Merry Christmas!!!

Christmas Stockings

So I am not the best seamstress at all, but the past few years we have needed Christmas Stockings and I just couldn't find ones I liked for cheap enough.  We've had these $1.00 stockings with our names puffy painted on by yours truly for tooooo long.  So when I saw this challenge on UCreate, I thought, hey why not give it a shot?  I'm so very proud of myself, here's how they turned out:

I just followed this tutorial pretty much, except I didn't do it quite so "scrappy" and just went straight across.  I used red velvet for the back and the top, then I used a freezer paper stencil to put the names on.  I also added little jingle bells across the top.  They aren't perfect, but I like them!

Photoshop actions

Okay, so I may be really behind the times, but I am just playing with actions in photoshop.  They are amazing!  I got some free ones from here and they are so so fun.  A couple examples:

Family Pictures

We had some family pictures taken today and I just love how they turned out!  This is such a beautiful time of year, we just went to a park a few minutes from our house and the fall leaves and trees made for such a wonderful background!  My next door neighbor and I decided to do a swap this year, she took ours for us and I'll take some of her family.  Now I just have to decide which one I like best!  Thanks Diana!!!

Happy Halloween!

Pumpkin Patch time.

We went to our local pumpkin patch this week and let the girls pick out their own pumpkins. 

Marisa searched and searched for the perfect one.

Megan picked up a lot of rocks and didn't care too much about the pumpkins.  

Megan and her dada...

Megan's pumpkin:

We finally narrowed it down to these four pumpkins.

and Marisa got a ride back to buy them...

It took some convincing but I finally got Marisa to sit in the tractor.  Megan wouldn't even go near it which was pretty surprising to us.  She's usually the dare devil in the family. 

My cute girls.

Marisa loved pushing around her little wheelbarrow.

They had a children's corn maze too.  Marisa led us all the way through it!  She did great considering most of the turns only had one way to go :)

When we got home we started the carving.  We baked the pumpkin seeds and Marisa kept telling me they tasted like popcorn.  I have been surprised by how much she is loving Halloween this year.  And we haven't even been trick or treating yet!

The final product:

The toddler bed experiment.

We were having a rough time getting Megan to go to bed at night and so we decided to try taking off the front of her crib to see if she'd throw less of a fit.  She LOVED it!  She was so excited to get a big girl bed like Marisa, so we thought we had made the right decision.

Um, yeah this was after a nap.  The room was clean AND she had clothes on when I left her in there.  After a few weeks of this she is now back in a crib.  Sorry Meg, you had your chance!  Maybe next year :)

Preschool!

Marisa started preschool and she LOVES it.  She comes home with a little craft every day and puts it up on her bulletin board in her room, and she tells me all about the games they play and all the stuff she is learning.  I think it has been so good for her!  Plus it has been great for me to have some time just to hang out with Megan.

Girly girls

I looked around our basement the other day and realized I really have a couple of girly girls.  Dress up clothes and barbies covered the entire floor!  This happens on an almost daily basis:

Happy Birthday Megan!

Megan turned 2 this month!!  We had our fun next door neighbors over for cake and ice cream to celebrate.

Megan was afraid of the candles once they were lit, so dada helped her blow them out.

She sure liked eating the cake though!!

I can't believe my baby is two years old!  She is talking so much more and starting to act like a little girl instead of a baby.  This is a really fun age but it makes her mom sad that she's growing up so fast!

I found this rainbow cake online and copied it, it turned out super cute. She loved the skittles on top the best.  It was fun to cut into it and see all the bright colors.

Family Vacation

We went on our first family vacation in years and it was so much fun!  We took a trip down to Southern California and packed in the fun. 

Our first stop: THE BEACH!

We've been reading this Arthur book (over and over again) about Arthur's family vacation and at the end of the book they go to the beach, so Marisa couldn't wait to go there herself. 

 They were not dissapointed!

We played in the sand...

and in the waves...

They loved the beach!

Our next stop: Disneyland!  I grew up in Long Beach, so my family went to Disneyland a lot.  This vacation was probably more for me than anyone else!  I had so much fun showing my girls all the rides I loved when I was a little girl, it was a blast! 

The teacups

The rockets - Marisa's favorite ride although it doesn't look like it from the picture.  We rode these 4 times she loved it so much!

Dumbo

Marisa and Megan love Mickey Mouse Clubhouse, so of course we had to meet all the characters.  It was so fun to see how excited they were to see Mickey and Pluto (Megan's favorite) in person!  We warned them ahead of time that Mickey is really tall in real life so they wouldn't be too afraid and it worked!

Tiana

Ariel - Marisa LOVED Ariel.  She gave her a big hug and asked her a bunch of questions and Marisa just beamed through the whole thing!

Cinderella

Giving Donald a hug

Chip and Dale

Megan LOVED Pluto

and of course Mickey Mouse!

I love Disneyland!

We also went to the San Diego Zoo...

Megan loved the monkeys, I'm not surprised because she is our little monkey climbing around the house all the time!

Of course we had to hit a baseball game.  The Detroit Tigers have been Gary's favorite team since he was a kid (passed down from his Dad) and they just happened to be in town playing the Angel's that week.  The girls loved seeing a baseball game in person, they are so used to seeing it on the TV all the time :)  and the Tiger's won so that just topped it all off!

Overall it was a great vacation.  The girls had so much fun and so did we!  We were all totally exhausted when we got back though and really needed a vaction after our vacation. 

(notice the Arthur book)

I think the best part was spending the WHOLE week with Gary and the girls.  They are such good friends already and I love them so much! 

I can't wait to go again next year!  Ha ha just kidding Gary ;)