A Nightly Ritual

Every night since Riley was one year old, Cory has been reading stories to her before bed. The nightly ritual is one of Riley's favorite times of day. Ry gets to pick the books (five per night, except on Saturdays, which is ten book night)and no one else is allowed in the room when they read together. Many times I have tried to join the two of them only to banished with a sharp point of Ry's finger. After four years I have gotten the message and I don't even bother to try to be included anymore. Aren't they cute together?


- February, 2009


- November, 2007


- May, 2006


- October, 2005


- October, 2004

It was a balmy 49 degrees...

so off to the park we went! It has been a LONG time since the kids had been to the park, and they were both more than ready to hit the playground. Bailey's little chubby legs started kicking in excitement as soon as she saw the swings, and Riley couldn't wait to get to the slides (which weren't wet for the first time all winter!). The stinkin' wind kicked up as soon as we headed outside, so we didn't stay as long as the girls would have liked to, but it sure was nice to get outside! Just look at these happy faces!

What do you think??

I took this picture of Bailey in the bathtub this morning...after looking at it I remembered a similar one I took of Riley when she was about the same age...though their coloring is different, I think you can tell they are sisters! What do you think?

Bailey is 1!

Bailey turned one on Monday the 2nd. We can't believe how fast the year has gone by! We celebrated her birthday with a party on Sunday afternoon (it is Cory's busy time at work and he had to work really late on her birthday, so it worked out best this way...plus she didn't know the difference!). Riley was in charge of the party and decided to have white streamers with pink balloons. She also thought Bailey would like cupcakes with white frosting and pink sprinkles, so that is what we had. After dinner and opening presents, we lit up Bailey's cupcake and sang "Happy Birthday"...the poor baby completely freaked out. She was crying and so unsure about what was going on that her whole body was shaking. Poor kid. She recovered quickly once the singing was over, though, and was able to enjoy her cupcake.


Riley and Bailey before opening presents.


Poor Baby Bayz...not looking too happy here. Who knew cupcakes and candles were so scary??


Bailey, happy again, eating her cupcake.


Opening presents.

Feeling Lucky??

Feeling Lucky??

My friend had this posted on her blog and it sounded fun (although I have no idea yet what I am doing but I thought I would be a good sport and try this)!!:)

The first five people to respond to this post will get something made by me! My choice. For you. This offer does have some restrictions and limitations:

1. I make no guarantees that you will like what I make!

2. What I create will be just for you.

3. It'll be done this year. (sooner than later because I hate putting things off)

4. You have no clue what it's going to be. Who knows? Not you, that's for sure!

5. I reserve the right to do something extremely strange (but don't expect my gift to be too strange because I am not good at coming up with strange things:).

The catch? Oh, the catch is that you must repost this on your blog and offer the same to the first 5 people who do the same on your blog. The first 5 people to do so and leave a comment telling me they did win a FAB-U-LOUS homemade gift by me! *Oh, and be sure to post a picture of what you win when you get it!*

Jumpin Jacks

Today we decided to go and check out Jumpin' Jacks, which is a center with several bouncy houses for kids to go and play on. Riley and Brody, along with her friends Carlie and Cayden, had a great time at "one of the best places in the world" (that is according to Riley). Jumpin' Jacks got thumbs up from all four kids, and is somewhere we will definitely go again!

Food Storage

We have taken a bigger interest in food storage over the last several months. In fact, we (my sisters and parents) recently bought a dry pack canner to use here at the house. Yesterday was the first day we broke it out of the box and put it to use. We canned rice, salt, spaghetti noodles, and pinto beans. We had a lot of helpers (from the kids who put the spaghetti in the cans and the Moms of the kids who supervised, to Mimi who was in charge of the babies, to Dave and Papa who ran the canner). It was fun and it always feels good to see new cans of food on the storage shelves (or in our case, the storage unit!).