Future artists

On rainy, bitterly cold, or otherwise boring stay-inside days, the girls start to get cabin fever after about two hours. They occupy themselves nicely for the first hour, drawing pictures, building with legos, playing school, going on a bear hunt, -- and then they start to bicker over toys and complain that there is nothing to do. I spend the second hour responding to "my sister called me a name" and "my sister won't share the toy with me" and "my sister won't play this game with me." In situations like this, I tape a large sheet of butcher paper over their little table, replace their regular shirts with painting shirts, and pour some paints in an old egg carton. Voila! Happy, occupied kids for at least the next hour!

Here are some pictures of the girls painting one such day earlier this month.

We chose Broncos colors for this particular painting party.


Adelaida paints very nice pictures -- usually of our family.


Cordelia gets huge globs of paint on her paintbrush and paints one stroke on the paper, then goes back to the paint to refill her paintbrush. Oh, and she usually leans over the table to get more paint, which is why the painting shirts come in so handy!


Ordinarily Estella paints quite nicely on the paper, but for some reason this day she decided to paint her hand instead.


Painting is serious business.


Eventually the paper is covered, the paint tray is empty, and it is time to move on to the next activity!

Christmas 2012

After a series of relatively recent blog posts, here's one I should have written several months ago. At this point, my goal is to post things to the blog no more than one year after they happen. So really, I'm doing this post two months early! (... well, kind of.)

Merry Christmas! Santa came to visit and took pictures with all of the families. The kids were squirmy, but we took one picture with all of us facing the camera.


Before I show any more pictures, I should really back up and start at the beginning: the airplane trip from Albuquerque to Indianapolis. Here was our plan: leave Albuquerque around 3pm, fly to Denver, catch a connection to Indianapolis, arriving in Indy around 10pm, on United. Here's what really happened: we left Albuquerque as scheduled and got into Denver around 4pm. Our flight out of Denver was delayed ... and delayed again ... and finally canceled. United gave us two options: fly to Baltimore and then on to Indianapolis the next morning, or try to fly from Denver to Indianapolis the next evening (but that flight was overbooked so we might not get on it). We chose the Baltimore route, only to have that flight delayed by two hours. The net result was the we spent six hours in the Denver airport with three kids (a 4-year-old and two 17-month-olds), then got on an airplane at 10pm and flew to Baltimore. We arrived in Baltimore at 2:30am, and because our flight to Indy was scheduled to depart at 6am, our layover wasn't long enough to qualify us for a free hotel. So, we spent the night in the Baltimore airport -- again, with a 4-year-old and two 17-month-olds. We found an empty gate and tried to get the girls to sleep, but it was futile -- they spent the night running around the airport while Dale and I fought to keep our eyes open. At 5:30, we moved to our departure gate ... only to learn that the flight from Baltimore to Indianapolis was going to be delayed three hours! We finally left Baltimore at 9am, arrived in Indy at 11, and all five of us took nice long naps.

OK, back to the fun part of our vacation.

Adelaida, Estella, Simon, and Cordelia sitting on the dining room window sill.


Estella, Adelaida, and Cordelia playing the piano in their adorable matching dresses.


Annabelle and Adelaida really bonded!


Cordelia became very attached to this John Deere hat and wore it every chance she got.


Keoni is such a cutie!


Adelaida and Estella became very attached to their Uncle BJ!


Adelaida loving on Papaw


Amani had no fear -- she was actually eager to talk to Santa, whereas all the other kids were a little bit hesitant to approach Santa.


By the way, our flight home was uneventful, on Southwest! :)

Family Pictures 2013

One late July morning, Dale and I skipped work, dressed the girls in their most adorable summer dresses, and took them to the park to play. The photographer we met there took a couple hundred pictures of the girls playing, and they turned out great! The best part was that it didn't feel like a regular (boring) photo shoot -- no posing for pictures, no "say cheese" or "everyone look over here." The photographer just took pictures of the girls while they were playing and having fun. Here are some of my favorite pictures from that photo session.

Sweet Cordelia


This is my absolute favorite picture of all three girls together. Dale is on the other side of the seesaw, and Estella can't take her eyes off her daddy!


Cordelia, Estella, and Adelaida playing "trains" on the slide. They do this on our slide at home all the time too.


Cordelia, Adelaida, and Estella on the bridge.


Loving sisters! Estella and Cordelia love each other so much. I just love to see them hug like this!


There's nothing quite as funny as riding on daddy's shoulders! I'm not sure how Cordelia's dress ended up covering Dale's head, but it is cute!


A lovely picture of Adelaida. She looks so mature in this photo, it is hard to believe she is just four years old!


I think this is my favorite picture of the whole family

Ring around the rosie!

Somehow Dale ended up with Adelaida on his shoulders and Estella holding on to his back for dear life. I think he was having as much fun as the girls were!


My favorite picture of the day: Adelaida smiling and smelling a dandelion!


Estella just can't keep her tongue in her mouth!


Another photo of the whole family. Adelaida, Dale, Estella, me, and Cordelia.


I was so happy with the way the photos turned out. Thank you Kira, for taking great pictures while the girls played and had fun!

Birthday party for our two-year-olds

We celebrated Estella's and Cordelia's birthday this year with a party! (It was mostly just a good excuse to invite some friends over for the evening, but we had cupcakes and everything, so it was a real birthday party.)

The girls loved being the center of attention, and did a great job of keeping up with the "big kids" -- most of the kids there were Adelaida's age, but Cordelia and Estella followed them around and played with them the entire party.

Here are some pictures:

We lined all the kids up on the grass for cupcakes, and let Estella and Cordelia sit in front of the other kids.


Cordelia and Estella, the happy birthday girls


Adelaida celebrating her little sisters with a cupcake



A little bit of icing!

Balloon Fiesta 2013

We were lucky enough to have family visiting for both weekends of Balloon Fiesta this year! Charlotte (Mamaw) and Aunt Karen were here for the first weekend and beginning of the week, and Richard and Laura brought Elizabeth, Sarah, and Benjamin for the second weekend. We generally try to go to Balloon Fiesta once each year, and this year we had good reason to go twice!

Here are some pictures from Balloon Fiesta 2013.

We rented a wagon for the girls to ride in, and it worked very well -- for about the first three minutes. Then the girls remembered that they were cold, tired, and hungry, and attitudes went downhill from there pretty quickly! Oh well, live and learn. (Cordelia, Estella, and Adelaida)


Cordelia, Estella, and Adelaida in the wagon, with Mamaw and Aunt Karen standing behind them.


The first balloon


Estella is happy!


Balloons in the air just after sunrise


Cordelia is happy on Dale's shoulders, despite the fact that her hat slipped over her eyes!


Adelaida on Dale's shoulders (about half an hour before she decided that she didn't want to walk, she didn't want to ride in the wagon, she didn't want anyone to carry her, and she didn't want to stay where she was; a pretty major breakdown ensued).


Estella, Cordelia, and Adelaida with me, with balloons inflating in the background


The weather was so perfect that most of the special shapes balloons went up, which is something that doesn't happen very often! This hummingbird was one of my favorites, and one that I haven't seen before.


A beautiful day for a mass ascension!