We've had an incredible couple of months! So much has happened and Lilly is really growing up!
I bought Lilly a powerwheels four wheeler at a garage sale after seeing how much she loved it at our friends' house. She absolutely loves riding it and enjoyed getting to drive it up and down the street while we were living at Chris and Vanessa's house.
Lilly really bonded with Yogi, one of Chris and Vanessa's dogs. He was very calm and relaxed, so Lilly enjoyed going up to him and petting him. He relaxed in his bed a lot, so Lilly would go over and pet him and say, "You ok, Yogi??" to check on him. She loved all the dogs, but she had a special affection for Yogi.
It cracks me up to watch Lilly "talk" on the phone, especially when she is doing something else at the same time.
Darren took Lilly to see one of Andrew's (Chris and Vanessa's son) soccer games while I was working at the theater. She clearly LOVED it, especially the popcorn!
We are still amused to find Lilly sleeping with her little tush up in the air. She used to do this when she was a baby, so it's really cute to see her do it still.
Trying on Daddy's hat :-)
Lilly loves frozen yogurt. We found our new favorite frozen yogurt spot, Orange Leaf in Holly Springs and we are all hooked! Lilly loves to get her own bowl, though we don't let her go to town on the toppings yet.
I bought some water beads from a co-op as a sensory toy for Lilly and she had a blast playing with them! They are small slippery, squishy little balls that some people use to put in vases of flowers as decoration/hydration, but we saw them used at Marbles as a toy for kids, so I got some for Lilly. Clearly, she loves them.
We went to a downtown concert in Fuquay with a bunch of friends one night. The kids had a great time dancing to the music, drawing with chalk, and getting their face painted, while the adults enjoyed some beverages and music :-) I had to leave early for choir practice, but Darren stayed with Lilly to enjoy the fun.
One of our first stops was the corn crib. I was impressed how big this was because there were at least 25 kids playing in it with room to spare. I don't think Lilly stopped smiling the entire time she was there.
Lilly has really bonded with Addy and Zoey, who live in our neighborhood. We rode to the Farm with them and the girls are very close in age, so they spent the entire day together. Watching them walk down the path holding hands melted my heart! There's something about little kids holding hands that is absolutely precious.
Lilly loved climbing through the tunnel.
A few selfies on the train ride :-)
Darren and Jason with Lilly and Zoe on their shoulders after we watched the animals races, which was a highlight of the day for me! They raced pigs, ducks and other small animals around a track and you rooted for the animal that was the "color" of the section you were standing in. Watching ducks "run" around a track was possibly the funniest thing I have ever seen!
There was also a huge tube slide that you went down on a burlap sack. Lilly was too small to go by herself, so I went with her. I think Lilly enjoyed it, but she didn't ask to go again, so I am not sure it was a highlight for her.
We tried to snag a few family photos while we had the chance.
More toddlers holding hands! Can you tell I was smitten with this??? I think we had about 25 pictures of the kids holding hands that day!
The best family shot we've had in about a year! Lilly usually doesn't' smile at all when we are taking family photos, so I guess this is the closest we're going to get. We were riding the train to the pumpkin patch to pick out our pumpkins. Lilly always likes riding on trains, so that was a lot of fun for her.
These two are going to spell trouble in a few years! For now, they are just adorable.
Here is the "crew" posing with their pumpkins! Lilly almost wouldn't sit for the picture. She was getting tired and was ready for a nap, but she held it together well.
Lilly has always liked bubbles, but she usually hasn't been the greatest at blowing them. She got some bubbles as a party favor at Kristin's birthday party, so we took them outside one afternoon and I was SO impressed at how well she could use the bubbles on her own. I also just loved her reactions to blowing the bubbles (hence the video).
How cute is this??? Purse - check! Heels - check! Stroller - check! Lilly is ready to take her baby for a walk :-)
During this time period is when we moved - LOL! I don't have any pictures of that for obvious reasons, but I would like to say how incredibly blessed we are to have so many amazing people in lives willing to help us in every aspect of this crazy process. Chris and Vanessa opened their home to us for two months, for which we are forever grateful, and countless friends who stepped in to help us move things, store stuff, put things back together and watch Lilly during this move. Moving is never fun, but it can be smooth, and our move was smooth thanks to our amazing friends. We love you all so much!
After our move, we needed a little break! Plus we needed to pick up Maggie Moo from Aunt Becky's house :-) That was a perfect excuse to go to Oak Island again! Our friend has a beach house there that we rented for two nights so we could just step away from the new house and stop thinking about the bare walls and boxes!
It was the perfect weekend! We took Lilly down to the beach to play in the sand and enjoy the ocean. There was another little girl about Lilly's age there who she played with a little bit. Lilly is still a little apprehensive about the ocean, so she stuck with the sand, but she had a good time. We also went to Marcy and John's house for dinner, which was wonderful of course!
When it was time to go, Lilly helped me clean by vacuuming the floors :-)
One of my favorite things about our new neighborhood are the impromptu playdates that happen almost daily. We are always having kids over to play or going to someone's house to play. It is obviously a lot of fun for the kids, but it's also been so amazing to get to spend more time with my girlfriends and for Darren to see his guy friends. We all just look out for each other's kids, talk, play and have a great time. Today we were at Chad and Michelle's.
Aunt Michelle was swinging with baby Kristin, Zoey and Lilly and the girls were having an amazing time. We are definitely blessed with amazing friends and Lilly will never lack in love and friendship.
These kids just have so much fun together!
Lilly loves playing at Kari and Jason's house. Lately she has been very fascinated by their small Adirondack chair and table. These are usually across the lawn on the grass, but Lilly picked each of them up and then brought them over the to patio. Then she set them up and sat down with her drink and watched the kids. So cute!
Kari and Jason watched Lilly for us one morning while we went furniture shopping. Addy was at preschool, so it was toddler time! When we came to get Lilly, she and Zoe were driving the jeep around in a circle. Neither of them know how to drive it well, so Jason turned the wheel so it would just go in a circle and they could "drive" safely. Look out Thelma and Louise!
Lauren came to stay the night with us one night and we had a blast! After playing at home for a while we went to a hot dog and smores campfire at church. The girls liked walking around in the woods, but mostly they enjoyed the smores. After that it was bath time buddies! I think they had a pretty good time ;-)
Future diva???
Zoey came over to play while Kari had some dental work done and we were so excited to have her! Lilly was over the moon excited to have her friend over and wanted to show her everything in her playroom. After the girls picked their dress up clothes and took care of their babies, they wanted to play with stickers. They both sat down and were so intense creating their masterpieces I had to snap a picture.
I was starting to feel bad about not taking Lilly anywhere "just for her" over track out, especially since we didn't make our annual trip to the zoo, so I wanted to take her someplace special. I remembered I had a groupon for Bounce U, so I asked Kari if she wanted to take the girls. I had never been there before, but other friends had raved about how wonderful it is. I was not disappointed!
First, we went to preschool bounce, so only kids 5 and under were allowed. Second, there were only 7 kids total for the first hour, 3 of them were Lilly, Addy, and Zoey and 2 were our friend Margo's boys who are very sweet and well behaved. I was very glad for this because it meant that Lilly and Zoey could pretty much try everything by themselves without us worrying about them getting knocked over (and without us having to climb in after them!).
I was also so excited to Zoey and Addy were there because sometimes Lilly is a bit timid about certain things she has not tried before, so she was able to see Zoey and Addy try them and then she went for it! Some of the pictures are a bit blurry, but I included them because it reminds me of the fun Lilly was having and how she never stopped moving!
I was very nervous about letting her climb the tall slide at first and I wasn't sure she would even do it, but she did it over and over again! There was only one small incident where she lost her footing and fell a little, but after a few tears, she got right back up!
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Here are all of the girls climbing up the big slide! They look so tiny!
I was working at the theater one night and this is the text I got from Darren :-) I love that they have so much fun together. There is nothing like Daddy/daughter time!
We are still working on potty training. Clearly it's not going exactly as we expected...
Grandma bought Lilly a princess karaoke machine for her birthday and one of the features is that you can plug in your mp3 player and sing along to any song you want. Lilly asked me to put on Frozen and then proceeded to sing Let It Go :-) I love how much she loves to sing! She has gotten so much better. Maybe I am biased, but I think she sounds pretty darn good for a 2 year old!
To celebrate Halloween a little early, we took "the crew" to the Haunted Trail in Fuquay. Parking was crazy and there were a TON of people there, but after about 15 minutes it was our turn to go through. I wasn't sure what to expect, but it wasn't scary at all. There were teenagers in costume throughout the trail handing out candy and greeting the kids. We managed to snag a group photo of all 10 kids. This is the best one I have :-)
I have started working out again, and though I usually do it upstairs alone, some days I need to improvise and workout while I have Lilly. This morning I set up my DVD on my laptop so Lilly could watch a show while I worked out. Apparently Jillian Michaels was a lot more interesting than Tinkerbelle because Lilly wanted to try to workout with Mommy. This isn't a great picture, but she is trying to stand on one foot and kick her leg out :-) You get the idea!
While the guys were putting together the swing set, Kari, Maribeth and I hung out with the kids in the backyard. Ryley started doing somersaults and Lilly and Zoey wanted to join in! I was cracking up watching them try to do this! I have never seen Lilly do this before, so I thought it was hilarious.
Lilly loves stickers, so we have a lot of stickers in her playroom. One of the sticker books is a giant book with huge stickers. Apparently Lilly got into them and decided they would make a great face mask??
This is a shot of Lilly's first big "boo boo" :-( I was at choir practice and Lilly was playing outside the kids while Darren watched her. She was running down the driveway and lost her footing and scraped her nose :-( Darren did an awesome job of taking care of Lilly (with a little help from Kari) and she was fine. I am actually glad I wasn't there because I might have cried and made it worse for Lilly! Her nose is completely healed, but it definitely looked like she had painted a Rudolph nose on herself for a week or so.
Darren usually does bath time with Lilly, so when I do bath time, it's very special to me. I rarely get to see Lilly in that environment. After her bath we had some Mommy/Lilly selfie fun! Lilly was cracking up at herself in the mirror! I took about 25 pictures, but these are two of my favorites.
That night Lilly asked me for an "Elsa" braid when I was combing her hair. Kari is awesome at braids and does them for the other girls sometimes, but Lilly doesn't really have enough hair to french braid (nor do I have the skill!), so this is what we came up with. It ended up looking a bit more like a rat tail than anything else, but it was super cute at the same time :-)
While we were playing in the Priest's backyard, the kids wanted to see the kids next door who were playing in their backyard, however they were behind a fence. It didn't take long for them to realize that because of the hill, there is a foot tall gap under the fence so they could see each other! They all lined up and laid down to talk to Carlisle and the other kids nextdoor :-)
Lilly's preschool hosts a Halloween Hoe Down every year. It is open to the public so I invited Kari to come with Addy and Zoey. Lilly was VERY excited to put on her Jessie the cowgirl costume!
Lilly's teachers were also dressed up as cowgirls, so that was very special. This is Lilly posing with her lead teacher, Rainy. We have been so blessed to have Rainy because she is the perfect combination of structure and fun for Lilly :-)
We met up with Lauren at the Hoe Down as well and took a moment to get a picture of all of the girls together. It was a beautiful day!
I tried to get a picture of Lilly and I, though the shadows got in the way a little. I had a great time with my little girl!
We were waiting in line for the hayride and I asked the girls to hold hands so I could keep an eye on them while Kari took Addy to the bathroom. When she came back they were still holding hands :-)
Later that day we went to Ryley's 3rd birthday party. The kids were in for an amazing surprise when Elsa came to the party! She sat and read a story with the kids first. I was amazed how attentive they all were. Lilly was completely transfixed.
After that she played a game of "Elsa Says". The kids did an awesome job of doing all of the movements with her, but they definitely did not get the idea that they weren't supposed to do it unless "Elsa Says." It was so cute to watch!
Elsa then posed for pictures with everyone! I know people can stand in line for hours at Disney to get their picture with Elsa, so we were very thankful to get to meet her :-) Lilly LOVED her!
Darren had the good camera out again, so he was able to get some adorable portraits of the kids. I don't know why, but I love this picture of Lilly eating an apple.
Lilly had a blast climbing the ladder and going down the slide over and over again. The other kids got involved too and we had a system of parents in place to help them since the ladder is very steep and the slide very fast. It's great to have friends who have kids the same age so we are all there for each other and our kids can grow up together :-)
Pure joy!
I know it looks like Lilly is putting Zoey in a choke hold, but she is giving her a hug! How cute are these two? Sometimes in order to get Lilly to do something I "bribe" her by saying she will get to see Zoey if... It works like a charm!
The kids also enjoyed Chad and Michelle's bounce house at the party. Darren caught Lilly in mid jump!
Kari and Jason had a BBQ on Sunday and one of the moms brought bubbles for the kids to play with. It was such a sweet idea except that some of the kids struggled to hold on to the bubbles and most of them ended up spilling everywhere!
It was also funny because Lilly insisted on wearing her church clothes all day. She wanted to wear her dress, tights and dress shoes (even her name tag sticker) to the BBQ, so I just let her. I pick my battles with Lilly. If it's not going to harm her or anyone else and it's not that big of a deal, it's not worth a fight. All she wanted was to wear a dress and keep her sticker on - why not! :-) She rarely gets to wear dresses and she loves them, so I caved.
We went to Michelle and Chad's house for dinner before trick-or-treating around our new neighborhood. Dinner was delicious, but it was also somewhat hectic with all of the kids and adults there! The kids all sat around the dining room table to eat. I think Lilly ate more ketchup than anything else, but what are you gonna do?
After dinner we got all of the kids in their costumes and started snapping pictures!
My sweet little girl :-)
Lilly and Zoey
Zoey, Addie, Lilly and Lauren
We ended up with 12 kids in our group. Here are 10 of them. Ryan, Kristin, Allie, Ryan, Zoey, Addy, Lilly, Lauren, Ryley and Grace. We later met up with Maddox and Waverly as well. It was nice to have so many kids, but it also made trick-or-treating a little hectic!
Here is a shot of some of our mob waiting for their candy :-) They were all very polite and sweet but it was hard getting them all to the door and back without lots of bumping around! I worried for the little ones a bit. Luckily Lilly didn't mind waiting while some of the kids went up first. She just waited until it was her turn. I was so proud of her for saying "trick-or-treat" and "thank you" almost every time, and she almost always left saying, "Happy Halloweeeeeen" and she would almost sing the last syllable. It was adorable!
As we got further into the neighborhood, we started to break into smaller clumps of kids and that was a lot nicer. I think it made it better for everyone. We still walked in a group overall, but kids went up to the houses in smaller groups to avoid the cluster.
Since Lilly nursed until she was 2, she was no stranger to the female anatomy, and she knows the words "boobs" and "nipples". She has never used these in reference to her own body, only mine. When we were getting her ready for the Halloween party we were going to, Lilly stood up on her changing table with her shirt off and pointed to her chest and said "boobies!" Then she touched her nipples and said, "nipples!" but she moved her hands around almost like Austin Powers (or Darren being silly style). We tried to get a video of it, but she was being different when she knew we were laughing and had the camera rolling. Forgive the last two things she says on this video. It sounds like she is saying an offensive word, but she is just saying "nipples" in typical toddler-I-say-things-wrong-sometimes-and-really-embarrass-my-parents mode.
Lilly Quotes:
At the dinner table:
Me: Lilly are you going to finish your dinner?
Lilly: (putting her head in her hands and sighing). I'm exhausted!
(I wonder where she got this one from! Lol!)
When I told Lilly bath time was over she started waving at all of her bath toys and said:
Lilly: Ok! Bye toys! You have to stay here. See you later!
Sometimes when Lilly is being clumsy, Darren will say, "careful drunky!"
Yesterday while Lilly was spinning around and dancing, she bumped into the banister and said, "careful drunky!" Clearly we need to be more careful about what we say!
There are moments as a parent that you look back on and wish you had done something different. For me, most of these moments involve getting frustrated with Lilly for something that is not very important. For example, the other day I was trying to get Lilly dressed and do her hair. Getting Lilly to sit still for anything is very difficult, but she has little to no interested in getting her hair done lately, so it's normally a battle. I have learned to let this go, so Lilly rarely has her hair done unless she asks me to, because that is the only time she will sit still. So she asked me for an "Elsa braid" so we sat down to braid her hair. The entire time I was doing her hair, she was moving back and forth grabbing at things and turning her head to look at things and I continually asked her to hold still. Finally I yelled for her to stop moving as I got the last loop around her hair. She turned and looked right at me and said, "Sorry Mommy." This was a moment when I felt about 2 inches tall. :-( I had yelled at her for what? Being curious about the things around her and wanting to see and touch them? And instead of her getting upset or sassy with me for yelling, she apologized to me. I immediately pulled her into a hug and told her that I was the one who was sorry because I should not have yelled. It wasn't nice and I didn't mean it. She then said, "Sorry Mommy. It's ok. It's no big deal." My two year old taught me a lesson in kindness and forgiveness.
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