Better Days

There have been better days at the Heald house. This was the girls last week in the carpool line at school. There are no cute pictures from carpool this week because we have been home with fevers, snot, coughing and no sleep all week. Yuck! Matney started getting sick last weekend and by Monday night HK was miserable, I was sick by Tuesday night and Jared has it now. It is such a shame that moms can't call in sick days. All I want to do it be in my bed in a dark room and sleep (as much as I can sleep when breathing through my mouth and coughing all night long). I'm going to cross my fingers that this is not a sign of things to come during the flu season. Germs be gone!!!

Sisters!

We had extra time before preschool one day last week (a miracle I know!) and went outside to swing. The girls were in a good mood so I grabbed the camera but they were too wild to stand still.

Like M's shoes? A friend gave them too us after her daughter was in a wedding and, even though they are too big, Matney loves them. We compromise and she wears them at home and then changes as we get in the car.

I love how much they laugh at one another!

Such a typical HK face!

Big girl in her big girl swing. Sniff! They are both growing up so quickly!

Happy 30th Birthday Jared!

Happy 30th Birthday Daddy!

Not sure if the girls were more excited about Daddy being almost home or knowing they were going to eat cake soon! 

Hip Hip Hooray! Daddy is home! We drove down and took Jared lunch at the office, the girls picked out their tutu dresses since it was his birthday.

Jared seeing his cake for the first time. He wanted a Top Gear cake (a car tv show) so I tried to make a red race car cake...it turned out looking like a pink pickup truck! Ha! Welcome to your 30s, nothing about us is cool anymore!

I was pretty proud of the cake until I just saw these pictures as they came off the camera. HA HA HA! That is the ugliest cake ever!

I figured 30 candles would have been a fire hazard!

Yummy pizza, tutu dresses on the cutest girls ever, monkey pants and a pink pickup cake - what more could he ask for?!?!?!

Opening gifts. Around his neck he's wearing a babydoll carseat handle that the girls call earphones.

While Jared opened gifts I caught two girls stealing icing.

Now it looks even more like it was in a wreck!

Much of J's bday gifts were golf related - here his is with the big surprise of the night. A set of his Unk's golf clubs all the way from TX!

The girls finally got tired and used the wrapping paper as blankets. I don't remember what happened to HK's clothes!

Thank you to everyone who helped make this day special for Jared. We had a great weekend being together as a family. I think he would agree that getting older is much more fun when you have super excited little kids...and a super excited wife to finally have a husband in his 30s like me!

Strange Eater

We are pretty thankful every time HK is willing to eat more than a bite of something. She is more than happy to go all day with just a cup of milk and no solid food. It is so frustrating because we have such a battle every day during meals and I don't want either of us to hate meal time. It is so obvious when she is hungry/has low blood sugar because she turns into a beast! There are times that I put her in the car just so I can strap her down and hand her food since she is more likely to eat while stuck and distracted!

This day we were out of plain cream cheese, her favorite, so HK was eating parmesan cheese with a spoon. She's a strange eater!

Date Night with Dad

The preschool does a Date Night with Dad every year and it always is the week of Jared's birthday. How cool is that? A night for mommy to do all the bday things she is behind on  for Jared to spend time away with just his little girls (and Robot, always Robot)! This year they did a craft with Dad and had their picture taken. I didn't take a picture of the craft and we don't have the picture of them back form the school photographer back yet so my front yard photos are all I have to show!

The girls were BEYOND excited to take Daddy to school and show him their classrooms. Between Date with Dad and making J's bday cake both girls were bouncing off the walls all afternoon. It sure was nice and quiet when they all left! I know things like this are hard for Jared because he has to schedule to leave work early. I am so thankful for a husband who does all he can to be here for the things that matter to me and the girls!

Lessons Learned

This picture is a few weeks old and I'm not sure now why I had pink paint out but....do NOT ever leave paint out when your children are awake because they will find it and paint everything (including themselves) that they can. This was after I'd cleaned HK's eyes and forehead but obviously after she tasted the paint!  Learn from my mistakes because I learned this lesson the hard way!

Like Mother Like Daughters

Disney World Dad Jared got all his girls up one weekend and took us to Dunkin Donuts. We each picked out a few and headed home. By the end of the morning ths is what was left...two were mine, two were Matney's and two were HK's. HA! We were not sitting together eating so I had to laugh when I was cleaning up and realized that all us Heald ladies eat or donuts the same way. I mean, why waste stomach room on any cake that doesn't have icing?!?!? Poor Jared, he's living with a bunch of tutu wearing mice!

Rainy Days

This is kind of painful to write since I know how badly TX needs rain but we had a weekend of storms that made the girls very excited. Disney World Dad got them up last Saturday and said they could go in their jammies to Waffle House. I mean, does it get any better than that? Nope! When they noticed that it looked liek rain they couldn't leave without their raincoats!

No, HK doesn't sleep in shorts. She didn't want to wear jammies because she only wants to wear Spiderman. Sigh.

Typical HK face - eyebrows raised and mouth in an "o"

As it cools off wearing long sleeves is going to be an adjustment for M. She wanted her sleeves rolled all the way up!

Playdough Ball Family

 Halle Kate's attention span is thislong so getting her to sit still for playdough doesn't last. Matney, on the other hand, will stay occupied for 20+ minutes. This day she was quiet and playing well by herself for a long time. When I checked on her she'd been hard at work making a "ball family". How sweet!
I can't look at even this picture for too long. I hate playdough! The texture grosses me out and all those colors they mix together about puts me over the edge. Sometimes though I'll do anything for some peace so out comes the playdough!

Chocolate Pinocchio

I don't know how well you can see the chocolate sprinkles on Matney's face but there are several...and we're working on telling the truth! M asked for chocolate sprinkles but I told her no and put them on the counter. Apparently she got them off the counter when I wasn't looking, took them into the playroom and ate them all. Too bad she didn't realize she had evidence all over her face!

When I first saw her I couldn't figure out what it was...and then I put "sugar high bouncing three year old" together with "was quiet for more than 30 seconds" and came up with "rotten stinker who stole the sprinkles"! HA! I asked her if she'd taken them and she said "no, mommy". Grrr! I tried very hard to act mean and not laugh but I think my need to take a picture of her face gave me away!

Big Girl Ballet

Oh the MESS in the background CUTENESS! The girls started ballet this fall and they are loving it. They both go to a "Mother Goose" class together and Matney stays for the 3-4 year old class by herself. Sniff! I leave my baby....and she doesn't look like a baby anymore leaping all over the place!

Here they are before practicing some moves before their first class.