First Halloween Outing

I had my first big Special Event at my new job......on my birthday! It was the Halloween Boo Bash. Matt and I realized on the Saturday before that it was the same night as his parent teacher conferences so he would not be able to go and bring the girls. Luckily my awesome mom was able to take off work and come up and take care of the girls. Since I wasn't going to be able to help get the girls ready in their costumes, I had them try them on the night before.

Kynzie is a little lamb

Maddie is a disco dancer. Such a little poser!!

This is the ONE picture I got of the girls at the Boo Bash

I will be taking more tomorrow when we go around trick or treating and post them after.

KC Pumpkin Patch

Last weekend we went to the KC Pumpkin patch which is just right outside of Gardner. It is the one that you can see from the interstate. We had a good time. It was a really nice day so that made it nice. Here are a few pictures from the day.

There's that famous Spongbob Haybale.

The girls bouncing on a giant trampoline

Maddie's Fall Field Trip

Last week I got to go with Maddie on her class field trip to the Deanna Rose Farmstead in Overland Park. I was given a group of 4 kids to watch over and take around the farm. We toured the farm all morning then met for lunch then took a hayride to a pumpkin patch. Here are few pictures of the day.


Maddie going down the slide face first

Just picked out her pumpkin

This is one of Maddie's good friends, I actually kept getting them mixed up all day.

Maddie playing in the corn

Maddie's class

Maddie's first horse ride

She finally did it. She overcame a fear of getting on a horse, or any animal for that matter. Every time we go to the zoo she wants to ride the camel but then chickens out. Every time we go to the Deanna Rose Farm she wants to ride the pony but then chickens out. We have been other places where she has had the opportunity to sit or ride on an animal and she never would. Well, that finally changed a couple weekends ago when I took her to one of my classes for work. I was offering a Little Buckaroo Day class through work and the girls really wanted to go with me to check it out. Maddie kept asking if she could ride but I didn't think she actually would. The instructor was really good and she got her to hop right on and even took her around the arena several times. Kynzie would barely even touch the horse. :)

Girl's Update

Okay it's about time I update again. Fall is going by so fast. We've already had a whole semester of school. We just finished up with BOTH girl's parent teacher conference's. Yes even McKynzie's preschool teacher had a conference with us. It was actually quite interesting. Matt and I learned that we definitely haven't spent as much time working with her as we did Maddie at that age. That is one thing we are really going to try and change. We both felt really bad about that. Anyways, she is still doing great in school and her teacher said she is very interested in learning so that is good. The one thing that both girl's reports had in common was that they both needed to work on recognzing when it is social time and when it is learning time. Apparantly we have the two chatterboxes of their classes. We were actually really surprised to hear this from both teachers but especially Kynzie's since she started out so shy at school. It almost made us happy to hear their teachers say that they talk too much :). Socially they are both doing great and have lots of friends.

We were out at Wal Mart the other night and for the first time I felt like it was when we were in Emporia and would run to Wal Mart. Every other aisle we would go down one of the girls were seeing a friend that they knew from school. It was a good feeling to know that they are making so many friends. The neighborhood kids continuing to make our house and yard the "it" place. There are usually about 6-8 boys out there every day to greet us the second we get home. Sometimes chasing us down the street until we pull in the driveway chanting, "Maddie Maddie Maddie."

Makeovers

Maddie got a hold of her make up and decided to give her and McKynzie a little makeover!


so pretty

Busy Weekend

We had a busy day yesterday, we took the girls to the zoo in the afternoon and the Royals game with the Temeyers last night. The zoo was doing a Halloween theme and the Royals were giving away free snuggies to the first 20,000 fans. We walked in and all got one and then heard them tell the people right after us that they just ran out. Whew, that would have been a bummer. Here's a picture of the girls at the zoo and then at the Royals game with Andon.


Girls posing by the scary thing


Kynzie posing for a picture again

I think with Kynzie getting her ears pierced, she must have overcome some of her other fears because she this was the first time every that she was petting the goats and actually fed them

The "sluggies"

Ear's Pierced

Well ever since Maddie's 5th birthday when we made an attempt to get her ears pierced, she hasn't wanted to get them done again. However, Thursday evening she came home from school and was dead set on getting them pierced that night. We told her we would look into this weekend but she did not want to wait and Matt and I thought we had better get them done while she was still really wanting to. So, we loaded up and went into Olathe to get her ear's pierced. We get there and she is soooo excited. She picks the earings out (little pink flowers) and then it comes time to hop up on the chair. I can start to see a little fear in her eyes but she is trying to play it cool. She agreed to sit on the chair if she could sit on my lap so the lady got her ears all cleaned up and marked with a marker and that is when she started screaming like crazy saying she changed her mind. At this point, the lady has already gotten the earings in the guns and we have to pay for them regardless if they go in Maddie's ears or not. After about 10 minutes of Maddie freaking out, Matt and I decided it was a lost cause. Then, little Kynzie looks at me and says, "I'll do it momma." Matt and I looked at each other and decided it wasn't a bad idea. So, Kynzie hopped up there, let the lady clean and mark her ears and in about 5 seconds she had two pink flower earings in her ears and she was smiling the whole time. She is absolutely in love with her ears. She is so proud of them and it is so cute to see her get all excited when she remembers that they are in her ears. She is such a tough cookie and as Coco pointed out, she now wants to actually smile and pose for pictures. :)

Updates

Everyone is doing great. We are loving this cooler weather and enjoying our weekends doing fun stuff. We took the girls to the Renaisance Festival a few weekends ago and it was a very "interesting" time. I wish I would have brought my camera because we saw some crazy stuff. I'm excited to take the girls to the pumpkin patch. Maddie's class is taking a field trip there in a couple of weeks and I hope to be able to go with her. I got to go with McKynzie on her class field trip to the zoo a couple of weeks ago and it was a lot of fun to see her around her friends. She really is very quiet. Her teachers tell me that she is very shy and quiet but very good in school so I guess that is good. That's certainly a change from how she is at home. Again, I forgot my camera on her school field trip :(.

We continue to try out different churches here in Gardner on Sundays. Last week I think we might have found one that we really like. It is a Baptist church. We'll see. That was our 6th church to go to. We have liked things about all of the churches, if only we could just take what we like about each one and put them together to make our "perfect" one. It's funny how the girls like some more than others too. I have no idea what they are basing it off of but they have said they liked some more than others. Oh well, I know we will find a church home soon. It has been kind of fun to go to different ones and we have met several people this way.

Matt's enjoying his laid back schedule right now. So different from Emporia. He is done at 2:50 pm every afternoon and gets to come home, go to the gym, mess around and then wait for us to get home. Basketball will be starting for him before we know it though. I still absolutely love my job. We went on a staff retreat to the Royals game last night and it was a lot of fun. Everyone is so nice.

Maddie takes off the training wheels

Ever since we moved here, Maddie has been watching all of the neighborhood kids ride their bikes without training wheels and she has been asking if we can take hers off. We just kept putting it off. I honestly thought she would be too scared to try and then she would never get to ride her bike because the training wheels would be off. Anyways, this weekend we finally decided to just do it. I was so amazed at how awesome she did. It probably took her a total of 10 minutes and 10 trips up and down the sidewalk to learn. After that, she has just been cruising everywhere. She is so proud of herself and she really loves riding her bike now. Now I'm sad that we didn't do this a long time ago when she was asking.

Kynzie's dance moves

McKynzie is such a crack up. She does this hilarious dance and then gets really embarrased if we make a big deal about it. This is her dancing to the birthday card that the girls picked out for Kali.

Waterpark

A couple of weekends ago, the Lake's came up and we all went to the new Schlitterbahn in Kansas City. We had been once earlier this summer but it was fun to go with some friends. Maddie and I even went down a big slide together.

The newest addition

The girls have been in school now for a few weeks and they are both really loving it. Maddie cried for the first few days when I would drop her off but after that, she has been doing great. We started her sticker chart again and that really helped. Last week she got her first line of stickers which earned her a special prize. We told her that she could choose whatever she wanted. I was a little nervous as to what she would choose. When it came time to go pick out something, she decided that she really wanted a fish. Matt and I decided that it wasn't a bad idea to get a little family pet since we will never own anything with fur. We let Maddie pick out her betta fish which she named "Goldfish." She loves taking care of it and feeding it every morning and evening. Kynzie has also been doing excellent in school and when I drop her off in the morning. Today I picked her up and she said, "can I sleep here tonight?" We told Kynzie that the fish would also be hers to take care of. Kynzie has also enjoyed feeding the fish, although it makes me nervous for Kynzie to be around that fish. I'm just waiting for the day for her to dump an entire bag of doritos in the tank like Matt did when he was a little kid. :)

1st Day of School 2010

Well first day of school today for BOTH girls. Maddie started Kindergarten and Kynzie started preschool. Unfortunately they had to go to different elementary schools because Maddie's school didn't offer a 3 year old program. So, the dynamic duo had to be split up! We started with dropping off Kynzie first. She woke up this morning and the first words out of her mouth was "I don't want to go to school." I thought, "oh no, this is not going to be a good morning." I finally got her excited for it though be telling her that I would give her a pop and candy after school if she did good today. When we walked in her classroom, she started to cry a little and her teacher had to give her a little pep talk about how she is a big girl and she would be fine today. Once she showed her where the babies were, that was it. I didn't even get a hug or kiss goodbye from her. About 3:15 pm, I got a phone call from her teacher and I was thinking something happened, but she just wanted to tell me that Kynzie had an AWESOME day and was very good. She even played Go Fish and won!

Maddie was the one that has been super excited to go to school and she woke up this morning saying how excited she was. She was all smiles at Kynzie's school and at her's until we were getting ready to walk into her classroom. Then she started getting clingy. I got her to smile for the camera by telling her the more she smiled, the longer I would stay :). She was okay until I left. When I picked her up today, her teacher said she did cry off and on today but not bad. Maddie promised to work on it next week. I'm still proud of her. There are so many transitions and choices throughout her day, I'm sure it is very overwhelming for a 5 year old.


Girls in front of our house

With matching back packs on

Still all smiles in Kynzie's hallway

Kynzie by her hook, she did NOT want me to take this picture

Kynzie's teacher giving her a pep talk that she is a "big girl" and she will have fun while mommy goes to work

Showing her the baby dolls

Now we're at Maddie's school and this is her look of fright before we enter her classroom

I got her to smile by her cubbie by telling her the more pictures she smiled for, the longer I would stay

Maddie's new "best friend" who we met at Meet the Teacher Night

Maddie working on her first Kindergarten project at her desk

And........this is how I had to leave the poor thing :(

Maddie's New School

Last night we went to a meeting at Maddie's school for the before and after school program. After the meeting, I stayed to introduce myself and Maddie to the two teachers and Maddie got to meet another little Kindergarten girl that will be in the same program and also in her same Kindergarten class. The girls were like best friends by the end of the night and having a great time. I was so glad to see this and it made Maddie really excited for school. I know there will still be plenty of tears but she will do great once she gets used to everything.



Tonight we went to the "meet the teacher" night at Maddie's school and got to meet her teacher and see her classroom. Her teacher is sooo nice and the classroom was really cool. Maddie got to see her "friend" there again from last night and they were all smiles and hugs again tonight. We got to tour the school and then eat ice cream! I forgot my camera but I will definitely take pictures on Friday!

Kynzie's 3rd Birthday

On Kynzie's actual birthday, we took the girls to Chucky Cheeses.






Kynzie LOVED riding that white horse!

Kynzie's shopping trip

We took the girls to Toy Story 3 for Kynzie's birthday. The girls really liked it and so did Matt and I. Grandpa Coco and Grandma Brenda came up the next day and took the girls shopping and to a hotel for the night. It was a win win for everyone. Matt and I got to have a night out and the girls got to have a fun night swimming in the pool and hot tub. Here are a few pictures of the shoes and shirt that Kynzie picked out while shopping.

New Shoes

New Shirt

Update

We're all settling in to the new place and new town. I started my job last Monday and so far I am loving it! Matt started his job last Friday but doesn't have kids until Aug. 18th. The girls started daycare last Monday as well and are doing really well there. They both really like it but of course are still together. On Friday, they will each start at their own school. :(

Since starting daycare, the girls have really been doing a lot of role playing at home where they each take turns being the teacher and the student. It is so cute to listen to them play. They pretend that the toy room is the classroom and their bedrooms become other rooms in the "daycare." I snapped a couple pictures of them playing in there the other day but I really need to get some video footage of them playing.

Maddie always posing

Sweet Sisters

Since staying home with Matt this summer and being around each other all of the time, the girls have gotten so close. Of course they still have their fights, but they really do love each other so much. They stick together and pretty much do EVERYTHING together. I really hope that continues throughout their lives. Here's a couple pictures of our sweeties! I just told them I wanted to take a picture of their matching braids.......the hugging each other was all on their own.

One day last week, I went to the salon and had zebra toes done on my lunch break (since I can't go home) and it took the girls probably 2 mintues once I got home for them to notice them. Of course, they then wanted toes like me, so this is my attempt at giving them zebra toes, kind of hard to see in the picture.