Friday iPhone Dump

This one isn't late!! Woohoo! I'm again linking up with Jen over at Ramblings of a Suburban Mom for Friday iPhone Dump!

The big thing we did last weekend was go up to the Woodlands for a Children's Festival! We didn't tell Emily what she'd see there, but there was a big surprise! One of Emily's favorite shows is the Imagination Movers. Coincidentally, it's the only one she watches that I also love. It's just so cute and the guys are funny - it makes me laugh! A month or so ago, they came to Houston and I found out about it literally the night before they came. It was a free show, so I didn't need to worry about tickets, but Emily had JUST started school 2 weeks earlier and missed her entire second week of school because she was sick, so I really didn't want her to miss anymore and the show was a Wednesday, one of her school days (she goes MWF). Usually, I can swap days during the week, but the only day left would've been Thursday and I had a doctor's appointment very early that day I couldn't change, so there was just nothing I could do apart from have her skip school. In the end, although it broke my heart to have her miss the concert, we skipped it because I thought it was important for her to go to school. She didn't know about it, so she was fine, but I felt like I was depriving her of an awesome experience! SO! When we found out they were coming BACK to our area for another show, I decided we absolutely had to go. This is her waiting for she doesn't know what.

What is going on?

As soon as the show started, people were up dancing in the aisles, so I let Emily go for it! They started with their theme song, so she recognized it for sure. Throughout the show, the Movers also came down off the stage and high fived and hugged kids. It was awesome!

Dancing!

For one of the last songs, they brought out trash can air cannons or something that puffed out big smoke rings (I think it was dry ice) and then finished with their show's closing song, which Emily loves - she loves to jump up, get down, and turn around when they sing it!

Watching the Movers!

After the show, they had mentioned a meet and greet, but we found out from security that it was something you had to win tickets for from Radio Disney ahead of time, which was a bummer, but Emily had fun, so it was ok. So, then Emily decided she really wanted to play on the hill up above the arena, so we went up and let her run and roll around for a while.

Running down the hill!

After a while, I noticed a blue jumpsuit down by the stage, grabbed Emily, and we got down there quickly to see that Mover Scott had come out to say hi! He was late for the meet and greet so that he could say hi to some of the people still hanging around, which was super nice of him. Emily told him she liked his show and he called her an angel and then told her she should learn an instrument! When we went and got a Movers shirt for Emily, we and the other family buying a shirt at the time were surprised with an invitation to go to the meet and greet! Emily put on her shirt (and has wanted to wear it as often as I'll let her this week!) and got ready to meet her Movers! Honestly, I think she was a bit overwhelmed by the whole thing at the time. Not so far that she was unhappy of course, she just seemed a little dazed during the meet and greet. She definitely knew it was them and recognized the music at the concert, but while meeting them, she clammed right up. Seems she's gotten a touch of my shyness. Directly afterwards and all week long, it was nonstop, "Did you meet the movers!!" (she still says "you" sometimes when she means "I") and "Scott's hair was tall!". I think Scott's her favorite. (Ok, he's mine too. He was just soo sweet to Emily! Plus he used to have long hair, and well, I'm a sucker for guys with long hair. Just look at my hubby.) I'm so glad we got to go. I think it was a fun experience for her and both Chris and I were just so impressed by how down to earth and genuine they all were in person. We will absolutely take her again if they come back!

Mover Scott remembered her from a bit earlier and said "I know you!" and picked her right up!

Mover Dave patting her on the head. Mover Smitty wasn't there, sadly, but Farmer Kyle was (he's their tour drummer).

With her Movers! They all sang a harmony together after this shot!

So, the rest of the week was life as usual. School MWF, Gymboree Tuesday, and Library and Chick Fila Thursday. I did need to pick up a few things at Walmart too, so we also had a little lunch date together there.

She had just noticed I was taking her picture.

At her Gymboree music class

In the Play and Learn class, "putting cement into the cracked road".

And jumping, one of her favorite things to do.

I don't remember which morning this was, but I love when I get to sneak a peek at her sleeping peacefully.

Playing with some cars (she loves cars just like her mama did!).

And finally, I've been scouring eBay for the past year in an attempt to find a backup for Emily's main stuffed animal. The one she's inseparable from, her Thumper. Now that sounds like it should be easy! Just go to a Disney store! We even have a gigantic box full of Thumpers (they're Chris's - Thumper was his favorite growing up too and he got one on every Disney trip. Still does!). But this one is different. It's tiny and lays down rather than sits. As far as I can tell, it was only for sale for about a year (when Emily was under a year old, which is when I bought the first one). I even have the same exact style in Miss Bunny, but that one isn't the same to Emily. Last week, I found THE bunny. I promptly bought it (Tags still attached, clean, and cheap too! I probably would've paid way more than I did for it!) and I have it hiding away just in case we ever need it. Hopefully, the newness of it wouldn't put her off immediately like Miss Bunny does, but I'm hoping it would do just fine. I took a picture of them laying next to each other (Emily was in the kitchen at the time so didn't see) and I just think it's so funny to see how mangled old bunny is.

Old bunny with it's bobbly neck that she grips very tightly, flat face from smooshing it up to her nose, and ragged fur and tail next to backup bunny all fluffy and nice.

Friday iPhone Dump

Argh, I'm late again! But, I really wanted to link up again with Jen over at Ramblings of a Suburban Mom for Friday iPhone Dump!

The first 3 all take place at my in-law's block party. My mother in law was busy with a quilting convention, so my father in law asked us if we wanted to come with him to their block party. Emily ended up having a blast playing with the other kids (which I somehow managed not to take pictures of).

We took Chris's old wagon! Emily loved the ride!

Granddaddy, Daddy, and Emily! It kind of looks like no one else is there, but there were actually a lot of people!

Emily found this chair and pretended to sleep in it.

 The next day we were back at the park!

Going down the big slide with Daddy!

This next picture, I was just trying on a dress we had just gotten from Etsy and I feel like Emily looks so old in it! Something about her face!

Sorry for the mess - Hurricane Emily...

One of Emily's favorite naptime activities, if she's not napping, is to empty her bookshelf. She usually does read them, but regardless, it leaves a huge pile on the floor that I've been encouraging her to put away herself. I noticed this time that she seems to have learned by watching me how I organize the books! She was arranging the Sandra Boynton books by size.

Cleaning up!

 On Thursdays we go to the library for Toddler Storytime. Emily's ok about listening to the books, but generally likes the songs, puppet show, and art better. This week was a Native American theme and the art activity was buffalo masks.

She thought it was pretty funny to wear it

I've mentioned her a few times on the blog, but we have a cat named Buffy (like the Vampire Slayer). She's 10 and used to be the feistiest cat - very picky about who she let pet her, quick to change moods, biting ankles, etc. She has thankfully mellowed with age and even more thankfully is super tolerant of Emily. She goes away when she's had enough, but does like to come and bop heads affectionately with Emily and Emily loves her.

Emily reading a book to Buffy.

Buffy displaying her tolerance by accepting a hug.

Emily goes into our bathroom and feeds the cat way more often than she needs to be fed. Probably the source of their relationship.

Now that the spiders have been taken down from the front yard, Emily misses them. I did leave one in the garage for her to see, though! But, this week at Chick Fila, instead of an arm painting, Emily decided she wanted a spider balloon!

Spider balloon! How is this my child? I hate spiders. Passionately.

And finally, Emily has a ridiculously large collection of Disney Cars. They're actually her poop rewards. She calls them poop cars. Anyway, the other day, she brought these 3 up to me, laid them out, and said "Baby, Mama, Daddy! It's a family!" It was pretty cute.

The poop car family. And, argh, another huge mess in the background!

Friday iPhone Dump

Ok, I know it's not Friday, it's Sunday. I'm super late on this, but I really wanted to put up my pictures and continue with this link up with Jen over at Ramblings of a Suburban Mom for Friday iPhone Dump!

Ok, so my first 2 are awful. My iPhone takes terrible nighttime pictures (is that how they all are or do I need to have mine looked at? It's a 4S.), so they're blurry and dark. I lightened one so you could at least see it. Anyway, they're from Emily's Trunk or Treat at school. I volunteered to hand out candy and decorate my trunk as part of it and managed to forget to take a picture of that, but I did a spider theme, since Emily's so enamored with our front yard spider decorations. Emily dressed up as Woody (in a dress) like she did when we went to Disney's Not So Scary Halloween Party a month ago.

Enjoying a piece of candy with daddy. I know, it's terribly blurry. This was with a flash.

Dancing to the music! She had a blast dancing! This was the one I lightened.

The next day, we were up bright and early to go to the pumpkin patch since we got there too late last weekend and it was backed up 3 miles with a projected 2 hour wait to get into the place. Thankfully, crowds weren't too bad this time and Emily had a blast! She gets so much more out of the pumpkin patch each time we go. This time, she was big enough to do quite a few more things - she did a pony ride, fed some goats, panned for "gemstones", went down a roller slide with both of us, jumped for quite a while on the bouncy air pillows, rode the cow train, rode the real train, rode the carousel, and picked a few small pumpkins! It was a really fun day and I'm so glad we got to go. A few of these upcoming pics aren't iPhone pics (they're from a real camera), but I thought I'd include them anyway.

At the farm!

Feeding the goats

Jumping high with Daddy (she also jumped on her own)

Drink break! (Oh, and the wardrobe change was due to the heat - it was nice, but got warmer)

With some pumpkins!

Next up, my nails of the first part of last week! I got the idea off Pinterest while trying to find ideas for my new chevron stickers! Later in the week, I did a more Halloweeny look with a dark orange and a gold/orange/black glitter accent.

Nails!

This next picture is a typical bedtime:

Animal friends all over the bed and daddy reading books.

Taken in the dark, but this is what I found one day this week during naptime:

Poor kid.

This one may look familiar! She wanted another picture with her beloved spiders. There have been 2 more pictures since.

I hate to take them down!

My cat staring at me creepily from downstairs.

I'm waiting...

An idea I totally stole from Jen at Ramblings of a Suburban Mom, this is my first attempt at a muffin tin meal for Emily! It has olives, bologna cut into animal shapes, toast cut into animal shapes, grapes, a cookie, and a fun size Crunch bar. Naturally, the chocolate was eaten first.

She liked it!

And finally, Emily changed her mind on what she wanted to dress up as for her school party on Halloween and for that night. She ended up dressing up like a kitty!

Getting home after her school party

Trick or treat! She totally filled up that bucket!

That's it for this week!

Friday iPhone Dump

I’m linking up with Jen over at Ramblings of a Suburban Mom for Friday iPhone Dump today! I've never tried a link up, but this one seemed like an easier one to start off with since I definitely have pictures on my iPhone ready to go! Hopefully, I did this right with the button and all (if not, please let me know!). Anyway, here's some of my favorite pictures from the past week!

First up, we have this. That's our TV remote that I had been hunting for for a week! I knew Emily was playing with it around the last time I saw it, but when I asked her, she couldn't remember where it was. She's usually pretty good at remembering where she left stuff. I don't even know what made me think to look here, but there it is! In her bike bucket. 

Aha!

Last weekend, it was sooo gorgeous out. Like low to mid-70s, sunny, perfect weather. We had plans to go to the pumpkin patch, but apparently everyone else did too, and by the time we got there in the early afternoon, there was at least an hour long line just to get into the parking lot, and then rumors of another hour to wait for tickets to get in, so we changed our plans and went to the park both days, which Emily loved.

Emily getting pushed on the swings by her Nana

Chris and Granddaddy on the big kid swings

Slide time!

Sitting in a tree!

Yesterday, we did our usual Thursday night activity - Chick Fila! We go Thursdays because Jingles is there doing balloon animals and face/arm paintings. Emily has always gotten a balloon (we've seen quite a few tigers and giraffes), but last week, when Jingles was out, the lady who was there in her place only did paintings, so Emily decided she's into paintings now. Last week was butterflies and this week, since she had gone to the zoo with Nana and Granddaddy earlier in the day, she wanted a giraffe (they're probably her favorite animal). When we got home, she asked if we could take a picture of it while she posed with our cat, Buffy - entirely her idea.

Emily and Buffy

Today, we made a short stop at Walmart because I needed to pick up some last minute Halloween decorations because I somewhat unknowingly signed up to decorate my car trunk for tonight's Trunk or Treat at her school. I don't mind at all and I was already planning to bring candy to help out, I just thought the sign up was to say we were coming, not that I would decorate my car. Whoops! Anyway, on the way out, Emily really wanted to ride Dumbo. Based on her super happy reaction, you'd never guess she'd actually been on the real thing less than a month ago! Her excitement was adorable.

Walmart Dumbo

And then at home, continuing her new behavior of requesting posed pictures, she asked if I could take a picture of her with one of the spiders I hung up on one of our trees outside. Ok, then.

Emily and her spider pal

So, that's this week in pictures. Next week should be fun with all the stuff we have planned - another much earlier attempt at the pumpkin patch, the Renaissance festival (I may regret both of those in one weekend with no naps), tonight's Trunk or Treat, and real trick or treating next Thursday!