Valentine Crafts for Daddy

On Thursday, Aubrey had a blast making some valentine's for daddy.
We made homemade dough that you bake and then paint. First we cut out some heart shapes with cookie cutters. And then I made circles and had Aubrey do a hand print and Brookie do her footprints.

I baked them while the girls took a nap. Then after they cooled down Aubrey painted them with glitter paint.



She sure had a fun time painting. Brooke wanted in on the action - but she's just not old enough to paint. She was at our heels at the coffee table the whole time.

Here's Aubrey's finished hearts.

When she was done I told her we would need to hide them before daddy gets home because they are a surprise. I hid them in the laundry room - so they could dry. Aubrey listened and listened for the sound of the garage door opening. As soon as daddy came in she said, "Daddy you can't go in the laundry room because there are surprises in their for you!" She was so excited about her valentines!

The next day I asked Aubrey to tell me all the things she likes to do with daddy. I wrote her messages on the back of each one. Then I sprayed them with acrylic.

Saturday morning while daddy was away I asked Aubrey if she wanted to hide her valentines for daddy. She said, "Are they dry now." When I said "yes," she said, "OH BOY! Let's go hide daddy's valentines!"

When daddy came home later Aubrey told her daddy that she had hid valentines for him and he needed to go find them.

She found some really good spots and we had to give daddy hints. She had a blast watching daddy find his valentines and giving him hugs and kisses after he read the back of each one.

We saved the handprint and footprint to give to daddy the next day.

Grandma & Grandpa Bagley also left some Valentine presents for us last time they were here. I finally let the girls open them on Saturday.

Brookie enjoyed the tissue paper and feathers on the bag! She liked her stories also.



Aubrey was thrilled to get her own sticker calendar. Brooke has one up in her room and Aubrey always wants to take all of the stickers off - but it is off limits for her. She also got some more make-up that is pretty much all gone already. That girl sure does love putting on makeup!

Here is Aubrey in the cute jammies she got in her present from G&G Bagley.

I LOVE when holidays are on the weekend - then you can stretch them out over several days!

Valentine Cookies

What is Valentine's day without crafts and goodies! We've had fun the last couple of days making Valentine crafts. I can't post what we made yesterday since we don't want daddy to see until Sunday. Today we made Peanut Butter heart shaped cookies with a chocolate glaze and sprinkles on top. Daddy's favorite cookie is Peanut Butter, so I decided to make those instead of the standard sugar cookie.

To make them heart shaped, I baked them as large round cookies and then cut them out with a cookie cutter as soon as I got them out of the oven. I wasn't sure how they would turn out, but it worked perfectly.

Then I piped on some chocolate glaze and handed them off to Aubrey to add the sprinkles.

Decorating with candy or sprinkles is one of Aubrey's favorite things to do!

And what was Brooke doing during the baking and glaze making, why playing with cookie cutters and Tupperware of course!

Our little puppy doggie (Brooke) has discovered that anytime Aubrey is at the table, there is generally food remnants on the floor beneath her. So, she bum hops or scoots her way over to the table to see what scraps she can find.

Oh, what am I gonna do with this little girl! I love that she looks like she got caught with her hand in the cookie jar in the top picture. And her smile is to die for in the below picture!

Aubrey got good at the two handed approach to cookie sprinkling.

And her are our finished cookie creations! I thought they turned out just as cute as sugar cookies and they were much easier with a lot less mess!

Valentines from Grandma Buell

The girls got a fun valentine surprise in the mail from G&G Buell this morning.

Don't they look just darling in their pink shades!

Brooke absolutely loved this squishy green froggy from Grandma.

Aubrey loved all her gifts. These Mickey & Minnie pens are too cute. They have a magnetic head and when you make them kiss their eyes close. I had fun with that for quite a while today.

Aubrey went straight to work decorating with her gel heart stickers. I Love these gel stickers that Grandma Buell always sends. They stick anywhere and then can be removed and repositioned over and over. Aubrey has lots of fun with them.

Thanks Grandma & Grandpa Buell for the fun Valentine gift. The girls had a blast with their gifts this morning!

The Park

We actually had a couple of nice sunny days last week so we decided to take advantage of them and go to the park with the Smith's.



It felt so nice to spend a few hours those two days in the fresh air sitting on a bench visiting with Rachel while Aubrey and Zoe played. This was our first visit to the park where Aubrey could play without help from me. It was DIVINE!

Both girls were sooooo excited to be playing outdoors.

They both did really good on the big kid swings also.

Brooke got to experience a park swing for the first time and just LOVED it!

Hmm I wonder what this thing is that I've been holding on to?

Both of my cuties on the swings.

Aubrey pushing her sissy on the swing.

Brooke enjoyed checking out the tunnel as well.

I can't wait for Spring and many many many more visits to the park!

Brooke is 10 Months

Brooke turned 10 months today. I can't believe she'll be 1 in only two months. This has been the quickest year of my life.

Brooke is getting really fast at her bum hop. She gets all over the house hopping away. We keep working with the crawling, but except for rocking on all fours, she hasn't taken to it yet.

She loves to bop up and down when music is played, she loves to giggle and smile. Her favorite song is "Leo the Lion" and she smiles the minute we start singing it. She has an appetite that never quits. I'm not sure she has ever been full! Last week she started sleeping about 12 hours straight at nights. Hallelujah!

She is just a joy to have in our family!

Girls with Curls

I'm sad to say that with Aubrey's hair getting longer and thicker she is starting to loose her perfectly darling curls. Her hair is starting to look a bit stringy and messy on top with curls underneath. (Just like Mommy's hair unfortunately.) So I decided to try out the sponge curlers. Aubrey actually thought it was pretty fun getting rollers put in her hair.

And here are her nice soft curls the next morning. I was very pleased with how they turned out!



Brooke has absolutely no curl to her hair. It's starting to come in but she still doesn't have much for me to work with. For church today I thought it would be a fun experiment to try and make some curls in her hair with just my finger and some hairspray.

I thought it turned out pretty cute. It was much cuter in real life.



And here is my silly little baby who has recently decided it is very fun to stick out her tongue.