Road Trip

Our family went to the Oregon Coast this last week. We had so much fun and even extended the trip a couple days. Here are some pics of the girls in the car. They were SOOO good, but thank goodness for DVD players in the car. How in the world did our parents do vacations without them???

Brynlee riding in her car seat with her headphones

Taylee being super cool in the back seat
Brynlee just being Brynlee

First Day of Dance

Taylee loves to dance so we enrolled her in another dance class this year. It is a studio in Shelley that my aunt recommended. We've only gone once but I was very impressed. The waiting room was VERY family friendly. There were toys for Bryns and a TV in the corner showed the dance class. I loved it and we are very excited about a no-tournament year of dance!

First Day of Preschool

Its been a couple weeks, but I wanted to post these pictures of my princess. Taylee has such a great time at preschool. It is done by a lady in our stake and the majority of the kids in the class will be going to kindergarten with Taylee next year. Taylee is such a cutie and I hate to have her gone two days a week, but hopefully this will help all of us adjust. Poor Bryns keeps asking where Taylee is.

Fun at the Fair

I have not been to the fair in almost ten years. I loved going when I was a child. I loved the rides, the buildings, the food. In high school I went to be with my friends and the rides, but hated the dirt and the ride workers. After I got married the fair lost all of its appeal for me. Even the idea of Tiger Ears (HUGE scones) could not entice me.

This year Sean had to run a booth for his company so I took Taylee and Brynlee to the fair while my wonderful sister and mom watched Paxton. And I was shocked when I realized that I had a blast! Taylee and Bryns had so much fun with everything and their laughter and smiled were contagious. The best part was that Sean was able to sneak away from work for an hour to come with us to the rides.

Walking down the main walkway toward the rides we stopped and let the girls pick out face-paint. I was a bit nervous because the lady was a little bit creepy but she did a great job and was quick (which is really good with a 2 year old!).

Brynlee got a butterfly with lots of sparkles

Taylee picked out a flower with sparkles

Here is my sexy husband with my two cuties! (Sean gets SOO sick on any rides that go in circles. I was very impressed that he made it on the carousel)

Had to get these pictures of the girls fishing in the duck pond game...it might be the only time they get to go fishing :-)

Here is Taylee fishing all by herself. She actually won a stuffed snake while Brynlee won a plastic sword. Bryns was so sad when she didn't get a snake that the nice man switched it even though she hadn't gotten enough points. It was so nice!

Taylee and Brynlee on the rides. This is one of the only rides that Brynlee was big enough to go on. I ended up playing a bunch of the games with her while Taylee rode the bigger rides. Unfortunately :-) another carnie worker took pity on her and gave her four goldfish when she only won one. She was so happy amd no longer felt bad about not going on the rides (by the way one of the fishes is already dead. Yuck!). I even went on the swings with Taylee. It was SOO much fun. I forgot how much I like fair rides. And since Sean can't do the circle rides I will always get to go on them with the kids :-)...though I do have to admit that even though it was a lot of fun, about 3/4 of the way through I was thinking "ok, isn't this done yet."

After the rides, Sean had to get back to work so I took the two girls over to see Mckee's Petting Zoo. Brynlee loved all the goats and she kept trying to hug them. But when the goats realized that she was out of food for them they took off.
We also went to Ag Adventure Land which was highly recommended by my sister. Both of the girls had a lot of fun. There were very few people when we went so it was nice and quiet and the girls got to spend as much time as they wanted at each of the stations.

Milking a fake cow

Taylee pretending to be a cowgirl. She actually was doing very well at roping the metal cow. Grandpa Gneiting would be proud.

We stopped and got rootbeer floats after Ag Land and then the girls wanted to go on these horse rides by McKees. So, here's a shot of Brynlee being a cowgirl.

So, yes, the fair was a lot of fun. There is something about taking your own children to things that brings out the kid in you and I will definitely be ready to go next year!

Laughing Baby

Taylee loves her little brother and she is always doing the craziest things to make him laugh and squeal. He loves her just as much as you can see :-)

Sorry the picture is a bit blurry. It was done on my phone.

Oh, Brynlee...

We had a girls party at my mom's house a couple days ago when my niece Aubree was visiting. I took all my kids fingernail polish with us for the little girls to use. They had so much fun watching Hannah Montana, painting nails, and, of course, dancing and singing together.
We got home late and I didn't unpack my diaper bag. The next morning while I was busy feeding Paxton, my little snooper Brynlee found the fingernail polish. And of course I didn't realize this until she came to show me how she had painted her own fingernails and toenails. I looked back to see not only a trail of blue across my carpet, but also an upturned bottle. This was in my living room. Right in front of the entry way. Where any visitor couldn't help but see it. Yep, I seriously wanted to cry when I saw that blue puddle that was about 3 inches wide.
Not knowing what to do I decided to try fingernail polish remover first. It gets fingernail polish off of my nails, perhaps it will work on my carpet. NOPE! The color did not go away, instead it smeared. So, at this point my carpet had about a 6 inch bright blue circle.
Still having no idea of what to do at this point, I searched frantically in my cupboards for ANYTHING that might help me. And lo and behold in the back of one of the shelves was a cleaner that I had gotten at Don Asletts the last time Taylee had a stomach bug and had thrown-up red kool-aid. It was called Juice Out---for food, drink, and COSMETIC DYES.
As quick as I could, I threw that stuff all over that Smurf Turf, followed the directions (which included using a wet towel and steam iron!), and crossed my fingers that it would at least help.
When the time was up, I lifted back the towel, and all of the blue fingernail polish was gone! Hallelujah! Sean couldn't even find the spot when he got home that night.
So, for any mother who has adventurous, mischievious children who may dump fingernail polish all over your carpet, remember Juice Out!
Sorry that there are no pictures, I was a bit preoccupied during the whole fiasco :-)

Smiles

Paxton is such a sweet baby! He is sleeping 10-12 hours at night, takes 2 good naps during the day and just wants to smile and laugh at everything. He has us all wrapped around his chubby little finger, too. Taylee and Brynlee are constantly sitting by him making silly faces and doing silly noises in order to get him to laugh. He is the cutest and best baby ever!