Not Me! Monday

So I found this on my friend, Travis' blog and I love it. So I am going to try to participate in MckMama's blog carnival of denial-truth. Here's my first attempt at Not Me! Monday. I hope you enjoy.

I did not put Alaina to bed in the clothes that she wore all day. And I did not let her wear those same said clothes the next day because I was too lazy to dig out some clean ones. No not me!

I did not let Paige eat dessert without finishing her vegetables even though I told her she had to before getting dessert.

Yesterday, I did not spend $5o at Old Navy on kids clothes that my girls do not need just because they were super cheap!

Not one time this week, did we do an acitivity just because I thought it might be blogworthy. And I for sure did not bring my camara along.

On Friday I did not eat 4 cinnamon rolls, and 3 brownies for supper after having pizza buffet. No not me, I have much more self control than that.

I did not let Paige eat a whole peach for lunch because I wanted her to find the "bead". I do not think that it's the cutest thing ever that she gets really excited about the seed and calls it a bead. I don't enjoy watching her inhaling the peach just to get to said bead.

Not once this week did I make Mark put on swim trunks in the shower because Paige wanted to shower too. I did not do this right after I got out of a nice relaxing shower.

I did not let Paige watch The Letter Factory over and over again while spent way too much time looking up my friends on Facebook and reading blogs. I am a much better mother than that. TV is not my daytime babysitter.

Homecoming Parade and Disc Golf

We went to the Hawkeye Homecoming parade on Friday evening. I love parades. It was fun to dress the girls up in their Hawkeye outfits. Paige likes to get candy, but then she wants to eat it all. We did some extra teeth brushing that night.
They did really well. It was a long parade. . .2 hours.
It was just too much excitement for Alaina.
We actually went disc golfin on Saturday with the Isaacsons. Before kids, we would go at least 3 times a week. And I think we've gone maybe 3 times total since kids. We do really enjoy getting out and getting some exercise. We got a sitter for the older kids, but took Alaina and Zach with us. They did pretty well. We play out at Sugar Bottom and got the full 18 holes in. It will be fun when the kids can play with us someday.

Alaina is Crawling!

Alaina is now crawling! I can't believe that she is so big already. Time is really flying. It is going so much faster with the second one. She has been gettting up on all fours and lunging forward for a few weeks, but just today as started moving her arms. And she's only 5 months old. I thought Paige crawled early, right at 6 months, but Alaina has a couple weeks on her. My kids just want to be on the go and once they can go, they are much happier. Way to go Alaina! I'm trying to get a video on here, but no luck yet. Stay posted!

My new look

I got my hair done last night and my sister wanted to see a couple pics. Here are my attempts at taking a self picture. I had to add Alaina for some interest.

Artist and Helper

Every evening Paige has to help me feed Alaina her cereal. It's kind of a pain, but she loves to help me. She even goes to the silverware drawer and picks out the right kind of spoon. I always let her give Alaina 2 bites, then its Mommy's turn. I think it's hysterical that Paige even opens her mouth when she gives Alaina a bite. It really is impossible not to.
And here is our little artist! She was supposed to be watching Boz while I caught up on some things on the computer, just on the other side of that wall. I thought I was hearing scraping on the wall and came out to find Paige coloring on it. She has that "I'm in trouble" look on her face. Thank God for Magic Erasers. It did come right off.

Fun with Unkie and Auntie

Unkie Patrick and Auntie Kathy at the Orchard with the girls. It was a nice fall day and the Honey Crisp Apples are ripe. Yeah, those are our favorite. And the turnovers were delicious.
Paigey on the the bridge.
We had to try to get a good picture of the girls. Paige loved the apples. She would take a bite of one, put in the basket, take out another one, take a bite, put it in the basket. . .We had to check at the end to make sure our apples didn't all have little teeth marks in them.
Unkie building a tower on Paige's back.
A little face time with Auntie.
Paige loves to color.
I just thought this was so sweet of Unkie, Paige, and Casey sitting out on our deck.

Hawks vs. Clones

We got to go to the Iowa Vs. Iowa State football game on Saturday with my brother Patrick and his wife Kathy. It was fun. We thought the weather would be a real bummer, but it turned out great, only light rain for a short time. None of us had been to an Iowa/Iowa State game, so we had a good time. It was a great atmosphere. I will say that the biggest disappointment was the Iowa fans that sat around us. They were totally rude, were swearing, and even bashing Iowa players. Mark was the sole Iowa State fan in our crew and was wearing an Iowa State t-shirt, but didn't take his jacket off because of what they were saying to Iowa State fans that were around us. We could never take Paige and Alaina to a game, which is really too bad. Other than that, great game. This really is the Hawkeye State!
Patrick, Kathy, Mark, and I
We are a house divided. We'll see who the girls end up liking. Probably Iowa State because their daddy does.
Aren't they cute!

St. Louis Family Vacation

We spent our first official family vacation in St. Louis, Missouri. We left last Wednesday and came home on Sunday. It was a lot of fun and the girls did great considering they are so young. I would highly recommend St. Louis to anyone looking for an inexpensive, family geared vacation. We went to the Magic House (a children's museum), the Science Center, the Zoo, Grant's Farm, and on a Riverboat sightseeing Cruise. We enjoyed them all, but the Zoo and the Magic House were really neat, both for the girls and for Mark and I. The car ride was interesting. Alaina doesn't love her carseat and 4 hours is a long time for Paige. But we all survived and I have to say that I would do it again.

Here we are at the Zoo. It was a nice cool, cloudy day. Perfect to be outside.
Paige takin' a break!
It was really nice to get so close to the animals. I think the Hippo exhibit was our favorite. They would swim so close to us and you could also see them play out of the water. It was really neat.
Paige really wanted to ride the Choo Choo train. How could we resist her? Mark took her, and Alaina and I waited for them.
Alaina did well. She either chilled in the stroller or the front pack.
You can see the giraffes in the background of this pic. There were quite a few baby animals out with their moms. There was a baby elephant, giraffe, and 5 tiger cubs that we saw.
We decided to forego naps on vacation. Paige was a trooper. She did have a big day at the zoo and fell asleep as we were leaving.

At Grant's Farm there was a spot where you could buy a bottle of milk and go in to feed the goats. What a mistake!!! We were attacked. At one point I thought I could put Paige down so she could feed one. They immediately jumped up on her and knocked her down, stepping on her. The poor girl was terrified. After dozens of dirty hoofprints all over my shorts, we left the pen and decided to feed them through the fence.
This was much calmer. Paige was still a little traumatized from the experience and got freaked out when they would start sucking from the bottle. But it was fun. Mark said he wishes he had the video going. He thought it was hysterical.
Here we are on the Riverboat. It was sunny and relaxing.
The Riverboat was down by the Arch, so we went to the base. Here is Paige standing at the base of the Arch.

The hotel had a pool. Paige loves to jump in to her Daddy. She had lots of fun.
The Magic House has a fishing pond. Paige really liked to "fish" and then throw the fish back and catch it again. It's magnetic. You could also take your fish to another little pond, throw it in, and follow it down the stream to the fishing pond. You can see the stream behind Paige. I had fun, too!
The have this very cool Electrostatic Generator. Don't we look awesome.
Here Paige and I are at the Science Center's dinosaur exhibit. I think she thought the T-Rex was real.

Fun with Grammy and Grampy

Mark's parents came this weekend. They brought Paige a scooter that goes by turning the steering wheel back and forth. I'm sure she will have fun with it when she gets the hang of it.
Daddy sure enjoyed riding it.
Grampy looking for Paige at the park.
Grammy and Paige spent many hours coloring and putting stickers on paper (and each other).
Alaina is such a happy girl. We sure had fun with Grampy and Grammy.

Snake Alley

We went to Burlington on Saturday to visit my family. While we were there my brother took us to Snake Alley, the windiest road in the US. It was short, but fun to drive down.
Here is our van driving down. My mom is walking with Paige.
Here is our family on the banks of the Mighty Mississippi.
My Grandpa playing piano with Paige.

Rockin' Comedy Night

On Friday night Big Daddy Weave came for a free concert in the park. It's always fun to go see a good Christian band. The music was great. They had fun stuff for the kids to do. Paige got to jump in a bounce house, she got her face painted and a tatoo on her hand. But she enjoyed her friends the most, of course.
Here you can see the flower painted on her face and her cross tatoo on her hand.
The flower up close. She accidently wiped some of the bottom of it off. I didn't know if she would sit to have them paint it or not, but she sat right down and held still.
Paige really got into the concert.
Here she is with her friends Jaclyn and Ashlyn(on her lap).
Paige loved to jump in a circle with her friends.