LeaAnn Claire's 2nd birthday party

Saturday, 3/2/13

Wow!!! Where does the time go?? Our baby-girl (a.k.a. Big Girl) is TWO!!! Doesn't seem possible... and it's been a bitter-sweet time. We (I) have been waiting to be done with diapers, waiting to be done with the 'baby' stage... but then it became a concrete realization... there will be no more babies arriving in our home. Kinda sad when you think about it from that stand point. However, we are not going backwards, we are completely done, and I am happy to think that our life will move on from here... on to ball-games, running like crazy from all of their events and family vacations (!) you know... Disney World or something like that ;) we can finally say, "yes, we'll be able to go in 3-years" 

Here we are at our last 2-year-birthday-party... a Minnie Mouse theme and room to run around for the girl who likes nothing but to do 'whatever her big-sisters are doing!' :D Literally, she likes books & her sisters peeps :) (occasionally dad too ;)

Had all of her favorite food groups, chips/cheetos, spin-art-dip, fruit & cake ;)

Adore this picture of Miss Lindsay Lou :)

How cute is the cake & cake-pops! Thanks to 6th Street Tasty Treats (in Winthrop! :)

There is that side-pony-tail group of girls again :)

thanks to Grammy for bringing the balloons!

Here's the birthday girl!! :D Love this picture of her & cousin, Emma :)

Like her hair?? I think it's so cute on her! Just wish she'd leave it in ;)

Still a blankie-addict ;)

The t-shirt(s) (all the girls have one) are from Mimi :) and are incredibly perfect!! Pink sparkle skirt and leggings were Lydia birthday presents :) and the pink sparkle shoes are all her own from God-parents, Kris & Craig at Christmas :)

"I do it!!" is her tag line. ALWAYS.

How cool is that!?  Laynee could stay in it and roll herself.. very cool :D

Grammy playing with the birthday girl...

how adorable is Ms. Emma's smile?? :)

Love this giggle...

family pic with our last 2-yr-old ;)

family pic from LAST year... Mom managed to wear a new t-shirt... Dad... not so much ;) we really need to go shopping!!

LeaAnn Claire at two...

at One... same kid, less hair ;)

Love this picture of Carson :)

cake time!  of course we found matches in a drawer after the fact ;)

She was soo funny opening up presents

Here she is opening up her Furby... she saw what it was, picked up the present and RAN. And never looked back... hilarious. Just wished I would have gotten it on video :)

Here she is with her Furby, all the way on the other side of the gym :)

She examined all of her books :)

1 & 4

Slight resembalance would you agree??

two years earlier :) 

She really got in to opening up her presents 'all by herself'...

And she ended up trying on all her skirts too :) Overall, I would say this birthday girl was super happy with her big celebration.

Friday night lights

Friday, 3/1/13 (only three weeks behind... but who's counting??? ;)

Mimi, Aunt Ashley, Uncle Donnie, Elle & Carson arrived in Iowa!!! :D A jammed packed weekend was planned that started with going to Cedar Rapids to watch cousin, Billy Back, coach his team, Texas Revolution against the Cedar Rapids Titans. Professional-indoor-8-person-football-league :) Billy was super sweet and offered us tickets for whomever would be there to cheer him on. Kress', Hogan's, Peck's, Short's and our family clan were all there :D 

We met at Carlos O'Kelly's for a mexi supper first... how cah-ute is this?!

Elle, Lauren, Laynee, Lindsay & Kreighton

Lydia & Mimi... Lydia new how to maximize her time ;)

At the stadium! This was a little while into the game... Carson, Elle, Lauren & Lindsay

everyone joined in...

super cute picture of Carson :)

Like the side-pony-tails? Elle introduced the girls to them... and instant hit :)

Billy spotted us and made his way over and talked to Carson :) very sweet of him...

At the game - Kreighton, Laynee & Lindsay

Overall, super fun and it was packed!!! Quite the following :) Texas Revolution did not win but Billy did a great job... very cool to see him in action, and hope that we can do it again!

UNI Cheer/dance

2/16/13 (painful to write how long ago this was... and that I'm just NOW getting around to blogging about it)

Drum roll please.... I got a new phone! Not just a new phone, a SMART-phone :D  Honestly, I sometimes still feel pretty silly... it's not necessary. But it is really nice to have! And it's a CAMERA! I am still (after 4-weeks of using it) having a hard time remembering that I can use it as a camera. (it takes good pics too! ;)

The girls begged to sign-up for this Girl Scout Cheer/Dance activity at UNI... so we let them :) Here they are using my new phone as a camera.

Chris brought the little girls to UNI later in the day after the big girls had already learned the cheer & dance.

waiting patiently to begin... Peyton Youngblut is an active Girl Scout and she was signed up too!

Patient Lydia... :) always wanting to be a big girl ;)

They did a great job!

Very cute cheer & dance

Like Lindsay's look :) I love it.  After I was taking pictures with my phone though, I was wishing for my big camera so I could have zoomed.

All about the convenience... b/c it was convenient!

Here is the video I got of it... using my new phone/video-camera/camera!!! ;)

Back in the stands... the Panther came to visit :) probably to scold LeaAnn for wearing her ISU outfit :D hilarious...

she loved him...

Excited dad... he can't wait to leave as he was headed the annual 'Sean Baragary card tournament' ;)

mass chaos

Sunday, 2/17/13
LeaAnn 23-1/2mo (we're trying to potty-train???), Lydia 3-3mo, Lindsay 6-1/2, Lauren 7-10mo

This video speaks for itself... I just showed it to Chris and we both laughed out loud ... again :)  Just a typical Sunday night....

And I threw this in there just b/c I know Mimi likes them :)  We were trying to get LeaAnn to say "Warn" but she wouldn't 'on-que' of course. Her words are just  coming on fast & furious and they are adorable. Mys,  favorites are, "orange, boots, green, balloon, moo" I'm going to have to start writing them down ;)

valentine's day

Thursday, 2/14/13

Valentine's Day in Lindsay's Kindergarten classroom :)  I was 'party-chair' as I was for Lauren when she was in Kindergarten...only I was big-preggo with LeaAnn at the time! Much easier to move around this time ;) And I took no pictures before school (I know...)  sorry Mimi.  Here's what I got.

Look how little Lauren was!!!  Oh my gosh... unbelievable... oh yes, this is Lauren at her Kindergarten Valentine party :)

Fell in love with this one :) She is my daughter! ;)

Lydia goes to school...

Wednesday, 2/13/13

Lydia was invited by our go-to-babysitter, Ashley Benton who is a junior at East Buchanan, to attend 'Little Buc Day' ...I said, "sure... what is it?" :)  It's an ALL-DAY venture for 3-6-yr-olds.... (yup, all-day) to attend school with the high-schooler who is taking the child-psychology class. I was shocked and kept telling her that if she needed me to come and get Lydia mid-day I would do so :)  BUT, she did great... I guess she dozed off around 1:30 but she stayed the whole day like a champ. AND, the kicker... she got to ride the bus home. :D  I Ok'd it with the principal (it's a 15-min bus ride) as long as Lauren & Lindsay agreed to look out for her.... done.

So of course I got no pictures of her before she left. It was pretty much mass chaos. The night before we packed her bag and I asked her, what do you want to wear? And she said matter-of-factly... "my Grandma-Alice dress" :)  melt. my. heart.

What I DID take pictures of was Ms. Wiam who wanted to know where "Wyia" was ALL day.  

And finally we saw it... the bus coming over the hill. So here is LeaAnn. Short but sweet :)

She got so excited... it was adorable.

However, I couldn't take film and get pictures at the same time... so I failed to get her coming off the bus. She was SO MAD at me!  It was hysterical. I guess she was mad to get ON the bus b/c she didn't want to leave school... and then she was MAD at the school bus b/c she didn't want the bus ride to end or to get off. :)  Oh what are we going to do with this 'little-big' girl... as she always has been.  Obviously not taking a nap, and being at daycare the previous 2-days, did not help anything.. but here she is sulking off ;)

And my futile attempt at getting a group shot.

I do wish there was a sheet that came home with her that told me what she did all day... according to Ashley she did great... I'm pretty sure pre-school will be a hit next year ;)

in preparation for Valentine's day...

Friday, 2/8/13

We started with coloring .... the big girls were working on writing all of their Valentine's out to their classmates, so Lydia & LeaAnn did not want to be left out :)

Still... the only thing she will really 'play' with is books and colors... much like her oldest sister, Warn ;)

On Saturday, 2/9/13 - Grandpa surprised us with a lasagna dinner!  He came not only with dinner, but bearing gifts for everyone :)  Grammy was in Iowa City watching the Raefield clan while Aunt Jill & Uncle Eric were on their 10-yr-anniversary trip to Mexico!

Wish I would have taken a picture of the individual cakes... they were decorated (by Papa) using chocolate chips and licorice to make it look like a smiley face on top of the icing :)  They were delicious.. I am such a sucker for cream-cheese frosting.

And there were four of course :)

Beer for dad :D  how cute is that??

and wine for mom ;)  but after one glass I said, "sorry Jim, your daughter-in-law prefers Dad's present' ;) maybe someday....

Then on Sunday, 2/10/13... we attempted to be able to walk through the downstairs... which started with cleaning the dining room so we'd have somewhere to eat... this is what 'cleaning' looks like ;)

Always a big helper :)

Sunday I also tried a recipe... a REAL one :D  complete with 'presentation' and all!  (so of course I had to take a picture of it ;)  Stole from Iowa Girl Eats, click here for the deets... is was awesome!  avocado-mozzarella-and-bruschetta-chicken

Then that night... all four of them on the couch... a huge rarity.  Notice 'big-girl'.... not paying attention to the show ;)

four clean kids in a clean living room... too bad the rest of the house wasn't that way!!! ;)

Oh yes, and Dr. Dad had to fix up the monkey... Lydia tore off both his arms!! ;)  (freebie from Children's Place the year before)  Whew! Big weekend... I think we're ready for the big V-day!