Sister Love...

Took these pictures of the girls today and couldn't help but post them..
I'm so excited for the girls to grow up together...

So many fun memories yet to be had...

I love you so much Ellie Hope and Alexa Joy!

You are my sunshine!

Flower Girl for a day...

It was a day we had been anxiously anticipating! Our good friends Josh and Betsy got married! We were so excited for their special day and it was Ellie's first time as a flower girl! That's where the anxiousness came in. Ha! :) At two years old, we just weren't quite sure how our little princess would handle the big day. Would she walk down the aisle like she was supposed to? Or would she cause a scene to be forever remembered on the wedding video? Again, it could have gone either way and we were hoping for the former and not the latter! I was a bit hesitent because the wedding was at 2pm...exactly the time that Ellie usually goes down for a nap. It was bound to be interesting.So, what's a parent to do? Well, on the night of the rehearsal you better believe that Ellie did SEVERAL trial runs down the aisle. Above is a picture of Ellie with Daddy...holding her fake flowers to practice with. The church had these cool flower pens that doubled perfectly for a little bouquet. After about 10 times, Joel was coaching her that she needed to do it TWO more times!
Ellie was all tuckered out after all that practicing! So we let her have her cow and binky and she crashed out on our way to the rehearsal dinner!But don't you worry! She was wide awake and all ready for the big day! She even got to get her hair done by our sweet friends Meg and Sarah and she was a GEM during the hair and make-up session. ;) She sat completely still and loved every minute of it!

I thought she looked just adorable!

And then, we had to get a couple more practice runs in before the guests started arriving... The dry runs on the wedding day were a little less successful. She would run like a crazy woman down the aisle and straight up onto the platform.

Thankfully, the bride wasn't worried at all...

And Ellie ended up doing a wonderful job! Straight down the aisle just like she was supposed to! I was proud as could be. First time as a flower girl: success!

Got a quick semi-family pic before the ceremony.

Unfortunately, Alexa was sound asleep and already in the nursery!

Most of the bridesmaids were composed of our staff girls, whom our Ellie LOVES! Here she is with one of them... our other Ellie, who is just like a part of our family! Ellie adores "Miss Ellie"!

So El got to spend a lot of the day with all the girls and she just ate that up! After the wedding, Ellie still had plenty of energy left so she proceeded to tear it up on the dance floor!

As you can see...she couldn't get enough. I should try to post a couple of her dancing videos! The still shots don't do it justice. :)

Congratulations Josh and Betsy! Your wedding was a FABULOUS day and incredibly memorable for us all!

Alexa is 6 months!!!

Here I am world! Half way to my one year birthday!!! And as you can see, I'm pretty happy about that! I am loving life and growing like a weed!!!

One of the things that I have started doing more in the last month is sucking my thumb. It helps put me to sleep! I'm not too crazy about my pacifier. I usually just pull it out of my mouth. Mommy thinks I look pretty cute when I do this. At least right now... It probably won't be too cute if I'm still doing it when I'm 5. :) Grandpa McCulley also noticed that I always suck my right thumb, so he's guessing that I might be a lefty like Ellie and Mommy! We will see!

I'm also getting pretty big! At my 6 month check up I was:

26.5 inches - 77th percentile

15 lbs. 15 oz - 50th percentile

and my head was 43.5 centimeters - 75th percentile

Mommy and Daddy say that I'm a happy baby! I am still not too crazy about sleep. Why sleep when there is so much going on in the world? I think it's a waste of my time.

I'm talking a lot more these days too! I love to say "da da" and "ga ga" and things like that.

I also love to SCREAM at the top of my lungs for no apparent reason. It scares Mommy and then Ellie and I will get into screaming matches which we both think is pretty funny.

I can also sit up by myself for a minute or two at a time! I'm not quite sure how long I could actually do it, cause when I'm sitting up Ellie is usually quick to come and tackle me.

She and I have gotten to be really good friends. She's always hugging me and kissing me and sometimes sitting on me, but we're always having fun. I can't wait until I get just a little bit bigger and we can start running around together and getting into all kinds of things together!

I love being 6 months old!

Ellie at 28 months

Ah... look at that sweet innocent face! :) But don't let it fool you... there is plenty of spunk and orneriness in there! Ha!
Decided to take Ellie's 28 month pictures with three of the most precious things in Ellie's life...
her binky, blankie and her cow! If she has these three things, all is right with the world.
If Ellie ever feels tired, mad, happy, scared, pretty much any emotion... all she wants are her, yep you guessed it, BINKY, BLANKIE and COW! That poor cow has been through so much! He's probably been washed in the washer about 50 times, been on lots of car trips, in lots of states, in lots of pack and plays and cribs... You get the picture. It's going to be a very tough day when the cow goes bye bye! We're hoping that his tail doesn't fall off. For over a year, that's been Ellie's favorite thing to do... Rub her nose with the cow's tail!
Much to Ellie's dismay, it isn't going to be long before we take binky away...
I just haven't had the heart to do it yet.
Soon... I think :/
I need to psych MYSELF up for it!
It will be a tough day... or tough few days...
But our little Ellie is growing up and doing so many fun and exciting things...
As of today, she knows all of her colors, her numbers, and many of her letters!
She can write an E, which she's pretty proud of.
She can spell H-O-T, say her address, spell her name.
She announced yesterday that Alexa was sucking her "RIGHT" thumb and sure enough, she can differentiate which hand is her "RIGHT" hand and which one is her "LEFT" hand!
And it's pretty definitive that she is going to be a LEFTY like her Momma! Yay!!! :)
She is speaking in much more complete sentences these days, too.
Last week she said, "come with us please, Daddy?"
LOVE this girl! She brings utter JOY to life! Not a dull moment around here!

Fun with Grandma and Grandpa McCulley!

That's right! Grandma and Grandpa McCulley came for a visit, so Ellie decided to document the occasion. :)
She was SO excited, she decided to do a little dancing... in Mommy's heels. :)

Alexa was pretty pumped, too!

At the end of a long day of playing! Whew! We have a lot of fun when the Grandparents are here!

Alexa got some good bonding time with Grandpa Richard! Don't you think they kinda look alike? :)

You're never too young to read a handyman book...

And the girls got all dressed up in their pink to get a picture taken with Grandma! I thought this one turned out really cute!

It's a new Christmas tradition for Grandma to buy the girls Christma pj's... so here was our attempt at a photo shoot after bathtime and before bed!

This is fun, isn't it Alexa? :)

Thank you Grandma and Grandpa for making the trip to see us! We had so much fun!!!

9 Years!

and SO much to be GRATEFUL for!
November 10, 2001 I married my best friend...
What an incredible ride it has been...
Thank you Lord for my incredible husband and beautiful little girls...
I am BLESSED!

Fall Leaves...

It's that time of year again! All the leaves in our yard have fallen, thanks to a few days of pretty strong winds... This year, I was excited to get out and rake the leaves because I thought it would be a fun family activity!
And it was! Yet, not exactly what I had envisioned... I thought Ellie would be SO excited to get out in the leaves and play and jump in the piles... I did catch a few pictures of her playing in them, but it didn't turn out exactly like I had imagined... :) You know how that goes...

There were actually several times that I would encourage her to go out in the leaves and play and she would say "No! I'm scared!" ... which if you know Ellie, that is not like her at all! She is little miss "no fear"! But, of course, since I WANTED her to do it, she wasn't so keen on the idea. :)

After about an hour, we decided to recruit the help of DAD... Below is Ellie coaxing him out of his office with a "window kiss"... Let's just say she has him wrapped around her cute little pudgy fingers... Both of the girls do! :)

This pic of Ellie was definitely my favorite!

Yep, waist high in this "HUGE" pile of leaves. "HUGE" is Ellie's word of the month... Everything these days is "HUGE"! :)

About half way through, little sister decided to wake up from her nap and come out and join us, too! So fun to be able to put Alexa in her Bumbo chair and have her oversee our whole project!

She was very curious and interested in the leaves. I just had to make sure she only studied them and didn't put them in her mouth! Ha!

The picture below pretty much sums up Alexa's sweet little personality of late and our day as a whole! We had a blast raking the leaves, playing outside on a picture perfect fall day and then ending the day with popcorn and a WILDCAT victory over Texas!

Thank you Lord for beautiful days and fun memories!

Alexa at 5 months!

That's right!!! Alexa Joy is 5 months old! And she seems to be very happy about it! :)
Our little pumpkin just gets sweeter by the day... I could just stare at this little face for hours... and she would just love that, too! This little girl cannot get enough face time. She LOVES to be held and cuddled and paid attention to. It just breaks my heart when I've spent time with her and then lay her down and walk away cause I have something I need to do. It's like she majorly gets her little feelings hurt and just starts sobbing... She's definitely my little feeler - while I'm pretty certain Ellie is gonna be our thinker! :)

We didn't have the most successful 5 month photo shoot, so I have to admit that we had to take a few of the pictures the next day. The top two pics are from our second go round! The pics in her sweet little monkey outfit are from her actual 5 month birthday! She was either sleeping, smiling but not looking at the camera, or looking at me with her serious/contemplative face! :)

I just adore this little beauty and I'm so thankful for 5 months with our Alexa Joy!

Here is what she is up to these days!

• SMILING has become her favorite! And when she smiles, her eyes disappear cause she smiles so big! I love it!
• Unfortunately, she is not the biggest sleeper in the world! She's still waking up one or two (or last night...multiple!) times a night! And she's still wide awake and ready for her day by 6:45am!
• She's loving tummy time a lot more, as well as her jumparoo! She giggles and smiles and kicks her little chubby legs. It's adorable to watch...
• She has also started "talking" a lot! Mostly in the form of raspberries and drooling all over the place while she does it!
• I'm wondering if she's getting ready to cut teeth cause she has gotten super drooly and she gnaws on her fist all of the time now... She is also our resident thumb sucker and it's so cute!
• She continues to be very laid back and go with the flow... I love it!

Our precious baby will not be a baby for long... Please don't grow up too soon sweet Alexa! Mama is loving every day with you!