Halloween

this year for halloween i wanted the whole family to be dressed up in a theme.  

the husband nixed that idea.  

so instead, i got the bargins of the century and scored these three adorable costumes at the consignment store for $8.  total.  

sweet.  

(do people still say sweet? i digress)

so elise was a watermelon, clara was a strawberry and cole man was the always awesome scooby doo.  

(not that he knew who scooby doo was since he is too young to watch that cartoon what with all the ghosts and monsters and crookery that takes place.  but he was super happy being a dog and knew that we used to have a dog named scooby...which also led to some interesting discussions such as, "scooby got all better in heaven and now he can come back to waco, right mom?" 

uummmmm, not quite.  gotta love that child innocence)

anyway, the costumes were a big hit.

we went to chipotle for their halloween burrito special, a campbell tradition, and then we went to our church's fall festival.  we had a great time and cole spent the entire time going back and forth between 4 bounce houses.  

(i really need to invest in a bounce house to expel the energy in this child)

earlier today i also baked 60 mini cupcakes to take to the festival. 

between cole's party last weekend, the fall festival and making another batch to take to cole's class tomorrow, i have made over 120 cupcakes in the last week.  

i can't believe that i am actually saying this, but i think i am all cupcaked out.  

good thing i have cole's halloween candy to fall back on.

 happy halloween!!!!

party time.

we threw a little party for some of cole's friends over the weekend and we had a really good time.  

i hardly took any photos because between the guests, cole and the girls, i could barely keep up. 

we didn't have a theme because a) i couldn't decide on one, b) cole didn't care and c) this way i could do whatever a want and be lazy about what i threw together.  this was a very low maintenence party which was just the way i wanted it.  all i wanted, and cole too for that matter, was some cake, ice cream, candles and playtime with friends.  the kids decorated pumpkins with glitter glue and stickers, there was a lightening mcqueen piñata, and some homemade cupcakes complete with ice cream and toppings bar.   

i made a few decorations, bought a few other snacks and called it a day.  

awesome.

i'm telling ya, people, these are basically the only pictures i got.  

sorry.  

but the whole thing was a success.  

cole woke up sunday morning and the first thing he said was, 'let's have another party today!'

Wedding weekend.

This past weekend, we traveled to d.c. and then onto pennsylvania for my cousin's wedding. It was a crazy 5 days as 4 of them included travel of some sort. people tell us all the time that we are brave to travel so much with small children. 

 we prefer crazy. thankyouverymuch. 

 but fortunately this was the last of our travels for quite a while. we had a great trip but it was wild and crazy for sure.  seven of my family members came down with the stomach bug and it was not pretty. seriously, they were dropping like flies. 

fortunately it was after the wedding but we had to change up travel plans and since brenner was one of the 7 sickies, it was hard to not have him around to help. but he is better now and we are sooooo thankful that neither the girls nor i caught the bug.

other than the sickness, the weekend was filled with cold weather, fall leaves, colorful mountains, good family time, celebrating, wedding dancing, Panera, lots of coffee, and of course the happy couple.

oh yeah, and elise decided this would be the best weekend to set a record in outfit changes.  

the child blew through ( and i mean that literally) 11 outfits in 3 days.  

11.  

let me tell ya, this was really fun while in the car, at the wedding, and in a hotel (in which we may or may not have had to get 2 new comforters).

and of course nothing says fun like changing a diaper in the airplane bathroom...4 times.  

fun times.  

did i mention that i am glad we are done traveling for a while?

but the girls once again amazed us at their flexibility and good traveling and we are sooooo grateful to have children who travel well!  

i was horrible bout taking pictures over the weekend, but here are a few from my phone.  

(the pictures of the girls in the empty house are from my parents' rental house.  they are moving in this weekend and knocking theirs down soon!!  we stayed there while in dc)

pumpkin patch.

here are a few pictures from our stop at the pumpkin patch over the weekend. the plan was to go to a farm where they have rides and animals and pumpkins. but our plans changed and it worked out as we got a few cute pictures and a few cute pumpkins. I took more pictures with my real camera that i have yet to go through but here are the ones from my phone.

h.o.t. fair and rodeo.

the heart of texas fair and rodeo was in town this past week so we loaded up the crew and headed out for an evening of animals, people watching and overpriced rides. woo hoo!

we had not been in years and never taken cole before but my parents took cole to a county fair in maryland a month ago so he was very excited to go to this one. he rode tractors, petted lots of animals, watched quite a bit of the rodeo and the highlight of the night was riding the ferris wheel. at first he was a little scared about doing it but he insisted that he wanted to do it any way and he ended up loving it!

my little stinker.

i love this kid and he makes us laugh every day! this age is so fun and the things he says cracks us up. these pictures are from our very fast trip to new orleans. he wanted to hug the giant stuffed crawfish, and then stood where it looked like it was choking him! he also got to feed some birds at the aquarium (random, I know). his cheesy face makes me laugh every time!

one year ago.

a year ago today, we were told that we had twin to twin transfusion syndrome.  

we were told that there was a high chance that our girls would not live.

you can read about it HERE and HERE.  

we were scared.  

we were overwhelmed.  

we were heartbroken. 

one year ago, we got on our knees and prayed for these little lives.  i poured out my heart, begging and pleading for God to intervene and to heal them.  i cried so many tears over the next days, weeks, months.

and yet i was at peace.  a peace that truly can only be described as passing all understanding. 

because when something is so big that you just can't handle it, you can give it over to God to carry for you.  

and that He did.  

He took our confusion, disappointment, anger, sadness, desperation, fear, stress, anxiety, and brokenness and carried it for us.  

He gave us peace to trust Him......no matter what happened. 

one year ago, we did not know what plan God had for their lives, but we trusted in Him.  

He had never failed us.  

He never fails us. 

we had to trust Him.  

we prayed for crying babies, the whining, the nighttime cuddles, the sleepless nights, the chaos of 3 kids, the first steps, the first smiles, the double everything!

but ultimately we prayed that the Lord's will be done in our lives and in theirs.  that God be glorified no matter what and that our faith in Him would be a reflection of His love for us.  

we would bless the name of the Lord no matter what. 

the Lord answered our prayers....the prayers of many, many, many people.  we had so many people praying for these little girls that it floods my heart and my eyes with emotions just thinking about it. 

the doctors told us that we would need surgery.  we didn't.

the doctors told us things would get worse.  they didn't

the doctors told us that this condition does not regress.  it did.

by the end of my pregnancy, everything was normal. 

 and here we are.  

one year later, with two beautiful daughters.  

we have sleepless nights, we have lots of crying, we have lots of baby holding, we have lots of belly laughs and smiles, we have stressful moments, we have slobbery kisses, we have lots of cuddles, and we have lots of chaos.

but everyday, no matter how tired, frustrated, worn down i am, i thank God for giving them to me.  

having twins is really hard.  i'm not going to lie. 

but i wouldn't trade it. it is so wonderful too.

God has molded me into a better person, and is continuing to do so every day, through the gift of these two girls.  even on days when i have failed in every possible way, God is teaching me and He reminds me of the grace he has shown us through the gift of these two girls. 

i will bless the name of the Lord not because he healed my daughters and saved their lives, but because of what he taught us through that trial.  

i will bless His name because He is good no matter what He does in our lives, no matter what our circumstances are.  

A little bit of houston.

we left for houston on wednesday to go to a conference for me to attend for texas school psychologists. while I was at my conference on thursday and friday, brenner kept the kids and they basically hung out at the galleria mall, which was there the conference was (well, in the attached hotel). I wish I could have gotten more pictures of the trip, but it was crazy and complicated but as smooth as we could have hoped for. one night we went to the children's museum (which was so cool!) and onto a Mexican restaurant that served us the best steak fajitas you will ever eat. and have you ever been to the galleria mall? it is ridiculous and has every store that you could imagine. it also happens to have a branch of the most incredible candy store, dylan's candy bar. cole and I were both in heaven! we have left houston and are on our way to New Orleans for a family gathering so wish us luck on the rest of our travels!