Catching up...again.

Last Thursday when I was taking Haylee to school it was so foggy.

I have never experienced anything like it. I felt claustrophobic because I couldn't see anyone or anything until it was right infront of me. Weird. That was Haylee's last day of school for the semester. She is doing so well. She has learned her letters and numbers and has come so far in just 4 months. Every morning she'll ask what date it is and I tell her and then she finds the correct number on the Christmas countdown. She is so smart.

Haylee is such a crack up. Yesterday she was looking at the Walmart ad and circling the things she likes- IPad 2, Christmas Wrap, Penguin Socks, Dolphin Tale DVD etc. I always laugh when I see an ad Haylee has looked at and I see all of her little circles. She even showed Natalee the M&M's that were on sale and circled those for her. Then when I was wrapping, Haylee decided to wrap too. She wrapped several of her toys and put tags on them that say "To Haylee From Haylee" and used about a whole roll of tape. Then she put one of the presents under the tree! She always has me laughing.

Natalee continues to be a little monkey. Recently she climbed the latter and was sitting on the top bunk in Haylee's room. Needless to say the latter was removed real quick. In the morning when she wakes up I hear "Mama!!!" and then I hear her calling for her "bebe". She sounds so cute when she says "bebe" (her binkie) and she is always saying "thank you." Everytime I give her something and even when she gives me something she always says "thank you." She is quite the polite little girl....and ornery as ever!

On Saturday I picked up Charlotte's brother/sister. I've been turtle sitting till she goes to her new home this weekend. These little turtles are just so cute, but Charlotte doesn't play well with others. She tried biting her sibling.

Sunday Josh and I got to go out to celebrate our 10 year Anniversary, of dating that is. We met on December 9th 2001 at Superstition Springs Mall in the theatre. He was going with his friend and I was going with mine (our friends were dating). We have been together ever since! Josh is a wonderful husband and father. I love him so much and I am so thankful for him. He's a hard worker and he is so patient with me and the girls. He's the best! We went to Outback and then to see "Jack and Jill". The previews looked hilarious but the movie was kinda dumb. Oh well, we enjoyed our time out. Thanks Mom for watching our girlies!

Dad's Christmas Cheer

Thanks to my friends in Iowa, my Dad has some Christmas cheer straight from us!

I am so thankful they took the time to drive to the cemetary where my Dad is placed and for decorating his "space" with the stuff I send. Thank you so much Sam and Lance!

Christmas Cards 2011

Coming to a mailbox near you!

Lightin' up the street!

Alright, drum roll please..............................

This is Josh's pride and joy. His beautiful Christmas decorations!!!!

Now if only I could figure out a way to take a picture that would do justice. Our house is so bright, it catches your eye as you're driving down the main street.

We added one Santa blowup this year and everything else pretty much remains the same from last year!

Good job hunny! :)

My Family

Grandma with all 6 of her Grandkids!

Haylee 4, Danielle 16, Timmy 13, Hannah 5,

Samantha 17 and Natalee 19 months.

My entire family.

We were long overdue for a family picture. The last picture we had taken was probably 7 years ago or longer.

Danielle, Timmy, Samantha

Poor Timmy is the only Grandson! Looks like we may need to have 1 more :)

Silly N Update

Just a quick update on our sweet baby Natalee. She is now 19 months old and still a wild child. I am very happy to report, that after turning her crib around a couple weeks ago, she no longer jumps out of the crib anymore. I know it's just a matter of time till she figures it out but I'll take the delay because I am not ready to convert her crib to a toddler bed.

I have decided to attempt potty training once the holidays are over and see how she does. She knows when she pees and says pee and poop so she seems more ready than Haylee was when I started training her at 2. Today she was holding herself saying "pee" and usually when I stand up she'll run to the changer but today she ran to the bathroom and wanted to sit on the potty. She didn't do anything but I think she might be ready.

Through all the sickness in our house Natalee has stayed healthy which I am so thankful for. I often wonder if her ears bother her because she plays with her one ear often but my kids usually run a high fever when they have an ear infection. I just have a feeling she'll get a fever Friday when we leave to go up north for the polar express.

So far she is doing awesome with the Christmas tree and all of the other Christmas decorations, except for the little donkey ornament that is! There are certain toys she likes to play with and she pretty much leaves the tree alone.


She is obsessed with light switches. It's funny because I remember doing a post about Haylee and her addiction with switches when she was the exact same age. She is so happy if I put a step stool under a set of switches and just let her flip them on and off.

This morning when she woke up I heard "mama" followed by "mimi" (she was obviously playing with her Minnie) and then she started calling for her "bebe" which is her binkie and that fell on the floor. Between the "mimi" and the "bebe" and the "bobo" I just have to laugh. She cracks me up.

Great Deals = Awesome Night!

It's been a long time since I've been able to post really awesome deals I've gotten, so tonight I had to post. The deals lately haven't been anything blog worthy. The prices at the store just keep going up and the coupons have been slacking. But tonight, my love for coupons returned :) I rocked Walgreen's & Target!!!!!

So Walgreen's has their Triaminic on sale 2/$10. If you buy 2 you get $3 RR. So essentially 2/$7. And it gets better, we got $3/1 coupons Sunday in the inserts making it 2/$1. Now is that sweet or what? That was enough to get me super excited. I picked up 4 of those bad boys. Since you pay upfront (I paid $8 OOP + tax) and then get the RR I had $6 in RR so I used that to get Natalee a Christmas gift which was on sale for $5.99. I did buy some Christmas paper too to print out our Christmas letter.

Then, as if my night couldn't get any better..... I went to Target where they have these 3 pack gift sets of Johnson & Johnson baby body wash, bubble bath & lotion. These are the big bottles (15 - 28 oz.) and they were $4.49. I had (2) $3/1 so I picked up 2 of those for $1.49 each. Can you feel the excitement yet?

I topped off the night with a trip to Kohl's to spend my $10 Bounce Back Cash. I bought Haylee a shirt and Natalee a pair of socks and paid $1.58 which was basically all tax!

I didn't want the night to end, but sadly it was getting late and it was only 44 degrees so I was ready to get home and warm up. It seems like too often I end up asking myself why I even left the house. I'll go after things that are out of stock, or the cashier gives me a hard time or whatever. I am proud to say everything went perfect tonight. Now I just need to take a chill pill so I can go to bed soon, Josh probably thinks I'm on crack! lol

Thanksgiving & My Favorite Holiday

Better late than never........

Thanksgiving day was spent at Kaysi's this year. We had a yummy dinner and then us girls looked at the Black Friday ads while the guys talked and the kids ran around.

Josh was my Black Thursday/Friday partner this year and I loved it!

He carried all the heavy packages for me and never complained! We got to Walmart at 9:15pm to find hundreds of people with their carts already filled standing in line to check out. I got a little queasy thinking the things I wanted were for sure gone. I went straight to the garden center where I found tons of Barbie Jeeps which I wanted for Natalie. Josh stayed there with that while I ran all around searching for everything else on my list. Luckily I got every single thing I went after, I was so happy. I even got the last Rapunzel bed set for Haylee girl and that made me super happy. When we got to the car it was 11:15pm, Walmart was crazy and the lines were super long.

After Walmart we went to Target. Their doors didn't open till 12am and there was a line wrapped around the building. In previous years I kinda just rushed the line or pushed my way in when the doors opened (crazy I know) but this year I behaved. Only because the Sheriff was right up at the door and also because there were metal fences all the way around the store!

We waited our turn and got in probably within 20-30 minutes. I was able to find everything on my list there also including Leap Frog games for $14.99 which I had coupons for making them $10.99. That was my exciting purchase there. We left there around 1:15am.

Then we were off to Kohls. I have finally learned the trick to Black Friday at Kohl's. The line is always the worse there thanks to lack of registers, and I usually always spend at least 60-90 minutes in line. Not this year. We got everything on our list, including $19.99 bed sheets (my favorite Kohls purchase) and then I went to the jewelry counter because me and Haylee needed earrings anyway. And if you buy jewelry you can check out at the jewelry counter. My little secret. We were in and out of Kohl's in maybe 30 minutes!

I went home and slept a few hours before I headed out again with my Mom. We went to Ulta, Walmart and Kohl's. I was so tired that day, but all of the deals I got were so worth it.

I really liked that the sales started at 10pm rather than 4am but I think there were definitely more people out because it was earlier. I love Black Thursday/Friday. It's my favorite holiday!

It's Beginning to Look Like Christmas!

Sadly, we had our first casualty of the season yesterday. A poor Donkey ornament got his head bitten off. I guess I can't blame Natalee, he looked and smelled like a cookie.


Josh started on the outside lights last Saturday. They were on by Monday night and they look awesome (pictures to come).


Tuesday we put the tree up. Haylee was a big helper and helped her Daddy put the tree together.

Of course Natalee helped too.

She is such a monkey. After Natalee went to bed that night Haylee & I decorated the tree putting only a few on the bottom half of the tree that are Natalee proof.


Wednesday we decorated most of the inside. Josh brought the fireplace down and I unpacked boxes of decorations. I still have a few finishing touches and everything will be up!


Natalee loves the singing polar bear and penguins and yells "go!" (they are on a sensor) so that they start singing and dancing. She has been very good with the tree and loves the ornament with Jackson's face in it. Her annual ornament this year was a M&M. We chose that because she likes to play with the M&M figurines and she'll tell us "M&M" when she wants one. She loves M&M's!

Haylee likes the collection of snow globes. She turns them on and watches the snow blow around while listening to the music. Her annual ornament this year is a dolphin. Ever since she saw Dolphin Tale she has been in love with dolphins. She carries around her Winter dolphin and plays with the other 2-3 dolphin stuffed animals she has too!

Fred came Thursday night. He is going to watch Haylee & Natalee to see if they are good girls and listen to us and he'll report back to Santa. I almost think Haylee is too smart to believe in the elf but we'll see. Yesterday morning we woke up and he was sitting in Natalee's high chair with a donut and milk and had white powder all over his face. Both girls thought that was funny.

It's the most wonderful time of the year!

Sweet Haylee

My sweet little Haylee girl is almost finished with her first semester of preschool. She loves it and I think she'd rather go everyday instead of twice a week. She loves to show me the new letter she learned and tell me all about her day. She has the sweetest teacher and I can only pray the rest of her teachers are half as nice!


Haylee has been fighting a cold off and on now for 6 weeks. That is very unlike her. She hasn't run a fever so I don't know what the deal is, I just wish she felt better. Most days you'd never be able to tell she is sick except you can hear she's stuffy. I bought her 3 different types of vitamins (that are all safe to take together) so I'm hoping that helps boost her immune system and she feels better once and for all.


Winter time is difficult for Haylee's wardrobe. Have I mentioned how skinny she is? If I find her bottoms that fit her waist, they are too short. If they are long enough they fall off of her. She doesn't like to wear jeans, only "comfy" pants. And if we're at home she always has her long sleeve pj's on. She is so silly.


She is such a big helper and I love it. She helped me decorate the tree this year and she's always willing to help when needed. That's what I love about her. I also love that she's at an age where I can take her with me wherever I need to go because I know she'll behave. She has been my boutique buddy this year and I have enjoyed taking her with me. I don't have to worry about her breaking anything fragile or throwing a temper tantrum because I tell her no. Now Natalee is a different story although she hasn't started the temper tantrums yet! It was funny, we went with my Mom to Joann's because she needed fabric and she was taking forever. Haylee told her "we've been here 10 hours because you've been farting around" I laughed so hard.


I can't believe my little Haylee girl is 4 1/2, where has the time gone?! I love you little Princess!