If You Are Going To Be Dressed Alike, I Might as Well Bust Out the Camera

Taking pictures of the two girls is pretty much my idea of a {not so} rockin' good time.  In fact, I would describe it as torturous.  And from the looks of the pictures I've taken of the two of them together, it is torturous for my girls as well.  At each session, I swear I take no less than 50 pictures.  I am lucky to get ONE decent picture of both of them together.  And, by decent, I mean like barely a passing grade in the class.  One of these days, I'm going to post some outtakes.  {I know y'all are saying to yourselves, you mean these aren't the outtakes?!}

Okay, so maybe I didn't get any good ones of them together this day.

New Year's Day...at least they are looking in the same direction.

I sent these out as thank you cards for Christmas gifts.  94 tries.  Ninety-four.

And, this was the second picture I took. Go figure.

They are SERIOUS about those Hoosiers.

Would it kill them to SMILE?

At least they are making the same facial expressions in these.

They are tight-lipped about something.

I promise - these aren't the outtakes.

So, yeah, solo pictures are pretty much where it's at.

Oh heavens.  This girl brings me so much JOY!

Thanks, Beth, for the sweet little hat.  

Clearly I need some work in my photog skills as well.  Her hair looks red in these pictures and it is SUPER blonde.  Not to mention, you'd think I'd be able to do something about the drool.  

As my dad would say, What it is, what it is.

Happy Tuesday!

The Luckiest of Birthdays

Well, Baby Girl, we've got one more month until you are three.  How is that even possible?  I mean, you will really be a full blown toddler at the point.  Oh the joys that could bring.


You sure do bring us lots of joy these days.  As I was saying to your daddy tonight when he told me about all the extra hugs and kisses you gave him before bedtime, When you are sweet, you are the absolute sweetest.  {And, you've got extra special skills in the stinker department sometimes too.  But, at the end of the day, I still love you more than I ever thought possible.}

Here are some of your latest gems:

+ Today, you turned the tv screen off, but the sound was still on coming from the receiver and so you said, Daddy, can you turn the tv's mouth off?  Oh, so cute.

+ We made green cupcakes yesterday for St. Patrick's Day and you could not get enough of the batter or the cupcakes.  I finally told you that enough was enough and you seemed to understand that.  Except when you took some over to Uncle Hank and Aunt Patty's and ended up eating one of theirs.  Apparently your nana asked you for a bite and, not wanting to give her one, you quickly said, Hey Nana, look at that bird outside and then shoved the rest of the cupcake in your mouth.  You sure are quick.

+ We have started you in two more classes - a gymnastics class and a dance class.  Your dad takes you to gymnastics and I take you to dance.  We both had similar experiences on our first classes with you - you basically just wanted to run around like a crazy child trying to embarrass us.  Thankfully, you got your mind right after that and have done a pretty good job of listening to the teacher.  You sure do love being on stage though.

+  The other night after dinner, you got up on your own, grabbed your favorite stool {which you love to use to get you to all the places you shouldn't be} and started doing the dishes.  Girl, keep on keepin' on!

+  Yesterday I pulled out our holiday tub of clothes to find something green for you to wear to gymnastics this morning.  The only thing I could find was your outfit from your first St. Patrick's Day...and it was a size 12 months.  That didn't stop you from wearing both of them last night and the leggings today.  The top I had you wear today was a size 24 months, so I guess when you add them both together, we are sort of on track.  I wanted to get some pictures of you in your outfit, but had to bribe you with a green cupcake.  It was more fun taking pictures of you eating that cupcake.

Such a grown up little girl!

{You were watching the Hoosiers on their way to the Sweet Sixteen}

+  Surprisingly you weren't bouncing off the walls too much - but you did want to show me how you walk the wall in gymnastics.

+  And, here you are two years ago wearing those little pants...even though they are barely visible in the pictures.  This was YOU two years ago.  Can you believe it?  I barely can.

We love you SO very much.

Happy 35 months.

Sydneygrams {and a few Oliviagrams too}

If you follow me on instagram {joyfulgirl77} then you've probably already seen these.  But, man, they are just too cute not to post up here.

Have I mentioned how much I love this baby?

And, I guess you could say that I love this little toddler too.

Cake pop time.

Oh how she wishes that toy was a cake pop.

{Thanks, Jill, for the sweater pants.  They are the cutest.}

These swimsuits got me on a Liberty of London kick. {So, I have been scouring ebay like a mad mama.}   I'd purchased both of these for Olivia and I'm so glad she now has a little sister to share them with.

Baby booties.

Fishing while Olivia swims.

Oh my...

Can you see how sweet she is?

Because if you can't, let me tell you - She is the absolute sweetest thing.

Hands down.  No question about it.

And I just can't get enough of her.

Her face!

Olivia taught herself this new trick. She is getting pretty skilled in the pool.

My sleepy baby...who {knock on wood} has been sleeping through the night, in her own crib.

Cheering on the Hoosiers!

Olivia's little toes - she took this picture herself.

Happy Friday!

Sydney is Famous

As some of you may remember, Sydney and I filmed a commercial for French Hospital less than 12 hours after she was born.  I have wanted to blog about this for the last 6+ months, but didn't want to elaborate much more than I did here without having the actual commercial to share with you.  We finally got a link to the commercial a few weeks ago and I'm thrilled to be able to show you some of the "behind the scenes" pictures from that afternoon.

Like I said earlier, they were in need of a mom and new baby for the closing scene of the commercial and after lots of persuading from our nurse, I finally agreed.  Sydney was a true angel that afternoon and slept the entire time.  My goodness, she must have just loved being all snuggled up in the receiving blanket AND the crochet blanket that the producer wanted to use. {He didn't like the way the hospital receiving blanket looked on camera.  I would have loved to use one of our sweet blankets, but I was just an actress, not a stylist.  Even though I'm the one who suggested I wear my nice nightgown and robe instead of the hospital gown.  Some things just need a woman's touch.}  Anyway...as I was saying, Sydney was just as sweet and precious as could be through the entire 2+ hours we spent shooting the SAME TAKE over and over again.  All for a 3 second shot.  Ha ha.

We are still awaiting some pictures and outtakes that they took from that day, but it took us almost 6 months just to see the commercial, so I'm not holding my breath that we'll get those anytime soon.  These were taken by one of the assistants with my camera.

Of course someone tried to steal the show.

So, without further ado, here is Sydney's debut!

(Oh, this commercial aired locally and we got messages from so many of our friends in California telling us that they saw us on tv!  So exciting.  AND, seeing this really makes me miss the beauty of the Central Coast!)

Or click here.

You Might Want to Sit Down for This

Yikes.  I sort of took an {unintentional} blogging break  last week!  My brother was in town for my dad's birthday {and then his birthday too} and even though we didn't really go anywhere, the days were full of activity.

I realized last night as I loaded pictures onto my computer that there were things from a couple weeks ago that I hadn't put up here.  So, I'm going to try to do a quick little "catch all" post here while both my girls are snoozing peacefully.  {Please don't jinx it, please don't jinx it.}

+  A few weekends ago, David and I took the girls {along with my parents} to Papago Park for a little hike that turned into a bigger hike than my mom would have liked.  It was a gorgeous day and that little Olivia is so in love with hiking.  She is fearless and it continues to scare the crap out of me, but I love that she enjoys being active and being outdoors.

I took this picture for my friend Doug.  I just knew he would love the landscape.  

My little hiking partner.  I'm really going to miss this stage.  The one where she just sleeps on my chest while tucked away in the Ergo.  Father Time, slow down a bit please.

+  We went on a few adventures while Ryan was here.  The first of which was a trip to GolfLand.  This must be a place that all guys want to go to because when David first saw it off the interstate, he was all, WAIT!  What is that place?  I want to go there...NOW!  And, so I got him a gift card as one of our 12 dates of the year.  Anyway, last weekend we were trying to figure out where to go, if we wanted to go on a hike or find a playground, when my brother suggested GolfLand.  We left Mom at home and ventured out!  It was SO.MUCH.FUN.  We did a round of putt-putt where I think Ryan was the only one to keep score.  Olivia had a blast putting all of our golf balls in the holes.  There was a little jungle gym for her to climb in and the guys took her to play laser tag {not her favorite thing}.  While I fed the girls, the boys did bumper boats and they finished the evening with a trip around the race track.  I'm excited to go back for our date night in the next couple of months!

Sydney's onesie says I'm told I like golf.

David never did make it around Dad.

He may have won Putt-Putt, but he definitely did not win on the track.

Watching the boys race.

And a passed out baby on the way home.

+  One of the things that has been on my brother's Arizona bucket list is to eat at Pizzeria Bianco. Apparently Oprah and Gayle King claim that it's the best pizza ever.  I have also had a couple Hoosier friends boast of its awesomeness.  I guess it is super hard to get into because there is always a huge line and the place is super tiny inside, but my dad made reservations for us while my brother was in town, so we were all excited to go.  The place is SUPER cute - exposed brick, wood burning oven, eight tables max - but the pizza was definitely not the best.  It is a super thin crust, which for this carb lover is not my favorite type, and mine was a little on the charred side.  There just wasn't anything that made it really special.  The salad was good, but if I had to pay $16 AND wait 3+ hours for my burnt pizza, I wouldn't have been super happy.  Fortunately, I had some cute tablemates.

Don't believe the hype!

+  No trip of Uncle Rhino's is complete without a zoo day, so we headed out on Friday for a little animal adventure.  I'm sure I blogged about it somewhere, but the last time we were there with Ryan, we tried to get Olivia to go on the camel ride.  She and Poppy waited in line and the second they tried to put her on the camel she FREAKED out.  When she told her Uncle Rhino what happened, she said that she had cried the camel.  And, that phrase stuck.  Anytime she cried about anything {and trust me, that happens a lot around here}, it was Olivia cried the YadaYada.  Well, this time around, Olivia didn't cry the camel!  She actually got on and took that thing for a spin.  And, she loved it.

Woot Woot!

Little Miss Sydney eating her oatmeal under the big top.  

Side note:  Dear Target Dollar Bin bib, I see why you were just a dollar.

Olivia has been on a Dumbo kick lately {she especially loves the part where the stork brings the little animal babies to their mommies} and we were amazed to see an actual stork at the zoo!

Why yes, her outfit is a little cray-cray.

+  And, since we apparently didn't get our fill of animals on Friday, we headed off to the Ostrich Festival on Saturday for some good old-fashioned carnival fun.  My parents had told us about the Ostrich Festival before, but somehow I expected it to be more, I don't know, ostrichy.  It was basically like a huge carnival/fair.  There were some ostriches that we were able to see and they did have an ostrich race where people actually rode the ostriches, but that was about it.  Oh yeah, you could also buy ostrich burgers, but we've been there, done that.  

My brother took the two pictures above.  He's got mad skills.

Of course, she HAD to ride the pony while we were there.  And, wouldn't you know it, there were camel rides too.  

We kept trying to get her to put her arm up and do the cowgirl pose, but every time she passed by us she would say, There's no time for that.  We were cracking up trying to figure out what she meant.  I literally laughed out loud last night looking at these pictures remembering her saying that and asked her today what she meant.  She told me that the man who put her on the pony told her to hold on with both hands, so she wasn't able to put the other one up.  Glad she listens to somebody.

Thank God, an ostrich.

This little McMuffin was as good as gold the entire time.  After her nap in the Ergo, she was ready to see what the Ostrich Fest had to offer and squealed with delight at everything she saw.  Love her to pieces.  I swear this girl keeps me sane.

+  And, if you could tell from the pictures above, I dressed my girls in coordinating overalls.  LawdHaveMercy, it doesn't get much better than that in my book.  Oh wait, if they would both look at the camera at the same time and actually smile, it really would.  

More of these pictures to come.  

Mama needs a nap herself.

Thanks for sticking with me...

Happy Monday!