Sunday in the Park

These girls are amazing. They always say you can't explain to people that don't have kids, how special kids are. It's true. I've finally realized that. As I tell our friends about all the feelings, emotions, new things happening with our family...I just see their eyes glaze over. I try and keep myself from telling all these stories to people that wouldn't be as interested but I just can't help it. I'm just fully consumed by what these girls are doing and what they do to me.

Tinsley is really REALLY close to taking off and walking from one end of the room to the next. She took 5 steps tonight. For the past 2 weeks she's been doing 2 and 3 steps at a time but we really haven't been working with her as much as we should to get her walking. I try and not push too much to make it happen and am trying to let it go at its own pace. Someone told me a life saving line one time..."by kindergarten they will be talking and walking, don't rush them." That stuck with me and I don't worry about it...instead I just enjoy every little phase and not worry too much about how they're doing compared to others their age.

I'm watching Calfornication as I type this. Excuse if it's not flowing properly.

Tinsley keeps being the most smiling little girl on the planet. She's also become quite the dancer. She has this little microphone that plays some Miley Cyrus song or something and as soon as she pushes it her face lights up and she starts rolling her body all around. She's saying distinctive words every time she picks up a phone like "hello" and "hi" and said "more" tonight for another bite of chocolate pudding.

Tatum is out conquering the world in every way she can. She runs over me like a concrete truck. I'm sure both girls will. And I love it. Anne is great about the discipline, rules and all that but I just have a hard time with it. I see where it's going and I know it's not going to be a good thing down the road. So...Tatum now has an iPhone. She loves mine and is always playing with it and I got tired of all the grimy finger debris all over it. I got a new one for my birthday and gave my old one to her. I had to get it activated and everything so it will do the Internet cartoons and things she likes. When I was activating it, they lady at the store said she was officially the youngest iPhone user they had enrolled. Not sure if that's a good thing or not.

It's CRAZY to watch her use that thing. She knows how to do all kinds of stuff on it. A few days ago she said "I call Papa" and I kind of shrugged and blew it off. Next thing I know she's having a conversation and he's on the other end of the phone. There's like 200 people programmed in the phone...I have no clue how she figured out how to call him. She now makes regular calls to Papa and Nettie and even checks her voicemail. Papa is great about leaving her messages. I"m not sure she really understands it because as she's listening to Papa's message she tries to talk back to him. There's some great stuff on the iPhone. My favorite is KidsTV...they have a bunch of fun stuff on there and she seems to really learn from it. She also loves the animal matching game. It's really cool to watch her little brain churn and work through the puzzle.

Yesterday we took the girls to the Zilker Park. Anne and I took the girls to iHop and met Papa and Kay. We threw down some pancakes and went to feed the ducks at Zilker. That's probably one of my favorite kiddie rituals...Zilker park.

Tatum insisted on pushing her little sister back from feeding the ducks.

Papa and Tatum w/ Annie, Kay and Tinsley up ahead

Today Annie was sick and I got the girls up, fed them and played in the house. I started to get cabin fever so for lunch we went to PTerry's drive through and back to the park for swings and a train ride. I think it was the first time I've taken both of them together on my own. It was a blast. I pushed both of them in the swings at the same time and just loved watching them smile every time I'd boost their momentum. After about 15 mins of swinging (that's a LOT of swinging) we jumped on the Train and took a meditating ride through the trees. Both Tinsley and Tatum waved at everyone we passed. It was so fun to see Tinsley wave so much...she really got the giggles and enjoyed seeing everyone wave back at her.

Well...it was a long day with all the girls and Daddy's beat. Looking forward to Thanksgiving in Emory next week and our first official family road trip. I'm hoping for minimal puking from Tatum and lots of Xanex for Anne.

Tatum spent Sunday night w/ Nettie and Cross. She came home today with these braids.

Tinsley was being a total goof with her crayons

I ran to the mall for something the other day. I passed by this ensemble and it had Tin's name all over it. And we wonder why we're broke...

Tatum is quite the artist. She LOVES to paint. At school it's her favorite thing and at home that girl will color until we're out of colors. This was a rainy day project in the garage last week. Look at the level of intensity she brings to the canvas. My little Picasso.

July - October update

So here I am again, 5 months behind. A record, I know. I'm giong to try and tell my updates through pictures rather than rambling on for pages and pages...as you know I'm keen on doing. For some reason I can't move these pictures around so they're not in the proper order but I will do the best I can...

Tinsley's First Birthday! We had a great party in our backyard with everything covered in lavender. Anne made an awesome cake for her.

Tatum's 3rd Birthday. We had this paty in our backyard too. It was a carnival theme. Nobody knew I was doing it...but I dressed up like a clown which I thought was really fun. Anne made this cake too...she's getting good at baking these things...

Sea World take 2. Growing up my Aunt Sarah always went to 6 Flags, Seasame Place and all those fun theme parks. I invited her to drive down from Emory and go to Sea World with me, Tatum and Mom in hopes of rekindling the days or yesteryear. We had a GREAT time...Tatum was a trooper and went almost all day without tiring out. I think her favorite thing was feeding the dolphins and gettign to pet them. We saw Shamu (which makes me tear up, I don't know why), we saw penguins, played in the water park and did all kind of fun things. It was really cool of Sarah to come all the way down and go with us. It was a great day.

Melrose! The newest addition to the Shiflet Family. For my 35th birthday Annie surprised me and tood me to LA. We had lunch at my favorite place which had the lobster ravoili that I crave. We had dinner at Phillipe and went rollerblading in Santa Monica/Venice. It was PERFECT. We spent a few hours shopping and passed by a rescue dog store and little Melrose was in the window. I caught Anne at a weak moment and she couldn't seem to say no. We scooped her up and brought her to Texas. She and Lulu really have fun playing together and I think she's going to make a great addition to our home.

For Halloween Tatum was Little Bo Peep and Tinsley was her little sheep. She was so freakin' cute! Look at those cheeks...

Knowing us, surely you understand that we go through a LOT of costumes surrounding Halloween. I love it.

Tatum helped Papa make some cookies. She liked rolling out the dough but I think her favorite thing was icing them. She literally put 1/4 of a can of icing on one cookie.

Tinsley also had a bit of a sugar tooth...here she just finished devouring a browine. Speaking of "tooth"...Tinsley's 2 upper and 2 lower teeth have come in. Annie calles them her "chicklets"...her teeth are so cute...she looks like a beaver.

My own personal Rugby team.

What's October without a trip to the Tarrytown Methodist Church pumpkin patch? Tinsley was really hamming it up for the camera. She gets that from her Mom.

Sadly, I think we only took the boat out one time this year. It was a PERFECT day and we ran up to Ski Shores for a hamburger.

Tinsley and Ane outside Tatum's Ballet class.

TInsley's first birthday! I love this pic of her surrounded by all her goodies.

We've really been working on getting Tinsley to walk. She loves her little alligator walker and runs with that thing from one end of the room to the other. She's now 14 months old and I think it's just a matter of days before she takes her first step. She's standing up on her own and just shows all the signs that she's about ot take that giant leap.

First day of school. I was working with Tinsley on going up and down the stairs and she tood a tumble and bumped her head on the tile floor. So...she went to her first day with a bruise on her forehead. Momma wasn't happy with me.

My favorite thing..."rain time." I love getting both the girls in the shower and letting them run all around and play. Tatum loves her "silly soap" and sprays it everywhere. TOnight for the first time I sprayed some of the foam soap on the glass wall where Anne was on the other side...Tinsley walked up and would wipe it of the glass and rub it on her belly. It was so cute to watch.

Bahamas! We took the girls to Atlantis hotel...Nettie joined us. We had a great time playing on the beach, building sand castles and splashing around in the pool. The girls couldn'' have been more sweet. And it was a huge help having Nettie there to give me and Annie some time to go have fun on our own. I hope we can make that trip a yearly thing...it's such a great place for both kids and parents.

Tinsley put on my clown wig. She looks like my great grand mother, Granny Jenny.

Tatum's Birthday. Papa bought her her first car! She calls it her tractor. If this isn't the look of pure happiness, I don't know what is.

One of the girls favorite past times. They LOVE taking everything out of the pantry and spreadign it from one end of the kitchen to the other. This is pretty much an activity reserved for when Mama is gone and they're on Dad's watch. THey know they can get away with murder if it's up to just me.

Just some random cutie pie pics...

Coppertone Girl!

Tatum is working Tinsley out...putting her through a grueling training course of how to walk. You can see that it's really a lot of work on Tatum.

Naked Cowgirl. Love the shoes.

Our first day with Melrose.

Halloween at Austin Country Club. The Roman Family.

This is Tatum with her silly soap. Nettie is a little less frugal with it than I am...I think she used the entire can of it on her here. She looks like Santa.

A month behind and not a good excuse for not updating more often on here. Again, rather than bore you with all the stories that you'd rather not read, I'm going to let the photos do the talking and give you the stories below each one. Life continues to be good here in Austin. Wish a few more people were buying and selling homes but honestly, the slowdown in the economy has been good for us. We've been spending so much time together at home as a family and really enjoying having everyone over to hang out and play in the backyard. I'm in the process of trying to install an outdoor theatre so we can watch movies in the pool at night. Most exciting thing I can think of off hand is Anne went to NY 2 weeks ago and left me alone with the girls again. We had a blast. Thursday morning we ran to San Marcos to shop, came home and grabbed PTerry's burger and met Shane and Kelsey at Mayfield Park for a picnic. Friday was Sea World! What an adventure. A huge thanks to my Mom for staying with Tinsley all day while Tatum and I hooked upwith Reese and Shelly, Shannon and Ainsley and Shane and Kelsey for a fun filled day. We were shooting to get there by 10am and leave by 1:00. We ended up arriving closer to noon (thanks to Tatum's getting sick 2x in the car....bless you Shelly...I owe you something for that!) and leaving more like 4:00 . All the kids had a blast and I might have had more fun than anyone. I'm looking for an excuse to go back. And you'd be proud of me...while looking for a Shamu stuffed animal that was life size to bring home, Tatum pointed to the "baby Shamu" that was about 12" long and that's the one I bought. One day we're going to have our house explode because of all the junk I buy that's completely unnecessary. I was proud of myself for being a little more reaasonable for once. It's HOT...over 100 every day recently. Looking forward to 4th of July with family and friends this weekend. For the first time in a long time I'm really feeling like I NEED a vacation. I'm telling Anne that when somethign big closes we're going to go hide for 3 days and leave our phones and computers behind. I'm starting to run on empty and need to recharge my batteries. I hope summer is keeping you all cool and that you're having fun somewhere.

We tried to escape the heat with a lunch time boat ride. It's always great to have Gyl around.

This it Tatum about to get her 2nd haircut. I love this picture...she looks like she's 9.

I have a picture of me when I was about the same age with a towel on my head. I need to do a side by side comparison.

I was so proud of myself for gettting the girls dressed while Anne was in NY. I had them both in all white to show off how clean I could keep them. We went to the mall and Tatum was strutting her all hite with white bow and white glasses and red shoes with matching fingernails. She was a freakin' ROCK STAR. I got lots of props from the other Mom's and made me feel good about myself.

This was Tinsley in her all whites. She was a little more incognito since she was floating around in her Lavender cloud.

This was our final rest stop at Sea World. We all had a much enjoyed and needed ice cream break.

Anne and I took a great little picnic to Zilker Gardens (they don't allow picnics by the way). It wasn't super easy in a stroller but I was excited to show Anne and the girls a little Austin treasure. I have great memories of running around there when I was little and want to share that with my girls too. I hadn't been there in probably 20 years. They have done so much with it and really made it great...but so much of it still felt the same and as special as it did when I remember going.

I had to put this in because it's actually a picture with me in it! Nettie (mom) and I took the girls to Cicso's on a Saturday morning and then down to Town Lake to feed the ducks.

This was us loading up the stroller for Town Lake. I had both girls in their hats (Tinsley wasn't so fond of hers, or maybe thought it was more of a toy). Both were in their Mexicna dresses Anne brought back from Cabo...I thought that was appropriate for Cisco's.

Oh yea! I forgot about the Ballet Recital. I could have an entire blog about that. It was just awesome. Tatum and her class took the stage and pretty much stared at the audience for their 3 minute performance. They were so cute in all their little fairy princess Swan Lake wanna be costumes. I took some contraband photos to commemorate the event. Towards the end Tatum (far right) and Natalie finally moved their feet a little bit. Nats actually did a jump! We had a great crowd of friends come and watch and Tatum was covered up with flowers after it was over. It was a prescious moment and I hope we have many more years of these ahead of us. Thanks to so many family and friends for coming and cheering on Tatum at her debut.

I think Pam put it best in this photo. She said they looked like two little girls caught with their hands in the cookie jar. You can just fast forward this image about 15 years and know that I'm in for some trouble. But how could anyone ever scold these 2 faces!? They can do no wrong my friends! Look at their eyes though...you can tell they're plotting against me already.

If you're ever having a bad day and need a smile, just walk in our front door. I swear this girl hass butterflies living in her tummy. She just laughs and giggles. We're at over 9 months and still no teeth...we love looking at those gummy smiles.

Anne took me for an impromptu (I can't spell!) picnic on a Friday at Mayfield Park. I got some great pics of the girls. Tatum discovered the waterfountain for the first time...a BIG hit. She loves the Peacocks and is always tryign to shase them and talk to them. Below I got a good pic of Anne and Tins with a peacock showing off his feathers.

The Sea World Crew. I hate that Shannon wasn't in the picture but someond had to take it. This was us at the Shamu show....which I thought was a ton of fun.

On Sunday we went out to HSB for brunch. I got a couple of fun photos of Tatum and Trip playing in one of Poppy's wooden boats.

This is from our Mayfield Park trip with Shane and Kelsey while Anne was in NYC. Shane said it best when he said the caption for this photo should be..."how many Aggies does it take...." These girls had some clever engineering to get a drink. I appreciated Tatum's foresight to let someone else do all the work while she enjoys the fruits of the labor.

I don't remember what this was for but was very proud of the best pigtails I've ever done. I can't wait until Tinsley has enough hair I can get ahold of it.

Our last adventure while Mom was in NYC was a Sunday pool party. Both girls love splashign around. Now that I think about it, Anne took this picture so it couldn't have been from when she was away. See what I get for waiting a month to do my blog.