Girls Weekend

I "woke up" this morning at about 8:30 to the delightful sound of my girls quarreling over what show to watch. (Woke up is in quotes because I didn't actually get any sleep last night, but that was the time I realized both girls were up so I should be too).

Rewind a bit to about 11 PM when one of my girls had an accident in the night. Mom gets up and starts some laundry, helps said girl get back to sleep. I can't sleep, though, because I'm home alone (since when do I have trouble sleeping alone?? Oh right, since forever...)

We make it through the epic battle of "SpongeBob vs. Pingu" (both shows equally disliked by me) and start Day 2 of our All Girls Weekend.

It's cool, though. Day 1 started a little rocky as well. I promised Matt I would be home early so he could leave in plenty of time for the airport and I could take Ally to karate. And I even left my 4 o'clock meeting early so I could! But then I forgot that I parked in the other parking lot (after walking to my normal spot) and had to add 10 minutes of walking time to my good intentions. So I was home earlier than usual, but not as early as I had planned.
Not a problem! Ally gets to karate on time, Lily and I have some quality hang time while we watch karate and then we scurry home because it's our night for the babysitting swap. Ally really looks forward to the babysitting swap so it's going to be a good night.

6:15 pm
No kids have arrived. Ally keeps asking when the kids are coming. Mom sends a text to the ladies whose number she has (I'm not sure why I keep switching to third person...like I said, I didn't sleep last night) and finds out they all have other plans. Johnny-on-the-Spot, I coordinate one of the best make-up/tea parties ever held at our house. It was nostalgic having A & L put every barrette we own in my hair (we used to do the same to my Mom while she read us Charlotte's Web. I, however, will be smart enough not to ever let my daughters near me with a curling iron. My mom learned that the hard way).

So now we're back to Day 2 and we have a pretty full agenda today. First, the girls both have their chore money to spend, and A has her heart set on finding a crystal (after learning the crystal she thought she found on the playground was, in fact, salt). I've offered to take them to library and A mentioned last night she wanted her hair cut shorter. We get out the door around 11 and head for World of Variety, where we are able to procure a crystal for A and some loot for L. (I bought yarn, in case you were curious). Then, we are off to the library. OH, and I forgot to mention, today we are going out diaper free. L is wearing big girl panties!
So, after the library, we head to the salon to get A's hair cut. Even though walk-ins are welcome, they have nothing available until 4:40 (it's 12:40 now). We are not deterred! I graciously accept their counter-offer and we head to Epic, first stopping at St. Vincent's thrift shop to see if I can buy a cheap entertainment center to convert into a play kitchen. I don't find anything, but it turns out that St. Vincent's is the best place for a 3 and 6 year old to spend their life savings...you want those bracelets - 60 cents! This barbie? $1.40! They were in Heaven.

After St. Vincent's, we went over to Epic. My girls always say they want to go to Mommy's work and it really is a fun place to just walk around - - for free! Ally really wanted to see the snake - - which is located outside the buildings on the opposite campus, but we had a lot of time to kill, so why not? Everything is connect by tunnels or land bridges, but those connects are sometimes, er, inconvenient with small children. You end up going up and down a lot of stairs or taking the elevators and having girls throw punches to see who gets to press the button this time.

So picture this - - we've probably been walking around for 30 minutes+ and we're just one building away from the giant snake. The only problem is using the indoor route would require another set of stairs. I tell the girls we're just going to hurry outside, it's really not that far. I'm not quite sure what happened next, but I start boldly making my way when I hear a smack and L screaming. I turned around and she is on the ground and her face is covered in blood. I scooped her up and ran back into the building we just came from, into the nearest restroom. I'm panicking wondering if she knocked out a tooth?! (It turned out to be just a nose bleed) and not 5 minutes after this happened, I get a call from Matt checking in on things.

After talking with Daddy, L calms down a bit and we are *finally* arrive at the snake. The girls were champs! Towards the end, we had a couple of requested breaks, as seen here:

And we still had time to eat at McDonald's before A's haircut. And L got her first haircut too! Came home, played with firetrucks and made lists for the fun things we want to do tomorrow. The girls got to Facetime with their daddy before bed AND I was able to talk to the girls about tithing and also "What is the Bible?" during the course of the day while also managing to work in several loads of laundry.

The day ended with Snuggle Requests. What more could you ask for?

Tough

This girl amazes me.

Last Thursday I came home to find out she had fallen on a sewing needle that (I) had left on the ground. She is normally so busy, something was clearly wrong when Lily wouldn't move or put weight on her leg. So, Matt took her to urgent care where X-Ray confirmed that she did indeed have a sliver of needle in her thigh. They didn't have the tools to remove the needle, so they sent her home and told us to take her in to our clinic in the morning.

In the morning, we called the clinic who advised we take her to the ER (thanks, we could have done that the night before). And so our adventure began. The nice resident tried to remove the needle in the ER, but couldn't (really, someone needs to invent a magnetic tool for this type of thing), so we waited for her to come out of sedation in the ER so she could get scheduled for the OR and taken up to have the procedure done there.

Fortunately, the surgeon was amazing, and Lily was even able to come home that night. Saturday and Sunday she spent a lot of down time (and I put up the Christmas tree and decorations to cheer her up). By Monday, she was full speed ahead. I had to remind her multiple time, "Don't jump." "Don't jump off the couch." "Don't jump on Dad." "No you may not go down the stairs by yourself."

But she has a system now and she does everything herself. Except take on and off her right shoe.

Oh Lily

I went to bed at 8 tonight and woke at 11 to the gleeful sound of Lily playing in the bathroom sink (Matt had gone to play basketball). After putting her back in bed, I soon discovered that her escapades extended beyond the upstairs bathroom. Downstairs I found all the lights on and the TV playing Dora. She had found and eaten half a box of ice cream sandwiches, and there was a half-eaten ice cream sandwich smushed in the carpet in the family room. She found, dumped out, and played in a box of graham cracker crumbs.

When Matt got home, I said, "Good call on putting the latch on the front door. She could have escaped." To which he responded, "I didn't." So, I guess Lily took the initiative to safely lock herself in the house. (Scary).
We also then went looking for Jimmer to make sure he was still alive and well. Lily had let herself into the garage, got out the outside toys, and graffiti-ed the floor and walls with colored chalk, we found another half-eaten ice cream sandwich on the garage floor.

That girl.

How to Tell When Your Kids Are Up to No Good

A Bug's Life

We celebrated the girls' birthday with a Bug Party!

There was a Build-A-Bug Station with Bug/Critter Face Painting:

(Lily wanted hers washed off RIGHT AWAY):

And a Dig-For-Bugs Station:

A Beehive Cake (complete with nice bees):

And after a quick costume change:

Grandma and Grandpa spoiled the girls:

Even Uncle Matthew came to help us celebrate:

What a fun birthday celebration!!

Nice Bees

Yesterday I was getting Ally's backpack ready for school and I noticed an sandwich bag filled with little flowers. It made me smile - that girl is always collecting bugs and flowers - so I took it over to where she was eating her snack and said, "Did you pick these at recess?" She grinned. "They're for the bees." "The bees?" To which Matt chimed in, "Yeah, she put bees in her backpack!" "Ally! You have to be careful the bees will sting you." "Mom, these are nice bees."

Apparently she's been collecting these little bees - she had four of them in her backpack, even better she had one in her pocket in class and the teacher made her go put it in her backpack (I wonder if she didn't realize it wasn't alive/real). On the way home from school, she let one out while Matt was driving, he said something to the effect of "there's a bee in the car!" and she said, "there's three more in here!" That crazy kid had managed to collect four live bees without getting stuck. As Lacey said, she's apparently the Bee Whisperer.

Just a Relaxing Day on the Lake