Valentine's Day is coming up...

Daniel might have some competition...

Valentine Hair

Not the greatest pictures because I was in a rush, but this is the Valentine do I did on Elise this morning... not perfect, but not bad. She has a Valentine party on Thursday and I have other ideas for that.

Our First Princess Party

The last week or so, I have been consumed with Princess Party planning.  No, this wasn't a birthday party but just a princess party for Elise and 6 of her friends.  It was a blast!!!  I don't mean to toot my own horn, but I had some nice decorations as well... though I didn't think to take pictures of them... grr.  Next time.  Anyway, here is the party...

Here is the whole "royal court".

This is the table with the party favors and prize boxes.  Each girl got a prize after winning a game.  It was perfect because every girl got a prize.

Elise and Abby... current BFFs.

Abby's mom came over early to help me set up and then stayed to help with the party.  Thank goodness!

First we decorated crowns (see counter) and then we played a 'stick Cinderella on her castle' game.

Elise taking her turn.

When each of the girls came in, they each got a magical wand from Ellie.  Some of the girls are holding them in this picture.  This was right before we played "pass the apple" (because Snow White ate a poisoned apple).

We also played BINGO and made sparkle princess play dough by adding glitter to the dough... they thought that was awesome.

Here the princesses are playing "princess says"... so, 3 year olds are not good at this game.  They just don't get it.  They all just laughed hysterically whenever I said, "princess didn't say!".  Oh well, it was fun anyway.  (You can kind of see the 'princess party' banner I made along with the fabric flag banner that I have swagged across the kitchen---- yeah, I'm trying to be crafty).

The girls didn't get it at first but just as we were running out of it, they got into the silly string.

We decided to decorate our Cinderella shoe, crown and princess dress sugar cookies with icing and sprinkles.  The girls LOVED watching as we mixed the icing with food coloring gel to make the colors.  They learned what colors make green and purple and pink.

Here is Elise decorating her cookies...she might be eating some of it too.

Overall, I thought my first party as a mom went great!  The princesses all didn't want to leave so I feel like that meant success.  The host princess had so much fun and is looking forward to the next party.  I figure I can probably pull one of these off every six months or so.  Elise is pretty luck to have so many great girlfriends that share in her love of all things princess.

Meanwhile, Daniel had a wonderful day with Owen and Maggie.  He was happy to not be present during the party and was anxious to get Owen out of the house during the girlie festivities as well.  They enjoyed the library, a long walk in the choo choo wagon and a lunch out.  There may have been some eye rolling and other frustrated noises from Dan this week as I prepared for the party... I never do things small, so he is very patient with me.

An Afternoon in the Park

The weather has been wonderful this week.... my favorite kind: Cool, crisp mornings and mildly warm afternoons. The kind of weather where you just want to open all the windows and enjoy the cool breeze. So we do. Yesterday, we went to the park with some friends. It was so beautiful out. It made me happy to think about how Spring is on its way.

Owen gracing me with a smile.

Ellie playing on the playground.

Maggie enjoying the swing...for the time being.

Ellie going down the slide.

Owen was a little sad in this picture because there was someone blocking the slide. He has been so emotional lately... mirroring his big sister I imagine.Now, look at Maggie's face in this picture. She had that HUGE smile plastered on her face the whole time we were in the wagon. This was a big deal since she has been crying non stop when she is out of my arms (she's teething). Guess I just need to get her in the wagon more often.Of course, one of these children is not mine. The child in the third seat is one of the kid's good friend. He is in Owen's preschool class as well. People are always asking if Owen and him are twins since they are both the same height and have that blond hair. Nope.. that would be scary.

Who doesn't love a baby in a diaper?

Sometimes there is nothing cuter than a baby in a diaper. Here's Maggie right before we put PJs on last night. She certainly has learned to cheese it up for the camera!

Dinner at our house

Typical dinner at our house. Since I had my blog fast for so long, I got a little happy with the camera and decided to document most of our happenings over the last 24 hours.

Mags chomping down on some orzo. The teeth at work!
Owen making silly faces.

Elise eating her green beans... which she called pupas.... her father informed her that they were not pupas, but beans.
Most not in her mouth but on her shirt. Oh well. Silly kids.

Ellie's Playdate

Elise had her first preschool-friend play date today. It is the first time we had a friend over who was not from church. This is her best girlfriend at school. They had LOTS of fun together.

Ellie and her friend are so cute. They have to hug each other every time they see each other. I mean, EVERY time they re-enter a room, there's a hug.

They're girls. 3-year-old girls. They like to laugh and scream in high pitched voices, play dress up, pretend they are princesses, etc. They are girls and wanted to play with only girls.

This left poor Owen out of the mix. It was the first time he didn't have a friend over at the same time Ellie did and he sure was feeling like the 3rd wheel.

He was sporting a lot of sad faces as he was feeling left out-- Dad did play football with him so he wasn't too lonely.
Look at that alligator tear coming down his cheek! Poor boy.
Mags was her happy, jolly self. Dad took her outside and she loved that!

TEETH!

Look at them choppers!

Kid Updates

Since Christmas, we really have been laying low at home most days. I think that is another reason I haven't been blogging, nothing has really been going on! But, the kids have been having fun anyway, so I will do some updates about them.

Elise has been really loving her preschool class. She has a friend there that she loves and even went to her house last weekend to play. Her friend is coming over here tomorrow so she is very excited about that. Ellie can now write her name and is learning to write all sorts of numbers and letters. She has started to show some interest in wanting to know what words say and what time the clock is showing. The kids keep busy on the days they don't have preschool and we usually have friends come over for play dates on those days. When you have 3 kids, one more doesn't make a difference and a lot of times it is actually easier to have them entertain each other. Next weekend Ellie is hosting a princess party where all of the girls her age at church and preschool will be coming over dressed up as princesses for tea and a royal luncheon. It should be a lot of fun.

Owen is a ball of energy and continues to love running all over the house and climbing everything he can. We recently changed his schedule around so he goes to bed an hour later and since then he has been doing awesome at preschool and really enjoys it. Before we changed it up, he was falling asleep before lunch time and waking up when the other kids were sleeping. It wasn't working, but I am happy to report that things are wonderful now. Owen gets more and more verbal each day and follows instruction a bit better than he used to. He has learned the importance of using Kleenex and wiping himself down after meals. That seems silly, but really, it's a big deal. As reported in the previous post, Mags is doing all sorts of new things. She is chowing down on cheerios, Nilla wafers, fries, couscous, rice, etc. Her hair is growing in so I can finally start putting bow clips in her hair and you know that makes me happy. A girl has gotta have a bow. Maggie is really long, much longer than Ellie was so a lot of her pants are short on her. Oh well, the girl is gonna have to wear floods because I bought too many clothes with Ellie and I don't think I am willing to buy more at this point. Summer is coming soon, they're just like capris, right? She still has the pacifier... not ready to give that up. She won't be 3 with it, but we didn't get rid of it at 6 months like we were so adamant to do. Oh well. She's happy and healthy, who cares about the rest!?

The kids are thriving, so Daniel and I are happy. We really are lucky to have three fun kids to have around. We didn't imagine we would have so many so early, but we wouldn't have done anything differently.

Oh that Mags

Our baby girl is 8 months old now. She is sitting up, crawling like a champ (or an army man, whichever), eating baby food all day and even growing teeth! That's right, as the 8 month mark came around, so did her two bottom teeth. Boy, has she let us know that she is unhappy with getting teeth. This new development has certainly encouraged me to start giving her a cup more often!

Finally getting a little hair on top.

Sweet smiles and weird looking elbow.

Rolling over in style.

Making her escape.
Loving her activity table.

Maggie has started standing on her own with support. Look at those feet though, it's amazing they can hold anything up; they're so skinny!
Aurevoir infant car seat. She is now in her own convertible car seat. It's a good thing too because this infant seat was falling apart. It said goodbye to all of us as it made it's way to the trash can. Baby #4 gets a new one (not an announcement).

All smiles as Magdalyn shows off her sitting skills.

Love that lil' tongue!

Glad I was able to catch you all up on Maggie's recent advancements. Believe it or not, it is our first child who has the least amount of baby pictures. Poor thing. That's ok, we make up for it with subsequent children and with her pictures as a toddler.