November in a Nutshell

➸➸  Olivia and I had a fun Veteran's Day morning together.  She didn't have school that day, but Sydney did.  She was so excited to take Sydney to her new school.  She loved seeing her new room.
After we dropped Sydney off, we had about an hour to spend putzing around before our reservation at As You Wish Pottery.  So, what better place to walk around than Target?!

I didn't take any pictures of us working on our pottery piece at As You Wish {because, whooo, we were messy}, but here's the finished butterfly dish in all its glory!

➹ We had so much fun -- we're excited to paint a few more pieces! ➹

➸➸ Speaking of Veteran's Day.... of course we had to pay a visit to one of our most favorite veterans ever so we could shower him with hugs and kisses!  We love you Poppy.

➸➸ And, as if Veteran's day wasn't already full, we spent a couple hours hanging out with friends.  Oh man, do we love a day off in the middle of the week! 

➸➸  And, speaking of sweet friends, we've been hanging out with a good crew these days.  Playdates at the park, after school ice cream dates, and birthday party extravaganzas -- fun times with fun friends.

➹ Ms Sheri picked us up for the party in her Jeep and these girls thought they were so cool hanging out together in the backseat! ➹

➹ Can you guess the theme of the party? ➹

➸➸  I got the girls these concert tees at Target, and even though they had no idea who Aerosmith or ACDC were, they still loved rocking the shirts {see what I did there?}!

➸➸ Our neighbor fell off his ladder while putting up his Christmas lights and the firefighters showed up along with the paramedics.  It tens out he broke his kneecap and needed to be transported to the hospital in the ambulance.  Well, the firefighters stayed and finished putting up his Christmas lights.  We thought that was pretty cool, so we took some cookies over to the firestation to say thank you.

➸➸  Both girls had special days at school last week.  Sydney was the featured student last Thursday, and we only found out about it 2 days before.  I think we did okay with making her poster though.  My mom and I went in and spent the last 30 minutes with her, and my mom read the class a cute Thanksgiving book!  

Olivia had the task of disguising a turkey to save his life.  So, uh, thanks Pinterest!  ;)  We made it our own though, and even though it was a family project, she did most of it herself.

➸➸ And, let's end this with lunches in the cafeteria.  Because, why not?!

Liv's Fun Run

So far, Olivia has had two fundraisers for her school.  The first involved selling frozen cookie dough to her family {which we now have tubs of sitting in Nana's freezer}, and the second was an organized "Fun Run!"  I didn't want to break the news to Olivia that running wasn't fun, because, man oh man, was she excited!  She collected pledges from all of us, and while I didn't think she would do a ton of laps, she ended up completing 35/36 in the allotted time!  I was SO proud of her!  And, even better, she was proud of herself! 

➹ The first several laps, she was full of smiles! ➹

➹ This one is one of my favorites from the day.  That face! ➹

➹ Aaannnddd, this was at the end.  But, seriously, how cute is that sign she made?! ➹

➹ She even asked her teacher if she could run one more lap so they could check off the last box.  Type A much? ➹

➹ Her class after the run. ➹

Farm Friends

I feel so lucky that I was able to chaperone Olivia and her class on their very first kindergarten field trip.  After studying a farm unit, the kids all went to a local dairy farm to see some animals and taste some fresh milk.  The kids were so great, and even though Olivia described the farm as stinky on more than one occasion, I know she loved it.  And, the bus ride, don't get me started on how excited she was to ride it!  On the way out, she told me that it was the best ride of her life!

➹ Sheri, Angie, and I {but mainly Sheri} made the girls shirts to wear on the field trip.  They turned out so cute! ➹

➹ The backs of the shirts!  Love them! ➹

➹ They each got to have flavored milk and ice cream too! Sign me up for another one! ➹

➹ Love my Mini Me! ➹

A Hoosier Halloween

As you are probably well aware, this mama likes a theme.  I especially like a Halloween theme.  And, as long as our girls will let us, we'll keep doing this whole family costume bit for Halloween.  Although, it's getting a little more difficult trying to find outfits for two {errr, three?} leading ladies.  Back in September, I started stressing out about what we were going to dress as for Halloween.  Sure, the girls could have been Anna and Elsa, along with every other girl their age, but our girls are sort of over the whole Frozen scene and I didn't want them to be like everyone else.  

My friend, Liz, was texting me one night and said how she wished her kids would just go as a football player and a cheerleader and she could be done with figuring out their Halloween costumes.  And, that's when it hit me!  Our girls could go as IU cheerleaders, and woot woot, we already had the costumes.    I figured that David could dress as a basketball player and I could go as a Hoosier fan!  We sort of threw things together last minute {as we tend to do}, but I think it turned out cute.  

The day was crazy with Liv's party at school, and then there was this whole drama with ordering pizzas for our friend's chili party and the pizzas taking longer than normal and my mom having to wait in line for 45 minutes to pick up those pizzas, butttttt.... we don't need to go there, do we?  {Thanks and sorry again, Mom!}  So, our 14 year old neighbor ended up snapping a few pictures of us, and once it was dark I realized that we didn't get our "rufferree" Magnum in the picture.  My plan was to get us all dressed up again sometime that weekend for pictures, but, yeah, that never happened.  So, you get what you get and you don't throw a fit!

➹ You can't see my striped socks, but they were my favorite part of my costume! ➹

We had a fun night trick-or-treating with friends.  We ended up going on a few different streets, hanging out in our driveway, and then hanging out with Riley and her family one street over.  Now I've got about 11.5 months to figure out what we are going to dress as next year!

Halloween Parties at School

The two weeks leading up to Halloween were cuh-razy.  We had parties at the school, at friends' houses, and even some Halloween events to go to.  In addition to all of that, I was preparing for the parties at each of the girls' schools.  I was one of the "party planners" for Olivia's kindergarten party, and I somehow sort of volunteered myself to prepare an activity for Sydney's class {plus two other classes}.  It was a bit chaotic at our house to say the least.

Buuuuttttt, everything got done and I think the parties were a great success.  It was so cute seeing all the little kids dressed up at Sydney's school.  I had NO idea what Sydney was going to dress as for the party.  I didn't think she was keen on the idea of dressing as a cheerleader {which is what she was going to be on Halloween night}.  She had told Ms. Erin that she was going to be a lion, but when I showed her the lion costume that we had at home, she said she was NOT going to wear it.  At Target, she picked out a Rapunzel costume {which I bought}, but a couple days before the party, she started telling everyone that she was going to be Elsa.  We have zero Elsa costumes.  Our friend, Angie, had given her an Aurora costume, so that and her scarecrow costume from the year before were also in play.  The night before the party, she decided on Rapunzel.  But, the morning of.... Well, she wasn't having it.  She pulled out a random t-shirt and shorts and told me that was what she wanted to wear to school.  None of the other costumes were even a choice, but as we walked past the laundry room, she saw Olivia's Dorothy costume hanging up and decided that was what she wanted to wear!  And, you know what, it was perfect!  She looked so stinkin' cute in it.  Somehow, we got her short hair into two braids {and they stayed!} and while we didn't have sparkly red shoes, we did have some sparkly shoes for her.  She looked adorable.

➹Sweet little friends. ➹

I ended up staying the entire morning -- watching them parade around the school collecting candy from the classrooms and then doing fun Halloween activities before the party.  She had such a fun day full of lots of sugar, and the best part was that Nana was babysitting her that afternoon! :)

As for Olivia's party, I didn't get as many pictures of her doing all the different stations because I was in charge of taking pictures at one of the stations.  We ended up having 6 different stations with 3 or 4 kids in a group -- they made pom pom spiders, decorated cookies, played Halloween Bingo and a Halloween guessing game with a Poke-a-Pumpkin prize, made slime, had a bean bag toss and pumpkin bowling, and made Halloween masks!  It was a busy party, and all the kids had a blast!

I'm so grateful that I have the opportunity to help out with their classrooms and that I can be a hands-on mom even when the girls are at school.