Animals Alive

The Friday before President's day, the weather was supposed to be wonderful. So a group of us met up at Frying Pan Park - which combines a park with a farm - to play, see animals, and picnic. The weather was slightly chillier than expected, but we had a great time. The girls really love to see the farm animals and their friends.

So excited to see the sheep!

Audrey petting a HUGE pig


The girls thought that this pig was funny cause it had mud up to its knees. I think that this was the first time that they realized that pigs lived in mud.

An attempt at a group shot in front of a cow. They are actually getting better about staying still for photos. Pictured: Max, Lorelei, Keira, Audrey, Elisa, Brooke, Maddy, Zac. Not pictured are Katie and Molly and Nathan and those in the strollers: Ian, Bennett, and Sloane.

Animals Dead

President's Day Weekend, we decided to take the girls into DC to see the dinosaur bones. Unfortunately we didn't really think through the whole holiday issue and so we were quite surprised to find that it was packed! We have been to the museum once before and the girls were not overly enthused about the bones. However, since then they have fallen in love with the tv show Dinosaur Train. (as an aside, they frequently pretend to be T-Rexes around the house. The funniest part is that they will tell me that they are eating meat from the meat tree. apparently they are not 100% clear on where the T-Rex actually got his food from. so funny!) They were much more interested in the bones this time, but Brooke was "scared" of them and was very clingy.

Posing in front of Tank the Triceratops

Mrs. Pteranodon skeleton

Audrey by the wing of a pteranodon

The girls by Buddy the T-Rex

Random bones

Ski Trip

This past week we went on a 3 day ski trip to Wintergreen, VA (the same place that we went for 4th of July). We left after work on Monday and got back around 11 am on Friday. It was lots of fun but very cold!

Did I mention that it was COLD?

Day 1: Girls in Kid Camp with a 1 hour lesson built in. K and D did skiing together and then K back to the condo to read by the fire while D did all of the black slopes. Our skiing was moderately uneventful - with the only exception being my one fall. Which happened to be into the fence at the bottom by the chair lift. Much more embarrassing than painful. I was surprised at how there really was not snow anywhere except on the ski trails (provided by the massive snow making machines that were on constantly) and how icey the slopes were. D says that is just the way it goes on the east coast. The little lesson for the girls did not go that well for Audrey (in her defense she had a very runny nose which does not mix well with cold) but Brooke really caught on quickly and loved it. They went down a MINIATURE hill that was right outside the kids area. The teacher let Darren help out with the lesson in an attempt to get Audrey involved and that worked pretty well. After their camp was over, each of the girls went down the big slope outside our condo (the downside for this place was that there really was not any type of bunny slope for the girls to use. They were on the same green as me!) They liked that a lot - especially riding back up on the chairlift.

We all spent a lot of time looking out the window at the chairlift. The girls liked to guess which way the people would go and whether or not they would fall getting off the chairlift.

At the lesson. First practicing walking with just one ski and then Brooke with both skis on ready to go. Knees bent and arms out in front. (Brooke is always the one in solid pink bibs and Audrey's are the purple pink plaid)

Getting ready to ski with the girls. Basically D snowplowed down the whole mountain and steered the girls. They were like little reindeer in the harness. Obviously D was the only one taking them down the mountain, so there are not any good pictures of that as I was back at the condo with the other.

Day 2: No camp for the girls. Just skiing with D and playing with K. I did ski a couple of times by myself and D went and did the blacks during their nap. I was happier cause it snowed during the night and there was snow everywhere and it was less icy to ski!

The girls after skiing: Brooke "let's go again" and Audrey "it is COLD"

D getting off the ski lift holding Audrey

Getting ready to make the exchange of girls

Just a cute picture of me and Brooke

Audrey being super silly

Day 3: The girls went back to the camp, but this time without the lesson. D and K skied together - until K crashed into a snow (mainly ice) bank and decided that was enough skiing for me. D got to ski the blacks again while I read by the fire. Then D and K went tubing. That was SO MUCH FUN! Though I was totally scared and insisted that we wear our ski helmets while tubing. Needless to say, we were the only ones. After the camp D and the girls skied again.

K at the bottom of the tubing park. Thank heavens there was a little moving sidewalk to get back to the top!

D getting ready to tube solo. We did some as singles and some hooked together as doubles. When you went by yourself you spun around and around. But hooked together you really flew down it!

Favorite part of the trip? The two sets of bunk beds in their room, of course!

I will post videos later!

Sledding

I finally bought a sled. For those of you who are long time readers, you may remember that last year we just put the girls in a plastic bin and used that as a sled. Since we are really not that much of a redneck family, I decided that we really needed to upgrade. So this past weekend we got out and did sledding in our backyard. The girls LOVED it!! and secretly so did their mom and dad. (As an aside, D is wearing those sunglasses cause he had Lasik the day before we did our sledding. It went well!)




Here are Brooke and then Audrey sledding down our hill. I love Audrey's ski bibs - she totally looks like she should be a snowboarder in them.



The girls are pretty adventurous and this is what the sledding looked like a little while into our playing:

Thunder Snow

Last week we had our first (and hopefully last) big snow of the season. It started snowing Wednesday around 3 pm and finished up around 9 pm. During that time we got a little over 8 inches. It was coming down like crazy - it was basically a thunderstorm but with snow. The snow was super wet and icy and subsequently was very heavy - limbs, and some small trees, were cracking and falling all night. Not to mention it is awful to shovel the next day! Wed night the roads were awful D left work around 5 pm Wed and made it home around 9 pm...and we only live around 8 miles away. We lost power around 8 pm but it was fortunately back on around noon the next day. Fortunately, because when we woke up Thursday morning it was a chilly 55 degrees in the house. We spent the morning shoveling the snow. We live on a hill and it is impossible to get traction right in front of our house so we also shoveled a big chunk of the road too. D went to work after that and the girls and I spent the day Thursday with our friends Kate and Abby, who live pretty close and had power. Here are some pictures of our adventures:

We went out and played in the Thunder Snow! Notice how much snow Audrey has on her hood in the second picture. And they seriously request to shovel the snow.


Our beautiful snow bunnies!


Just watching us shovel was exhausting!


Our attempt at a snowman



Playing with Abby


Holding giant snowballs

Gingerbread House

One of the advantages of having little kids is that they don't know that you usually do a gingerbread house before Christmas. So a couple of weekends ago we were looking for an activity and I remembered that we never did make the gingerbread house that we got early December. They really liked making it - and eating the candy that went on it.

Brooke directing Audrey on how to decorate


Brooke directing Daddy on how to decorate


Audrey's finished side


Brooke's finished side

This and That

Happy New Year...at least it was in Italy when we toasted at 6pm!

Just a little post to document some of the things that are going on with them at this age.

• When they eat, name the order they are going to eat it in. I am not sure where this started from but without fail at each meal they discuss what they are going to eat first, second, third, and last. The key item is what they are going to eat last.
  
• Now when we finish meals, they are responsible to put their drink in fridge and PLACE their plate in sink.
  
• They are napkin obsessed. Each meal they each go through about 5 napkins. One is for this mess, then wiping their fingers, and then it is too dirty, and one is for their fork to sit on, and one for their drink to sit on, and then of course a new one to wipe their hands and face again. It is ridiculous.

With their friend Lorelei at Frostival - a little event with rides and crafts for preschoolers

• For their birthday and Christmas they got the Bitty Twin dolls and some associated American girl paraphernalia. At first they weren't real sure about them - especially since they each already had one baby doll (from when they turned 1). But they now LOVE their new dolls who they have named Kate (Audrey's) and Kayla (Brooke's). And the best part is that they got diaper bags complete with changing pads and wipes to go with the dolls. I cannot emphasize how many diaper changes we do around here on a daily basis. For sure more than we ever did with the real twin babies.
  
• The girls are obsessed with middle names. They love to find out middle names and they love to call each other by their middle names. Darren started this craziness by calling them Elise and Elizabeth during their nighttime routine. Today at the grocery store they were talking to the guy stocking the juice and asked him his name. Fine. Then they ask him his middle name. He was clearly taken aback. Then they are telling him their middle name, Darren's middle name, my two middle names (another exciting thing about middle names). You could tell that he thought this was all rather odd.
  
• Speaking of names, they now consistently call Darren by his name of Darren rather than Daddy. They even will say Mommy and Darren.
  
• They love to play pretend now with their animals, dolls, little people, etc. But here recently they have started to talk for them in little voices. It is precious.
  
• Audrey has now starting saying "dude." Hilarious!

Putting the kids to work shoveling the snow.

• Brooke has clearly grasped the concept that she is bigger than Audrey (a point I frequently have to make regarding fitting into clothes and shoes.) She will now tell Audrey "you can do it when you get big like me." So funny! Also when we look at baby pictures, Brooke always points to the babies and says "that one is bigger so that is Brooke. that one is smaller so that is Audrey." We have to work on scale though cause I have a set of pictures of each of them in the bath when they were around one and the picture of Audrey is zoomed in more. Brooke is convinced that it is Brooke cause she is bigger.
• The girls love to play games. Their favorite by far is Zingo (it is actually quite fun and is a quick game to play.) Here recently we got a game of Go Fish (where the cards are of animals - mainly marine animals) and the girls LOVE to play it. At first there was some confusion about who would need to get a card when they said Go Fish, but now they are masters at it. Except for the fact that they spread their cards out on the floor so they can see them and then announce what they get each time they draw. It is so funny to play with them.
  
• They like to pretend to be babies - which I can't stand. They crawl around and say Ga Ga and won't respond cause they are babies. Irritating.
  
• They have gotten very good at reading a digital clock - just calling out the numbers like five, four, three. This makes it quite handy when they have to sit down after getting in trouble cause they manage their time themselves.
  
• I had the parent teacher conference with their teachers last week. Embarrassing to say, but I was nervous going into the meeting. As it turns out, there was no need to worry. The teachers were totally complementary of both girls. A brief summary: Audrey is independent and basically runs the play kitchen area. Brooke is a leader in the class and makes sure other people know what they are supposed to be doing. They said that both of them were helpful and that they had great vocabularies.
  
• Two funny little conversations. Audrey was playing and her Barbie was feeding the penguin. So I asked her if she knew what penguins ate. She looked at me and responded, matter-of-factly, that penguins eat snow. I said that penguins ate fish. So she said "penguins eat fish and snow."
  
• I was getting ready to cook dinner so it was time for the girls to select their movie (which is really dvr'ed shows from disney or pbs). This has gotten touchier lately mainly because Audrey no longer always just acquiesces to what Brooke wants. So I read them their choices and Brooke decided that she wanted Agent Oso. Well Audrey decided that she wanted (don't remember but probably Handy Manny, Super Why, or Dinosaur Train). So they are both chanting their choices and are adamant that they are not going to change their mind. Brooke grabs by face and says "Mom, Oso now. Audrey will get happy later." It was hilarious!

Getting ready for The Big Show at their Little Gym dance/gymnastics class. I took video but it is currently trapped on our camcorder. So here is a picture with their friend Falyn.