Thursday, September 09, 2010

Back to school

Off she goes!! Taylor started her first day of preschool (well, her second year first day) yesterday.
1st day of Preschool
This year she's going to a "big girl" preschool at a real elementary. Needless to say, she is beyond excited!
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Taylor said she loved the whole day. I personally thought the 3 1/2 hours was VERY long. She said she listened and was so good but there was a "crazy boy" who wouldn't "relax". Who knows who that is, but she will be quick to tell me all about his antics every day, I'm sure.

Taylor and her buddy Ashley. We are so, so happy they are together. What luck!
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Time is going by so fast and next year she will be a big kindergartener! It was such a good day that we're off to celebrate at Disneyland! Actually - we just love going to Disneyland, so any excuse to go, we take it!

Oh, and Ellie was there too
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Thursday, September 02, 2010

So long sweet Summer

Remember when I was going to try and make every post a line from a song...I'm back at it! So long sweet summer is RIGHT! I can't believe it's all coming to end. The beach, pool, park and Disneyland have been our very good friends this summer. The sun decided to hide until August, but we made due with what we had. Taylor finished swim lessons and is a fish, she started soccer a few weeks ago, and dance and preschool start next week. I have ONE picture of us at the beach and one of her first day of soccer, and NONE of anything else local. I took so many pictures in Seattle, so let's hope the ridiculous amount of collages I put on this post makes up for it.

Taylor at the beach : First day of soccer
PhotobucketHit up the circus with Brittany and Jake. Very fun. Very LONG.
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The family playing at the beach. Taken by the oh-so-talented, Tiffany Garfield.
PhotobucketQuick trip to Vegas. I honestly took NO pictures, but we did have lots of fun. We met up with lots of old friends (so sad I took no pictures!), went to some yummy dinners, went shopping, played at Town Square, finally saw my mom's GORGEOUS showroom, and lounged around my mom's house. The girls always love hanging with their Nana.
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5 days later we were off to Seattle.
The first day we went downtown at the Seattle Aquarium and lunch on the water after. This was so much fun and Taylor was so daring and pet everything! I was a little shocked. It first took one of the workers to give her a small bowl of some little creatures to feel and then she was all about it.
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A day at Remlinger Farms. So fun and only 20 minutes away. By far the hottest day we had, but it was great to be outside and enjoy all the fun kiddie activities. We rode a pony, roller coaster, ferris wheel, fed some animals, took the train and had some yummy homemade ice cream.
Remlinger FarmsRemlinger Farms 2
We took the ferry to Bainbridge Island one of the days and had a lot of fun walking around and enjoying the sights. I only wish I would have taken a picture of some of the ice cream we had while over there. It was DE-LISH! That alone was worth the ferry ride. The view was incredible too. Such a clear day.
Ferry to BB
We had so much fun the week we were there. Julie even slipped in a few beginner piano lessons for Taylor, we played in the backyard (a novelty for us), Jay and Lee golfed 2 days while Julie the girls and I slipped away to the doll museum in Bellevue, saw movies, watched movies at home, read books, played toys, went the park, lots of eating out...PHEW! We got it all in basically.
PhotobucketNow it's back to the grind. It was fun having Jay around for the month of August. It always feels like we're back in college when he takes those big breaks from work :) The other thing Taylor has mastered this summer is her poses! Oh please, that girl can't give me a straight face and normal stance to save her life! I feel like we had to tell her a thousand times a day to put her head straight and just smile! As you can tell by my many pictures she has some winners in there with her pose, and we basically got not one family picture. They all failed, but that's kind of the deal at this age I guess. Now we're on to fall. As the song says, "it's cold where you're going, I hope that your heart's always warm." :)

Friday, July 09, 2010

ONE


Guess who partied it up today?

Miss Ellie Jane! I cannot believe it was a year ago today that we brought this sweet and crazy girl into our home. We love her so much and just can't picture our days without her in it. She's always keeping us on our toes by walking everywhere and trying to get into everything.
She's still a tiny little bird on the charts, but she eats anything that falls onto the ground or that you put directly into her mouth! :) She loves to give hugs, snuggle (but only for .5 seconds, and then she's done), say uh-oh, shake her head "no", say mama, dada, baby, baba, hi (in the cutest, high-pitch voice you've ever heard), waves "hi" and "bye", laugh at anything Taylor does, and SCREAM. That little peanut has a set of lungs like none I've ever heard. It will make us want to climb the walls every now and again, but she's so cute, we let it go! ;)
For her big day we did a party at the park with our friends and kids. I did a "pink lemonade" theme and had some delicious Las Golondrinas for dinner.


It was low-key and with good friends. What could be better?
Trying the cake (and SUGAR) for the first time.



She wasn't too sure about those - but I thought the pink lemonade cupcakes were perfection!
Some of the party peeps



Sisterly "love"
And to top off our big day, we left the park and went straight to the hospital to see someone else who had a birthday today...

the not-so-little Avery Mullen was born today, weighing in at a whopping 10 lbs 12 oz! I could have held her all night. It was definitely surreal to be in the same hospital as I was just a year ago today to see another little girl make her way into the world. What a miracle those little babies are! There is just nothing better than a newborn to squish and love! It made me go back and look at Ellie a year ago today -

I can't believe how fast she went from that, to this -
Happy Birthday sweet Ellie Bell! We love you more than you'll ever know.

Tuesday, June 29, 2010

Saturday was Taylor's first dance recital!
Can I just say how much I have looked forward to this day?!?!

I could not have been more proud! The girl cracked me up the whole time and really got into the moves! I wish I could have taken pictures DURING the recital, but rules are rules I guess :(
It was to Little Mermaid, "Under the Sea" - and they were all darling. We had such a fun day with Taylor's choice for lunch - McDonalds, and Toy Story 3 (with hair and makeup). I'm starting to wonder at what age McDonald's is not the #1 choice. I'm really looking forward to that day....
Lee and Julie came to stay for the weekend and they were able to go to the recital and babysit for my birthday. YAY!
30 is really creeping up on me. Yikes!
And this little one is a walking machine!
She's crazy fast and walks much more than she crawls.

The girls crack each other up all the time and keep us laughing as well.
And just because I LOVE this face - I will end with this little beauty
I love those girls!

Wednesday, June 09, 2010


LATELY...

We've been to Arizona to see the cousins and Grandpa.
Fun was had by all.
Had a joint birthday for Hailey, Taylor and Caden.
Not quite the rockin' party I was planning on, but they could have cared less.
It's fun just to be with your cousins!





Our little Taylor turned 4!! I can hardly believe it.
We partied all day at Disneyland, without Ellie (thank you Jenn!)
Let her eat all the junk she wanted.
We later paid for it at 2 am with some "throw-ups".
Rode all the "big" rides, now that she's tall enough, and when all was said and done all Taylor wanted to do was dance with her wand before we left.
It's a long 3 minute video, but we had to share!







Had a little getaway with just the 2 of us to San Diego (thanks Nana Julie and gramps!)
We celebrated our 8 year anniversary on May 24th.
Still in love and had so much fun.
Seriously took NO pictures of anything.
How pathetic.
But we did go to dinner - as captured by our waiter :)


Ellie decided to start walking. She hasn't quite mastered it, but she is oh-so-close!
She's 11 months old TODAY!

Next week Taylor will finish her 1st year of pre-school. Summer will finally start and we are going to live it up.