21 months

In Kendall's 2nd year of life, I have tried to post something specific about her every 3 months, and that time has come around once again. She is now 21 months old and I am slowly adjusting to thinking of her as an almost-two-yr-old instead of wobbly toddler. It helps that she is now talking in sentences, going to school, and as always, doing her best to keep up with Avery. She's also starting some of those "terrible two" behaviors and finding herself in time-out for throwing fits when she doesn't get her way. Ah, growing pains! Despite it all, she is still such a sweet little girl at heart. Thankfully, she is usually pretty good in public and never seems to get in trouble at school or church. I guess she saves up all her bad behavior for Scott and I! She is like a little sponge, just soaking everything up that she can and often surprising us with the things she knows and picks up on. She sings along with songs now and sings a few on her own like "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star" and ABC's, she counts to 12, knows a few colors, and knows her shapes (except rectangle). She still LOVES reading books and spends literally hours every day either "reading" books on her own or bringing book after book to me to read to her. She also loves dancing to music on the keyboard that we got from one of Scott's dental assistants, watching Barney, and playing with Avery. I also wanted to record some of her Kendall-isms at 21 months:

"My ovey's (lovey's) good to me!"
"I'm a jawa!" (Scott has poisoned both their minds with Star Wars jargon)
"It's good Mommy. I love cum-a-cums!" (golden grahams)
"Uh-huh, I do" (instead of answering yes to questions)-- funny that this was one of Avery's favorite phrases too at this age
"How 'bout. . . dis one Mommy?"
" I want si-nacks" (fruit snacks, which she asks for EVERY day without fail) or
" I want jabies" (strawberries, also asks for every day)
"I want my bish-bush" (toothbrush)

So that's my little Kendall! We are proud of her and love her so much!

dancing to music on the keyboard

Avery and Kendall playing out back. I can't hardly take a picture of one w/out the other in it too. They are thick as thieves these days, although there are plenty of squables and fighting.

checking out a grasshopper

The Halloween Happenings of Minnie Mouse and Princess Leia

Minnie Mouse and Princess Leia started off their "Halloween happenings" this year with a costume day and pumpkin patch at school last Thursday. They were both really excited to wear their costumes. In fact, Princess Leia's teachers said she even wore her wig (or "twig" as Avery called it) most of the day, and Minnie Mouse did not want to take her costume off at nap time even though I sent an extra outfit that would be more comfy.

Leia and Minnie's sassy poses for the camera

On Halloween Day, Leia and Minnie helped me carve their pumpkins from the school pumpkin patch. That evening we stopped by Sonic for some 50 cent corn dogs and then went to our little church carnival for awhile. They had games, face painting, clowns making balloon animals, and a Disney princess bounce house, which Leia and Minnie LOVED. After doing all the activities there, we came back to the neighborhood and trick-or-treated for awhile. After going around the block, Leia and Minnie's buckets were full and they were getting tired, so we headed home for a little pre-bedtime sugar. They barely made it in the door before plopping down to pick out the handful of treats they wanted to eat. Judging by the bowl full of treats on my counter, Minnie Mouse and Princess Leia had a sweet and successful Halloween!

Leia posing by the jack-o-lanterns

Minnie was being a little stubborn and would NOT stand by the jack-o-lanterns

jumping in the Princess bounce house (it was hard to get a good shot through the netting)

Leia and Minnie enjoying the spoils

poor Josie was hoping to get in on the Halloween action too

Kendall's first haircut

Mimi, Avery and Kendall

Yesterday my Mom took the day off work and came over to Ft. Worth to spend it with the girls and me. We did a little shopping at Target, had lunch at Cheddar's, and then after nap time, we took went over to Southlake to get Avery and Kendall's hair done at Sweet n' Sassy. After debating about it for a couple weeks, I finally decided to get Kendall's hair trimmed so it wouldn't look so scraggly and would maybe thicken up a bit. She was a little unsure about the whole thing when we first put her in the chair, but she sat very still and was smiling and enjoying herself after a few minutes. She even got sparkle spray, glitter stars on her face, and a Twinkle Pop at the end, just like Avery.

looking a little unsure in the mirror

all smiles now

getting a cool style

the finished product- 2 beautiful girls

girls day coming to a close

After we finished up at the salon, my Dad joined us and we killed a few minutes walking around the Town Center while we waited for Scott to join us for dinner. The girls had a good time throwing pennies in the fountain, running around in the gazebo that overlooks a pond, and playing on the steps of the courthouse.

playing outside the salon and waiting for Poppihugging on Poppi

looking for ducks in the pond

in front of the courthouse

For dinner we decided to go to Kobeya and let the girls have their first Hibachi experience. They both got a little anxious watching the chefs light the big fire at the other tables, so when it was our turn we requested "no fire". When our chef started making a bunch of noise and doing tricks at the beginning, Avery started crying and jumped into Scott's lap. Thankfully we were able to calm her down and she ended up really enjoying the whole thing. She was even OK with the chef lighting his onion volcano on fire. They were both pretty mesmerized by the whole thing. As Avery was attempting to eat her plateful of rice grain by grain with chopsticks, she said, "I think this is a pretty good restaurant!" I think Kendall liked it pretty well too considering the manager gave her 3 suckers and a fancy straw in her cup of milk. Next we are off to our church Halloween carnival tonight for more fun and treats!

Fall Portraits

At the end of September, my friend Kerri who owns Freckle Face Photography took some fall pictures of Avery and Kendall at the Ft. Worth Botanic Gardens. It was a gorgeous day, maybe a bit too sunny for picture taking, but perfect temps and no wind. In fact, after Kerri was finished, the girls and I spent another 30 minutes or hour out there exploring and watching all the turtles around one of the ponds. Kerri did a great job and we ended up with completely different shots from the last time we had pictures taken out there. So here are some of my favorites of Kendall at 19 months and Avery at 3 1/2 yrs.

This one was kind of a blooper, but I thought they looked cute being silly and it captured their natural smiles and laughter so well that I had to include it.

1st homework assignment

This afternoon I was getting Avery's things ready for school tomorrow since we will be busy w/ church tonight and I remembered she had a "homework" assignment in her folder. It is her first official homework assignment, so she was excited about it. The assignment was to draw a picture of something she did on the fall break. So I set her up at the desk with her crayon box and her paper while I changed her sheets and was cleaning in her room. I decided I was going to let her do it completely on her own unless she asked me for help, which she didn't, and this was the finished product. It is a picture of her and Scott fishing at our church camp-out last Saturday.

I was so impressed! I knew she could draw a person, but she had never drawn people with quite this much detail before. She even got Scott's eye color right and added curls at the end of her hair! I was also surprised that she was able to draw the fishing pole, water, sky, and sun all in the right places.

Unfortunately, I forgot to take the camera to the camp-out, so we don't have any "real" pictures of it. But thanks to Avery, we at least have something to help us remember it! We had a good time throwing rocks in the lake, exploring, sitting around the campfire, watching the kids play with their friends, and Scott took Avery fishing for the first time.

We also had my Mom's birthday lunch at our house last weekend, and I did get a few pictures of that. My aunt, my sister and brother-in-law came over (although you'd never know from the handful of pictures I took),and we had some family-style entrees, bread and salad from Macaroni Grill, some sweet tea from McAllister's, and strawberry cheesecake from La Madeline--yum! Thanks for having a birthday Mom!

Mimi and Poppi w/ Avery and Kendall

Avery enjoyed helping my Mom open her cards and presents

Kendall and Poppi

Kendall's silly spoon trick

Cousin Mason visits Texas

At the end of September, my sister-in-law, her husband, and my precious nephew Mason made the 3 day trek from San Diego down to Texas to visit and let Mason meet all his relatives. Mason is 5 months old and we had only seen him via webcam so far, so this visit was a real treat for all the aunts, uncles and cousins. We were able to eat several meals with them and hang out a couple of times during the week they were here. Avery thought Mason was really cute and enjoyed holding him. Kendall, on the other hand, was no too excited about Mommy holding another baby. Scott's aunt and uncle were kind enough to have his whole family over for a swim party and cookout one night while Amy, Mike and Mason were here. You can see from all the "cousin" pictures that Mason is completely outnumbered, poor guy. We really enjoyed having the whole family together and we are all looking forward now to our trip out to San Diego for Christmas!

Cousins-Kendall, Avery, Bailey, Mason, Brooklyn, and Braden

in order from oldest to youngest

Mason's "the man"!

Avery got to stay up late one night just so she could see Mason for the 1st time

Mason and Dedaw (Scott's Dad)

swimming at Travis and Elaine's

Kendall taking a dip with Daddy

Braden, Bailey and Avery playing with Mason

Lake weekend 2009

Last weekend we went on our 3rd annual trip to Cedar Creek Lake with some of our college friends and their kids. We had a great time catching up, watching all the kids play together, and playing on the lake. We were able to enjoy ourselves a little more this year since the girls are older and also since they slept better (even if they woke up at 6:30 Saturday morning, at least they slept hard all night and took long naps that day!) The worst part of our whole trip was that Kendall was NOT a fan of her life jacket and of the fact that she did not have her lovey on the boat. She cried just about the whole time on the boat-- which was a whipping for everyone I'm sure. But she had so much fun swimming and playing on the beach, so I guess it was worth it. Sunday she kept looking out the back windows and saying, "I want swimming," and getting upset when I told her we couldn't. Avery had a great time playing with the other kids, especially Mick and Alexis's little boy Graham. She was so sad that he had to leave Saturday night. When we were on the boat Sunday she said, "It's not very fun without Graham." She is such a little "people-person." We all had such a good time and we feel so lucky to have the kind of friends where you can just sort of pick up where you left off. Hopefully we'll be able to keep the annual mini-reunion going for years to come!

Avery and Graham liked to snuggle up and watch cartoons together

all the kids (minus Harrison Kennedy who was staying w/ grandma)-- poor Graham was upset that he was about to leave

Scott putting his karate moves on Avery and Graham

Graham helped Avery put on a blue-haired fairy costume

Scott and Avery tubing on the way back from the beach

hanging out on the dock

Avery and Abby Holm

Kendall and I swam in the cove while Scott and Avery rode the jet-ski