Long Overdue Family Pictures

Since my brother and his family were visiting from Maryland at the beginning of the month, we took some family pictures. They were long overdue. The last ones we had taken were Christmas Eve 2007, since that was the last time we had all been together. My Aunt Melissa takes wonderful pictures, and we were lucky to have her take them for us. We actually took them at one of our favorite places to eat, Joe's Farm Grill. It was nice because we took them first thing in the morning, before it got too hot, and Joe's is right down the street from us. Here's a few of my favorites:

Payton was definitely not in the picture taking mood when we did the whole family. Just as soon as Melissa would stop taking pictures in each pose, he would decide to stop his complaining and would be happy and sit still. One of these days my kids will cooperate, right?

I love this picture of my mom and dad.

And I love this one of my sister, Annie. I still can't believe she won't be a teenager anymore in a couple of months!

I also really liked this one of my brother, Scott. Him and Annie actually had a lot of good ones. I guess that's what happens when you don't have kids to deal with.

My brother, Jim, with his wife Katie, and their kids Claire, Luke, and Charlotte. So cute. I had actually wanted to take our family pictures on the fence, but it was too far away from where we were. So I'm glad they took theirs there.

Then there's us. Baylee wasn't looking at the camera in any of the pictures of just our family. Oh well, I still think this one is cute and at least Payton was finally smiling.

Thank you so much to my Aunt Melissa for taking all the wonderful pictures!

First Days

My kids are growing too fast, and it's making me a little sad. Baylee started preschool last week (I wasn't on top of it enough to put her in last year). I don't know what I'm going to do when she actually starts real school. I'm going to miss my little buddy (although I'm not going to lie, sometimes it's nice to have a little break from her endless energy).

My dad brought her over some Star Wars pancakes the night before, so she got to have them for breakfast before we got ready for school.

Of course she was such a nice sister and shared with her brother. The silly girl didn't want them heated up or with anything on them though.

Ok, so picking out her backpack and lunchbox was a little bit of a challenge this year. She really wanted Star Wars or Batman for her backpack. No girly one for her. After much debating, she ended up with a Buzz Lightyear backpack and Batman lunchbox. All the girl backpacks ended up being way too big for her anyways. At least Payton can get use out of them too, right?

We had to get the typical pictures of her before her first day of school.

Baylee also started a ballet class through the city. She's been asking to take ballet, but she has gymnastics that we pay monthly for, so I didn't want another monthly payment class. Instead Ben's parents paid for this one, it's about 9-10 weeks long, for her birthday.

She's also starting another dance class today. 11 weeks for $30 total (although we didn't start last week) from a youth from church. There's a recital at the end, so hopefully we will get pictures then!

Baylee is loving all her fun activities. This girl is busier than I am! That's okay though, she needs it to get some of that energy out. I just wish it actually helped. :) I love my little girl, and am so proud of her.

Failure

I had my first failure of my cupcake project. I made these a couple weeks ago, and let me tell you, the batter was so good. I was sad that they didn't work out. August's cupcake was going to be pineapple, half with lime cream cheese frosting, the other with chocolate cream cheese frosting. When I went to frost them I noticed they had cracked and pulled away from the wrappers. A taste test also revealed that they were not really edible. Ok, so you could eat them if you really wanted, but they were so thick you might as well be eating a sock. Or something else that is really thick. Maybe I will try these ones again. I figure that one failure out of how ever many other cupcakes I've made isn't bad.

Quality Time

We were so lucky to have my brother and his family come stay with us at the beginning of the month. They live in Maryland, so we never get to see them. This was the second time Baylee has seen them (the first time was the Christmas after she turned 1), and the first time Payton has ever met them. We had so much fun with them, and since we never see them, there's definitely a lot of pictures (plus my sister-in-law Katie took tons of pictures and sent me a cd of them). So, here's some of what we were up to while they were here:

Saturday:

Payton and baby Charlotte played. It was also our first time meeting Charlotte. Payton loved having someone more his size around. They are about 4 1/2 months apart:

Baylee and Claire became instant friends. They entertained themselves for hours, mostly playing dress up:

We went to my uncle and aunt's for a BBQ, so I made lemon blueberry cupcakes with lemon cream cheese frosting (pretty tasty!):

At the BBQ we swam (well, I guess I didn't, but there was swimming):

and the kids had fun on the trampoline with my cousin Brooke's kids:

Sunday:

The kids had fun playing one of Baylee's games:

We refilled the pinata from Baylee's birthday party (it never broke, the bottom just opened so we taped it back up). Luke had a turn:
Baylee took some swings in her twisted blue Power Ranger outfit (Ben's sister Jenny gave us a bunch of dress up clothes):
The bottom opened back up so we had to tape it, and replace some of the candy. Payton tried to be quick in getting some:
Claire took some hits in the lovely pink Power Ranger costume (we loved that her pulled up dress made her some love handles):
The kids didn't quite crack it, so Scott gave it a whack:
Jim modeled the beaten Space Ranger space ship:

The kids had fun sleeping in the tent Ben set up for them:

Monday:

We went to Tempe to play at the splash pad, and it was a great way to cool off:

We had dinner at my grandparents. Claire and Baylee had fun with the dress up clothes there (ones I had played in when I was a little girl- my aunt Melissa had some great dance costumes):

Tuesday:

We started out the day shopping at a mall. Later we made the girls and Luke cute button bracelets (found them on my sister-in-laws Jenny's friend's blog):

Ben, Jim, and Baylee hit a baseball game, but didn't take any pictures.

Wednesday:

Katie and I made flower clips for the girls (and I've already lost one):

We took them to the pool we went to for Baylee's birthday, and had a ton of fun cooling off:

That night we BBQed for dinner and made s'mores in our fire pit (we probably could have roasted them on the cement though, it was so hot):

Thursday:

We went to Joe's Farm Grill for family pictures and breakfast (family pictures will be another post). Katie got this cute picture of Payton and me:

Before they left for the airport, we unsuccessfully attempted to take pictures of the all the cousins:

We had so much fun with Jim and Katie and kids! It was great to see them all, and the kids played really well together. We hope to see them sooner than 2 1/2 years this time!