Our new babysitter

While Addison was working her way around the house this afternoon she managed to finally get INTO Halo's crate. She's been trying to get over the door frame since she's been mobile and today she finally made it. We've decided that next time we need a babysitter for her we will just lock her up in this with Halo, I'm sure she'll be well taken care of :)

I'm sure some of you will remember a picture of Trinity in the same situation, unfortunately I don't have it on my computer to share with you, but hopefully someone will.

Addison was awfully proud of herself!

Looking for signs of fall

Here it is, mid-November and it's in the 80's for the millionth straight day! We are getting desperate for signs of fall to help us remember it's almost Thanksgiving. We've started listening to Christmas music when we're in the car (KVIL started playing it last week) and sometimes when we're at home. We've gone to the stores where they have all their decorations out just to browse and get in the spirit and we've talked about Thanksgiving till we're blue in the face. Other than the fall colds running rampant through our house the only other constant reminder we have is the hail storm of acorns (that is NOT an exaggeration) in our yard and a few trees that are turning. I took a couple of pictures of pretty trees while we were driving this week to prove they really do exist.

This one is in the Toys R Us parking lot

The girls and I have really enjoyed this red tree at Northwest Highway and Buckner. It really stood out with the trees on both sides of it still green.

And the Winner is...

Yesterday was Derby Day for Adventure Princesses, something Greg has been looking forward to since the day they signed up, encouraging Trinity to do the same. Greg was in Indian Guides and Scouts for years, so he and his dad had quite a bit of practice building winning cars for this highly competitive sport. Greg was taking this first Princess competition quite seriously and Trinity was feeding off that. We spent last Sunday afternoon at Greg's Dad's house designing, cutting, sanding and priming the car to prepare for completion during the week. I spent a good part of Wednesday and Thursday painting the car just how Trinity requested, half pink and half purple with diamonds. I felt bad not letting Trinity doing it, but I have a little bit of a hard time letting her loose with a can of spray paint. Thursday we went back to Sachse for setting the axles and putting on the finishing touches. Not long after arriving we discovered a bit of a problem, with all the parts on the car and the pre-drilled holes filled with pellets we were only up to about two and a half ounces and the cars were allowed to be five, this was the beginning of several hours of work for Greg and Hal! They figured out a way to implant weights in the sides of the car, still fill the holes with pellets and have it come in at just five ounces, filled all the holes with wood putty to still have a smooth finish and prepared to be repainted. By the time I got the car repainted and a good, thick coat of clear coat on it you couldn't even tell there were any weights in it! Woohoo!

When we showed up at the race with all the other first year competitors Greg was getting pretty excited about their chances. Several cars were NOT aerodynamic at all, but looked pretty cool. Some of the cars had enough weights to max out, but they were simply glued or screwed on, interfering with their aerodynamics. Then some of the cars were just cars the girls and their dads had fun designing together.

Now it was time for weigh-in. Greg was really nervous! He put the car on the scale and it rolled right off- it was ready to race! Once he got it to stay the number said 5.00 ounces...now that's good work! It's time to check it in and hand it over.

So finally race time is here! This is a highly technical race these days. Each car races four times and the track times their speed in each race. The car with the highest average speed is the winner. Of course at the Y everyone is a winner, so there are several other categories for winning and ever competitor receives a trophy.

Trinity's car won each of her four races, but we weren't sure how she was stacking up against some of the other cars that seemed to be doing the same. The girls were having a great time cheering on each others cars and watching for their own. When it came time to hand out the trophies we started to get a little nervous because we knew Trinity's chances were good. So they're down to the last three awards, 3rd, 2nd and 1st fastest time. I think Greg was starting to sweat a little bit! Then the announcer says, "And the winner of this year's first year Adventure Princess Derby Day race, with a time of 3.1????? seconds is...car #16...Trinity Hinckley!!!" WOO-HOO WE WON! Greg and Trinity were so proud! Trinity's friends and their parents were wonderful supporters and were very proud too! Trinity was a very humble winner, congratulating all of her friends as well and giving each one a unique compliment on their car. What a great time! Here are some pictures of our experience.

Trinity before we left for the race

Greg and Trinity leaving for the race

Cars lined up as their entered, you can see Trinity's is #16

Close up of Trinity's car with it's #16 sticker

Charlotte's Dad, Kelly having to drill holes in the bottom; it weighed in at 5.04 ozs You should have seen it though, it looked like a model car! Three weeks worth of work and 20+ coats of paint!

Jenna, Trinity and Peyton watching the races

You can almost see, Trinity's car is in lane 2.

They didn't know they were about to see true greatness!

Greg and Trinity accepting their first place trophy

Trinity and her Settlement with their Dad's, cars and trophies

Proud winners with their trophy!

Ava turns one!

Last Saturday we had the pleasure of helping Ava Cardwell celebrate her first birthday! We all loaded up in the car and headed up to Frisco to join in the festivities along with several of our friends from college and several kiddos as well. Their house was decorated so precious! Perfect for a little princess! We had such a great time visiting, eating yummy food, watching Ava enjoy her cake and open presents, and playing with our friends! The girls jumped right in to play with all of Ava's toys and all the kids did a great job of sharing!

We gave Ava our routine Little People gift (they have taken over our house and all three of the girls love playing with them, so we figure it's a pretty safe gift) and Addison really wanted to play with them! She didn't understand the plastic cover on the box; she kept trying to get to the Little People on the other side of it...too funny!

Anyway, here are a few pictures of the celebration. Somehow I didn't get any of the kids playing together, guess I was too busy playing and visiting. Oops:)

Ava enjoying her very own smash cake

Ava showing off the mess she made

Addison and Uncle Ben

We hope Ava enjoyed her party! We are so grateful to be included in these special times of our friends! Thanks Cardwells!

Trinity's Mommy day

Last Saturday Trinity and I took the day to spend just the two of us and we had a blast! We started off by going to Starbucks where Trinity indulged in a cup of hot chocolate and I got a coffee...yum! From there we went to the mall and went shopping for winter clothes for her (not that we'll ever need them at this rate!). She loved trying clothes on and looking around at everything she could find. We bought a few outfits for her and ended up getting a Groovy Girl doll for her and of course she had to get one for Emory too; Trinity's is Lollipop Lola and Emory's is Bubblegum Bella...what names! We had a nice lunch together and got to visit a little bit which was a blast! We ended our shopping in Gap where she found some beautiful pink sparkly ballet flats that tie around her ankles which she convinced me to buy for her and she immediately put on! The purchase was worth the complete prideful smile she wears every single time she puts those shoes on!

Of course in order to get Trinity out the door without Emory we had to sell Emory on the idea of Greg having some time with the two little girls. He took them to McDonald's and to the White Rock Stables to see the horses, then to a craft sale in our neighborhood. Rumor has it they had a really good time together!

Halloween!

What a fun and busy day we had! We started out taking Trinity to school, then ran to Starbucks for a little treat and to get gas before returning to school for Emory's party at 9.

As soon as her party was over we left and headed to her party at dance. From dance we headed to grab a bite to eat (which we scarfed down in the car) on our way to Sam's because I had forgotten to get candy for our trick-or-treaters. When we finished at Sam's we came home for Emory and Addison to get quick naps while I got the groceries put away and got everything ready for that night, then we rushed out the door to pick Trinity up from school. On our way home from school we grabbed dinner which we came home and ate as we got ready to start our evening adventures. Trinity and Emory were all dressed up in their costumes and were ready to get started when I brought Addison in to them in her costume and they went ga-ga over her! They are such sweet big sisters and you can tell how much they love her when they react that way toward her! They immediately jumped out of their seats and ran over to her telling her how beautiful she looked and oogled over her everything! she was precious if I must say so myself...they all three were!

We started out trick-or-treating adventures at Greg's mom's house where the girls were so proud to show themselves off!

After another stop we headed back to our house where we met up with Greg and set off around our neighborhood. This was the first year we really went door-to-door for candy; last year Trinity wanted to stay here and hand out candy to everyone and see everyones costumes. We collected quite the loot while going on the couple of blocks we could last and saw some really neat costumes!

We left a box of candy on our front porch with a note taped to it asking each person to help themselves to three pieces of candy. We were only a few houses away when we noticed a group of teenagers going back to the porch for multiple trips of handfuls and they emptied us out. I was pretty disappointed in their behaviour (such the Mom thing to say), but we have never had a problem with this in the past and I thought this year would be the same. It was very sad to see them take that much, this box was really big and it was overflowing! Oh well, at least we didn't have any left over that I had to try my best to not eat!

This was a wonderful day! We all had a great time! The girls are already asking when it will be Halloween again!

we've got top teeth!

They're here! After several weeks of working on six teeth at once (I've never known a baby to take this long for their teeth to finally break through once visible) Addison finally had two of them pop through! Now she has her two middle bottom teeth and two top teeth. Notice how I didn't say the two middle top teeth? That's because that's not what she got, crazy huh? She has the top middle tooth on the left, but then she has the next to middle tooth on the right. I think that makes her a snaggle-tooth already! She doesn't show her top gums much so I'm sure no one would notice if I didn't point it out, but it's still pretty funny!

I've been trying to get pictures to share with you, but she'll have nothing to do with all that!

Cat fights already?

Trinity is only 5 and is only in kindergarten, but it seems her fight over this boy is escalating. She and Emma are good friends and always hug when they see each other, but apparently that's not enough to save them from fighting over Billy. We got an invitation to Billy's birthday party and Trinity and I were talking about it when she said, "I bet that mean ol Emma will be there." I asked her why in the world she would say that about Emma, she is one of the sweetest girls I know. Trinity's response was, "She's trying to steal my boyfriends and I don't like that!".

And so it begins...ugh!

Of course when she saw Emma the next morning she was happy to see her, so I know it's not a grudge she is really harboring, just a momentary thought.

I am REALLY dreading the teenage years already!

Pictures...finally!

Mom finally sent me pictures from her camera from the past few outings with them. I don't know what took her so long, it's not like she has anything going on:) Anyway, they're precious and I wanted to add them to our "online scrapbook" even though they're a little out of order.

These pics are from the weekend Greg and Trinity went on their campout and I took Emory and Addison to Fort Worth to play.

Addison and Gommy playing at mall

Addison and Nini playing at the mall

Emory eating her ice cream, acting extra silly for a little more attention

Playing at Pappy and Gommy's campsite

1. "arts and crafts tent" 2. Gommy and Addison 3. Trinity cooling off in the ice chest


Emory and Me playing in Pappy's hammock. I love having a snuggle bunny!

Still playing at the campsite

1. Trinity and me in the hammock 2. eating cheetos on Pappy's "bed" 3. Trinity roasting her hot dog

Playing at the lake

1. Me fishing with a Barbie rod n real 2. Trinity hunting for treasure 3. inspecting our treasures

Gommy playing with her little girls

1. Emory showing me "I Love You" 2.Nini and Emory 3. Nini skipping rocks

Checking out Mommy's fish!