The great outdors (sort of)

The kiddos recently got some outdoor play equipment. They LOVE to play outside. They get sooo excited when I tell them to find their shoes so we can go outside... they RUN to the back door and start to scream in anticipation. The only problem I have with the play equipment is this...




LIZARDS! As you can see, this lovely lizard was trying to climb in between the play house and the roof, but didn't make it. It was crunchy and dried up my friends... AHHHH. Nope , it doesn't matter if it's dead or alive, I still hate lizards.


Look at my sweet little girl. She totally takes after her Mommy! She just noticed the dried, crunchy, dead lizard... ha!

Anyways, besides the lizards, we love to play outside. Here they are enjoying the great outdoors (of the back yard!)

Let's play catch up

So, I know you are probably wanting to break up with me in this blogging world because you haven't heard from me in a while. I am not intentionally avoiding you. You've heard my story before though, I've just been busy lately. In an attempt to get you to not break up with me, this post is going to be extremely full of pictures to try and catch us up. Here we go....

As you can see, Maddie's hair is getting long enough for me to put pony tails in. I love to do it... she hates for me to do it. This is what her hair looks like after she pulls out the pony that I so loving put in. Talk about a bad hair day.

I also love playing dress up with her. Unlike getting her hair done, she totally gets into playing dress up. Isn't this dress cute???

Madaleine's Easter wasn't the greatest for her. First, she busted her lip and then later on that same day she tripped and busted her eye on a table. The poor baby still has a black eye AND lip today. I felt so bad for her.

Here is Gavin being the monkey he is! He now gets up and down from the couch as he pleases. This is where our two couches come together. We have a lamp back there and we also usually throw anything we don't want the babies getting to back there (like the lap top you see in the picture). Gavin now can get to this spot that was once kid free. He knows that this is a no no, and I think that is what makes it that much more exciting for him. I guess you can't blame a boy for wanting his own fort though can you?

Here are the kids walking in the mall with their Daddy. We were actually in line to see the Easter bunny, and the kids were getting very antsy. Long story short, after all that waiting in line we still didn't make it to the Easter bunny. It was just taking way to long. I guess we will try again next year.

We took the kids to the beach a few weekends ago. It was really windy when we first got there, and the sand was hitting them in the faces, which they really didn't like very well. So we went to eat and tried again. By then, the wind had calmed down and they were more interested in the sand. I had not planned on letting them get in the water (it's Galveston people.... yuck!) We did however "chase" the waves back and forth. The kids had a blast with that! Before we knew it though, Madaleine had tripped and fell on her bootie and a wave came at the same time... she was soaked. She thought it was HILARIOUS. So, it was all over then. My kids have now had the pleasure of "swimming" in the nasty water of Galveston... something I would have never dreamed of me letting them do.
Here they are "swimming" in the ocean, clothes and all!

Gavin running to the waves

I love these pictures. They look so small compared to the big ocean.

"Okay Mom, I'm ready to go home now. First, I'm soaking wet. You should have brought my swimsuit. Second, this sand stuff turns into mud when it gets wet and it sticks to my feet. Not cool. Third, I just realized this doesn't taste like my bath water. It's way to salty for my liking. This beach stuff is way over rated... take me home."

Well, I hope those are enough pictures to satisfy you for now. Stay tuned... I've got a picture of Madaleine just as terrified of lizards as her Mommy coming up in the next post!

The burping toy

Today Len brought home a burping toy. Yes, a burping toy. Thank you VERY much for that Len. It was given to him by a co-worker who didn't want to bring it home to her kids (geeze, I wonder why???) It apparently has been named the Nickelodeon Kids' Choice Award burping toy for 2009. Do your kids have any toys that are just absolutely the world's most annoying toy? Well, this new burping toy tops the most annoying list! The kids love it, of course. They press the button over and over making it burp constantly. They think it's hilarious.

So what is a Mom to do with such an annoying toy brought home by her wonderful husband?

Let me tell you...

It was time to get the kids ready for bed tonight, and since the kids were so enthralled by the thing, I just had to let them bring it upstairs with them. I was busy getting bath water ready, undressing kids, putting kids in the tub, and dealing with the pee pee puddle that always seems to happen as soon as I take off the diaper. I was just to busy to keep up with that lovely burping toy. Needless to say, the burping toy ended up in the bathtub. DARN! The once loved burping toy that made the most unattractive noise ever has now been silenced from the bath water. Although it did solve my problem of getting rid of the most annoying toy, I really didn't intentionally do it on purpose :) Len still thinks I did, but I promise I didn't.

Let me end on this. As I found the toy in the bath tub and noticed it didn't make the burping noise anymore, I told Len that it was broken. He took it from me, and as he was walking away with it he said, "Maybe I can get it to work again once it dries out." He then placed it on the window seal so it could dry out. PUH -LEEEZE! :)

Crayons, Cheetos, Climbers, Converse, and a Carousel

I decided to bring out the crayons and let the kids "color" today. I have been waiting because it says it's for 18 months and up, but I just wanted to give it a try anyways.


It was all fun and games until Gavin decided that it was better to eat the crayons instead of color with them. You gotta love the fact they are non toxic!

Do you notice the little specs of blue evidence around his mouth??? Since Madaleine has now become a picky eater, she didn't want to eat them, but instead decided to color her nose. We gotta work on staying on the paper...

Since it matched her outfit and all, I let her walk around for a while with her blue nose... ha! It was cute.

I then brought out another new thing for the babies... Cheetos. No doubt, they loved them.

Madaleine is a much more "clean" eater than Gavin. She rarely makes a mess.

Here is Gavin's Cheetos face... gotta love it!

The kids have also been climbing up on things a lot more lately. This is not a good thing, because although they can get up, most of the time they don't know how to get down therefore resulting in a few crashes to the floor. Here is what they have discovered to climb on most recently... the window seat!


Climbing on the window seat is not a good idea for two reasons. First, there is nothing but hard tile below. I just know that one day they will fall down and hurt their little pumpkin heads. Second, they love to mess with the blinds which are already broken because of the cats. Remember people, we have our house on the market... people don't like broken blinds!

Going on to our next subject... the twins have officially graduated from babies to kids because they got their first pair of converse shoes!

They are just so adorable! I can always remember my brother wearing these... and he still does! Our kids for some reason LOVE shoes. They look so grown up when they wear these!

And last, but not least, the carousel. We took the kids down to Kehma this past weekend. They had a blast riding on all the rides. The favorite was the carousel.

This was Madaleine and I waiting in line for the carousel. When I saw this picture, I just laughed. I mean look at her! She is just lounging in my arms while waiting in line. SPOILED!

And here is that precious girl on her zebra. She loved it!

Gavin got to ride on it with Daddy. He wasn't quite sure what to think of it, but by the second time he rode, he figured out that it is fun after all!

We also rode the train. By then, both kids were tired, so the train ride wasn't such a hit.

It's about time I put up a post...

We headed out to the Houston Children's Museum a few weeks ago. The kids absolutely LOVED their tot spot. They played for about two hours. I always love it when we can wear the kids out and have fun doing it! Here are a few pictures. Sorry they are not the best, but it's a little hard to get good pictures when you are trying to run around after two little ones!

This last picture was them when it was time to go. They were not very happy that it was over. We look forward to going back!

WARNING: The sheriffs are in town

You better be on your best behavior or else you are gonna get busted by these tough sheriffs! No joke, they are hard core... they don't put up with anything!

I already had a run in with them. They gave me a ticket for leaving the unfolded laundry in the middle of the floor... a severe traffic violation.
Just look at those faces... they mean business! So, keep your eye out because you could be next on their chopping block!

night night.... YEAH RIGHT!

I have found this wind up contraption on the back of our son. It is the weirdest thing. I wind it up, and he goes crazy! I like to wind him up every night before bed. Here he is after I have wound him up really tight one night...

Now, if I can just find the "off" button... ha!