Party Time!

Today was finally the day...the big family birthday party for Bennett and Ainsley. The girls decided to go with a Hawaiian Luau this year... Check out their cute cupcake birthday cake!

Bennett, Ainsley and Cousin M. smile for the flashing cameras.

Bennett and Baby Cousin S. spent some time hanging out at the party. Thanks, Uncle C. and Aunt K., for letting him participate by wearing an authentic Hawaiian shirt and a plastic lei!

Poor, poor little girls! I don't know if there were quite enough gifts at their party.

The party games involved riding the Gator around the yard, pretending it was a boat out on the ocean, sailing from game island to game island. We just had to find a way to incorporate the Gator into the day, you know.

Game 1: Stick a picture onto to the island scene, but with your eyes closed. This is the somewhat wacky scene we ended up with. I think some tiny eyes might have been ever so slightly opened, as several things are posted where they should be. Tisk, tisk.

Game 2: Pop a colored coconut, find a slip of paper inside, assemble a secret message...

The assembly of the message, which led the kids to their party favor bags.

Present opening time! Wow, what craziness! This part really wore me, and I'm sure several onlookers, out! The girls got tons of fall clothes and tons of toys that they'd been wishing for for months, as well as some cash for saving and spending. Both the girls and their parents are so pleased!

By mid-afternoon, Bennett had all of her toy-type gifts opened, and as you can see they get along with each other quite nicely! Thanks, all of our wonderful family, for making the party a wonderful time for the girls, and for all the wonderful gifts you gave!

Lovely Labor Day Weekend!

What a beautiful weekend we had for Labor Day! We had a great time relaxing, being outdoors and hanging out as a family. On Saturday we headed out to the middle of nowhere for some hiking... Bennett and Ainsley hiked themselves silly! Above they are trekking up some steps.

Several small frogs were seen in the forest, and Ainsley managed to catch one! She was so very thrilled!

Here is the view we took in from a lookout point.

Bennett made her way up a bit of an incline. Notice she's wearing a mini skirt. The hike was relatively last minute, and we put the Keens on, but we failed to have the girls change into more appropriate attire. Who says you can't hike in a mini skirt anyway!?

Here is a view of about half of a flight of very steep steps we decended.

Dad was a good guide, even though he had no idea where we were going.

A view of the prairie as we headed out of the forest...

And now, on to family movie night. We hung out one evening and just watched a show. The girls tried out the "new" kiddie lawn chairs that we purchased second-hand for use in the the "new" canoe. Good news! They second as theater seating! More good news! Step stools are the new end tables these days.

Lounging, watching and snacking! Is that a newborn panda on Bennett's lap? Of course!

Now to completely switch gears, here is a just a picture of Bennett's most recent "scene" on the rooftop of her dollhouse. It's a club of some sort we're told. Apparently two dollhouse moms are just resting in the kids' bunks with their pet cats. The "kids" who are porcelain and in pajamas are hanging out on the roof of the canopy bed...not a great thing for porcelain kids to be doing, if you ask me. And for some reason, the bed has a sign on it, stating that one of the kids, Chuck, works at Hy-Vee. Again, not a great idea for someone made of porcelain, really. Oh, so entertaining! Thank goodness Bennett is such a garage sale "treasure" collector. It's her pack rat, trinket collecting that provides us with such interesting happenings at our house.

Birthday Beginnings.

We like to celebrate our children's birthdays in shifts. We kick off with Bennett's actual birthday, a mid-birthdays family celebration for both girls a couple weeks later, followed by Ainsley's actual birthday. We recently started this month-long party process. The night before Bennett's actual birthday, Ainsley gave her a present...a new YooHoo, a capuchin monkey! Both girls were thrilled! He's kind of an ugly little fellow, but Bennett loves him all the same.

The next morning, Bennett's birthday morning, she awoke to her decorated bedroom, a family tradition. This year, Dad and I tried to incorporate some of her toys in the decoration to provide maximum thrill for her. As you can see, Josefina is riding in her doll-size wheelchair, blindfolded by a pink streamer. She is flying some balloons, attached to a light pink streamer (balloons not pictured) and the balloons are being blown so violently by the wind that they are dragging her along in her wheelchair. Little does Josefina know that she is about to crash into Bennett's tower of birthday gifts! Tragedy is about to occur, unless Bennett opens the presents and gets them out of the way. It was close, but Bennett managed to do so in the nick of time, and thanks to the streamer blindfold, Josefina never had a clue that she was in any sort of danger. Whew!

Bennett enjoyed opening her gifts from Mom and Dad, three Precious Moments figurines purchased at a garage sale (Bennett's Mom is very thrifty.) I posted this picture mostly so that the masses could witness an incredible display of voluminous hair. Bennett wakes up each day with amazing body and bounce in her crazy hair. It cannot be easily tamed. I would kill for this kind of volume myself!

Since the girls have a family party in between their actual birthdays, they celebrate on their actual birthday by having one friend over to play and have birthday dinner and dessert. Bennett's former classmate and friend, R., came over this year. Believe it or not, these two girls are the same age! It's amazing how children come in all shapes and sizes! R. is blessed with tallness, and Bennett, not so much!

The girls played the spider web game. They each had to follow a "spider silk" around the living room and unwind it to find a prize hidden at the end. They had a great time!

Three "spiders" are about to open their prizes....

The girls posed once more with their opened prizes...each got a Peek-a-boo Petite. They seemed pleased, and I think they all enjoyed Part I of our month-long birthday bash!

Firsts

The past couple of days have involved a couple of firsts for us...our first excursion in the "new" canoe and the first day of the school year for Bennett! We took the canoe for a test run on the farm pond, with the help of Grandpa. The canoe is leak-free and totally awesome!

It was a picture perfect afternoon for some paddling!

Here are Bennett and Ainsley with Grandpa, just prior to canoe launch. It comes as no surprise that Ainsley was pumped and Bennett was, well, not as pumped. She was actually terrified, but she calmed down once they were out on the water and she realized how safe she really was.

This morning Bennett headed out for a new year of school. The above is a picture of her on the first day of school last year...

...and here she is on the first day of school today. I'm not sure what's up with the bent knee pose, but she recalled doing it last year so she insisted on a repeat.

Here is the non-bent-leg pose. She started the morning off with some tears, but not for long. She seemed to be in very good spirits after awhile and started the day off well. I hope for the good spirits to continue!

Summer Wrap-Up

Well, the last week of summer vacation is nearly over! We are about to kick back into school mode, but here are a few pictures of our last few days of "freedom." It's been a somewhat rainy week. The girls enjoyed some umbrella time by "the river" at the end of our driveway the other day. Ainsley has her baby with her, as always! She seems to have momentarily lost her maternal instinct, as the baby appears to be hunched over and without protection from the umbrella. Poor little thing!

We brought out the beloved ball pit this week. It only comes out of the closet about once ever 6 months because Mom gets tired of having millions of colored balls all over the place. I found Ainsley shoving as many balls as possible into her shirt the other day. She was being a mother chicken and they were her eggs/babies. Every time one would fall out I would here her yelling, "Junior! Junior! Get back over here!!!" Funny.

The Girls have been getting their little hands on my camera lately. When I uploaded my most recent batch of photos, low and behold, there was a picture of the vintage McDonald's character, Mac Tonight, driving a jeep on my kitchen counter! I have never seen this toy before in my life. I didn't know he lived here, but apparently he does, and a little girl caught him on camera.

Summer Miscellaneous

Quite a bit has been documented via photo over the summer but it has not been posted to the blog....until now! Enjoy the following pictures taken over the past couple of months. Bennett and Ainsley landed some faux American Girl dolls at a garage sale. They discovered that their dolls resemble their...grandmothers! Upon realizing this, Bennett exclaimed, "We just bought our grandmas!"

Bennett, hanging out at Grandpa and Grandma's, conducting a stuffed animal orchestra.

Cousin F. recently educated Bennett about the world of Webkinz online. You can imagine what is now quite high on her birthday and Christmas lists.

Cousin A., Cousin N. and Ainsley had a blast playing dress-up together!

Ainsley enjoyed some time with her baby caterpillar, Fuzzy, while house sitting at Grandpa and Grandma's. She had Fuzzy in a jar, in a cloth baby carrier. What a good mama.

The Girls and Cousin M. enjoyed a few spoonfuls of Grandpa C's whipped cream while he was away.

Bennett and Ainsley enjoyed dining out with Great Grandma E. a few weeks ago. They even got to order pie for dessert!

We hit the theater for a free movie once this summer. The highlight was not the movie, but rather the massive amount of popcorn, candy and soda the girls got to order! Yikes!

Bennett chose to wear a basketball sweatband to the show. No idea why.

Dad made an amazing space shuttle for the girls one evening. They worked with him for about two hours to create and decorate it. There was plenty of room for both of them and numerous babies inside.

We had a great time at the zoo with Grandma L., Aunt C. and Cousin M. Bennett and Ainsley liked the hippo drinking fountain, among many other things.

Three girls, just hanging out at the zoo playground.

Weekend Roadtrip

We took a mini-vacation to visit Uncle B. and Aunt J. over the weekend. As you can imagine, Bennett and Ainsley had a wonderful time!!! You can tell how much Bennett and Ainsley love Uncle B. by their desire to hold his hands while walking to a restaurant for dinner.

After dinner we stopped at a local candy shop. Ainsley's dream came true when we allowed her to get a big lollipop!

Next we took a few trips down the wax paper slide a few blocks away. It was insanely fast, and we saw Aunt J. nearly do a 360-degree turn about halfway down. Bennett and Ainsley were able to maintain forward motion, thankfully!

B. and J. took us to a huge Mexican pottery shop, just for fun. Bennett and Ainsley loved this huge metal giraffe outside of the store. For $650 we could have taken this fellow home with us!

B. and J. have a large, wooded yard, complete with wildlife. Ainsley was able to get a close-up look at a very tame deer.

While at the Mexican pottery shop, we allowed Bennett to choose a souvenir. What says Mexico more than a....Asian rice hat? Oh, yeah! Why not?! She's always wanted one, and it allowed her to really become a part of the show while watching Kung Fu Panda.

We did some hiking in a cool forest near B. and J.'s home. Here is a shot of the girls loving each other up while on the trail.

The forest was offering some special kind of dinosaur display. It was fun to see some life-size prehistoric beasts while hiking!

While visiting, we got to meet B. and J.'s neighbor, Rolly. Rolly asked us if we wanted one of his 17-foot canoes for free, and of course, Grant said, "Why, yes!" It's a good thing we had borrowed Grandpa and Grandma's vehicle for the weekend. We needed the rack and the length!

Before heading home we stopped at Scheel's for a ferris wheel ride. What better way to end a fun weekend with family??!!