Branson Trip

Clint got home at 2:00am Wednesday morning and we were in Branson by noon that day. Yeah, talk about a busy day! We stayed in a condo that was actually very convenient. We had a bedroom and my sister and her family had a bedroom. It worked out great because we could put the girls to bed, shut the door, and go watch a movie in the living room! My parents had to sleep on the sleeper sofa and had very little privacy, so I felt sorry for them, but not enough to trade them rooms! Ha!

Ainsley LOVED spending so much time with her baby cousin, Hailey. She was not jealous at all and was very sweet with the baby. She loved to dance for Hailey and sing to her. And especially loved giving her toys to play with. Here's a picture of both the girls having their milk...

This was taken the first day we got there. It was a little late when we got in that night, and very windy, but our balcony overlooked the playground. Well, you know I just couldn't fight that battle! The pictures are terrible, but it was super dark and they were all action shots. Here's Ainsley racing Mimi down the slide!

Ainsley posing in this lion. For some reason she kept calling this a fishy. ???

What should I play with next?

Both the girls were giggling as they rolled this toy back and forth to each other! It was so cute! This is my mom and sister.

Ainsley jumping with Hailey and Barbie!

I didn't get many pictures, considering we were there for 4 days. We had some great photo opportunities of the girls swimming together too, but my batteries were dead in my camera. My dad got several pictures, so maybe I can post some of his later. It was just so fun letting the girls spend this much time together and really bond. I think it will make the holidays even more fun now that they've already warmed up to each other. Ainsley slept pretty good too, but insisted on sleeping in a pack 'n' play. She wanted to sleep in "Ainsley's wittle bed". She took 2 hour naps and slept about 10 hours at night. It wasn't nearly as much as she sleeps at home, but I was happy considering we were in a hotel! It made me feel better about traveling for the holidays. Hopefully she'll do just as good!

And, lastly, this is probably a good opportunity for me to tell you all that I'm pregnant! It has become very hard to hide lately. Luckily, I've been out of town the last couple of weeks so very few people have seen me, but I don't think there's any hiding it now! I just wanted to wait to tell everyone until we were out of the first trimester. We've had 2 ultrasounds and everything looks good so far! My official due date is May 3, but the ultrasounds showed April 30. And since I'll be having a C-section again it will definitely be an April baby. I think Ainsley is going to be a great big sister! We're watching a little 2 month old tomorrow so I guess we'll see how it goes with a tiny one. We haven't said anything to her yet, and we don't plan to for another couple of months. She already thinks she has a baby in her tummy (because she felt the baby in Zoe's momma's tummy kick) so I'll just let her concentrate on that for now. :)

Fall Activities

Well, as I mentioned earlier, Clint was in China for a couple of weeks this month, so Ainsley and I did a lot of things that wouldn't normally be allowed. For example, we made caramel apples one day and ate them in my bed while watching the Wizard of Oz! :)

We made this princess pumpkin this year instead of carving. The pumpkins just don't last anytime at all when you carve them up, so this will last much longer. Plus, we can use it again next year! It's a set made by Mr. Potato Head and Ainsley LOVED it!

Posing with her "pukin." We got home from Oklahoma late the night before and were leaving early the next morning for Branson, so she stayed in pajamas all day. And we never even combed our hair!

Here is our finished product...

We also made Daddy's favorite cookies to surprise him when he got home! I only make these 2 or 3 times a year so it was a big surprise for him!

Clint's plane was supposed to land just after 10:00pm Wednesday night, but it was the night of all the storms and tornadoes. His last connection was in Dallas and I knew that he was on the last flight of the day. If he missed it he'd have to stay overnight somewhere. So, by 11:00pm, when I had not heard from him, I got on some of those flight tracker websites and could see the flight path his plane was taking. It was very comforting seeing all of the updates and knowing that the pilots were in direct communication with someone. (They updated with some kind of message or status about every 3 minutes!) Anyway, they circled NWA for a very long time, flew up to Missouri to get out of the storm, and eventually had to redirect to Little Rock and land there for a while. It was after 2:00am when he finally made it home. I tried my best to wait up for him, but I fell asleep just a little before he got home. I even had candles lit for him to find his way to the bedroom because the electricity had been flickering all night. Anyway, the first thing he said to me when we woke up that next morning was, "Did I see cookies in there?" Ha! Here's evidence that food really IS the way to a man's heart!

On another note, did anyone watch Spookley the Square Pumpkin this morning? I had seen the previews on Disney and had already scheduled the DVR to record it, but Ainsley was too excited and had to watch it! She loved it and it was a very cute story! It's about a square pumpkin that just wants to be round like everyone else, but in the end realizes that he is very special because he is square and learns to love himself! Cute movie!

If you missed it, keep an eye out for "The Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown" next Tuesday, October 30 at 7:00pm on ABC. I have not missed a single year of that movie since I was a child! It inspired the Great Pumpkin that used to come visit us every Halloween when I was a kid too. Very similar to the Easter Bunny or Santa Claus, my mom would play the Great Pumpkin and buy us a small little gift and candy and place it in our trick-or-treat bags overnight. Maybe not the traditional Halloween that most kids are used to, but we sure looked forward to it! Ok, enough plugs for Fall cartoons!

Toddler Toes - Safari

I'm a little disappointed because I just realized that I uploaded all of these pictures in reverse order. Oh well. Try to follow along. :) Our Toddler Toes play group went to the Wild Wilderness Animal Safari this month. We had 8 moms and 9 kids and everyone had a wonderful time! We left pretty early, but it took so long to drive through the main part, and then walk through the petting zoos that it was past naptime when most of us got home. However, we didn't have a single cranky child! They were all so good and excited to see the animals! Ainsley's absolute favorite animals were the kangaroos. They would hold the bread in their hands and Ainsley kept calling it a "samich". :)

Will, Caleb, and Ainsley watching the "piggies".

Ainsley thought it was so neat that Caleb and Caleb were dressed alike! She kept watching them and saying, "My orange shirt!" Ha!

Will, Caleb, and Ainsley looking at the "BEEEG" towutull!

Feeding the bunnies. They were very sweet!

The zebra is one of Ainsley's favorite animals in her ABC pop-up book. She kept telling me, "Z for Zebra, Momma!"

This is the "more bread!" pose....

She was moo-ing at the goats here. We obviously haven't worked on our goat sounds much!

This was my attempt at a group picture.

Feeding the baby goats.

Will and Ainsley chasing the rooster!

Should I play with the monkey or Ariel? I think Ariel won this contest!

Everyone LOVED baby Kiwi. This little monkey lives with the owners of the zoo. She wears preemie diapers that they cut a whole in for her tail. She was just born in July, but has already learned to take her diaper off so they have to put it on backwards too! :) She would reach out and hold the kids hands!

Ainsley was a little nervous with these animals getting so close at first, but she quickly warmed up and tried to roll the windows down when we drove through the camels! I only got a couple of shots during the drive-through part because my camera was a little flaky. We all carpooled through and Ainsley and I rode with Michael and Veronika. We let the kids ride in the front with us.

Here are a couple of random shots in the bathtub a couple of weeks ago. Ainsley has 2 new things lately. She wants her hair "fixed" with shampoo in it, and she's been swimming on her back. She actually floats! There is so much water in the tub that she can't lay all the way down without going under, so it's a little scary for me to see this! The first time it happened, I was getting her jammies out of her closet (right next door to the bathroom) when I walked in and saw this! It scared me to death!

On another note, I have to apologize for taking such a long break from blogger! Clint was in China for 2 weeks so during that time we traveled a lot to and from Oklahoma. The day he got home, we also left for Branson for our annual trip with my family. So, we all got home last night and I have lots of pictures to upload! I'll work on it throughout the day and maybe get them all added! :)

Tulsa Fair

Tulsa is a good half-way point between here and my parent's house, so we decided to meet them at the Tulsa State Fair yesterday. We had a blast! We planned to leave really early, but Ainsley slept until 8:15am Saturday morning, and then we had to do a breathing treatment (she had another allergy attack last week) so it was later in the morning before we left. We got to the fairgrounds about 11:30am or so. We went straight to the rides, of course! I told my mom we didn't need more than 9 tickets or so, enough for 3 rides, but she came back with 20 tickets! I didn't think there was any way we'd go through them all, but we went through them fast! I got several pictures, but I forgot to have my parents take pictures of the rides I rode on. So, we have about 1/2 of the rides...with Mimi and Bapa. It started raining on the last ride of the morning, so we darted into a building about 12:30pm. Ainsley had some grapes and then laid her head back in the stroller. She has NEVER napped in the stroller (not since she was a newborn, anyway) so I was very skeptical about naptime happening, but by 1:00pm she was asleep! (Ok, I admit that I gave her some Benadryl, but she DID have a runny nose) I took a blanket to lay over the canopy to block some light out and it seemed to work pretty well. We even had to walk back through all of the rides to get to another building and she stayed asleep! I was SO relieved that she had napped. I was a little uptight until then, but once she was asleep I started to enjoy myself too! We decided it was a good time to see all of the vendor booths, samples, new cars, etc. while she was sleeping. It worked out really well.

She only slept about an hour (that was enough for me) and woke up when we walked past a DJ stand that was playing music. When she heard the music, she popped up from under that blanket and started dancing! To rap music! She's usually so cranky when she wakes up, but she was such a happy little girl! So, we all ate a bunch of junk food and Ainsley played on the display swingsets for a while. Then we went to the "Just for Kids" building where she made some colored sand necklaces, watched a puppet show, played on the "toddler toys", looked at lots of snakes (and even got to pet one!), and played with a HUGE turtle. After all of that, we still had time to watch the moo cows (and met one named Sally), had some ice cream, and rode a couple of more rides! Whew! What a day!

My parents came back to Arkansas with us and stayed home with Ainsley today so I could go to Wal-Mart by myself. Isn't it amazing how fast you can shop without a 2 year old? I was SO glad they were here. Last week was awful....the new medicine she's on keeps her from sleeping. One night I ended up putting her in bed with me at 11:00pm and still fell asleep before her. Then the next day she skipped her nap altogether. I've taken her off of all prescription medication now (other than breathing treatments) and she's been doing great. But, needless to say, it was a hard week and it was so nice to have some time to myself.

Ok, I just read back through this blog and realized how boring it was. I am SO tired, can you tell? I'll stop before I put you all to sleep too!

Garage Sale

Sorry it's been such a long time since I've posted. I really over-worked myself getting ready for the garage sale. Yes, it takes time, but it is SO worth it! We did really well, both Leah and I. We sold pretty much everything that we were really wanting to sell, with the exception of my coffee table. I hope to get that in a friend's garage sale this weekend, though. We also sold some big pieces of furniture for friends of ours. I still haven't had a chance to go over the exact totals, but I'm pretty sure it's enough to decorate Ainsley's big girl room! :)

Speaking of Ainsley, here is a picture of her next to her newly refinished baby doll crib. A friend from church, Hollis Stanbery, refinished it for us because he's retired and was bored! A great deal, huh? :) It was my mom's when she was a little girl and mine when I was a little girl. It has a drop rail and everything! She loves to put her babies to bed when she goes to bed.

After the sale, Ainsley and I went to pick up the signs. I guess I didn't realize that she had taken a sheet of pricing stickers with her because when I looked back this is what I found! She screamed when I had to peel them all off, though!

Kids helping sweep the garage before set-up. And yes, Will got into the dress-up clothes all by himself!

After working all morning on Friday, then all day Saturday, we had just enough energy left to load the kids up and head to the pumpkin patch. Caleb was sick and Clint was really needing to mow, so it was just us mommies! We had a great time! I had no idea how much fun it would be, but the kids had a blast running around in the field and rolling pumpkins. I'm not posting any pictures in my blog because I posted an insane amount on our flickr page. If you'd like to plow through them sometime, you can view them here.

One last thing.... We were playing in the backyard tonight when Ainsley spotted something above the roof. She was saying, "Look, Momma! Look!" "What is it, Ainsley?" "Stars!" Ok, it was 5:00pm....not even slightly dark outside so I have NO idea what she thought she saw. But the conversation continued. I'm convinced this came straight from a Dora episode too. "Come here, stars! Come here!" (She was motioning for them too) "Play with Ainsley! Ainsley catch you!" She just kept saying things like this...trying to entice the stars to play. Bazaar, huh? She didn't get much of a nap today (since I worked at MDO and she doesn't nap if I'm in her room) so maybe she was a bit delirious? Does that happen to kids? :)