hard to give yourself a "win" if you know that you are falling short of your own goal line.

The team in the training rooms with our fun decorations.  

That night we went to a Frisco Rough Riders ball game.  It was really windy and stormy (never rained hard while we were there but there were some droplets and we could see lightening).  I was wiped and happy when the group that hung in their the longest finally called it quits.

My group - -

Debbie, Steve, D'Neesa, Donna, John, Kristi, Chris, Milt, and Mike

All of Field Ops and Client Services for the Convenience Solutions Team

That night, Peter and I celebrated our 13th anniversary by going out to dinner (it was a quick dinner because we didn't have much time) and then to a musical.

Fancy restaurant called Stampede 66.  They carried the cowboy theme pretty far.  Napkins in the shape of bandannas?  That certainly paying attention to the details.

We saw Newsies and really enjoyed it.  I had no idea that Peter had never seen the real movie!

Let there be light!

Second week of April 2015...

This girl loves cereal.  Unfortunately it just becomes a messy ordeal in the morning when we give it to her.  She spills Max's or hers all over the place and then eats it off the floor.   Oh man...

Happy girl.  She's so happy and cute, she draws lots of attention when we eat out.

I had to supplement Emmalyn's milk intake with frozen milk and some formula this weekend.  I just don't have the output needed. :(

She waves all the time and has started blowing kisses.

I swear she says "yeah".

She is super cranky when you try to wipe her boogers and she produces SO MUCH DROOL!

She's demanding and screams loudly to get attention.

I got to read books to Maxwell's class during their library time this week.  I took a pic as I was leaving and captured Maxwell blowing me a kiss.  :)  He's fine now when it's time for me to leave.

Jacek, Maxwell, Harper, and Malia

The other kids get excited when I come to read to them too. It's super sweet.  They want to hold my hand or walk by me or talk to me.  I love getting to know the kids that Maxwell goes to school with.

...and since I was out of the office already, I stopped at In-N-Out for lunch.  Delicious!

My little swimmer - he loves swimming lessons.

Ha!  Those baby shades are so big on her!

FINALLY!!! We had a soccer practice.  We ended up having to rent space at the indoor facility but I am totally willing to pay a little bit to help get more out of this experiencing!

Cousins

My house is so dark.  Here's how "lit" it is with the lighting installed by the builder.  There are no uplights and the little solar powered lights along the path to the front door hardly do anything.  It's been my biggest dislike about my house.  I feel like it's not very inviting.  So finally we are doing something about it!!!  This is the "before" pic.

Here is the "after" with just the newly installed LED lights (that are on an automatic timer - - it's soooooo awesome!  They come on when it gets dark and go off in the morning.  I never have to turn them on or off and I didn't even notice a change in my power bill!)

And the full "after" with the new lights and the old lights.  I love it so much!!!  I am incredibly happy with the lights on the house and the lights on the path.  

She loves her time at the park

Video - Emmalyn is so different from Maxwell in that she loves puppies!  She's super cute in this video and then a stroke of luck, we caught her very first "kiss" on video!  She figured out how to make a kissy sound!!! and boy is it cute.

So tired that she fell asleep before the end of our bedtime routine.

Maxwell basically stays dry now at night.  He may have 1 wet pull-up in 3 weeks.

One morning this week, he woke up and called for me like he always does.  So I went into his room and he wanted me to cuddle.  When I got up into his bed he goes, "There's still hair you can touch." because he wanted me to play with his hair.  :)

She loves playing with books in the morning when she wakes up

Miss Mary Ann and Jared came to cheer Maxwell on at his soccer game.  We are so blessed to have such great neighbors!

We were planting our spring flowers and Mary Ann was working on her yard outside as well so Maxwell decided he wanted to take a bunch of flowers over to give to Mary Ann so they planted them together in her front yard.  She was so great with him and let him plant them even though they didn't match her other landscaping.  He was so happy! (I think he had more fun helping her than he did me!)

Helping Momma water after everything was done.

All planted and ready to go

Hopefully we'll have lots of pretty flowers soon!

There's been so much rain lately that lakes are starting to fill up.  We went on a random drive toward the closest lake until we found it.  Of course, once we got there, we didn't have much to do but at least we saw the lake.

He found a walking stick to use on the way back

Happy to be outside

She's looking so big to me here!

Gotta love that belly

However when you see her in perspective to other things, you see how tiny she is!

You can see her trying to say words when you prompt her.

She's standing forever and I saw her pivot today and move one foot - - getting closer to walking!!!

Her screams quickly make me crazy.  Ugh, girls.

Maxwell and I were talking about long tails in the car, and I mentioned that monkeys have long tails.   And Max goes, "At splash academy, the kids that were tigers got tails." (He was referencing the circus put on by the kids when we were on a cruise)  So I asked him what tigers say (because I have been trying to get him to say "ROAR" since the cruise because he didn't say it when the tigers were up on stage).  He goes, "I can't tell you but if you ask Emmalyn later, she can tell you."  ha!  can't fool this kid!