silly antics

Life with these two girls is a bottle full of giggles.

Ains & good friend J sportingly "cleaning up" after a bout of silly string

UNO - and craziness (and Jake photo bomb)

she's mobile! Watch out!

yep. that's a thumb in the mouth. A first. :) Love the fingers sticking straight out.

word

what? I didn't do anything!

there must be something else I can take out

the view from here

furniture moving stage has arrived! She pushes these little chairs everywhere to practice her walking... and rearrange

our little writer - discovered this on her art table one night

the post-bath "catch me if you can" game

another dolly lover

path of destruction everywhere she goes

one of her favorites? the play  kitchen [jake photo bomb. again.] 

spaghetti, anyone?

impressive on the monkey bars now - clever way to get up

sisters and paper crowns:

(I love this little run of photos)

from awhile ago... when daddy traveled to Mexico:

good little Husky (she has lots of purple swag!)

and some random vids for your pleasure:

violin practice

quesadilla ... or is it a toy?

from Addie 9 months - adventurous eater

piano girl

on blogging...

This is what our house looks like lately.  All. The. Time.

First of all, THANK YOU to anyone reading this right now.  Truly, you are DEAR and TRUE friends.  I know because if you check this blog you've realized that I never post anything anymore!  Yet here you are, loyally clicking on that bookmark to see if by chance I've pulled up the laptop and tossed some pictures up. 

I have to tell you, I've been so very overwhelmed with LIFE these days.  We have been LIVING.  Forget about documenting the living... :)

Truth be told... I'm kind of intimidated to blog again. I mean, where do I start?  So much to share. And life keeps tumbling forward at warp speed with the little ones and jobs.  Also, I'm sure I'm experiencing some hormonal roller coastering these days (as I did after Ains turned one and we slowly started weaning).  The night weaning occurred first.  Blessed SLEEP here I come!  But oh, the mama guilt, the fear of supply drop, the hormonal tornado.  Sigh.  And then - SHE TURNED ONE. 

She's growing up so fast!  We soak up every mess, every diaper change, every whimper and giggle and drool.  Every babble, every sign-language attempt, every sweet-baby-smell-snuggle. And yet it goes.  Just look, my first baby is so big!  She's set her mind to learning the 'cup song' (haven't seen this youtube yet? you MUST). 

So I finally recalled some advice a friend once gave me: 'just start'.  He was talking about unpacking (when we moved to DC) but it applies to lots of things. including this blog. So, I'm back. I hope. I'm just gonna start.  It's probably going to be messy, not in chronological order, not in any order... but so is my life right now.  Stay tuned!

VERY FIRST LAUGH!!

So, we'd heard her first single giggle - she must have been having a good dream because it happened in her sleep about 1-2 weeks ago.

This week...

First REAL laugh! 

(Thank goodness I had my phone nearby to capture it!)

What was making her giggle, you ask?  

Here ya go:

dressin' up Jake

Can you believe?  This puppy LET Ains dress him up, then obediently followed her around the house, attached by her impromptu "bling leash" made of a broken plastic pearl necklace while she swung a citronella candle.  There are no words for this.

Preschooler With a Camera

This is what I found on my phone when a certain pre-schooler figured out the 'flip the camera' feature to take pictures of herself while mom made dinner.  NICE.

fun videos

Ains rockin' out to a steel drum band at Eastern Market:

I only wish I had vids of her singing ALL of the pop radio music she has picked up during our summer.  (I've been a little lax on protecting little ears and have been blasting my favorite tunes -- which she promptly learned.).  Her favorites?  

Somebody That I Used To Know

Here's My Number, Call Me Maybe

Rumor Has It

Set The World On Fire:

Best way to learn how to ride:

catching fireflies:

El Derecho: the storm that marched through DC this summer and nailed the area pretty bad.  We watched as it approached, then skirted, our KOA campsite:

Halloween 2011

artwork - courtesy of Ainsley V.    (Those black lines to the side of the nose?  They are cheeks.)

So, it has taken FOREVER for me to get this post up.  Blogger has not been nice about uploading photos for me lately.  But it's here!

Ains really got into Halloween this year.  She was... 

Yep, SNOW WHITE.

This girl is SOO into princesses (Disney preferred).  So unlike myself as a child.  I have no idea where she gets it.  I especially love the throwing herself to the ground and then demanding that someone be the prince and kiss her. (And whoa to the chump who wrinkles, soils, or otherwise messes up her dress.)

Halloween night proved to be movie re-enactment-free.  We walked, with our neighbor friends, down the street to "Hilloween" (Halloween on the Hill) - an insane mob of locals with toting all manner of costumed kid.  Free - and complete with moon bounce, hay ride, a balloon shaping guy, face painters,  etc.

a taste of kid-friendly "hot" apple cider

hay ride

Ains and Jas sat on the edge of the wagon

Ains had insisted "We aren't ready for Halloween yet, we don't have a spooky house."  So - we made it spooky.

I'm sure the mail lady appreciated crawling under this web each day. :)

After Hilloween, our dear friends and neighbors invited us in for macNcheese casserole dinner before trick or treating with the girls.  

Best moment of the night?  

When a man handed out packets of instant hot chocolate - and Ainsley picks it up out of her bucket, turns it over in her hand, then gives it back saying "No thanks.  I don't want that one." Then turns and walks down the stairs to a mortified mother on the sidewalk.

When I finally thought of a way to explain how (and why) this wasn't polite, she responded:

"But I don't want to make my own hot chocolate.  I want someone else to make it for me.  We can go to the coffee shop tomorrow and get some, Mommy."

preschool chores

So - I'm curious to know what chores kids are doing these days?

What chores do your kids do?

Ainsley has two jobs every day we get home from school:

1. set the table 

2. feed the dog

  

Of course, you never know quite HOW the table will be set...

Or what type of 'glass' you'll have your water in. (She often fills the water cups too, since she can do it independently from our fridge "tap" container.)

 Feeding Jake is one of her favorites.

She gets mad if one of us does it instead.

Sometimes she adds a chore for herself ---

serving water to the neighborhood cats.