Fall Is In The Air

Well, it actually still feels a lot like summer here. The high today is 95 but we have had a few fall-like days. But it is the end of September and fall activities are in full swing around here. We have settled into our back to school routine. The girls love their new school. It makes me so happy that they enjoy being there and love their friends and teachers. They are learning SO much. This past week, they brought home two little books that they had made and "read" them to us. One was about colors and one was an "I can" book (I can swim, I can run, etc.). They had written most of the words in the books (without tracing) and then read the words to us. I'm so happy that they are learning so much and that they love to learn (for now anyway!). They are also taking gymnastics this year. They love jumping on the trampolines, swinging on the bars, and walking across the balance beam. For some reason, I haven't taken a single picture of this yet but will soon.

We have made two trips to Fayetteville for Razorback games. We went to the first game during Labor Day weekend and then the Alabama game last weekend. Although our beloved Hogs are a huge disappointment this season, we still had a blast both weekends. For the first game, the girls went with Ben and I to the game. This was actually their first Razorback game to go to with us. They have been to one other one with Mom and Dad and a few tailgates but they have never actually sat in our seats with us before. They loved it. Their favorite parts were the fireworks when we scored a touchdown (thank goodness we didn't take them to the Alabama game or they really would have been disappointed) and the cotton candy. They did great at the game but Ben and I didn't get to see a whole lot of it, because they asked a MILLION questions the whole time. They wanted to know every little detail of what was going on around them which is no different than how they are all the time, but there were lots of things going on for them to ask about and it's really hard to concentrate on watching the game when they are CONSTANTLY talking to you. : ) We decided not to take them to the next game which was a good decision since it ended up being a terrible game and raining the whole time. Mom and Dad came up and watched them while we went to the game. Like I said, the game was terrible but we had a lot of fun tailgating and spending time with our friends without the kiddos.

Grammy and Pawpaw came to visit one weekend and we put them to work. : ) Grammy made some super cute curtains for the girls' rooms and she recovered our dining room chairs for us.  One major project that we have been working on is decorating our downstairs (entryway, living room, breakfast nook, dining room). It looks really good and is finished for the most part so I am going to take some pictures and devote a whole post to it. I think I have been saying for a year that I was going to do a post about our "new" house, but I promise that is coming. I have also been back to the Dr. a couple of times so I will post about that too but in a separate post. Here are some pics from September.........



playing Baggo at the tailgate

 

Loved seeing the Chic-Fil-A cow at the game. Macy wouldn't stop petting him.

 

This giant blow up Hog was at Mom and Dad's hotel

Macy is pretending she is camping at Cabella's

Swimming at the hotel

Ava. So grown up.

We met up with the whole Cockrell clan for brunch on Sunday. This is my sister in law Jacqueline, my cousins Sara and Amy, and Amy's two girls Ellia and Marys. As you can tell from Ellia and Macy's faces, we were looking right into the sun. Not the best picture but at least it captured that we were all together.

This was at home yesterday. Ava asked me to "send our family of a picture of her acting like a cheerleader."

Macy eating some of Eddie's delicious ribs at the Nalley house last night. Yummy!

4th of July and Grandparents Galore

We had a fun 4th of July this year with neighborhood friends. On the 3rd, we went over to some friends' house for dinner and had a small, informal neighborhood gathering in their front yard. The kids played in a blow up pool and rode bikes while the adults ate, drank, and visited. Fun times! On the 4th, we went to the pool, cooked out burgers, and then met up with friends again for a fireworks show. The fireworks didn't start until 10:15! The girls had been so excited about the fireworks all day but by 10:15 they were pretty cranky and tired, so I don't think they cared that much about them.


Getting ready for fireworks in their red, white, and blue.



The next day I met my parents half way between Monticello and Frisco so that the girls could spend a few days with Gigi and Papa without me. Mom likes to have them to herself for a few days every summer. It gave Ben and I the weekend to get some things done around the house without the kiddos. We have been working on finishing up Ava and Macy's bedrooms so that we can get started on the nursery. I headed to Monticello on Monday and spent a few days then took the girls to Little Rock later in the week so they could spend time with Grammy and Pawpaw. They had so much fun with all of their grandparents. Both sets kept the girls super busy and spoiled rotten. Just in a little over a week, the girls went swimming, went to 2 movies, went to the library, got manis and pedis, visited all of their great grandparents,  played on the slip n slide, went to a children's museum, went shopping (to buy toys for themselves), played with huge water rockets, and ate an endless amount of popsicles and ice cream.

Playing the race car game at Ray's (their favorite restaurant in Monticello)

They loved playing in the back of my dad's truck. They would use his tools and say they were fixing things. They loved these bungee cords that have these little hooks on the end. The funny part was that they called them "hookers," so one night when I called to check on them, they told me they were having fun playing with Papa's hookers. Hmm......interesting.



Jumping off the diving board! No more floaties for these girls!

Loved playing with Nana's dog, Sandy.

Even though Macy is making a face, I love this picture. To me, this picture tells it all. True personalities. I am going to try to devote a blog post to Macy and her silliness and crazy facial expressions.



Then, as if that isn't enough grandparent time, Mom came to Frisco the next week! I had 3 days of continuing ed workshops (ugh!) so Mom came here and kept the girls for me. Again, they went to movies, swimming, restaurants, the splashpad, and GattiTown. I mean seriously..... spoiled rotten and loving every minute of it! I think next week will be grandparent detox for us. Healthy eating and staying at home! : )

In baby news, I had my 16 week appointment a couple of weeks ago and everything looked great. They weighed me, took my blood pressure, listened to the heartbeat, and sent me on my way. My appointment was the fastest appointment in the history of doctor appointments! My appt. time was 10:15 and I was back in my car at 10:29! But, I didn't really have any questions or concerns and everything is going according to plan so it's all pretty quick and easy. I had only gained 3 lbs. total but not to worry I have packed on some serious weight since then. My belly has really popped out in the last week. The exciting news is that we go this Wednesday (the 25th) to find out the gender of the baby! So excited to find out!

Home Sweet Home

We are finally moved in and settled into our new house. We have been here for a couple of weeks but I am just now feeling like I have my head above water and feel somewhat settled. The bad news about that is that I start back to work tomorrow so I am sure I will get that "swamped" feeling again soon. That's okay though, because so far we are LOVING our new place and I have a feeling that I am going to really like my new job too.

We have two little trees in our front yard but they are kind of pitiful looking right now due to this extreme heat and drought. We have had 38 CONSECUTIVE days (and counting) of temperatures over 100 degrees. It's miserable. Yesterday we went to the pool and I thought to myself, "it feels kind of nice out here... much cooler than it has been." I checked my phone and saw that it was 99 degrees. That's bad... when 99 feels like relief. The worse part is that I don't think it is going to let up anytime soon. Anyway, enough about the weather.... back to the house. : )

I decided to wait to add pictures of the bedrooms and the playroom. We are going to paint the girls' rooms and do some things to the playroom and then I'll post those pics. We are also getting new living room furniture so I'll post that later too.

I need to say a quick thank you to all of those that helped us with the moving process. Thank you to my cousin, Lizzie, who gave up a weekend and flew to Dallas from Little Rock to entertain the girls. She came out the weekend before the move so that Ben and I could finish packing up, do our final walk-through of the house with the builder, run some last minute errands, and shop for a refrigerator without two little ones in tow. They played dress up and manicure/pedicure for hours. Lizzie was such a good sport and let Ava and Macy paint her toenails and put makeup on her. Yikes! Check out the shimmery eyeshadow all over her forehead in this pic.

One of our regular sitters, Kat, kept the girls during the closing. My friend, Stephanie, kept them on actual moving day.  And finally, my mom came a couple of days after the move and helped with unpacking and also helped entertain the girls while I unpacked and finished everything up at the house in Fort Worth. There is no way we could have made this transition so smoothly without all of our helpers so thank you to all of you!!

I am way behind on things I want to put on here. Look for upcoming posts on swim lessons, our trip to Atlanta, and Ava and Macy's second flower girl "performance" of the summer!

House Update

The house is coming along so well. I think we are getting close to being done!! The tentative completion date is July 22nd. Here are some pics that our realtor sent to us today. I just couldn't wait to share.

Brick and stone are done.





The bars on the staircase are wrought iron. That is plastic covering them. 

They installed the granite in the kitchen yesterday! I am in love with the kitchen cabinets. They are even prettier than I thought they would be.

This is a view of the dining room.

 This is the playroom. There are built-in shelves on both sides of that bench in front of the window.

So excited and ready to move in!!!

SOLD

Well, we have some exciting news to share. We have purchased a new house!! For the past year, we have looked all over the Dallas/Fort Worth metroplex trying to figure out where we wanted to buy a house. After looking in Dallas, in Fort Worth, and everywhere in between, we finally decided that Frisco felt like "home" to us. Before the girls were born, Ben and I lived in two different older homes in Little Rock.  We love the charm and character that older homes and neighborhoods have but decided that the upkeep is so difficult and that it would be nice to have lots of SPACE which you don't get with the old houses. We found a brand new neighborhood in Frisco that we love, and were able to purchase a home that is in the process of being built. In fact, when we signed our first round of papers the only thing that had been done was the plumbing. There is a model home in the neighborhood that is the same floor plan, so we knew when we saw the model that we really liked the layout. The good thing about getting in at such an early stage is that we got to pick out the cabinets, flooring, light fixtures, etc. There are sooo many details that go into building a house that I never would have thought of. Here are some pictures of the process so far:

 This is blurry but it is Ben putting the "sold" magnet on our lot on the map of the neighborhood.

This is the first picture we have. Dirt and pipes.

 The frame

 Starting to look like a house

 Windows are in

 The staircase

 This is a view of the kitchen and what will eventually be the bar which seperates the kitchen and the living room.

 SOLD!

This is all of the stuff that we picked out. Cabinets, counter tops, carpet, wood floors, etc.

 There is a really nice pond and park area across the street from our phase of the neighborhood. Here the girls are feeding the ducks at the pond.