A Bed Time Tale

This is the tale of 2 little girls and their bedtime adventures. It all began about a week ago when our baby monitor started making some really weird noises during morning nap one day. When I went to check, this is what I found:

Emma sitting on the changing table!

I quickly put her back in bed, told her this was not allowed, and left her to take her nap. She did go to sleep, but managed to get back on the changing table during her afternoon nap. So, since she was using the bumper in her crib as the step to get out, I immediately removed it. That seemed to do the trick. No more escaping... right?

Wrong! Yesterday, I heard a crash and loud cries. When I entered the room, the pad from the changing table was laying on the floor and Emma was standing there screaming. We began to rock, I began to wonder what to do next, and Ella began to climb out of her crib. OH NO!!! Now what? They can't be big enough for toddler beds, are they? I'm not ready for them to be big enough for toddler beds. That's for sure! But... for safety sake... we sure don't want someone to get hurt... so....

Here we are converting the cribs into toddler beds.

FREEDOM!!! They immediately went and climbed into each other's beds. The room must look different from sister's bed because neither wanted to check out their own beds.

Emma climbing into Ella's bed.

Ella climbing into Emma's bed.

Time to play! We had two little monkeys jumping on each other's beds. This was so much fun. They climbed in and out, jumped, sat, jumped, ran around the room, jumped, climbed in and out, jumped, laughed, jumped, laid down, and did I mention jumped.

They had so much fun for nearly an hour. By then it was time for their afternoon nap. They were so tired from all that jumping, they laid right down in their beds. I erroneously thought, "Wow, this is going to be easier than I thought." So, we left them to sleep. However, they were not as interested in sleep as we thought. After a while we peeked in and found this:

Not sure where they found the yarn, but they were knotted together with it.

Then later, after that had been taken care of:

Being able to get out of bed is great fun!

So, I helped them clean up their mess, put them in bed and sat on the floor in their room until:

Emma finally gave in.

Shortly thereafter, Ella did too.

Who knows what tonight will bring when it's bedtime? Hopefully, we will be able to make this transition fairly smoothly, but I'm not counting on it.

Cuteness between Thanksgiving and Christmas

I'm not quite ready to tackle a Christmas blog entry yet, so while I was looking through our pictures I found some really cute ones that happened between the holidays to share.

Above: Ella, Below: Emma

Emma rocking

Ella with static hair

A Christmas Treat

Our Christmas Tree

(Yes, we put a fence around our tree, and it was a great success. The girls could just barley reach a couple of the branches, but all our ornaments and presents were safe without having to only decorate the top half of the tree.)

Belated Happy Thanksgiving

We had a very busy holiday season, and as a result, I am seriously behind in updating our blog. I will try to catch up, but it might take me a little bit. Here is a brief recap of our Thanksgiving.

We visited Bryan's grandparents over Thanksgiving this year. We first traveled to Graham, TX to visit Nana and Papa. We enjoyed spending time with aunts, uncles, cousins, and grandparents while we were there. I even had my first experience with Black Friday sales at Walmart with Bryan's aunt. That was an experience! I did get some great deals though.

Emma managed to pull many things, including this artificial fern into her bed during her nap on our first full day there. I love the expression on her face.

Our girls had a great time roaming around outside. They love walking on all the different textures, especially in the piles of leaves. (Emma has on the brown shirt, and Ella is wearing the pink.)

Playing on the stairs with Cousin Price

Ella helping sweep up their mess.

They both climbed in the box full of plastic balls and had the best time throwing them out.

On Friday, we drove to Quitaque to visit Mamaw and Papaw. Another wonderful family gathering!

Mamaw, Cousin Berkley, Ella and Emma

Thanksgiving Dinner

Playing with cousins

We had much to be thankful for this year: our wonderful girls, family, and friends, along with many other blessings, the greatest of which is our heavenly Father who watches over us and takes such good care of us. We hope you had a happy Thanksgiving and took a few moments to think about all the blessings in your lives as well.

Miscellaneous Cute Pics.

Sweet Kisses

(Above: Emma, Below: Ella)

Wearing Mommy's Slippers

They each put one on their right foot and walk all around the house.

Happy Halloween 2009

We had a very happy Halloween! Ella and Emma were the cutest little giraffes, and Mommy and Daddy made pretty good zoo keepers/ safari leaders too. We went to the fall festival at our church on Friday night. They had some inflatable games and carnival type games for the kids to play. The girls really loved bouncing in the bounce house with Daddy. They will walk/crawl around and jump whenever they had something to hold on to (usually Daddy).

Ella

Emma

We both won a prize for getting the bean bag in Sylvester's mouth.

(Ella above, Emma below)

On Halloween, we spent a little while at a pumpkin patch with Grammie and Grandy. Unfortunately there weren't very many pumpkins left, but Emma and Ella still had a great time running around amongst the hay bales. They didn't want to leave.

Our little "punkins"

Ella

Emma

After we got home, we played with bubbles in the back yard for a little bit.

Halloween night we went Trick or Treating at the grandparents' houses.

"Trick or Treat, Grammie and Grandy"

Emma helping Grandy play the organ.

Daddy and Girls

Mommy and Girls

Emma, "Hey, Grammie, that's my candy!"

Ella

Helping ourselves to Memaw and Datt's candy basket.

Yummy raisins, Memaw

We had a fun time and the girls did a great job of keeping their costumes on. They still play with them from time to time.

God Answers Prayers...

In Mysterious Ways!!!

Well, our housing saga continues. We have been praying (a lot) about selling our house and moving in with my parents while we search for a new house. God has taken care of our homelessness. We no longer have a contract on our house. The potential buyers backed out. So, it looks like we will get to be in our home for the holidays after all. This will be a very good thing. One less thing to stress about over the holidays, not having to move in with family (although we love my parents and I'm sure we would have gotten along as well as possible), not having to get a storage unit right now, etc.

We have decided to wait until after the holidays to put our house back on the market. From what we have seen, our perfect new house is either not for sale right now, not in our price range, or just not showing up in all our searches. So, while we will continue our search for our new home, we will be able to enjoy the holidays without the worry of having to keep our house spotless for potential buyers. We plan to put our house back on the market either in January or when we find a house to move into, whichever comes first.

Your continued prayers for our family as we will eventually be selling our home and buying a new one would be appreciated.