Anna's Spends the Night Off!

We had another milestone this week!  Last Friday as we are riding in the car running errands, out of the blue, Anna asked when she was going to spend the night at YaYa's by herself.  We all had a long discussion about it because Aubrey, of course, piped in that she wanted to go spend the night at YaYa's too.  I told Anna that we would call YaYa when we got home to talk to her about it.

Naturally, when we got home it slipped my mind to call YaYa.  After about an hour or so, Anna came up to me and very accusingly told me that I had not called YaYa like I said I would!  I stopped what I was doing and immediately called YaYa!  We made arrangements to meet her after church on Sunday for Anna to go back to Shellman Bluff with her for the night.

Anna was beyond excited that she was such a big girl that she could go spend the night off all by herself!  Anna has spent the night without Danny and me many times, but she's really never spent the night away from her sisters and she's never spent the night at YaYa's without any of us!

So Anna got all packed up and we met YaYa and Tom at Cracker Barrel in Kingsland for lunch after church.  Once done with lunch, there was no hesitation from Anna to go by herself with YaYa!  Like a big girl, she hugged me, told me she would miss me and then gave me a goodbye kiss!

She had a wonderful time.  In the short 24 hours that YaYa had Anna, I know she spoiled her beyond belief!   

Anna with YaYa and Tom before leaving us!

Treasure Box!

So we have a treasure box.  It's full of little dollar-store toys and trinkets, but you would think it had a million bucks in it!  Below is the criteria for getting to choose something from the treasure box

• Be helpful without being asked by mom or dad (does not include regular chores)
• Go out of the way to be loving or kind to each other
• Can not ask for something from the treasure box

On this particular day (a couple of weeks ago because I'm trying to get up-to-date), Anna was especially helpful to me.  Without me asking she helped me put up laundry, put sheets on our bed, and she moved the clothes from the washing machine to the dryer (with the aid of a step-stool!).  After all this, she then asked me if there was anything else she could do to help me.  Why, yes!  I then gave her some wet paper towels and she wiped down the table on the back porch and the school table and chairs. Then she asked, "Anything else, mom?" I almost fainted! After a quick recovery, I gave her more wet paper towels and set her to wiping down the walls and base boards around the school table!

She definitely deserved something from the treasure box after all this!

 Anna is very proud of her new sequined crown!

Anna dressed herself this day and she chose this dress.  When I told her that it was a church dress, not a play dress she said, "I know, mom.  It will be ok."  I can hear her saying it write now in a way that only Anna can say it!

Puzzles, Puzzles, Puzzles!

Aubrey and Anna have always loved putting puzzles together, but not until recently has Alexandra showed an interest in puzzles...and now it's all she wants to do.  It's amazing how a child's confidence boosts when they realize they can do something all by themselves.  Once she realized she could put one of the easier puzzles together by herself, she was determined to do the bigger puzzles by herself.  It may take her a while, but she stays with it!  She will sit there for 30 minutes or more sometimes working on a puzzle.  That doesn't seem like a long time, but in three-year old time, that is no small feat!  Here she is with some of her puzzle accomplishments!

 Then she decided this puzzle was big enough to lay on!

 Well, if she can lay on it, she might as well go ahead and get her pillow and blankie and take a pretend nap!

Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle

We have only read the first chapter of Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle, but I can already tell this book is going to be a favorite with my girls.  How much fun is a little lady who was married to a pirate, lives in an upside down house and bakes sugar cookies for all the children in town?

We haven't started the second chapter titled "The Won't Pick-Up Toys Cure," but I thought we might give Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle's tactics, uh, cures, a try.  We read that Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle pretends that she's a beautiful princess and if she doesn't get the dishes washed and put away, the cruel queen will come and throw her into a dungeon!  Hmmm....my girl's room still needed to be picked up before bed.  I wonder....Yes! 

I promptly told my girls that I thought I heard a cruel queen coming and they should go quickly and pick-up there room!  I also reminded them that the cruel queen would inspect their room thoroughly!  She will look in drawers, she will check beds and she will look at the doll house.  The cruel queen wants everything to be put in the correct place and not just thrown under a bed or on a shelf!

It was working!!!!  They ran to their room and I could hear them feverishly picking up everything and telling each other where things belong.  With some continued prompting from me, such as "I think I hear the queen on the roof" and "I hear her footsteps!  She's almost HERE!" they had it cleaned up in no time!

Now, I have to think of how I could quickly dress up like a cruel queen so I could go inspect there room.  What does a cruel queen wear?  Well, last night she wore a black pea coat with the collar pulled up and a pink pashmina scarf!

The cruel queen stomped into their room and checked their beds, opened drawers, made sure only doll furniture was in the doll house, and made sure their blanket were on their beds while the girls huddled together and pretended to be scared of the cruel queen. The queen told them that they narrowly escaped the dark dungeon, but she would be back and they may not be so fortunate next time! 

They loved it!  The cruel queen had to come back to check teeth after they had been brushed, too!

I can't wait to see what other great things we learn from Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle!

Fall Craft Time!

What is it about fall and spring that gets me in a crafty mood?  Fall (when the weather is actually cool here in Florida) is one of my favorite times of year!  I love getting out the fall decorations adding the warm colors to my home decor.

Fall is not complete with out a pumpkin or two sitting around!  These burlap door hangers seem to be really popular this fall (according to the pins on Pinterest).  It was super easy to make...so easy, that I made quite a few!  As you can tell, this one is not hanging on my door at the moment because we have to also show our team spirit this fall, too!

On our door for the moment is our Red and Black wreath to show our allegiance to the GA Bulldogs, which is a must when you are in Florida and surrounded by much less fashionable colors as orange and blue!

Other projects, which weren't necessarily fallish, but recently completed so they can be included in this post, are our dinner table subway art and our new bulletin board collage wall.  Pardon the bland walls in these pictures.  We are temporarily in a rental home, so we are pretty much stuck with the wall color.

I pinned several different pictures of subway art project similar to this and then used the different sayings from different ones that I liked to make ours.  It's a topic of regular discussion at our dinner table and I love that I can point out a specific written rule in our home instead of coming up with rules on the fly. 

This picture just doesn't do justice for our new bulletin board collage wall, not to mention the lack in photography skills of mine!  I took three old framed prints that we were NEVER going to hang in our home, cut the backs out and then spray painted the frames black.  I then took the old backings and cut a sheet of cork to fit.  From there I wrapped the cork and backing in burlap and slid it into the backs of the frames.

I would be completely embarrassed if anyone ever saw the backs of each board and the not so pretty duck tape holding the backs in the frames!  There is also a blank piece of wood on the wall collage as well.  Since it doesn't really stand out against our bland walls, I plan to paint it black and then add some vinyl lettering to it.  I'm still trying to decide what I want to put on the board, too.  This is where I'm severely lacking in creativity.  I hope I'm not staring at a blank piece of wood for months and months while waiting on the perfect something to come to my brain!


The girls have already picked which boards they each want to display their school work and their masterpieces!  I'll post more pics when this project is completed!

Bible Study Fellowship 2012

Since we were running out the door this morning, I forgot to take a picture of the girls,
so technically this was taken after BSF, but still on the first day!

We started our second year of Bible Study Fellowship (BSF) today!  Not only do I love the biblical knowledge and growth I receive from BSF, but my girls love it, too!  This year we will be going through the book of Genesis. Yes, a whole year (well, school year) dedicated to one book of the bible.  I'm quite certain that I will learn more than I ever could have imagined about the first book of God's word.

A few thought provoking statements and questions from the lecture today:

• Do you expect God to speak to you? 
• What the bible says, God says.  Are you listening?  Are you responding?
• What is the ultimate priority of your life?  What do you spend your physical, financial and emotional resources to build up?  
• What habits to I need to develop or discontinue in order to meet God in His word. 
• Human beings are moral and spiritual failures.  What hope do we have?  

I pray that it will be another great year of study in God's word, that I will experience greater spiritual maturity, that God will reveal Himself to me, that my girl's will grow in their knowledge of God's Word and His promises, and that through the Holy Spirit, I will become a better disciple for my children.

Sweet Sisters

No photo shoot is complete without silly faces!

What's Your Name?

For the past 6 months or so, Alexandra has self-proclaimed herself to be called "baby."  I'm not really sure how this came about, but if I would call her name or something other than baby (such as young lady or miss priss), she would adamantly state, "No! I baby!"  Whenever anyone would ask her what her name was, she would reply, "Baby."  I, of course, thought it was adorable, so I thought I would  encourage her along to say that she was "Mommy's Baby."  So whenever someone asked her, "Who's baby are you?"  Without fail, she would say, "Mommy's Baby!"  I loved it!

I have been extremely hesitant of taking Alexandra's pappy (pacifier) away from her.  I took Aubrey's away at about 19 months or so (before Anna was to be born) and I took Anna's away at 24 months.  I was anxious taking it away from all of them, but even more so Alexandra.  She was extremely fond of her pappy and she slept so well with it.  For naps and at night, all you had to do was lay her down in her crib, she would roll over and go to sleep.   This was like angels singing!!  Heavenly!!!

Since she is now two and a half, I thought I should really consider taking it away.  I was letting her have it mostly because it made life easier and I was dreading the long nights of her trying to get herself to sleep without it.

I spoke to her about giving her pappy to Santa Claus when he came to see us.  At frist she was on board with this, but then Aubrey piped up and said that wasn't a good idea.  Aubrey said that if she didn't have her pappy, then she would cry at night and keep her (Aubrey) awake.  Yes, we need to work on not being so self-centered in our house!

Christmas came and went and we did not leave her pappy out for Santa.  New Year's came and went and we did not take away her pappy (although I did cut, i.e. "break") all of them but one.  So a few days after the new year, I bit the bullet and snipped the one pappy that wasn't "broken."  She was not happy when she found at nap time that her pappy was broken.  She cried the entire nap and never went to sleep.  Oh, boy!  I was thinking that this was not going to be fun.

That night, I gave her a little melatonin to help her get to sleep and she went right down without any problems.  We haven't physically taken the pappy away, but with it being broken, she no longer can get a suction on it, so she just chews on it a little bit just to have it in her mouth.

The next day at naptime, she went right to sleep!  It was incredible.  I couldn't believe it!  It was too good to be true.  That night, she went right to sleep (without the aid of the miracle of melatonin...that's for another post)!

So, this morning when she woke up, she came and snuggled up to me in the bed.  As I was talking to her, she had her blue headband on (yes, I think she slept with it on) and declared she was Cinderella.  I said, "Oh, your name is Cinderella, now?"

"No, my name Alexandra."  What???  I had to get her to say it twice because I couldn't believe it.  I also had to decipher what she was saying because Alexandra is not an easy name for a two-year-old to say.   We jumped up and went and told daddy what her name was!!!

To make it more of a milestone morning, she later went and got her pappy out of her crib and said she was throwing it in the trash.  I was a little more hesitant of this right of passage than she, but she was confident, so she did it!  We all cheered and clapped for her, which she ate up!

I love that she's had these two great milestones, but it's reminding me that my littlest girl is growing up and I really don't have a baby anymore.  :(

And just because I don't think a post is complete without a picture, 

here's one of me and my littlest angel on New Year's eve.