Dallas Visit Part 4~ American Girl Store~

On Saturday morning Rick had his conference so I took the kids to the new American Girl store. I have been to the one in NYC many many times and it is amazing. The one there is 4 stories, with a theater, restaurant, doll hospital, hair salon and so on. The Dallas store was on a much smaller scale. Being only 2 stories. Parker was being a toot that day. Mostly because we were running on little sleep, with no naps and going to bed around 8:30. (hey that's late for our kids!).

Parker & Libby her "Just like me AG doll"
Parker and the double stroller with the bitty baby twins that belonged to the store. She of course wanted to trade her doll for those dolls.
Yes Libby got her hair done. This was so funny. The kids got a big kick out of it. And those of you with little girls know their doll's hair is a huge mess, so these ladies fix it up so nice. she looked like new again.
Griffin & Parker posing with another one of the stores dolls.
Outside of the store. Parker completely refused to look at the camera. This is typical Parker. you can't tell but I was really forcing her to stay still. UGH! She can be rather frustrating at times.

Dallas Visit Part 3

Part 3. On Friday we headed back to Dallas to stay in a hotel for a few days. For those of you that don't know us that well... We are big swimmers!! Our kids love to swim and have been swimming well since they were 16 months or so. When we booked our hotel we of course had to get one with an indoor pool in it. Nothing like swimming when its 27 degrees outside. They were so excited and had a blast. We were able to swim 2 times during our visit.

They basically jumped in like this the first time without even feeling the water. Keep in mind they have not swam since September. But its like riding a bike, you just don't forget.
That is Parker with her head in the water. Now she was more "timid" if you can call it that. This summer she was jumping off the side like the boys were but she was being cautious this time around.
Cooper was not feeling great. He started running a fever. I know we're bad parents, here is is swimming with a fever. It's not like he's our first baby. *wink* No he was fine. We decided not to let him go under though just in case. :)
Big jumpers
Still working on our form for diving. ha!

Dallas Visit Part 2

After Scottish Rite on Thur. we headed to N. Richland Hills (outside of Ft. Worth) to stay the night at Rick's sister Tiana's house. She has one little girl, Lauren, below with the red hair.

On Friday it was SO cold and icy so we went over to their church play area. WOW!! They have this huge indoor maze play area that is two stories high right in the middle of their church. It was fantastic!! We brought some lunch and had a blast.

Our great friend Aimee & 2 out of 3 of her kids meet us there. Aimee & Phillip were friends of ours in The Woodlands. They are an amazing couple that do yearly mission trips to Japan, Germany & other far away places. All with 3 kids under 8 in tow. Phillip's parents are the founders of Let's Start Talking, http://www.lst.org

Not a great pic, but the kids Lauren, Cooper & Parker in the play area. They were WAY too busy to stop for pictures.
Carson & Griffin on the rocking horse at Tiana & Scott's house. And yes that is a pink cow girl hat on Griffin's head.
Aimee and I

Dallas Visit Part 1

Thursday we went to Texas Scottish Rite Hospital. They are so amazing there! The kids had a great time. In front of the hospital is the huge, every kids dream park. They could have spent days on it, except that it was 37 degrees out and we limited them to 20 minutes.

Coop in his Quicksilver beanie from my mom's store
Carson & Parker playing in the park

While waiting for the doctor Daddy read them a book (Parker & Carson)
Fun with daddy in the park (Parker & Cooper)

Hangin in Dallas...

Quick update no pics...

We are here in Dallas Thur-Sunday for a few reasons. First of all Parker had an apt. at Scottish Rite with the hand clinic. The visit went really well, we had a great time. This children's hospital is amazing & goes above and beyond for their little patients. The kids all received a beanie baby when we walked in, a bag of popcorn and lots of fun playtime with all their cool toys & exhibits.

For those of you that don't know me well... I have a degree in Child Life from Florida State University. (Go Seminoles)I worked as a Child Life Specialist before kids. Child Life specialists work in children's hospitals doing medical play, play therapy, explaining operations & making the hospital experience as stress free as possible. My favorite floor was the ER, I love trauma!! Going back reminded me of how much I love the hospital setting. I am sure when all the kids are in college, at the same time, sigh, I will go back to the hospital to work in some form or another. Before we arrived I contacted the Child Life Dept. & told them we were coming. Amy our great CLS came down to see us during our apt. It was great to see her and of course Carson talked her ear off giving her all kinds of "useful" information! LOL! We will be going back tomorrow for our hands down meeting, the group we are in. Should be a fun time. Lots of "little arms".

The other reason we are here is for Rick. He has a medical conference Sat & Sun. So while he does that we are off to The American Girl store!! (new to Dallas, I have only been to the NYC one). My mom calls it the "cult". But hey its fun. We even have "Libby" Parker's American Girl all dressed and ready to go. And of course Parker has the matching outfit to wear too. Ha! Girls are fun!!

I will update with pics. when we return on Sunday.

Grocery Game update

Just an update on how the fun the Grocery Game has been for me.

Last week I spent $120 and saved $74

This week I spent $84 and saved $81

Highlights on the greatest deals this week: free Peter Pan PB, free dog treats (yea for Maggie!!), Lipton tea bags for $.34 a box, 5 boxes of Kellogg's cereal for $.50 a box (large boxes) & 4 boxes of Quaker Oatmeal for $1 a box. There are many more items but those are just some that come to mind. You are probably laughing about how many of each item I bought. We actually go through all that with 6 very good eaters in our family. :) Besides that, my pantry, fridge and storage closets are full with food, paper goods and lots of other great items. I actually had to clean out some closets to find room to store all the loot. It's also fun to come home and make Rick guess how much I saved. ha!

City vs. Country

I came upstairs to the playroom the other day and this is what I saw. (please no comments on how messy our playroom was on that particular day! ha!) Griffin takes after me in a lot of ways, but this really describes us best. I don't know if you can tell but not only are the cars in a straight line, but they are categorized by color and make.

On the left you will find the airport complete with a parking lot. Then head E on the highway and you will come to the "Big Dig" (for our Boston friends)

Once you enter the "Big Dig" you will sit in traffic for about an hour per mile.

(does this bring back memories Rick?)

But if city life is dragging you down, that's ok there's always the country. This is a place to park your Taxi cab, shown here by Carson's creation. The Taxi is located in the top left under the unfinished "garage".
Or you can head out to the Griffin farm with a log cabin house & horses. There is even an Indian Reservation on site to celebrate other cultures. These kids crack me up with their creative minds. Each day is full of new exciting creations.

*for those of you that don't know what the big dig is in Boston click here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Dig_%28Boston%2C_Massachusetts%29 ...The Big Dig has been the most expensive highway project in the U.S and lasted around 10 years. We lived in Boston during some of this time.

17 Months of Good Cooper Lovens

Cooper turned 17 months on Saturday. He is still the calmest natured baby we know. We enjoy each moment we spend with our little buddy.

Here are 10 Cooper Facts

1.He loves cars and carries around 1 particular car all day long. He sleeps with it, eats with it, bathes with it. One day I will blog about him and his beloved car. The funniest thing is how responsible he is with it. He rarly looses it. I hope this is a good sign.

2. Cooper's nick names: Coopy Benny, Benny, Benny Bop, Ben, Big Ben, Cinco (Carson calls him this, as if he is the 5th baby) Gochy Gagga (another Carson creation),Boppers, Coopy, Coop Ben. This poor baby doesn't know his real name.

3. The cutest newest thing he started doing this month...He signs I LOVE YOU and says "Wove You" when he's signing. SO SWEET! He does this when we come into his room in the morning, when we leave, any time we go bye bye.

4. His new obsession is lights. Anytime you walk into a room and there is a light on he looks up, points and says "wight, wight" Rick says he's going to work in the chandelier section at Lowes

5. He has a very long attention span and sits flipping through a book for 30 minutes at a time.

6. Total teeth count-11, working on the big molars this past week. ouch!

7. He still loves bath time and is going to be a great swimmer this summer

8. He figured out how to go down the stairs on his tummy, get off a couch & a bed the safe way

9. When he's tired at night he says "nye nyete" to be put in his bed

10. He loves when his daddy gets home from work & runs to the door yelling "Dada Dada"

I dug up a few pictures from the past

Can you tell he was a summer baby, look at my tan! ha!
8 lbs 13 oz he was huge at only 38 weeks

Look Out Ladies...

Cooper's sporting a new do. This is how his hair looked when he woke up the other day. No matter what I did to his hair, it stood up on each side again. This is what happens if he goes to bed with his hair wet. Poor Coop, just wanted to play with his cars and I was bugging him with the camera.

Belly up to the bar
Trying to escape from the camera

"Enough already mom!

Haven't you embarrassed me enough in front of your blogger friends?"

Texas Military Museum

On Saturday we took the kids to the Texas Military Museum at Camp Mabry in Austin. Rick had a talk about medicine? (bad wife, have no idea what he talked about) to the young marines. For those of you in Ausitn with boys, this place is a must see. Jonna I was thinking of you the entire time, your boys would love this place!!

Their 5th birthday party theme is a camo theme, so I took them there to do a mini photo shoot for their party invitations, which came out so super cute!! They were all dressed up in their "bad guy" clothes (what they call camo). I can't wait to post the invitations I designed after the party. Here are some photos we didn't use.

Aren't they tough?!
Carson loved the section where you could dress up in their gear. The others, not so much.

Lots of model planes to see. We are proud to say we (Rick & I) have been on the C130 TWICE! Yes thanks to Jeremy who is a pilot to that big monster. We were able to go inside it outside of London England and the boys were able to go on it in North Carolina when we visited them. Very cool. The C130 is the one that can hold a helicopter. They drop supplies to the troupes, bring them home etc.. I can already tell these boys will be big history buffs like their daddy. This week at the library we are going to check out books on the military and war, requested by Carson.

The Grocery Game

Looking for a fun way to grocery shop & save a ton of money? Thanks to Shea Lea's posts about saving money at the store it got me thinking.

So I joined the grocery game along with my friend Cortney.

The one month trial membership is only $1. During that first month you can choose as many stores as you would like for only $1. This is great for me because I was not really sure which stores I wanted to subscribe to each month. I need to figure out which ones will have the best deals and suite my family best.
Right now I am subscribed to HEB, CVS, Randalls & Walgreens. So far I can tell I will not choose HEB because they have their own deals I can do on my own. But the other stores have had some really huge savings and a lot of free stuff as well!

One of the things I like about Terry’s Grocery Game is the easy to read chart format. Each row tells you what’s on sale, how much the regular price is, how much the sale price is, the amount off for the coupon you need to use, which week of the paper it came from, what coupon flyer it came from, how many items you should buy, the percentage off the item is, and if it is an item at rock bottom price that you should stock up on.

I suppose you’re wondering how I did this week. I spent a total of $97 and saved a total of $61. Now I know that's not that great, but remember I don't have all the coupons yet, I have only been saving them for 3 weeks now. And I have a large family. :) So spending only $97 is actually good in my case!

If you would like to join The Grocery Game, I would suggest that you begin collecting the Sunday paper coupons first for about 2 weeks. Go to the site and learn more. The idea is to stock up on stuff even when you don't need it, and within 12 weeks you will have a full pantry & will only need to buy the staples each week at the store.

A Day in the Life of....

The kids and I took Maggie, our shaved Golden Retriever, to the lake to swim today. I brought along my camera to capture what an hour of my day looks like. 4 kids, and a fantastic dog,60 degrees with not a cloud in the sky. It doesn't get much better than this. I am thankful everyday to Rick, my amazing husband, for providing for our family so that I can spend everyday & every moment with our children. I am thankful that I don't have to miss one singe milestone they make or one single boo boo. I would not have it any other way.

And the Winner is...

Mat & Beth!! Congratulations on winning the Image of the Year contest.

You will receive an 8x10 of your winning photo.

Warpula Family Slide Show

Turn up your volume to listen to the song. It is a good 4 minutes long, just a warning. :)

Click the link to view:

http://cozyimpressionsphotography.com/WarpulaFamilyUT/

UT Photo Shoot, Warpula Family

On Saturday we took the kids to the UT campus for a mini photo shoot. Its been about 4 months since we've done any family shots. We had a great time. I am working on the slide show and plan on posting it tonight.