Happy Birthday Ryan!

4 years ago today, we were about to head off to the hospital....
To meet this little angel (not Grant, the baby)...
Who morphed into the oh-I-don't-know-if-angel-still-applies hilarious, independent, sassy, intelligent, gorgeous little lady we know and love. In honor of Ms. Ryan Elizabeth Stiff and her love of ballet and crafting, a little series we'll call 'post-it note art' to help ring in the big day.  
Happy Birthday!!!
Which, PS, she has been asking me every morning this week if that day is her birthday.  Hopefully the room full of balloons today (courtesty of dad) will tip her off.

White trash summer fun....

No clothes, no class required.
Thanks for all your sweet comments regarding Stiffler #3.....and a big thanks to Grant for changing his what-I-thought-was-adamant position on the topic!

 And, guess who is turning 4 tomorrow????

Bun in the oven

That's right.....the Stiff's are expanding by one come January!
The above pic is our little nugget at the 9 week mark. I'm currently cruising along and just about to start week 12. You may have noticed a blog shortage in mid-May, early June....well you may thank the newest Stiffler for the morning sickness and lack of energy. For about three weeks, we did nothing but this, group naps on the couch:
This time around has been a hoot now that Ryan 'get's it' and can talk about the baby with me. She's been practicing a lot herself.
We are super psyched to add to the craziness and no, we will not be finding out the sex.  Surprise city come 2013.

Life

This is what happens when you are taking a break during Reese's naptime, sitting on the couch reading your new House Beautiful and then staring intently at the space over your buffet table (channeling the inner decorator you think you are due to the magazine) and decide on a whim the whole space needs to be redone.  Naturally that leads to this:
Yes, this is the kitchen. No, the buffet is nowhere in sight. The connection? I realized we needed a new space for our liquor stash (that we rarely use and was taking up valuable real estate) and our tiny kitchen was maxed out in the cabinent department. Some reshuffling, pitching, and reorganizing was in order. Naturally this wasn't completed before Reese woke up so let's just say our afternoon was a bit trying. Depending on what the 'after' ends up looking like, perhaps I'll post....but for now we're in 'transition'.

Here's what happens when you decide one morning you will go to the gym:
Why not decide instead to redo your entire closet and drawers after you are fed up trying to locate your 'gym' clothes. We never made it that day. However, in AMAZING gym news....we are now going regularily again. Apparently Reese detested the idea of mom getting exercise because the girl would lose her sh&t everytime we went...nevermind the gym daycare ladies cringed when they saw us coming and I would get a whopping 10 minute workout before they came to get me. Well - the turning point came last week and now we have been more in the last 10 days then we had the previous 6 months. The girl loves the place now and when we leave she always says 'bye friends' to the random assortment of children in there on that particular day.

 I digress. Here's what happens when you have kids:
Interesting art work pops up in the most annoying of places. The perp has yet to step forward but I'd bet my 401k her names starts with R-E-E and ends with S-E.

And this would be from the other day when Diva Ryan was acting all snotty and we warned her we'd leave her behind if she didn't stop. She didn't. So we left. I only wish I had had my good camera and not my iPhone. The face was priceless. Of course we barely made it out the driveway when the point was driven home.
Happy Friday. Happy Weekend.
Congrats to the Defee family and the addition of their newest cutie Lincoln!

Park time

Shaw Park has quickly become one of our favorites....plenty to do, decent shade, spray pool and best feature of all -- completely fenced in! Playground jackpot! We've done play groups here as well as packing some sandwiches and meeting dad after work.
Pretending to sleep...one of her favorite games to play
One more in the 'pretending to sleep' series...

The circus came to town...

And I'm not just talking figuratively about my own children.  Although I fully understand why you might equate the girls with the circus.  I've talked to a handful of fellow awesome mothers who have seen or planned to see Circa Flora over the past few weeks and thanks to our neighbor's friend accidentally over-ordering tickets, the girls and I set out yesterday with Ameila (A-meal-ma-ma) and her mom to embrace our inner juggling/tight-rope walking/magical selves.

The girls would have been content just riding around in the car all afternoon....the three of them in a row was a hoot. A headache inducing hoot.  Led by who? One guess. Reesers. She was the ringleader for the Circa Backseat.
The morning show was perfectly suited for this age group. One hour long. Started on time. Ended on time and just as the girls were starting to get antsy, we were applauding the performers and making our way out. We scored some awesome seats....third row. Yep, that's how we roll.  Or that's how it works out when somebody else is an awesome mom looking for fun things to do with her kids, over orders tickets and through a friend, ends up giving them to the lazy neighbor with two girls.  Whichever.
Ryan and Ameila - super pumped. They both watched the entire show and followed along closely. Ryan told me it was 'so fun' and 'cool'.
I was worried about my own little circus freak, Reese, but she did amazingly well....Watched about 50% of the show and spent the other 50% dancing intently (sometimes with all her limbs moving but eyes closed taking in the music) in front of her seat. When she had a spare moment, she was hugging Amelia.
And clapping:
The other highlight...popcorn.
I think the circus is still in town for another week or so, should you be on the fence about it....give it a go.  Air conditioned tent.  Enough said.  Or if all else fails, invite a friend over, let them all ride in the car together and drive around town eating popcorn.  Same thing.

Ryan and water

It's a love/hate thing.  Has been for years.  Loves it on her own terms.  Hates it on her head.  That makes for an entertaining time when washing her hair.  So many rules she has.  I think we're all anxiously awaiting her response when she starts her intense swim camp in a couple of weeks.  God help the instructors.  But lately though, there has been a glimmer of hope.  At the pool and at the park, she has been a bit of a rebel and venturing close to full on head in the water mode.
Trying to stay above the fray...
Getting more comfortable....
Will she ever become a water baby?  Stay tuned until mid-July when we either have a full-on swimmer or a Mrs. Ackerman's Swim Club evictee.  

In honor of the girls' new obsession with knock knock jokes (have you ever taken a 25 minute car ride listening to non-stop knock knock jokes?), anywho....
Knock knock
Who's there?
Opposite of Ryan
Opposite of Ryan who?
Water obsessed Reese

Monday cuteness

This could quite possibly be my favorite pic of these three to date.

Grant just realizing the Reeser's chill 'pose'/squat

Girrrrrl, you nuts.

A father.....to daughters

Means spending hours playing 'princess', partaking in tea parties and being a 'customer' to the girls' many cooking adventures.  And of course, making rocks 'pretty' on the tiny picnic bench under the swing set.
Precious.

Happy Father's Day!

A very big happy Father's Day to all the dads out there.....but for myself and the girls, two particular dads mean the world to us.

To the best tire swing pusher out there (waaayyyyy better than cautious mom)...
To the best human jungle gym we know...
To the king of dancing....
To an amazing husband/partner/buddy - you make life fun and we love you!
And to the man I have called dad for 34+ years and my girls have the privelege of calling Papa.
With all his little peeps...
And to a man whom I only wish myself and the girls had the pleasure of meeting....Grant's dad
To all the dad's out there....we love you! we need you! you make life so much more fun and exciting!