Pretty Girls

Dear Daddy

Mom and I did our makeup in preparation of you coming home tonight. Don't we look pretty? Also I gave mom a good reason to go makeup shopping!

Love,
Kirsten Sue

 

 

lover long weekends

We really enjoyed President's weekend this year. Kirk got off of work at 2:00 on Friday and we had a nice weekend staying  at home and crossing things off our "to do list". My brother Josh came down on Friday night and stayed til Sunday. We love visitors and had a blast with Josh.

 

• taxes
• readied garden ready to plant (including drip line system)
• sprayed polyurathane on the table and chairs
• cleaned 3 very dirty bathrooms
• washed, dried and put away 7 loads of laundry
• installed a security system (just try to burglarize us, I dare you)
• watched Unstoppable (and Office & 30 Rock, of course)
• Kirsten and I went to Hoover Dam and did the tour, it was really fun
• made chocolate chip cookies for Josh
• visited friends, had friends over
• planned Kirsten's birthday
• and this morning we dropped Kirk off at the airport and sent him to DC for a couple days

But the best part of it all is when I went over to watch Bachelor with some girls in the ward  I left Kirk home to put Kirsten to bed and go to bed himself (he was running on only 4 hours of sleep). But when I came home a couple hours later he had cleaned the house. Including folding towels, sweeping, mopping, vacuuming, dishes, and picking up. He is so fantastic! I'm not sure it's possible to love a man more than I love my Kirk.

Day of LOVE!

Growing up Valentines day was one of my very favorite holidays. Mom made us feel so special. Every year she would bake each of us an oversized heart shaped sugar cookie with our name on it. She would also host a candlelit Valentines dinner where we got to eat off the china in the living room, and drink red punch (always red). The great Valentine would always visit leaving a small gift for the family in the mailbox or on the front porch. She would also write all the reasons she loves us on a heart cut out of construction paper. We had so many great traditions that I want to carry on with my family too.

This year I was preparing for a lonely Valentines because Kirk had to fly to Chicago Sunday thru Friday. But cupid worked a miracle and on Friday Kirk's trip was canceled! Oh cupid I love you! But we decided to go ahead with our Valentine plans on Saturday and celebrate all weekend. Saturday we met my cousin Holli at Calico Basin and did a little hiking. Audrey was a champ and walked up a huge hill, while Kirsten happily refused to leave the carrier.

 

I made the girls heart shaped sugar cookies and they decorated them, then licked off all the frosting. I made Kirk a delicious meatball soup that evening and we cuddled up and watched "Life as We Know It"

 Monday Kirk made heart shaped waffles for his girls, which made us all very happy!

 

 *disclaimer I had just exercised*

Isn't my Valentine the cutest?

 Ok, but really he is a stud!

 

Kirk was super sweet and bought each girl a cute wooden music box. They loved them and carried them around all day!

 

He gave me this pretty willow tree family box. He knows I'm a sucker for these things! He also bought me blackberry and raspberry starter plants instead of flowers, smart boy! AND he wrote me a poem. He is the best!

 In the afternoon the girls and I decorated the house in balloons and hearts. This is Kirsten standing next to the balloon she proudly blew up all by herself. She kept putting it up high so Audrey couldn't touch it.

Kirk made me soo happy when we got a Bertoli freezer meal for dinner. Candlelit dinner ready in 9 minutes with hardly any clean up, that's the way I like it!

The girls had chocolate covered marshmellows for dinner, 

it was a holiday so anything goes!

For dessert I made Kirk chocolate covered strawberries, 

Happy Valentines Day indeed!

 

After dinner we had a visit from the great Valentine. 

He left a present for each girl

 lucky girls!

I gave Kirk his favorite snacks: milano's, trailmix, wasabi nuts, mtn dew, and a box of chocolates.

The girls gave him a flying spinner toy. They had fun playing with it. At my failed attempt to work it Kirsten said "good job mom, daddy's turn". Nice. Also when I did finally get it to work I shot it straight up into the light, killing the lights. I was pretty afraid I had just ruined our light/ceiling fan when Kirk pulled the string and turned it back on. Tricky toy.

We had a fun holiday as a family.  Man I love these three!

The cute things they do!

Thanks to an e-mail I got from my sweet sister-in-law, Emily, I started writing down a few of the cute things our girls are doing these days.

• Audrey smacks her lips when she wants a kiss (especially when Kirsten gets in trouble)
• Audrey says "nuh uh" and shakes her head when we tell her it is time for bed
• Audrey points to the ducks in the picture above her changing table saying "duck duck duck"(the cross stitch my Grandma Brinkerhoff did for me when I was a young girl)
• Audrey runs to stand in the corner as a privilege (in fact sometimes we tell her to go to the corner to distract her, and she happily prances right over! (great parenting I know))
• Kirsten giving Audrey a time out (complete with Kirsten dragging Audrey over to the corner, babbling about why she is there, stepping away for a few seconds, and having Audrey give her kisses and say sorry)
• Audrey sticks her tounge on her teeth rubbing back and forth when she wants to brush them
• Audrey has decided to use my"shelf" (yes I sometimes stick things down my shirt to hide them from the girls, until Audrey started sticking toys she wanted to hide from Kirsten down my shirt, and then even down her own shirt!)
• Kirsten says "your welcome" every time we ask her to say "thank you"
• Most common phrase out of my mouth is "Kirsten give it back to Audrey,.. one, two, thank you"
• Kirsten sings twinkle twinkle little star to Kirk "dinko dinko williw ar, ow undr wat ew ar, up buv sky hi, dinko dinko ar"
• Kirsten has a shutting door fetish. She loves to shut all the bedroom and bathroom doors often trapping Audrey. So the other day when I had "had it" I locked her in my closet for 30 seconds. She cried when I let her out and continued to cry for a couple minutes until I told her sorry and gave her kisses. 
• Both girls LOVE to dance, all day long, everyday.
• Audrey keeps good tabs on our shoes and brings us to them, no matter where we are in the house (bathtub included)
• Kirsten refuses to feed herself and Audrey refuses to be fed
• Every time Audrey gets in the car she points to Adam's carseat and say "Ada" and then to Kirsten's car seat saying "ir en" and keeps repeating herself until we agree with her.
• If Kirk is around Kirsten insists on him helping her with everything. If I help her then she is upset until Kirk redoes it for her. It can be very frustrating having a Daddy's girl!
• The girls LOVE fish and insist on visiting the fish tanks every time we go to Walmart.

I plan to keep adding to the list as I think of all the cute quirky things they do. They sure make me happy and I love the sweet little things they do!

Happy Daddy is Home!

We're so glad when Daddy comes home

Glad as we can be

Clap our hands

 Shout for joy

Climb up on his knee

Put our arms around his neck

Hug him tight like this

Pat his cheek and give him what?

 

A great big kiss!

Lately

 I feel like I haven't blogged forever. It's only been two weeks but there has plenty of life happening at our house. Kirk is in Chicago this week. Yes Chicago, as in the huge snowstorm that paralyzed the city. They sent him home (to his hotel room) Tuesday afternoon and declared Wednesday a snow day. He said everything in the city was closed. Poor guy had to sit in his quiet hotel room and order room service all day, with only his iphone and ds to keep him company. I would feel sorry for him if I wasn't so jealous. A quiet hotel room? For reading books, long hot bubble baths, and naps? Please sign me up for the next snowstorm! When I told my brother Brett he won my heart over by saying "I do (feel sorry for Kirk). Video games aren't as good as a wife." Isn't his wife lucky? Kirk left Sunday and will be home Friday. We are over halfway through the week, hallelujah! The girls have opted out of a lot of naps this week and it just makes for grumpy girls and a frustrated mom. The coolest part of Kirk being gone is we get to use our facetime feature (video chat) on our new iphones! Wow is it the coolest thing ever. The girls LOVE being able to talk to their dad face to face. Audrey carries him around the house (holding him up to her ear most of the time, he loves a good closeup of her ear!). Kirsten spends most of her time showing him Tiana or Ariel or the dress she is currently wearing. She asks him "howryou" about every 30 seconds, it's pretty stinking cute. We carry Kirk with us and have him help "put the girls to bed", he is even able to read the stories to them, cool huh? It makes me miss him more because I can see his handsome face, but I also miss him less because I can SEE him meaning I am less hormonal about him "abandoning" me (ha ha love being a woman).

We take lots of baths while Daddy is gone

At my wits end I put Kirsten down for a nap in her room, not wanting to take a nap but knowing she couldn't leave she fell asleep in the doorway.

We have had some really beautiful days here in Vegas. We enjoyed of every one and have spent a lot of time at the park.

Audrey and Adam swinging away

I am loving January weather in Vegas. Kirsten may be wearing her Ariel nightgown

Climbing up all by herself

Audrey is fearless at the playground

After returning home from our trip we started potty training Kirsten. The first couple of days were pretty awful mostly because I spent every waking hour cleaning up a bathroom mess. But then I realized the magic of pull ups, hello! She did fantastic and we got to the point that she would tell me when she needed to go and was staying dry (except for #2) all day. FANTASTIC. Until the time I was changing an Audrey poopy diaper and Kirsten needed to go but I couldn't exactly stop what I was doing and Kirsten had an accident in her pull up. No biggie, but she realized that she could still just pee in her pull up if she wanted, easier? she thought so. And so we have digressed big time. She goes in the toilet twice a day at the most. Please pour on the advice. We do reward candy and stickers, bribes and pretty panties. I finally see the gloriousness of a potty trained toddler and I want it badly. Please tell me how!

  

Audrey likes the stripping down part of potty training

Potty training is exhausting us all

Magical nap time. After Audrey is asleep I put a movie on for Kirsten and enjoy the quiet

Can we just take a few minutes and talk about how adorable and charming Audrey is? If I am sitting on the couch reading or watching a movie she is on my lap laying content in my arms cuddling with me as long as I am there. When Kirk and I kiss on the couch Audrey sprints over to be included. Whenever I tell her it is time to eat she runs over to her high chair and waits to be put in. When I tell her it is time to go she runs over and puts on her shoes then waits patiently by the garage door. I say it is time to take a bath and she drops what she is doing and runs upstairs to the bath. As soon as I turn the water on she yells "bubba bubba bubba" bubbles! she is a girl after my own heart! Her favorite thing in the world is still her red sippy cup, but not far behind is her coat. She drags the coat everywhere and is even sleeping with it tonight. I love this sweet little girl.

Last weekend we had a fantastic time together as a family. Saturday morning we had one of those picture perfect moments. The girls climbed into bed with us and we cuddled together as a family. Everyone was smiles and giggles and I would have stopped for a second to grab a camera but I didn't want to miss one second. Kirk, Kirsten, and I hid under the covers while Audrey tackled us and stepped all over our faces. Moments of happiness that we live for. Moments where my favorite people in the entire world are overflowing with happiness. We have our moments of frustration and exhaustion, but I love sharing my life with Kirk and our beautiful daughters. Anyway, after spending the day sanding and priming our kitchen table and chairs Saturday night we sat on the couch sharing a carton of icecream. Kirk and I each had a spoon and Kirsten jumped up and grabbed a spoon for each her and Audrey. Then the four of us dug in feeding each other bites of icecream. It was so cute and fun, I wanted to grab my camera but I couldn't pull myself away. Two perfect family moments in one normal Saturday, love it!