sometimes my kids look presentable

so I try to take their picture...

{I wanted to get a "birthday portrait" for each of them. Eleanor's birthday was in October, Penelope's birthday was in August.  

November seems close enough to their actual birthdays, right? Especially considering we threw a new baby into the mix in September.} 

sometimes they insist on wearing a green tutu...

sometimes they want nothing to do with taking pictures...

 

sometimes they cooperate...

sometimes they don't get along very well...

{fighting over a stick-turned-microphone}

sometimes they really like each other and play together so nicely...

 

but, one thing is for sure, I think they are always pretty cute!

       

and of course I couldn't leave out this little cutie from the post :)

 

A Name and a Blessing

We blessed Molly on November  4th.  And I'm completely aware that was more than two months ago :) Let's just say I'm a little behind.
But, it is a new year, so I'm resolving to be better at recording our family history! (Baby steps, right??)

Now that we live in North Carolina we are much closer to Andrew's parents so we get to see them more often.  Andrew's dad often has business in Charlotte so every other week or so we get to go meet up for lunch at Chick-Fil-A with him and the girls love it!

Anyway, they were able to be with us for Molly's special day.  It is always so neat to get a glimpse into what the Lord has in store for his little spirit children, and so humbling to think that the responsibility of helping her reach her potential is mine!

Unfortunately, I didn't get around to taking pictures of just Molly before church.  Even with the extra hour we got from daylight savings that morning we were still rushed :)  By the time we got home from church she was already changed into something more comfy, so I made sure to snap some of her during the following week.  

 

She is such a doll!  And have I mentioned an AWESOME sleeper?!! Definitely earning some favorite child points :) At 7 weeks (about the time of her blessing) she was still sleeping in her swing. (We've since moved her to her crib, she was just getting too big for it and a flat spot on her head!) At night she was sleeping from about 11 pm until 6 or 7 am.  And boy do I love her for that! And for many other reasons of course. 

 

She has the cutest little face.  I think every time I go to pick her up I think to myself or even say out loud, "you are so cute!" She has such a content little personality and just loves to watch her sisters.  She is always scanning the room to make eye contact with anyone.  Now she'll smile as soon as she locks eyes with someone, but back then smiles were a little harder to come by.  She likes to be held, but she's not a cuddler.  So once she falls asleep I always hold her precious little cheeks right next to mine and take a mental picture while savoring that moment. Oh, just such a sweet little girl.  She also really enjoyed just being with me and Andrew late at night once the big girls were in bed.  She would just talk and coo and give us all her smiles.  It was like she had been holding them in and saving them all day just for us!  She goes to bed much earlier now and I kind of miss those days of just sitting on our bed and getting acquainted with her sweet little spirit.     

 

Some of her nicknames are Molly girl, Miss Molly, Miss Molly girl, Molly pop, Molly Molly. 

 

Molly has actually always been my favorite girl's name but I could never convince Andrew to use it until now -- since she was the third girl, our favorite names list was dwindling.  Elizabeth is my middle name, and I am also the third girl in my family, so that is pretty neat.  And it is my mom's middle name, too.  We sure do love our little Molly Elizabeth and feel so lucky to have her in our family.

We attempted to get a good family picture before church (you know how that goes)...

And then we tried again after church...

  

Needless to say, we had a lot of outtakes.

I guess I'll just have to get used to my new reality of "good family picture" :)

Happy Halloween!

We missed our ward's trunk or treat while we were out of town at the BYU game and Andrew has class on Wednesdays (which is the night Halloween was on), so I thought we'd just skip Halloween altogether since the thought of taking all 3 girls trick or treating just didn't seem very appealing.  LUCKILY Andrew's class got cancelled and he was able to join us for Halloween for the first time since we've had kids.  It was so fun! Andrew practiced the whole "Trick or treat"  script with the girls and they had it down until it was actually time to do it.  They went to about 20 houses then came home and were so excited to tell me all about it and show me all their candy! 

Strawberry Shortcake

Rapunzel

I'm so glad when daddy comes home...

I have so many blurry pictures because they were running around screaming "best day ever".  

It's the go-to excitement phrase in our house, and even more fitting now that Eleanor was Rapunzel.

 

            

Wouldn't you want to give these little cutie pies some candy?

  

Go Cougars!

We were so excited to find out BYU would be playing Georgia Tech.  Since it would be close enough for us to drive we bought tickets back in August for our anniversary present. Georgia Tech is in Atlanta so we made the 4 hour drive down in time for Andrew to attend the fireside that the football team puts on the night before they play.

On Saturday we got all dressed up in our BYU gear - my sister Amy was nice enough to send BYU shirts all the way from Provo so the girls would have proper attire. Then we took the MARTA (subway/train thing that runs through downtown ATL) to the football stadium. 

Loyal strong and true, wear the white and blue...

Waiting to ride the MARTA down to the game

 When we got to the stadium I was feeling a little nervous/embarrassed/anxious about having all three kids with us, including a 5 week old!
But as soon as we got to our seats in the BYU section we felt right at home, there were kids everywere.  The lady sitting in front of us was even crazier than us, she had a 3 week old in her baby bjorn.  Gotta love BYU fans.

There were a few times I didn't think we'd make it all the way through the whole game.  Luckily popcorn and cotton candy make for good entertainment.  Penelope fell asleep for the whole 3rd quarter so with her bestie unavailable Eleanor got a little antsy so we went and walked around for a little while.  All in all I think we all had a really good time and best of all, we have some new cougar fans in the house!

 

Cougar claws!

Sleepy Penelope at half time.

Eleanor, running out of steam.

Game over, BYU wins

I couldn't help but dig up this old picture (and reminisce about how much skinnier and blonder I used to be).  This was the last BYU game Andrew and I went to.  It was in the fall of 2007. We used to be so footloose and fancy free back then :)

Crazy to think what a difference 5 years makes!

 

Birthday Girl

  

Like most birthdays, Eleanor's lasted pretty much the whole week.  Her birthday was on a Wednesday but Andrew has class on Wednesdays and Thursdays and we were going out of town over the weekend so we celebrated as a family on Tuesday.  Eleanor got to pick out a balloon (she chose a princess crown of course), she got to pick what we had for dinner (she chose pizza, my kind of girl!), we had cupcakes and opened presents.   On her birthday we went to lunch at Chick-Fil-A, and the day after her birthday we had playgroup at our house, shared cupcakes with our friends and I told her it was her birthday party :)

She's picked up my bad habit of biting nails

   

Eleanor is so much fun to have around.  She is so imaginative and moves from one idea to the next all day long.  She is such a good helper and a great big sister.  She genuinely wants to do what's right and she always helps remind Penelope what they're supposed to be doing.  She always wants everything to be perfect though, which can lead to frustrations when she's working on writing letters or doing art projects/craft type things.  She likes to do "gymnastics" and "play" soccer.  I'm hoping we can actually put her in these activities next year so she can decide if she really likes to do them.  She is also so good at playing games on the computer (she navigates websites like Disney Jr and Nick Jr like a pro).  She has gotten really good at painting and will match the colors exactly to what they are "supposed" to be.  She still loves to read books and now really likes to tell stories (like Goldilocks, 3 little pigs, and princess and the pea).  She has also become very inquisitive and loves to ask questions.  My favorite is when she comes into our room in the morning and asks, "mom, did you sleep good last night?" And speaking of mornings, she is definitely a morning person.  She wakes up so pleasant and ready to start the day.  This morning she came in telling me that it's ok if we don't get a dog right now, and that she'll be content with just a goldfish for now and she'll name it Alice in Wonderland.  She also loves to hide from dad when we hear the garage door opening and then jump out and say surprise.  She loves to "decorate" by arranging random things in random places.  She also loves to pick out her own outfits and proclaims she is "fashion fantastic".  Needless to say, she keeps us entertained.

 

She brings so much fun and laughter into our house.  We are so glad she is in our family!

So crazy to think she is 4!

She got some princess paper dolls, a Barbie camera, and little figurines from Brave)

And birthday week continues with a package from my sister Jessica.  The girls were just as excited about the box that the package came in as what was inside of it.  They used this box and stuffed it with junk and sent each other pretend packages for a good week after we got this.

In the original package was a Halloween book for Eleanor and she also included a BEAUTIFUL quilt she made for Molly. 

You can see the back of it here.  Eleanor kind of thought it was for her and insisted on sleeping with it for a couple of nights.  I was finally able to convince her it was for Molly!  I tried to get some pictures of Molly laying on it but she was getting fussy, so I'll to try again soon.       
I'm one lucky mama to have such sweet little girls.