I LOVE these faces!

Busted!

When I was home sick on Tuesday I was in and out of the bathroom.  One of those times I cam out to find the family room was very quiet.  I wasn't sure where the girls had gone so I just stood there for a second.  Then, I saw Hannah's little foot stick out from behind the chair and heard a familiar giggle.  I knew they had to be up to something so I turned the camera on my phone and began to tip toe over there.  On my way I heard Aly whisper to Hannah, "Shhh!"  This is what I found...

Hannah had gotten into the pantry and got a bowl of candy.  Both of them were frantically eating as much as they could before they got caught. Caught. Red. Handed.  

Note To Self:  Candy goes up one shelf higher!

Pre-School Halloween Party

Yesterday was Alyssa's schools party and costume parade.  Since they do it at the beginning of the day, I wasn't able to go :( But I gave my mom my camera to get some pictures.  Despite her lack of confidence in taking pictures, they turned out pretty good!

Here is Hannah waiting to see all the kids dressed up...it was still really cold outside!!

Here is her class all dressed up!

Showing off their costumes in the parade...

"Ok, enough of this...I am cold!"

Waving to her fans!

 

Hugging her sister.  There where like 10 pictures like this...she LOVES to have Hannah around her at things like this and show off that Hannah is her little sister!!

Aly was so sweet after school.  She said she could wait to get home and show Hannah all the stuff she got in her goodie bag from the party.  I asked her if she was going to share and she said, "Oh yeah, definitely!  Hannah is going to love this stuff!!"  When we got to Grandma's, she gave Hannah one of her suckers and her sheet of stickers.  She was right, Hannah did love it!

Next year, Aly will be in Kindergarten and Hannah will be the one having the pre-school Halloween party...crazy!

Trick or Frostbite

It was way too stinkin' cold to be trick or treating last night!!  It was 39* with windchill...and the wind was brutal!!  Figures.  It was in the 70's earlier this week.  The girls still had fun getting candy, but trick or treat isn't as fun when you have to cover up your costume in winter coats, hats and gloves!!  We thought we had been out for most of the two hours, but when we got back we realized we were only gone about 45 minutes!!  The girls passed out candy for a little while, but it was so cold we hardly had any customers!  Regardless, the girls were beautiful in the princess dresses!!  And, there is always next year :)

Here are some pictures...before the winter gear went on!

 

The girls with their BFF, Sleeping Beauty!

Daddy needs some serious dental work...maybe Aunt Emily can help with that one!

Waiting to pass out candy while enjoying a treat...or two ;)  Look at how red their noses are!!

D-O-W-N

The FREE swing set is now DOWN :(  

I stayed home on Tuesday this week because I wasn't feeling well.  Good thing I did because we had a thunder storm and tornado warnings all day!  I would have freaked out if I was at school and the girls weren't with me!  Anyway, we spent a good portion of the afternoon in the basement on the futon.  The girls thought it was actually pretty fun.

 When the warnings were over we went back up.  For the most part, we didn't get the weather like they were saying we would, but then I looked out back and saw this...

I guess the winds were worse than I thought.  The girls pulled chairs up to the sliding glass door and sat there staring at it for at least 10 minutes.  They just took turns saying, "I just can't believe it..." over and over!  Dan is going to try to fix it, but I don't know if it can be fixed.   At least swing set season is over.

Pumpkin Art

Alyssa really got into the pumpkins this year.  It is the one time of year where Aly throws caution to the wind and enjoys getting messy!  They were so cut talking to us while the gutted the pumpkins and talked about cooking the seeds.  Hannah had a lot of fun too, but she lost interest pretty quickly and watched Angelina while we finished up.

 Look Mom!  Pumpkin guts!

 She kept showing me how dirty her hands were...I think she was trying to convince herself it was ok...

Hannah had to show me hers to after Aly did...except there was nothing on them because she wouldn't touch the gooey stuff!  She had to be just like Aly though...

Proud of the final product!

Pumpkins aglow!

Pumpkinfest and the Great Pumpkin Fun Center

Our favorite Fall tradition, Pigeon Roost, did not disappoint this year! We went with Grandma and Grandpa 'Aidan', Aidan, Grandma and Brittney.  It was a beautiful day and there is so much to do there that the girls could play for hours!!  The corn box is Aly's absolute favorite thing to do - she would not rest...or do anything else...until she got to feel the corn  between her fingers.  Here she is in all her glory with Aidan and Hannah!

Feeding the goat LILYgoat!  Tell me that doesn't look like Lily...

Tunnel Slides...Racer slides....

 After playing in the fun center, we picked out our pumpkins.  It didn't take very long this year.  Hannah found hers immediately and Aly didn't take long either! She is so strong and independent!

Chillin' with Frankenstein...

 

 Cousins

Family

I LOVE Fall!!

CREEPside

Creekside is always one of our favorite places to go and it is seriously so beautiful this time of year.  Earlier in the month we went to the annual CREEPside festival and the girls had a blast!  It was insanely busy (around 6,000 people), so we didn't stay long but they had a blast anyway!  I love Gahanna and how much there is to do around here with families!!

She has the princess walk down!  Check out how she is holding up her dress...because "that is what the princesses do"!

  There as a little inflatable haunted house set up (with NOTHING inside)...Aly peeked in.  Check out the sheer horror on her face.  Neither one of them would go through it...

Two Belle's are better than one!

 They had a bunch of funny little tombstones set up by the creek...this was our favorite!

Allergy Induced Asthma

It has been a while since I blogged, I know.  This month has been ridiculously busy for us, but I plan to catch up on some posts throughout this week :)  I seriously can NOT believe October is almost over!  Where has the month gone?!?!

Anyway, last month we took Alyssa back to the allergist.  After months of being on antihistamines, her allergies and eczema were not getting any better.  In fact, they seemed to be getting worse and she was coughing constantly.  So I called and they asked to see her  in the office because she had 'all the classic signs of asthma'.  Great.  We went in and the doctor checked her out and couldn't believe how bad she was scratching on the medications!  So bad that she was making herself bleed in some places.  After listening to her lungs for a a second she said it was easy to diagnose her with asthma, induced by allergies.  She wouldn't need an inhaler, but did need daily maintenance medications to help her sleep and breathe during the day.  And, she said we should move up starting the immunotherapy to this December.   With shots, starting this young, Aly has a good chance of outgrowing the asthma and maybe even the allergies all together.  So, how exactly do you prepare a 4 year old for weekly shots for the next 9 months...and once a month after that for the following year or so???       

In the mean time, Aly is taking 5 medicines everyday...and we still don't see much of a change.  It stinks.  She is not sleeping well and I think the medicine is starting to affect her in others ways too.  Dan and I have started to take her forward at church for prayer.  Sometimes we feel trivial getting prayer for her allergies when there are people who are suffering from much worse.  But then we are reminded that Jesus is a mighty, all powerful God who cares for us and all that concerns us.  He wants to walk through life with us: good and bad; big or small.  We believe Jesus can heal and are praying He heals her from all this junk!  It is hard to see your child miserable and not able to help them.  Although, I am very thankful it is not something that is life threatening.  It could be so. much. worse.  My heart truly goes out to families who have terminally ill children...that is something I pray we never have to experience.  For right now, we are just trying to figure out how to proceed.  I hate allergies.

Class Picture

Last year she didn't even crack a smile, so I told her she had to smile really pretty for her picture this year.  She listened.  Absolutely adorable!

When I grow up...

The girls had to be with me at parent/teacher conferences last week because Dan had class.  I didn't have any conferences scheduled so it wasn't a big deal and they love coming to my school.  At one point, I was talking to a co-worker of mine and she was asking the girls if they were having fun in 'mommy's classroom'.  They said yes, so she asked them if they wanted to be a teacher like me when they grow up.  Alyssa said 'yes', without hesitation.  Hannah thought for a second and then said, "No...I gonna be a princess!"

And, the week before I told Dan I thought she was going to be a lawyer because she likes to argue with everything.  She overheard me say that and yelled from the other room, "No I not a lawyer!  I'm a princess!" 

I think these Disney movies may be going to her head...

Goin' to Miami...of Ohio

Last Saturday we went to visit Aunt Brittney at Miami for Family Day and the girls had a blast!   When we got there it was lunch time so Brittney took us to the dining hall right by her dorm.  It was a  food court/buffet style, where you could pick your own food and eat as much as you want.  The food wasn't the greatest, but Aly absolutely loved the concept.  She told me three or four times, "This place is so cool!" And, Hannah got to eat 'matoes' until her little heart was content!  After that, we went on an adventure to Wal-Mart since there was nothing else to do in the rain and then went back to her dorm to hang out for a little while.  Even though day was kind of gloomy and rained most of the time, but we got these shots in before it really started to come down.

 

 

 

 

 

They needed a nap...but there was no sleeping going on.  They took over her bed, watched a movie and raided Britt's snacks instead...

If you noticed in the picture above, there was something missing in the photo collage above her bed...us!  So, we brought a little something a put it right on her dresser - where she couldn't miss it ;)

We are proud of you Britt! Keep up the good work!!