Another full week

How much can happen in a week? Quite a lot. Here it goes.

Sarah and I celebrated my birthday by visiting my favorite museum, De Cordova, in Lincoln. It was quite chilly so we tried to keep the kiddos bundled up. Unfortunately the museum was between exhibits so there wasn't a whole lot open inside. I was inspired by the childrens area and may try to replicate it for the girls room. Luckily my favorite part, the sculpture gardens, can not be closed. We wandered around outside and had a great time. Edith was quite the character, not wanting to stop her rest on the tower sculpture and calling both this head and the red man, "Daddy."

Then we celebrated my birthday with my parents and Sarah's family with a nice dinner at my moms.

Then we did some packing and more packing and more packing. Then the packers came and packed up the rest of the house. I had taken the girls to church and then came back to help after leaving them with my parents. They had already packed my spare shoes so I spent the day packing in my heels. The next day the movers came and moved all day long. I was greatful that I didn't have to move any heavy boxes. Addie was real cute saying as one of the movers went by, "Wow. He has big strong muscles."

We are now starting to enjoy our new house. Hurrah. Lots of space. We still have a lot of work to do unpacking but I already feel that I am home. Our first full day in the house was my birthday. Couldn't have had a better present. The girls also survived dinner out through dessert which was also especially nice. Now we just need to locate the hardware for Edith's bed, the girls' socks, and a few other essentials.

Addie and Edith are thrilled to have Grandma and Grandpa visiting us. All yesterday morning Edith was chanting "want Grandma Gloria" over and over again. We are looking forward to the rest of the Butler clan arriving this weekend to celebrate the girls' birthdays.

And a very Happy Birthday to Aunt Casey, today.

Catch Up Post

So I have forgotten to post about many things as I have been busy with moving related tasks. (move date Oct. 19) I will start off with today and go backwards.

1. I love the mannequin game. When we are at the mall, I have Addie look around for certain kinds of mannequins to buy me a few more minutes or to keep her moving. I ask her to look for ones with no heads, or no feet, or her favorite, kid mannequins. Since she likes mannequins so much, one day when I wanted some peace and quiet I created the mannequin game. Here is how it works. I tell loud wiggly kids something like "be a running mannequin or be a swimming mannequin." Said kids freeze into the required mannequin pose. After a while I request something else and then kids start naming their own and I can get something done. Always a crowd pleaser and today Addie requested it.

2. My best buddy was up visiting her family and we actually managed to squeeze in a nice morning walk at the reservoir. We even got to hop the fence because the gate was closed. Addie took this picture of Bess and Beth, dynamic duo. Also featured is Bess's nephew, Austin, and Edith's pigtails.

3. Scarecrow Festival: We headed out to Leominster to the scarecrow festival. I wanted to be there early before it got too crowded. This was a bad idea because how the festival works is people bring their old clothes and then make scarecrows with the provided frames and hay. This meant there were only 6 finished scarecrows to look at. Not wanting to just leave I bought the girls a pumpkin and we made a jack-o-lantern. The girls scooped it out and gave input to how it should be cut. (While Addie complained continuously about how windy it was). And again Addie decided to name her pumpkin diarrhea. Lovely. (that is also what she named her pumpkin last year and of course it made everyone crack up)

4. Celebrating Dad's Birthday: We had lunch and cake to celebrate my Dad's birthday. Edith wore her new I love Grandpa t-shirt. She loves this shirt and has since asked to wear it everyday. Cute. I guess the elmo shirt is now in second place for favorite. Dad was happy to have parsnips as part of lunch as he really likes them and doesn't get them at home, and I was happy to have someone be pleased that we were eating parsnips. He turned 1 year old. (I only had one candle that wasn't an inacurrate numeral)

She'll be coming round the mountain

Today's lyrics to "she'll be coming around the mountain" courtesy of Addie

She'll be bending all the jewelry when she comes....

She'll be blowing up the anchor when she comes...

She'll be poking all the trees when she comes...

She'll be eating cake on the lawn...

Who knows where all this stuff comes from. Al1though I suspect blowing up the anchor is taken from a pirate song about pulling up the anchor.