The Aquarium at Fair Park

last week for our friday play group

we went to the aquarium at fair park

it was great!

it is really inexpensive

and the kids loved it!

i am not sure what they are looking at here,

but they were very interested in it :)

you are able to touch the sting rays

jayden - after getting comfortable with them for awhile,

finally got brave enough to do it :)

this little girl has no fear -

she probably would have been in the water if she could have

sweet thing

this was a great activity and i think we will be spending more time there soon!

What I've been up to . . .

i love christmas

but

i also love fresh starts

i love goals, cleaning house, organizing and fun projects!

so because

we have a crazy busy winter/spring

and then we are going to have a new member added to our family

i have been focused with getting things in my house

orderly :)

i made a new wreath for the winter/spring

i love how it turned out and the colors

we also finally got all of our pictures in frames or shelves

(see below)

i was having a hard time figuring out how to display the kids pictures that we had done this summer

(yes summer, i got them in october - but still - i hadn't gotten them all up yet!)

i had tried different types of frames to have three pics of the kids all together

but because they are mounted on a board they wouldn't fit in most frames

so i finally ended up with this shelf

i think it works perfectly

i had to add a couple of bigger pics to make it look right on the wall

(so there is our engagement picture from (gasp) 10 years ago - we look young!)

anyway - so glad to finally have the pics in a place to be displayed!

today we made valentine's mailboxes for the kids

super easy and cheap

i saw it on a blog somewhere - and i am sure it was a lot cuter there,

but i am glad with how ours turned out

i thought it would be fun to put little treats in them during the week of valentines

and jayden is super into drawing pictures and putting them in envelopes

so now we have a place to put them :)

these mailboxes are from target in the dollar spot,

i just put them on top of candlesticks (i didn't glue them b/c i want to be able to reuse the candlesticks)

i had the white ones and bought the black candlesticks at target

i wanted to put wooden letters on them,

but could not find any the right size at michaels

so we ended up with black felt ones and i think they work just fine

i couldn't find another j in the bag - so jordans ended up with an "O"

he was fine with that :)

and my most proud accomplishment since christmas -

jordan and i went through every room, closet, drawer

in our entire house organizing and getting rid of things

we literally filled the back of jordans car with things to give away

plus filled up both trashcan and recycling can

it was a great feeling

this is just one example of a closet that was redone:

so that's what i have been up to in my free time . . .

it feels good to get some things done off my checklist!

happy wednesday night!

Molly's 1st Birthday

on sunday we celebrated my sweet niece Molly

it was her first birthday

amy had a family party in their new, beautiful home

sweet hallie

molly's favorite song is "let it shine" and she holds her finger up

as a light anytime this song is sang

sweet thing! she is precious!

love this cupcake on the candle stand

jason & alex

don't they look alike?

we love you molly and are so thankful for your life!

you make life sweeter!

Family Fun Night: January

on friday we had one of our family fun nights

it didn't start out too exciting according to jayden :)

but things changed quickly:)

we took the kids bikes up to SMU and let them ride their bikes around campus

i was super surprised and excited about how well duncan rode his bike!

i obviously wasn't aware of the work that jordan was doing with him

in riding his bike :)

b/c he did great!

this little miss just hung around and watched

(she had pink eye - so didn't feel her best)

love that they can ride their bikes together

campbell and i got in the car and drove down the block to pokey'os for a surprise dessert

jordan and the boys rode their bikes there :)

they were proud :)

(and yes i realize we don't have helmets on them - i forgot them!)

picking out their cookie

yummy ice cream

jayden picked out the flavor "crazy colors"

blue bell knew what they were doing when they made that flavor,

i am sure it taste just like plain vanilla - but to a kid -

it is the most amazing flavor ever -

and to a parent - the biggest mess

one happy camper :)

don't think the pink eye caused her to be left out from the yummy food :)

it was a great night!

it was super simple.

but that is okay.

jordan and i's vision for family fun nights is to have

regularly scheduled times where we do something out of the ordinary

together as a family.

it can be as simple as this night was or super extravagant as something else.

the idea is to have consistency in doing something out of the norm

together as a family.

our kids loved it

and so do we :)

making memories and being together.

its pretty special.

Duncan sleeping in a BIG BOY BED!

we have transitioned duncan to jaydens room for sleeping at night.

yes we have done it - but if you think it was easy - you would be quite mistaken!

the room looks very different now, from these pictures that were taken the first night!

so the way it came down -

duncan basically forced us to move him to a big boy bed

he had kicked out one of his slabs to his crib (that my dad made by the way)

and we had glued it back - a couple of times - but he kept on kicking it out and

when one slab was kicked out - it was just enough room for him to escape from his bed.

when he would escape - a lot of times he would stay in his room,

but then crawl into his sisters bed -

who would be sleeping at times

and play with her for awhile.

we would take him out,

discipline him, and give him his instructions

but he kept on escaping

finally

jordan and i decided it was time to try the bed out.

he was very excited to sleep with his "brother" as he calls him (so sweet!)

and jayden was excited to have someone share his room with (at first)

but that first night -

getting duncan to stay in his bed when we put them to bed -

was quite the challenge.

he kept on getting out because he was scared.

thankfully the first night - jayden was super tired so he went to sleep without any problem.

finally we got duncan to fall asleep in his bed.

but it was on the top bunk with his brother.

once he fell asleep he was good.

then - the next morning jayden woke up around 5 am screaming -

i think he was scared because he didn't know where he was,

and he tried to talk to duncan and he was in a deep sleep and didn't talk back to him.

so we moved duncan back to his crib for the next couple of hours to sleep.

the next night -we had them sleep together in the bottom bunk.

things went better but still not smooth :)

duncan still got out several times at first because he was scared.

we finally got him to fall asleep -

and then around 3 am jayden had to go the bathroom - which woke duncan up -

so we put him in his crib at that time to go back to sleep.

we decided then to forgo the top bunk

and alice had a great idea - to get a trundle to put under jayden's bed and pull it out at night and have duncan sleep there and then put it under during the day.

i was worried about having the ladder up all the time anyway, because campbell had learned how to climb up to the top of the bunk - and i just didn't want to have to worry about her falling down all day.

plus - the boys had started climbing up the bunk - without a ladder, and then jumping off from the top (i am not quite ready for a broken arm yet)

so to end this story :)

we ended up taking down the top bunk, getting a trundle and having duncan sleep on that

and two nights ago - we had sitters here watching the boys

and they got duncan to bed without him getting out once -

and then the past two nights he has done the same thing!

we also added a sound machine because jayden doesn't like the noises duncan makes :)

jayden has still randomly had to get up to go to the bathroom, but it gets later each morning -

so hopefully this is going to work!

sorry for the long post - but i wanted to document our transition!

each child is different.

i am reminded of that daily.