Slumber party aftermath

This is the first of many, we are certain. After putting the girls to bed at 8ish, going in twice to silence the giggle fest we finally headed to bed at 11. Jeremy checked on the girls and they were sleeping peacefully in their own beds. However Saturday morning when we went in to get them, they were snuggled up on Mallory's bed. They had already run off to play by the time I found the camera to take a picture. We have no idea when Kelby climbed in bed with Mallory. They have not slept together in the same bed in two years. I love the bond they have. Nothing is sweeter.

Play time

Mallory in deep concentration!



Mallory is the best little Mommy to her baby dolls. She constantly is taking care of their every need.

A new bath time ritual..

At first glance it might appear that the bath tub toys are nicely put away. However, that is not the case. These bath tub toys are in line to "go potty". Their potty is at the other end of the bath tub, this is merely the line. Kelby makes sure every night during the bath that each and every toy has a chance to "go potty". She is very insistent in her directions to the toys that they "Go potty, right now, OK! Right now, go potty." Thankfully, she is not playing with the real potty or even her real potty. Mallory is the cheerleader for the bath tub toys. When they have finished she energetically claps and says "Yeah! Good job, you did it!"

Cripple Creek Ranch

This picture pretty much says it all! We had a wonderful opportunity to go to a friends family ranch for the weekend a while back. Araceli and Hunt Hellums are dear friends of ours and when the offered we could not say no. Their family ranch is in Medina, TX and truly sits on the most beautiful piece of property either of us have ever seen. Hunt's parents host camps and hunting trips for orphans all across the state. The ranch consists of 5 or 6 cabins, a main house, lodge, several ponds to fish in, horse back riding, canoeing, swimming pool, tons of hiking trails and a peaceful creek to listen too.

We had so much fun getting to visit with some great friends we hadn't seen in a while and enjoying every bit of the ranch. Heidi came along too for the adventures and honestly had more fun than anyone there! She completely checked her "spoiled lap dog" attitude at the gate and became Heidi the ranch dog. She out ran the ranch dogs, swam in the lake and river every chance she got, bailed out of the jeep while it was moving, chased the roosters and quickly treed the ranch cat in mere seconds. By the end of the weekend she had earned the name White Lighten'.

Mallory's turn.

Araceli helping Kelby hit the pinata.

Alex clearly had some experience hitting pinatas.

Heidi was really hopping Luke would whack it open. Then the roosters caught her attention and she was off!

Heidi was gone before we could snap a pic. She chased them in and out of the chicken coup. They finally gave up and flew into the tree. All of us city folk were shocked to know roosters could actually fly that high.

Mallory, Alex and Luke eating their loot! Alex is actually 6mths younger than the girls. She and Kelby could pass for sisters. Many times we all got the two of them confused.


Hunter riding the horse.
Mallory and Kelby crashed Saturday afternoon. Sadly they missed the pony rides.


More pics of the ranch.


The main house and the edge of one of the cabins. Scarlet, a friends dog, was scoping out the place.

The girls first boat ride! This does not look safe, but I promise it was completely safe. The whole boat ride lasted maybe three minutes. The girls giggled the whole time.

Zilker Zephyr

Gran and Grandad came in town about a month ago and fortunately the weather that weekend was gorgeous! Taking full advantage of a nice day we headed down to fabulous Zilker park to play and ride the train. Our cameras memory was almost full so we didn't get to take very many pictures but did snap a few of the girls riding on the train. After the girls played and played on the play ground. Kelby LOVES slides- the higher the better!- and Mallory just loves to run wild and swing.



Staking out or seats before it fills up.


Kelby riding with Gran.


Mallory hanging out with Grandad.

"Biggirlbed!"

We conquerd the task of big girl bed transition in a weekend. After taking down the cribs we taped off the walls, painted and the set their beds up the following day. A simple painting task took longer than expected. You may remember that we had diamonds painted around the girls room. Well we foolishly assumed they would easily be covered with two coats of paint. Unfortunately, it took two coats of primer and two coats of paint. Not exactly in the plan or budget for that matter- but it finally got done! We have a few more things we want to add to the room, but for the most part it is complete!

The big reveal! They were SOOOO excited!!!

Mallory's bed

Hanging out on Kelby's bed.

Baths before our first night in the big girl beds.


The first night and really pretty much every night so far has gone well. There is the occasional giggle fest or late night gab fest, but for the most part they lay down and go to sleep easily.

Kelby's first night in her bed.

Mallory's first night in her big girl bed. (she refuses to wear pants to bed!)

Bye, bye cribs.....

So the time has finally come to say good bye to cribs and hello to big girl beds. It was a bittersweet day as Jeremy and I stood and thought about all of the sweet memories of them in their cribs. From the first few nights they slept in their cribs, the first time the started standing up (picture to come) and now look at them!

Funny how small the beds look compared to two years ago. We took pictures of the last time in their beds and the last time of them together in each bed. It had been a busy day already without naps so as we began to take pictures the girls panicked that it was bed time!

Disassembled cribs ........


A bare empty room. Babies will no longer sleep in this room. It is soon to be occupied by little girls. Little girls that can get in and out of bed on their own, open doors, feed themselves, and dress themselves. Little girls that can now request songs, shows, food, toys and activities. Little girls that no longer need to be carried everywhere, but can walk and even run where ever they want to go. TONS and TONS of fun times lie ahead. But our hearts were heavy with the fact that babyhood was over!! Very thankful for pictures, because I do not feel that I enjoyed it enough. If I could do it over again, I hope that I would soak up every little moment!

March of Dimes Walk 2010

Hello from the long lost world of parenting toddlers. Whew! They are lovable, hilarious, creative and exhausting! haha!

To start the first of many updates, here are pictures from the March of Dimes Walk. We proudly raised a little over $150 this year. Thank you so much to everyone that donated. The walk was fantastic as always. A bit breezy and cool, but much better than hot and humid! This year the 5K trek went through the capital grounds (instead of just around the perimeter) which for this extremely patriotic political junkie, was an added bonus. Something about walking on the grounds of the state capital just energizes me! ( I am a dork, I know!)

As we mentioned before, this year Evan's name was on one of the memorial towers. Seeing her name was such a reminder of why we walk and the miracles that God does through the March of Dimes. Below are a few pictures from the walk. We wanted to have shirts made this year, but procrastination got the best of me. Here's hoping for next year!

Evan's tower reads:
Evan Reese Cheatham
November 16, 2007
Psalms 4:13
Thank you God for the five hours we had Evan in our arms,
but more importantly, for holding her in yours until we get home.

We borrowed two single jogging strollers for the walk this year. As you can tell by the girls expressions, it was an early morning!


The annual Capital picture.