Up, up and away!

The weather was gorgeous yesterday! It was bright, sunny and there was just enough wind to be able to go try out Chloe Jo's new kite!

She was so excited to fly her kite! When I asked her if she even knew what a kite was she said "of course. Boots has a kite." I should have remembered that. :)

We picked out a ladybug kite and it was so fun to watch!

I let Chloe Jo fly the kite just long enough for me to get a picture. I thought she was going to fly away with it! Tiny little thing!

She is begging to go out and fly her kite again today, but I don't think it is quite windy enough. We will definitely have to go again soon, though!

What I'm Loving Wednesday!

It's midweek and that means it is, once again, time for What I'm Loving Wednesday!

If you would like to play along, link up {here}!

I'm loving that we only have 3 more weeks until closing on our house (if everything works out like we want). I can't wait to move in and for things to get back to normal.

I'm loving that Wal-Mart had a great sale on fabric the other day. I bought 8 yards for a little over $12.00. Those of you who buy fabric, you know what a great deal that is!

I'm loving the great new nail polishes I bought yesterday. I had been wanting some new colors so I hit the buy 2 get one free sale at Sally Beauty Supply.

I'm loving my sweet Chloe Jo. She has been so irritatingly clingy lately, but I still love her dearly!

I'm loving beautiful, park-going weather! We were able to make our way to the park last night and played for a long while.

I'm loving the precious pictures I have been getting of sweet CJ lately. She will pose for me most of the time now.

I'm loving NCIS. I know I'm waaaaaaaay late getting on this bandwagon, but I started watching online from the 1st season several months ago and have been loving it.

What are you loving on this wonderful Wednesday?

This and That

*Since being at my Mom and Dad's house, I have been forgetting to leave my camera out so I can take pictures so this is going to be a no-pictures post. I know. That's soooooo boring!

*I took Chloe Jo to the library for story time this morning. I'm so happy to be somewhere where story time is actually organized. I'm excited that there is a story time close to the town we are moving to.

*I'm so ready to get moved and put all this drifting behind us. We are so thankful for the family and friends who have helped us out this last year. We have really had to lean on others to get through some of the difficult times. I am anxious to start paying it forward.

*Speaking of moving, our house appraisal was done last week and it came back way too low. The homeowners offered to pay for another appraisal. Since no one agreed with the original appraisal (no one meaning us, the homeowners, the realtor or our loan officer) we are really hoping it was just a bad job and everything will turn out all right. We should hear something back soon.

*Chloe Jo has been having a difficult time adjusting to all the craziness that is our life right now. She is being ultra-attached to me lately...much more than usual. She keeps asking about sleeping in her bed and so I know she is missing her things.

*I think we are going to try to go to the park this evening. The weather today has been gorgeous. We didn't even have to wear jackets to the library this morning.

I think that is all for now. I'm going to go scour the internet for craft ideas.

Sum, Sum, Summertime

I would really love it if the weather would warm up a little more. I wasn't really thinking when I packed for our stay with Mom and Dad. I packed for spring/summer weather and that is not what we are having!

I'm not sure if I like the new blogger changes. It's going to take some getting used to.

I never posted the second finished dress I made for Chloe Jo a couple of weeks ago.

I love the way it turned out! It ended up being too short (how does that happen!? The first pattern was too long!) so I put some leggings under it and it is so cute with them! I'm kind of glad it turned out that way! 

I have been slacking so bad about blogging lately! I will try to do better!

I hope you all are having a fabulous week!

XOXO

Zoo Day!

Last Friday my sister asked if Chloe Jo and I would like to stay with them for the week. Her husband, Chris, was scheduled to go out of town for work and she thought it would be great to spend some time together. I thought that was a great idea so we stayed. We had a great week with my sister and her family and we got back to my parents house this morning.

My sister takes her kiddies to a Bouncing Beethoven's class on Tuesday mornings so Chloe Jo and I tagged along. We had so much fun! It took CJ a little while to warm up, but I know she had a great time. It was so fun, even for the adults!

Wednesday morning we decided to take the kids to the zoo. We had a great time on our outing and I am so glad we were able to do that. The best part is the my sister's family and our family were gifted year long zoo memberships. I see many more of these outings in our future!

The girls were very excited to be going to the zoo!

It was a gorgeous day for a zoo outing. The temperature was perfecto!

I love this picture! I have one of me doing the exact same thing from several years ago! I have to find it!

I am so proud of this picture! I took it through glass, with a flash, while this dragon was being crazy and running around all over the place. His forked tongue is sooooo creepy!

Love the aquariums!

No zoo trip is complete without getting a picture of the flamingoes!

The girls really wanted to ride the train so we obliged. They had a great time! This is my sister, Chelley, and her kids, Brianna and Brenson.

And we had to get a mommy and me picture, too!

My precious. She always keeps me on my toes!

Miss Brianna enjoying the train ride.

Both of the girls really liked the bear. This guy was very active. He would walk around, then sit down, scratch himself, swat off flies...kind of reminded me of a man! HA!

Chloe Jo said her favorite animals of the day were the zebras. She was fascinated by them.

Mr. Brenson-man was pretty happy most of the time. I love this picture of him! His dimples are oh-so adorable!

The giraffes are always one of my favorites. My most favorite animals at the zoo are usually the penguins, but they were very inactive during our trip so they got demoted!

This was the best we could do with my sister and her kids. HA! Brianna is just at that age where she will. not. smile on command and Brenson is...well...9 weeks old and fussy here.

Gorgeous animals! Love.

We had a great time at the zoo and we are looking forward to another zoo day soon!

Birthday Party Love

Saturday turned out so fun! We loved celebrating Chloe Jo's birthday with a Strawberry Shortcake themed party!

Here is the cake table. I was so happy with how it turned out. My sister said it was "pinterest-worthy." Um, yeah...best compliment evaaaaaaaah!

I was thrilled with how this banner turned out. It looks hard to read in these pictures, but in real life, it was perfect.

The punch and fruit pyramid turned out great! I have the best punch recipe (it wasn't the normal lemon-lime/ginger ale and sherbert) and we enjoyed it all day Saturday. I'll have to share it soon! And a meat and cheese tray is always a good idea. There was nothing left of this one even though we didn't end up having near as many guests as was originally planned.

And this is the cake I made fore CJ that morning. The girls (CJ and Brianna) were so excited about it. They kept running into the kitchen to stare at it!

I used the same ribbon topiaries I used at the baby shower I threw. I'm so glad I've been able to use them multiple times!

And here is the birthday girl in front of her table. She was so excited about everything!

She was happy to be getting ready to eat cake, but she would have nothing to do with blowing out those candles! Daddy ended up blowing them out for her!

Miss Mess eating her tasty treats.

I think this picture of Daddy and Chloe Jo came out so good! I'm going to have it printed and frame it for his office.

It ended up that we had a very small party when we had planned on having several. None of Russ' family was able to come and we had planned on having some of them. Then on the way to Oklahoma, Mom and Dad had 2 blowouts and Chris had to go rescue them! Mom and Chris made it before we served cake, but Grampy missed the whole party. We were disappointed, but we just had to roll with it! Here is Russ with our little nephew, Brenson.

Cute family picture! Not my favorite, but cute!

We were so happy G-Jo was able to eventually join us. Here she is with ittle Brenson.

And the sweeties in their birthday party attire.

Brianna and Chloe Jo

Chloe Jo and Brianna were very serious when Chloe Jo was opening presents. It really cracked us up!

She was so excited to get a new My Little Pony.

And she has been loving playing with her new Mobigo!

I think everyone had a great time celebrating and, of course, eating cake!

Just for fun, here are some pictures of the besties:

Chloe Jo and Brianna: love this picture!

And I just have to include this one because it is sooooo funny!

I decided to stay at my sister's house this week. Tomorrow we are going to take the kiddies to the zoo.

Only 4 more weeks until closing on our house!!!

Birthday fun!

Tuesday, the 10th, was Chloe Jo's 3rd birthday. Since we had a party planned for Saturday, we didn't do much on the actual day. We went to story time at the library in the morning and then Grampy took us to McD's for lunch and ice cream. Chloe Jo and I then did a little bit of grocery shopping in the afternoon. After supper, I let her open 2 of her gifts from Daddy (who, sadly, couldn't be here for the day) and I.

I think she was happy to be getting a couple of presents!

She loves ice cream so we gave her a Little People ice cream truck!

She also opened a set of Strawberry Shortcake lipglosses and nail polishes. She is obsessed with chapstick so she thought they were great!

She, of course, had to have birthday desert again!

After bath time I painted her nails with her new Strawberry Shortcake nail polish. She wasn't so sure about sitting in the chair until they dried, but she eventually decided that was ok to have pretty nails.

We had a great day on her birthday!

Up next: The Strawberry Shortcake birthday party!

Stay tuned!