Too fast.....

This little gal is growing too fast! She has already accumulated some roly poly legs and doubled her cheek size. She is awake alot more during the day and seems to entertain herself with lights and the other two kiddos running around. We love her to death and can't imagine life without her.

This girlie is also growing up too fast. She is SO excited for kindergarten to start and is gearing up for her dance recital in June.

This little monster is going through a crazy stage and can't grow up fast enough! No, he is SO much fun to have around and seems to come up with something new every day to make us laugh until our sides hurt. In this picture he found his dads socks in the laundry and decided to dance around in them while brushing his teeth.

Sisters??

We always thought it was cute that Alex used to roll to her side and snuggle her arms to her chest, I guess it's in the genes :)

To: Great Aunt Cari

We had a photo shoot with Charlie and her cuteness while Grandma is visiting and had to post them so the rest of the fam could see how sweet she is. She is the BEST baby! She is sleeping and eating great! I'm knocking on wood, but she just has something about her that makes everybody smile.

Charlie Kate

She's here! Charlie Kate Balls joined our family Sunday, April 26th at 7:14am weighing in @ 7lbs 7oz 19 in long. Mandy started having contractions at 4, we headed into the hospital at 6:45 and barely made it there for her arrival. The kids love her, she eats with the best of them and seems content with life.

More pics to come................

Waiting....

It has been a long long couple of weeks waiting for #3 to arrive. Emotions are up and down and all sorts of around of wanting her to come soon and then thinking "Am I really ready?" I am officially saying that I am ready and can't wait to meet her. We will not have to wait any longer than Sunday but hoping she wants to come sooner than that. My good friend talked me into taking some maternity pictures, I am so glad I did it because I had not one picture of me and the belly, so for now I will look at them and reminisce in the good times while being pregnant.

Birthday and Easter fun....

We had a crazy fun week! Cam turned 29 last Friday, we went out with some really great friends on Thursday night and on Friday had a low key fun time with just our family. Me and the kids made him a cake and a cool candy bar poster. Our dad is the coolest and we hope he had a great day!

The Easter bunny came on Saturday and the kids thought it was so fun to get some things from him. We got them all excited about going to the annual Eggstravaganza at the stadium but who would have guessed that the only rain we have had in months and months we had a pour down Friday and Saturday so it was cancelled. BUT our friend Tammi had an awesome glow in the dark egg hunt at the church Saturday night and the kids thought it was awesome!

Jake was a little too into the egg dying, he thought he needed to do everything "mineself" and made a pretty big mess by the end of it.

The results......

I really only ask to take cute pictures of the kids twice a year, Christmas and Easter but the kids seemed to still want to be big stinkers when I asked to take their picture before church so the pictures aren't so great but they sure looked cute.

What a goofball...

Update.....

It's been a crazy start of Spring in our house already. We have been keeping ourselves pretty busy but have been squeezing in the fun also. Alex had a fun preschool field trip that just me and her got to go on last week. We went to the White Tank Mountains and did a nature hike, had lunch and some playground time. They made some binoculars in class and had so much fun using them on the trail. It was nice to spend some one on one time with her even though being eight months pregnant plus wasn't the most convienent time to go on a 2 mile hike.

Cam's boss gave us tickets to one of the Spring Training games, we didn't know that they were "high roller" tickets which got us some yummy catered food and rockin seats in a big tent. We forgoed the tent seats because it was full of older people who were really into the game and with two crazy kids that didn't go well, so we got our food and sat on the grass. It was also the only night of the month with fireworks at the seventh inning stretch.

Yes this is Cameron, he was in a funk at work and decided to grow his beard out, I FINALLY got him to shave it after a week.

Alex got her big girl shots for kindergarten and was the bravest girl! The nurse told her to look away but she decided she would rather see what was going on and didn't even blink a tear until we got out to the car and she shed a few but she was so great and now she is officially ready for kindergarten! AAAHHHH!!

Aunt Cris made her annual debut to our house! It was so much fun to have her around and the kids are still sad over her leaving yesterday. Jake woke up this morning asking where she had gone and told me he thought she needed to stay forever.

Last but not least it was my birthday this week and Cris made me my favorite apple pie!! I'm not a huge cake fan so this was extra special and very yummy!! Isn't it so professional looking?

It wasn't the funnest being extra pregnant on my birthday but Cam, Cris and the kids made it for a GREAT day. See the shrine for me on the sliding door behind me? Thanks guys for the awesome day!

You did what???

Yep, that's me!! Wow, do I ever look pregnant! SO here's the story behind this beautiful picture in case no-one has talked to my friend Tammy, who apparently thinks it needs to be known to every person in the state ;) I received an email about a week ago from a friend saying that the new local fabric store was having this AWESOME deal on fabric for St. Patty's Day. I'm ALL about a good deal so I said bring it on! I continued to read the flyer and it said that if you dressed up like a leprechaun from head to toe you would get 50% off all you fabric purchases!!! YESSSS 50% OFF!!!! What a deal! Then it hit me, do I really want to dress this fat, REALLY pregnant body up like a leprechaun? I went back and forth about whether I was going to do it or not and decided why wouldn't I do this, am I crazy to even hesitate to get ten dollar a yard fabric for five?! Unheard of! AND it was the perfect opportunity to get the fabric for those skirts I wanted to make my girls. As I was telling my oh so supportive husband what I was planning to do he just laughed and said, "You will NEVER follow through with this." So the big day came, I got dressed in my borrowed hat and skirt and wore Alex's baby legs and my green shoes. Cam couldn't even take a picture of me without laughing, as I was leaving I said goodbye and he turned his head and said that he couldn't even look at me and that he prayed for my sake that I wouldn't see anyone that I knew. What a putz, didn't he know how much money I was saving!? As I got closer and closer to the store I started to get a little nervous about if I was going to be the only one dressed up. Sure enough I parked right in front of the store and couldn't see a single person in green, not even the employees. I thought maybe they didn't want to promote the deal too much because it was such a BIG deal. I couldn't get out of my car. I had to call my sister Cris and have her walk me through getting out and realize how much of a steal I would be getting. I did it, I finally got out saying what the heck who cares right? As I was walking up to the door the manager was walking out to go next door and he took one look at me and said, "Oh dear! It's tomorrow!!" Wow did I ever feel dumb and that's what I get for not knowing the date half of the time. I told him that I would just put my lovely hat in the car and come in anyways and look around. By that time ALL of the sweet old ladies that work at the store had seen me in all my glory and were chuckling as I walked through the door. The manager came and found me and asked me what I was needing fabric for and I told him that I was getting a bunch for my girls to make some skirts and do a project in my oldest daughters room. He said that he would honor the deal if I would do one thing for him. I thought what in the world would he have me do? He asked that I put all my outfit back on and take a picture to put in the weekly newsletter they send out via email. WHAT?! Oh great, so not only did my husband get to laugh and mock me but all the people in Surprise get to too. I had already been humiliated twice so I agreed. I got 16 1/2 yards of fabric for $80! SO worth it! It would have costed me about $200 full price. So all of you out there that think I'm nuts and are having a good laugh at me I will have two cute girls and one awesome room when I'm done :)

All the pretty fabric....aaahhhhhh
I thought I would throw in a cute picture of the kiddos in their green.

A child's addiction......

My child as an addiction. He LOVES his crocs and mommy loves them because he can put them on himself. His old brown ones lost the back straps about a month ago and everytime he would wear them, which was every day, they would fall off in random places in the grocery store or as we were crossing the street. He as been begging me to get new ones and you know who has the time to remember to get your kids shoes :) So today was the day, we dropped Alex off at school and me and my buddy headed to the mall and got him some new stylin red crocs. He picked them out himself and since it's St. Patricks day next week they gave him some free clover Ji-Bits that he thinks are pretty cool. While the man was putting the Ji-Bits on Jake saw that there were a variety of different Ji-Bits and just HAD to have the ball one. I figured what the heck $2.50 for a little piece of plastic was a steal ;)

Finally!

I made a bag!! It took me F-O-R-E-V-E-R! I saw this pattern a long time ago and decided that I would some day get ambitious enough to get around to it. I thought what better time to make it than now for a diaper bag for the new little chica coming soon. Me and my friend got together and I won't tell you how many times or how long it took us because yes it is depressing but it is done!! I know those are some pretty crazy prints, it must have been one of those "crazy" days when I was picking out fabric, but I couldn't be more happy with it and I'm glad it's done.

INSIDE

I saw some really cute appliqued onesies and decided I would experiment and make my own. Let's just say it will probabaly be my last. Wonder Under is NOT my thing. I know there are some of you out there that think I'm crazy because I've been told so, but it just plain SUCKS to work with. So here's to never doing that again and here's to probably never putting the baby in them because of the cringe I get every time I look at them.

Alex wanted in on the picture fun....