28 Days of LOVE follow up

Well, it's February 28th and I have officially completed my 28 Days of Love project I first posted about here.  It was fun, rewarding and made me a happier person.  Adam asked me what my favorite items on my list were and the first one that immediately popped in my head was taking Sonic cherry limeades to the crossing guards at our local elementary school.  Why?  They were so darn happy, surprised, grateful, gave me hugs and were the only people throughout all of this that promised to pass it on.  Overall it was an incredible experience and I hope to do it again next February.  Did you participate??  If so, what was your favorite act of kindness???

There was one thing on my list I was really looking forward to, volunteering at the local charity, Food for the Soul.  They have an incredible back pack program, it sends kids who wouldn't eat on the weekends home with a backpack of food.  Otherwise these kids can go 65 hours before being back at school where they can get breakfast/lunch.  Can you imagine?  I can barely go 3 hours without eating, so pathetic.  Well, they ended up calling me to cancel, help wasn't needed at the time. 

However, to make up for it and give a BIG send-off to these 28 Days of Love and random acts of kindness I wanted to do something special.  I was browsing the Food for the Soul website here and clicked on the backpack program.  It was there that I read this, "$95 will feed a student every weekend of the school year."  WOW!  I doubled that at CostCo today for food that will last us much less than that.  It was like a slap across the face from humble.  A few of you have commented that you wish you had jumped on the 28 Days of Love bandwagon.  

Well, I am here to make it easy on you.  I have set up an online Stella and Dot show with 100% of my commission going to Food for the Soul.  How awesome if we could donate $95 to feed a child for the whole school year!?  And...I will raffle off the hostess rewards (aka free jewelry credits) to one lucky guy or gal!  All you have to do is this, shop this link.  It's that easy.  Or, email me ash4545@hotmail.com.

Here are my current favorites!

Need an Easter gift?  This a best seller...sterling silver, delicate and perfect for all ages!  You can see more details about it here.

I will keep you posted on the 28 Days of Love finale!  

War Wounds

Well, sibling rivalry is in full swing and the first war wounds are on record.  Here's how it went down.  I was making dinner so I had turned on Jake and the Neverland Pirates for the kids.  This usually means that Coop is totally content and Laney watches for 7 seconds before she is back into destruction mode.  She often chooses to annoy her brother (for example, tonight out of nowhere she whacked him over the head with his play sword).  This night she was trying to climb in his chair with him, he pushed her away, she bit him and then he scratched her face.  

the war wounds...

 Can you see the bite marks on his shoulder?  This was actually from 2 weeks ago...not the bite from the fight I mentioned, but still worthy of documenting.

This was from the fight.  And this is a week later!  You see the bite marks, right?  Whew, girlfriend has got a serious grip with those teeth.

And here was the damage brother caused.  This was a few days later and looks much better than the first couple days.  

Let the games begin.

Our Week in Pictures

It started with a sick Doodles on Monday morning.  Fever and throwing up snot (all snot) a few times.  The rest of the week she has been herself but still green nasty nose and coughing throughout night.  So we have been home most the week trying to get the girl well and not spread germs.

Clearly not showing being sick.

Cooper started swim lessons this week and he did awesome!  We were pleasantly surprised.  Yes, we feed the kid and he does eat, he looks like a starving 3rd world child with those protruding bones!

As part of our 28 Days of Love we took cookies to the local fire station, I think we got the better end of the deal though.  They were so gracious, always are, this isn't our first tour ;).  If you have a boy around 3 and want to make his day, stop by the local fire station with some cookies.

School pictures arrived.  How did they get him to smile normal???!  It almost makes me want to order them, but I won't.  Too many years ahead of buying cheesy school pictures.

 Every night I make dinner Laney destroys the living room and

usually the kitchen too.  She has no purpose except destruction.

Our otherwise low maintenance shih-tzu, Lola, has been the opposite over the last couple weeks.  At her routine annual exam, the doc noticed she had a scratch on her cornea.  Honestly, we probably never would have noticed...it's not often I am gazing into my sweet dog's eyes anymore.  So, the treatment was eye drops 3-5 times a day and one pain pill.  We followed up a week later to find out the scratch was still there :(.  An hour and 15 minutes later (with a crazy 18 month old in a teeny tiny room) we had new treatment.  Keep going with pain pills and regular drops 4 times a day.  And...they drew blood from Lola and created a blood serum (we had lots of those droppers) to put in her eye every 2 hours.  Yes, you read that right, every 2 hours, for 5 days!  We go back in for check up tomorrow.  We have been very diligent about those dang drops because they said the next step would be to see an opthamologist to figure out what's going on!  

Hope you all had a good week!  Cheers to the last week of February! 

Today is Doodles 1/2 Birthday!  More on her later :)  I gotta get her to slow down long enough to catch some pictures.

Smile Fridays - week 35

If you were a 90210 (the original version) lover like me, you will love this.  Do you know that through high school every Wednesday my two BFF's (stace and ali) and I got Jalapenos take-out and watched the show at Stacey's house.   Every.single.Wednesday.  It was awesome. http://www.scarymommy.com/beverly-hills-90210/

Adore this and want it framed in my home (maybe without that detailed heart pic in the background though:)).  I have been plugging along in my 28 Days of Love and it has been just awesome, 100% awesome.  I am doing nothing life changing, but to know I am making one person smile makes it totally worth it.  Just today I baby-sat for a good friend. My kids love her kids and she is pregnant with her 4th, so who is more deserving than a morning without kids than her!!  

Today is the last Friday in February, that is a BIG reason to smile.  February is just blah.  After this weekend we have visitors the next 4 weekends straight, how fun is that?!  There is sure to be lots of fun blog posts about our visitors in March!!!

Cowboy and his Cowgirl

The kids are really into dressing up these days.  Today Cooper wanted them to be cowboys, so we made it happen.  They were both totally into it.

The original pic.

Instagrammed.  Cracks me up!  

 Yee-Haw!  Just found this pic tonight, much better!

Cooper reciting Pledge of Allegiance

I have mentioned before that Coop doesn't talk about school once he is home.  Today I thought I heard him mumbling lines from Pledge of Allegiance while playing.  I asked him what he was saying, he said, "your hand goes here,"  putting his hand somewhat near his heart.  And then he recited that whole pledge!!!  What??  What else does this kid know that he doesn't share with us! I didn't even know they said the Pledge at school!  He even cooperated to get it on video so I could send to Dad.  Enjoy :)

Happy Monday Y'all!

Freakin' Incredible!

Just like her Daddy

The girl eats just like her father...fast.  I try to be sitting down/standing up and eating right when she starts so I can get 1/2 my meal done before I am up getting her more or cleaning her up.  And when she's done she either wants more or to get down and fast.  

Coop and I were laughing at her the other day because I couldn't cut strawberries up fast enough.  By the time I would turn around from her tray, they would be gone!

3 1/2 Years!

This boy turned 3 1/2 this week.

Besides always giving this cheesy smile for the camera, here's what else he is up to...

-Still an incredible sleeper.  We put him to bed around 8:30, he's rarely asleep before 9.  Usually up around 8 or unless his sister's morning chatter wakes him earlier. He's back down for a nap around 1, sleeps a solid 2-3 hours.

-Loves going to preschool.  His teachers say he always participates but hardly speaks a word of school at home.

-Is an ok eater-would survive on Chick Fil A and PB&J if he could.  Really digging yogurt, fruit, baked potatoes, pancakes/waffles, avocados, cheese.

-Favorite things to play at home- basketball (really need to post about our games), Super Heroes, working guys with trucks, riding his bike, playing golf and of course, reading books. 

At preschool they celebrate summer birthdays on their 1/2 birthday.  I took Coop to grocery store and told him I would make any treat to take to school.  He wanted cupcakes.  He chose strawberry (yuck!) with pink icing.  Not sure about the pink thing?  He's always adament about his favorite colors being red and blue.  Man, he was pumped to take these babies to school.

 Adam got home the night of Coop's 1/2 birthday after being gone for a week so we headed out to celebrate and have some fun at Urban Air!  It was soooo fun!  Not sure who enjoyed it more parents or kids?? :)

 Laney just ran circles around this area.  Cooper raced Adam and I and jumped, jumped, jumped, etc.

Adam had a tiny bit of fun playing Dodgeball.  Coop was his wingman and Laney screamed to get in their for her turn.

Happy 1/2 Birthday Cooper William, we love you!!!

Smile Fridays - week 34

It's time to celebrate President's weekend, woot-woot!  Shop at stelladot.com/ashleyjones.  Email me at ash4545@hotmail.com for FREE shipping and any questions!

This cracks me up.  Coop asked to change her diaper, I said-go for it.  You should know that I practically need a straight jacket to change Laney and here she lay for her brother so peacefully!!??  He got as far as opening it when he realized it was poopy.  I took over but he was right there to help.

Friday afternoon haircut!  I didn't realize how bad he needed a haircut until it was over!  He says he will let me style it like the stylist did...we'll see about that.

Have you heard of the Harlem Shake?  Apparently it's taking over You Tube.  All the videos follow the same gist...same song, starts with 1 person dancing and people around them going about their business, then the music drops and it gets hilarious.  It involves costumes/masks and ridiculous dance moves.  It's definitely a love/hate thing, I love it.  Of course my fave is the Kansas basketball version.  For the record...they didn't record this until after the 3 game losing streak was over :).

Happy Heart Day 2013

Valentine's Day was pretty uneventful, which was fine with me.  We all wore red/pink, had dinner together, and Coop celebrated at school.  Here's the holiday in pics...

His Valentine cards this year make me cringe.  I despise the teeny, tiny cheesy cards with gross candy attached and I had so many grand ideas from Pinterest.  But it was over when he spotted these suckers and I caved...boo.  Maybe next year??? 

Did you ever notice the tiny space they leave for you to write your name on the cards?  I didn't until I had a 3 year old writing his name on them...impossible.  So we improvised and he wrote his name on the back (minus the e) and Dad did the front.  Shout out to Dad that did these with Coop, I was at a Stella and Dot show and of course waited until the night before to finish them!  And we were so proud of Cooper for writing his name on them all, that's a big accomplishment in this house!

This was as creative as I got for the holiday this year.  Not even cards/gifts for the kids.  They were spoiled by their Grandparents and Adam and I gave up sugar for Lent so no sweets in this house!

Cooper made this for us at school.  Man those teachers are good, will treasure this forever!  See that cheesy, ridiculous smile in the picture?  Everytime he smiles like that I laugh thinking of the Friends episode with Monica and Chandler's engagement pics...please tell me you remember it?! 

This pic is to document the beautiful day we had, sunny and 70.  

Valentine Kisses

Earlier this week I attempted a Valentine photo shoot, total bomb.  This was the best I got...Laney wouldn't sit still and Cooper was determined to catch her.  I even had M&Ms bribery and One Direction playing on my phone!

I attempted more pics tonight and it was a failure too, at least Cooper has a real smile here.  They are only smiling because Adam put Lola on my head, they were both screaming seconds before and after.

Sending lots of love from Texas to all of you on this special day!

Click here to see Valentine's Day last year.  I can.not.believe. how much the kids have changed!

Tomboy, Teeth, and a Tough Decision

 Tomboy?  Just maybe.  On a walk last week, I stopped the kids to point out a worm.  Laney sat her happy hips down and picked up that sucker.  She thought it was hilarious!  For the record, her brother's fingers never touched that worm.

 Teeth.  I have been meaning to post about Doodles teeth for months!  And now she has a mouthful!  It seems like every week I spot a new one sprouting.  The latest is the bottom two on either side of middle ones (clearly I don't know the correct term for these teeth).  She has at least 12 now, that seems like a lot!

Tough decision.  Ugh, how is time to register for next year already?  Obviously Coop is going back next year, gotta keep on keepin' on.  

The decision is with Doodles.  We started Coop at her age (will be 2 in the fall).  I had no 2nd thoughts when we started him...he needed some social skills, there was a new baby coming, and everyone else was doing it.  Here's where I struggle...Laney is learning her social skills with big bro, there is no baby coming (yet), and I don't care what everyone else is doing.  It's not that I don't think she would adjust, in fact I am sure she would adore it and thrive.  She just still seems like a baby to me and I feel like my babies are slipping thru my fingers.  And I don't crave days alone without the kids (yet).  Even though I know 2 days=9 solid hours I could devote to my Stella and Dot business instead of working it at naptime and from 10-midnight/1am and running some errands minus kids/carseats.  

Wondering Adam's opinion?  He was all about her starting next year, he knows how great Coop did, how Laney would adore it and doesn't get why I am even questioning it.  And then I reminded him we will be doubling tuition and his mind quickly shifted ;).  So this is where we (or I, Adam is on board with whatever I decide) are at in the decision process...I change my mind every other day.  Good news/bad news, I have less than 2 weeks to make a final decision.  i am very aware that when i have teenagers i will look back on this and laugh that i thought this was a tough decision ;)   

Grandpa Visits!

Grandpa made a quick and last minute trip down to see us last week.  Why the mid-week visit?  KU was playing TCU, not even going there.  I could write pages about that ridiculous game.  Anyways, despite the awful, heart breaking loss we had lots of fun with Grandpa here in his short 36 hours.  

 The weather was beautiful!  Coop and Grandpa had some front yard golf lessons.  They also cleaned out my car and garage!

 He was taking it all in and actually listening!

Watch out Grandpa!

Guess what I did while they played golf?  Yep, chased Laney around.  Here she was on the loose with a golf club.

Grandpa loved how happy Laney wakes up in the morning and from naps!

The main reason for the visit :(