Kingwood Birthday Extravaganza

We hit the road in the new car back on Sept. 14th to head to Kingwood to celebrate Grandma’s, Brynn’s and Reese’s birthdays!

As we know Brynn turned 1 on the 8th, Grandma turned 91 on the 14th and then we had an early celebration for Reese who turns 5 October 1st.

Last time we were in Kingwood (July 4th), Reese stayed at Nana’s for a few hours and played with Nana all by herself. During that exchange Reese mentioned to Nana she wanted a wedding dress to play dress up. Well anyone who knows my Nana knows that if her girls ask for something, she will do what she can to find or make it. So as you can see, Nana made her a wedding dress and veil to play dress up. Reese has been in hog heaven playing in it since. She wears it at least once per day and it’s her favorite thing to wear when she puts on her shows at home. Thanks Nana! Nana even made Brynn a matching shirt (dress) to go along with Reese’s wedding dress. Now Reese can have a flower girl!

Dad cooked a big dinner on Saturday night for the birthday extravaganza. It was a favorite of Reese and Brynn, spaghetti and meatballs. Both girls ate like champs but I can say Brynn ate more than Reese.

Since then we’ve been gearing up for Reese’s birthday. As soon as she knew Brynn’s birthday was over and one it, she was counting down the days for her birthday to come.

Grampy also told Reese that since she’s going to be 5, she can come on vacation to their house all by herself. She reminds us of that everyday, so she is more than ready to visit Kingwood all alone. All I know is Reese and Grampy have more fun on their grocery store trips each time we’re in Kingwood than most people I know. She always come home with things she’s talked Grampy into getting.

Brynn is 1!!!!!

Here are a few pictures from when Reese was out playing in the sprinklers. She had a field day running around out there and Brynn had just as much fun watching her.

We’ve had a busy few weeks. School started, dance class started and Brynn turned 1! Reese goes to school 4 days a week now and she’s loving it. Brynn and I drop her off and then head to Stroller Strides and come home to a quiet house, to play and eat lunch before we head out to pick Sister up at 2. As happy as Brynn is when we pick up Reese I don’t know that she misses her too much during the day. I think she’s happy not to be getting tackled every 5 minutes, or hearing me say “Reese” 4000 times in an hour.

Reese wants to be a teacher. I will continue to ask her this every year and see how often it changes.

Reese also started dance class again. This year she is taking Hip Hop classes with Tippi Toes and she is having a blast. Last year I always just plopped Brynn in the stroller and she’d just smile and laugh watching Reese dance. This year she wants to dance up there with her, so today is the first day we’ll leave Reese in class, and go out for a fun on the Bayfront while Reese is busy. It’s going to be hot today, so I might regret my choice for a 4 p.m. run but we’ll see how it goes.

Brynn turned 1 on Saturday and we headed to Geronimo for the weekend. We cooked her favorite meal of spaghetti and meatballs and she had her very own cake. By the time we got to have cake she was pretty beat from playing all day so she didn’t really eat any, but she enjoyed the one bit Ryan gave her. The next day we headed to a baby shower where our sweet cousin Erin Homann made Brynn her very own mini bunt cake. Brynn LOVED the cake, and has had a few bites this week of the left overs. She’s a super happy baby!

Brynn playing with one of her new baby cousins. Ryan took this picture so I don’t know if this was Lucy or Nora

The girls have coordinating Aggie dresses. They looked so sweet for the shower. Now that Brynn is mobile it’s impossible to snap a picture of them together.

She also took her first few steps this week, she walked from me to Reese and we’ve been practicing some more everyday. I don’t think it will be long before she’s off and running. I know where she’ll go too, because she crawls in there whenever she thinks I am not paying attention. She makes a b-line for Reese’s room, she knows that where all the good big girl stuff is.

We’ve been hitting the park in the afternoons this week since it’s been a bit cooler (90’s instead of 100’s) and we have been loving it. I can’t wait for it to get even cooler.

Oh and I got a new car!

August

It’s been too long since I last updated the blog. 

We have had a busy August already. The first weekend of the month Mom and Dad came for a visit so we hit the beach and enjoyed the sun and sand. Mom enjoyed the shade with Brynn. The upside to the beach trip is the stop at the German Bakery on the Island. SOOO good! They also came down because they had tickets to Antiques Roadshow. Shockingly Roadshow came to Corpus, so both Mom and I put in for tickets and they were picked in the lotto for two tickets. Tune in next fall, you might see them in the background.

Reese and the dolphin at the Aquarium. We go there every Monday morning!

This picture is from the end of June but how cute are these 3 at the Hooks Game!

Brynn loves Kobe!

The day she figured out how to walk around the table. Yes we have kids, yes the house is littered with toys.

Brynn and Nana

I hosted Bunco at our house the last week in July so Ryan took Reese out for dinner. They ended up at Mr. Gatti’s and Reese had a BLAST. This was the pirate patch she won with all her tickets.

Ryan took the day off two weeks ago and we surprised Reese by taking her to Schlitterbahn for the day. We left Brynn home with Oma and took the big girl out for fun. She was crazy! Reese has NO fear. She was a trooper and stood in line for over an hour to ride the Master Blaster, the number one rated water ride in the US. She didn’t bat an eye lash. She also went on all the big kid rides alone. Ryan or I would go down the water slide first, the other would send her off from the top and then follow her down. She went in those dark, twist and turns flying through the water like she does it everyday. She is going to love amusement parks when she’s older. It was a ton of fun and I know we’ll do it again next summer. There are no pictures because cameras and water parks don’t go well together.

Brynn has been REALLY busy. Over the course of one day (this was a few weeks ago) she went from pulling up on coffee table, to walking around the coffee table a few hours later. Since then she has been unstoppable. She’s pushing her toys all over while she walks behind them, scaling the furniture, walking from couch to couch (as long as she can hold on) and most recently started really balancing herself and letting go. I don’t think it’s going to be long before she’s brave enough to let go and take a step. Reese walked 13 months to the day, so we’ll see if Brynn will beat her or not. I better be careful though because yesterday she figured out that if she stands on her tippi toes at the back door she can turn the lock. She is also saying MaMa, Dada, and Pu-peee (although she only whispers that). Brynn is OBSESSED with dogs.

BFF’s. They don’t go anywhere without the other one following close behind.They LOVE looking out the window!

tired baby!Grampy and his girls!Thurman is such a good sport. He lets me dress him up all the time and leaves the get-ups on. I used a scarf to create this lovely flower behind his ear. We all LOVE Thurman. As you can see he is always within arms reach of Brynn and Reese.

I love this picture of Reese.

Two sisters who LOVE to play rough.

First time to feed herself spaghetti. This particular night, she had spaghetti and 5 meatballs. Yes I said 5! They are her absolute favorite thing to eat!

It’s hard to believe that in a few short weeks my baby will be 1, and in just over a month my big girl will be 5!