She Now Knows She's A Real, True Princess

The other day while we were out, a lady at the store overheard Emma talking about princesses.  She stopped and looked at Emma and said, "do you know how you know if you're a real princess?"
Emma just looked at her with those big hazel eyes and shook her head in wonderment.
The lady said to her, "if you have a blue line inside of your wrist, then you are a true princess."
Emma looked, and sure enough... there it was!  Her blue line!!!
She gasped in disbelief!  It couldn't have been any cuter.
She looked at the inside of her wrist for the rest of the day and told everyone we met that she was a real true princess.
After we got back into the car, I would look in the rearview mirror at her and she studied her princess wrist the whole way home!

To The Love Of My Life... Happy Ninth Anniversary!

We are no longer newlyweds.  We haven't been for 3 years now according to the traditional anniversary rules.  We are well into our "truly devoted years."
Truly and hopelessly devoted.
Now I'm picturing a very Olivia-Newton-John-moment.  You know, love letters and reflections of Danny Zuko in the kiddie pool.

Ha!
But really, I truly am hopelessly devoted.  I was the first day I met you and I am even more so now, after 9 years of marriage and two babies.
I'm the luckiest girl in world.  I've got it all....  a handsome, funny, smart, hot husband who loves me with all of his heart and shows me so every day.
Colin, I love you with all of my everything!
Happy anniversary!

Emma's First Day Of School

I can't describe the feeling of dropping off Emma in the mornings now.  I feel pretty lonely and empty at first.  Don't get me wrong, it's nice to have a little time to myself for the first time in 5 years, but it's hard to get used to.
Emma is loving her school and her teacher absolutely adores her.  It makes me so happy when I pick her up the afternoon and ask her teacher how Emma's day was and her reply is, "Great as always.  She's easy peasy!"
I know I know!!!  For those of you that know her... I said that her teacher says she's "easy peasy!"
I knew it was going to be like that though.  She's so full of spunk, but I've always thought it was in the best of ways.  She's that girl that NO ONE is ever going mess with, but everyone loves.  She's easy going, yet no nonsense.  I love it!
And now her teacher has confirmed that it's not just my bias opinion, she really is like that!
Anyways, here are a few pictures of her first day of school.
We dropped Drew off at school and took her to Starbucks to spend her last hour of pre-pre-school with her.
It was a lovely morning and we just soaked it up!
When it was time for us to go, we forwent the car line and walked her in (Mom had to bring her camera of course).
Notice that there is not one shot of her face.

She never looked back.

Getting ready to leave the house

snuggled up to Daddy in the cold coffee shop

hanging out with Mommy before school

Walking Daddy to the door  :)

The brave girl never looked back

Preparing For The Teddy Bear Picnic

Cannon's Jr. K is having a Teddy Bear Picnic later this month and the children are preparing their performance for the picnic (how cute is that!?!)
Drew's music teacher emailed us a recording of the class singing their Teddy Bear Song.

Drew did a little performance of his own that I filmed along with some pictures that I took of him in his room with his teddy bear.

Getting Organized For Back To School

We are in the midst of the back to school excitement and we are staying on top of things by staying very organized. I'll be posting some of the many ways that we are doing this over the next couple of weeks, but I thought I'd start here: school lunches. I now pack two lunches so it's important to keep things stocked up and easily accessible. I do this by portioning everything out as soon as we get home from the grocery. I get rid of all of the bulky boxes that clutter up the pantry (b/c I don't have loads of room in there) and I create a snack basket. 

 As you can tell, Drew was with me at Target and was allowed to pick out the color scheme that we would use in the pantry, hence the green.  I love the plastic baskets because they are so easy to clean if they get crummy.

The pantry is organized, food is portioned, and I make as much as I can ahead of time.

One of my favorite go-to's is this waffle recipe.  I can make a ton of them ahead of time and freeze them.  Then I have the convenience of frozen waffles without feeling guilty about buying frozen foods for my kids.  I really love 100 Days of Real Food.  I use a recipe from this site at least once a day!