Mills & Syd

Mills & Syd

Friday, October 2, 2015

Currently

Wayyyy back before Labor Day, we met Coco and the boys at Natural Falls for a hike and picnic.  It was so fun!  Loved meeting in the middle to hang out for a few hours.  Won't be long before Dan is off to college, so we'll take what time we can get!  Look how cute they're being here and our girls refused to cooperate (and JKK too).
We love picnics!  And cheetos.
It was extremely humid that day.  Check out Syd's curls...
No caption needed for this pic.  Video: Millie strums to He's Got the Whole World in His Hands
Millie got all the X's on her pooping in the potty chart!

Off to Jump Zone to celebrate.  She was proud!
Random picture of Millie's "snuggly things".  She took this pic.  She adds to the pile of things she sleeps with weekly, so I try to sneak some things out of the house every once in a while.  She's having a hard time coming to terms with pink dolphin leaving her posse, even though I explained other kids around the world need toys too and we gave pink dolphin to one of them.
Labor Day weekend, we drove to Mimi and Papa's in Tulsa to pick up Nana and bring her home!  Look at Mills explaining something to Pa. ;)
We've really enjoyed having Nana here.  I know she thinks it's temporary, but we're probably going to force her to stay. ;)
Love spending the day with Mimi and Pa; wish we could do it more often <3
Syd had a bad fall into the corner of a bookcase....gave her a shiner.  I think it bruised really deep because she wouldn't let me wipe her face on that area for weeks.
Still loving Little Gym!
This time of the year has been so fun outside.  We play with the neighbors almost every afternoon.
A couple of weekends ago, we went camping at Devils Den with Papa and Grandma Tricia.  They got the girls some headlamps.  The pics crack me up.  Looks like something from Star Trek.
Mills figured out how to make hand shadows ;)
The gang on a hike!  We love it there...so many trees and actually feels like camping, even though we're sort of "glamping" these days.  Plus, you can hike to a playground, which the girls love.
So tall!
Papa made us some awesome camp food, and the girls loved going to look in their tent.
Thankful for these times to get the girls out in nature and away from TV!
Last week, we had our annual photog session with Amber Lanning.  We brought the minibus for something different.  Love the way these two previews turned out, even though Syd was clearly over it by this point.  Millie was cracking us up though, such a great little poser now.  Amber laughed that Millie thought this whole shoot was about her. ;)
Amber was so sweet to throw these up on Facebook the very next day, which she knew was our tenth wedding anniversary!
Without knowing she was going to do that, I posted this awesome shot that Midge took in Destin.  There was a whole lot of KK and JKK on the internet that day.  #sorrynotsorry
Nana to the rescue while we took off on our very first trip away from the girls!  We went to Napa for a few days, and it was heaven.  The weather was perfect and the wine was superb.  It was so great to spend time with my favorite guy.  Love him ten times more than I did ten years ago...
Most of the pics from the trip turned out like this...
...or this.  JKK doesn't like to make a fool of himself nearly as much as I do.
Nana did a wonderful job getting them off to school and entertaining them all weekend.  Turns out Syd picked up something at school on the first day we were gone and ended up developing pink eye and an ear infection.  We had a very teary FaceTime session on Saturday.  Broke my heart.
Millie learned that she loves to cook, so this week has all been about "helping" in the kitchen.  Thanks a lot, Nana. ;)
Aunt Coco came out on Saturday to hang out with the girls too, and look what she made for Millie!!  Her very own rainbow mittens.  Millie loves them.  I adore them.  How awesome!  Aunt Coco is the coolest.
This week it is finally cooling off.  Yesterday, the girls and I took a walk around the neighborhood.
 Syd was finally feeling better....
Millie was happy to be riding on her scooter...life was great.  Then her wheel caught on the sidewalk and she face-planted.  It was pretty awful.  She scraped up her face, fingers, hip, and elbow.  I felt so sorry for her.
Can you see her scraped up face?  Made me so sad to later find her shoulder all scraped up too when I was putting her to bed.  She's so small.   Her shoulders are so tiny.  Most of the time, I think she's such a big girl, but when she gets hurt like that I'm reminded of how young she is.  I hope I never have to see my girls seriously injured.  It may kill me.

Sunday, September 13, 2015

Happy Birthday, JKK!

JKK turned the big 45 last Wednesday...we did a lot of celebrating and wish making.  We love him so... 

Bday pancakes for breakfast
Momofuku Birthday Cake (his favorite) BEFORE lunch
Syd sang the loudest
First wish was the girls
Then we had to redo so that daddy could make a wish too
Then we had family band practice!  Funny story with a bit of background: Millie has a princess guitar that daddy always steals from her.  He loves to jam on that thing.  For his bday, I figured he needed the real thing.  We got him an acoustic guitar AND a ukelele, which I'm secretly hoping to learn.  Millie was THRILLED that we could all play together.  However, before we had even given him his gift, we were eating cake and Mills said out of the blue "now you won't have to play my princess guitar anymore".  He figured it out and we gave him his own right after that.  Kids are so funny.  Don't tell them your secrets!
Saturday, the celebration continued...Nana kept the girls for us to go out in Fayetteville.
We met a bunch of friends for a fun bus tour of different breweries!  We even coordinated our plaid.
We had a terrible time.  Obviously.

Millie's Wish

Me:  what do you want for Christmas?
Millie:  a house all to myself

Saturday, September 12, 2015

They're Famous!

Amber Lanning shoots for the local Kids Directory magazine.  She needed some girls to help her out for a nail salon ad.  Millie and Syd loved it!  Such a fun morning with Amber's precious daughter.

School Artwork + Homework

Things are getting real for Mills at school now.  No more messing around.  Her teacher actually grades stuff, and she has even had homework a few times.
practicing with scissors
tracing
lots of tracing...her teacher circles when she gets out of the lines.
Ms. Lea has also pointed out that she needs to learn to color inside the lines.
When I told Millie that Ms. Lea said she needs to work on coloring inside the lines, Millie said "well I didn't know".
This homework was attached, so we practiced coloring inside the lines.  She did all of the yellow stars and was really proud of herself!
She loves this concept of homework.  After rest time, she comes out and asks to do her homework. ;) I wonder how long that will last...
mazes are a favorite
storytelling

 guess we need to work on staying in the lines with painting also

look at her name!
I love this fish.  Beautiful.
great job cutting!
letter recognition
Ms. Lea sent homework for the parents too.  I had to make Millie some scrapbook pages and send them to school.  You know I loved it.



This month's theme is feelings.  Sidenote: she looks so old on red shirt Wednesdays in her little uniform
self-portrait
Mills had no problem giving examples for each of these feelings.  She can be pretty dramatic.
Millie's coloring style has changed recently.  It's very aggressive and always rainbow-like.  Millie's is far left, then Syd, then Natasha.  This is from Natasha's last day to babysit this Summer.  The girls love her.
She's proud to show off her school work each day.
Before school pics include posing now
Piddy hasn't brought home much artwork yet.  Just this beauty, which I think is frame-able.
Funny story: Syd knows most of her colors.  However, she doesn't call them by the right name.  Instead, she refers to colors by saying the name of each corresponding Paw Patrol member.  This is her favorite TV show about a group of dogs.  Each dog has it's own vehicle in a different color.  For example, the bulldog is named Rubble and has a yellow bulldozer.  So when you ask Syd what color is this (yellow) object, she says "that's Rubble".  I would correct her, but I think it's so funny.  Syd what color is that (red) strawberry?  Marshall.  Ha!
She enjoys her mornings alone to play with whatever she wants while Millie is at school.  She's actually amazing at playing by herself.  One morning I was talking on the phone to mom and couldn't find Syd.  This is where I finally found her. ;)