Monday, July 26, 2010

Frisco, TX

Leslie and Evan stayed with us last summer when Nick came to Houston for work.

This summer we decided to head up to Dallas to visit them. The kids were amazingly good on the drive up and Leslie was very kind to let us arrive at her house well past 11pm Thursday night.

Of course we had to make our traditional road-trip stop at Buc-ee's!
Molly and I LOVE that place... Paul, not so much.
The next morning Paul introduced the babies and Molly and Evan were so excited to see each other again!
Rebecca is feeling a little left out since Marshall immediately became infatuated with Evan's firetruck. Molly and Evan LOVED swimming together!After a full morning of swimming we got all the kids seated for lunch...
Marshall had fun trying on Evan's old cowboy boots (ok, so maybe I am the one who had fun putting the boots on him!)Friday afternoon we took the kids to the local splash-pad.
The picture below cracks me up... can you see Evan?Friday night Marshall enjoyed his bath in the sink...
while Molly wrote me a very sweet message...which earned her brownies for dessert :o)While the brownies baked Molly and Daddy played a little soccer. Daddy's punishment for a little too much smack-talk on the soccer field!Saturday the kids enjoyed cinnamon rolls for breakfast before we went to the Frisco Water Park. Those pictures are on a disposable camera, I'll post them as soon as I get them developed. After the water park, the kids were exhausted and settled down to watch a movie together.We tried to let the kids have a slumber party, which seemed like a good idea, but only lasted 10 minutes before they both came out of Evan's room crying. Sunday morning we enjoyed a little more playtime before heading back home.Leslie helped turn the entire living room into a tent!
I love Evan's "How you doin" face in this picture!Marshall trying to muscle his way into doing some crafts with the big kids...You might have noticed that Nick is not present in any of these pictures... turns out he threw out his back the week before we arrived and spent most of the weekend in bed or laid out on the couch. It was very kind of him not to kick us out of his house while he was feeling so crummy!

The kiddos and our car-full of stuff loaded up and ready to head home:

Wednesday, July 21, 2010

First Steps

Marshall just took his first steps, 8 days shy of his first birthday! Paul is working from home today so little man and I popped into his office to stay hi and when I put Marshall down he walked right to Paul. Six whole steps!!! WOO HOO!!!

Yay, Big Boy!!! We're so proud of you!

Tuesday, July 20, 2010

Sneak Peek...

While visiting Leslie and her family in Dallas last weekend, we took our family photos with an AMAZING photographer... it will be about 4 weeks until we get the rest of the images, but in the meantime here is a sneak peek! These pictures of Molly and Marshall just make me squeal they are so good!!! I *HEART* Bella Jewel Photography!

Commissions

Paul and I have been taking Dave Ramsey's Financial Peace course this summer and decided to get Molly started on Financial Peace, Jr.

We listened to the lesson on CD with Molly and I found this really cool Responsibility Chart at Target. Molly has 5 things she has to take care of every day in order to earn her "commissions": 1) Make her bed, 2) Clean up her toys, 3) Clean her desk, 4) Check the mail, and 5) Take out the recycling.
She gets $1 weekly per chore and has to have all the magnets for each day in order to earn the money. If she gets all her magnets each week, she gets all $5. After she gets paid, she has to divide the money between her Save, Spend and Give envelopes.

She's done great so far! Here are pictures from her first week's payday.