Love

Love just isn't a strong enough word for the way I feel about these girls.  I am so blessed to have these 3 calling me mommy.  They're growing up faster than I would like.  I literally sometimes feel a panic come over me that it's all just going by too quickly.  Things have changed a lot in the past year.  They're getting older and are at school longer and have activities.  Gone are the days of me just hanging out at our home with my babies.  I miss that A LOT.  Nighttimes are filled with swim team, dance and homework assignments.  I used to be able to just play with them all day and then I could write about it here on this blog.  I've been terrible at baby books and so this blog is where I can log my memories of my girls at all of the different stages they have been in.  I still get to play with them but finding the time to write about it is getting more and more scarce.  I think of all of the things I love about them daily and don't want to forget.  Today I decided to write my top 3 favorite things about the girls right now.  I could just bottle them up right now just as they are.  They make me happy and I love them more than they'll ever know.
 Elle, Gwen and Lily - my hope is that one day when you're older you'll read my words and know that your mom loved and adored you - from the beginning.

Lily

Top 3 things I'm loving about you right now:

• I LOVE your voice.  It's incredibly cute right now.  When you mean to say "because" you always say "tocause" and I never correct you - it's just too cute.  When you ask to snuggle in my bed I'll say, "why? are you having a bad dream?" and you'll reply, "no, it's just tocause I love you."  How can I resist that?  I pull you up next to me every time.
• I love how before bed every night you say, "what do I have in the morning?"  No matter how I answer that question you always get so happy and excited about the next day and say, "Yay!"
• I love that after we go to swimming lessons on Fridays you always get excited to go to "rocco's".  It's our routine to go to LaRocco's pizza together every Friday.  Just the 2 of us and it's my highlight too.  

Gwen

Top 3 things I'm loving about you right now:

• I love how every morning I find you in bed with your little sister, Lily.  You told me that when Lily wakes up she says, "Gigi, will you snuggle me?"  It's so cute to see you being a big sister.
• I love how you quote lines from TV shows and movies during the day. It's always hilarious and your timing is incredible.  You crack me up every single day.
• I love how you get so excited about how you're growing up.  You often yell to me to watch you grab a glass out of the cupboard and make sure that I am noticing that you are NOT on your tippy toes.  

Elle

Top 3 things I'm loving about you right now:

•  I love your sweet notes you leave me all over the house including on my bed at night with directions as to what time you would like me to wake you and the "agenda" for our next morning.  It's pretty cute.
• I love how much you love reading Biographies.  Every single week during school library that's what type of book you choose to bring home and then you are enthralled until it's time to choose a new one.  Right now you're reading a biography about Neal Armstrong.  You read the biography on Elvis Presley in one night and then asked for me to let you listen to his music - you loved it!
• I love driving in the car when it's just the two of us.  You love to turn the music up and have taught me little routines that we do while driving to your favorite songs. 

Easter Bedroom

Lily is now out of her crib and shares a room with Gwen.  When she realized she was a big girl now and got to have an Easter Tree in her bedroom she was soo excited.  As soon as the box of Easter decorations came out of the garage the two of them grabbed the tree and ornaments and ran up to their bedroom to decorate it.  It's something so small and simple but to little girls it's a BIG deal.  I think the little wooden egg ornaments on their tree were moved about 1,000 times over the past few weeks.  There's even a big crack in the pot because of it tipping over so many times but I don't care a bit.  That was the whole purpose of this little tree.  It's theirs and they can play with it as much as they like.  

Easter Tree and Bunnies

I absolutely love Easter decorations.  I never tire of them and hate when it's time to put them away.  I spotted these little cement bunnies at an antique shop and fell in love.  They weren't very much and I really wanted both but purchased just one of them.  My friend Christy was with me and later in the week she went back to the store and surprised me by buying the 2nd bunny and dropping it off at my house.  Aren't they so cute?  I love them and now they'll always remind me of my friend as well.  

  The girls helped me decorate our Easter Tree in the front room this year.  We've collected little ornaments for it over the years and their favorites are the little cards with their initials on them.  They each get to place their initial card wherever they want and put a lot of thought and effort into it.  

Egg Hunt

The egg hunt in the backyard was cute.  They were each trying to find "their own eggs", the ones each of them had dyed.  Elle was sweet and helped Lily find eggs and Gwen's face shows exactly how excited she was.  

Easter Morning

Before the girls went to bed on "Easter Eve", they put out carrots for the Easter Bunny.  Gwen was contemplating what beverage to leave for the bunny.  She couldn't decide between milk, water or juice. After thoughtful contemplation she decided water would be the best.  In keeping with tradition, the girls also got to put on the Easter Pajamas.  Very exciting :)  

Early in the morning all three of them rushed into our bedroom to wake us up so they could go downstairs.  It really is the most adorable thing to watch them be so excited about finding out what the bunny has left for them.  Lily was screaming with excitement when she saw that the carrots had been nibbled at and the water was gone.  The girls each found their baskets.  The Easter Bunny left them lots of foil wrapped chocolate eggs, jelly beans, a milk chocolate bunny for each of them, pez (of course!) sunglasses and a few other little prizes. They were thrilled.  

Happy Easter

We had a very happy Easter.  Poor Jon didn't feel well.  I did make him get out of bed long enough to take our picture before I headed to church with the girls.  Little Lily's dress looked cuter without her little cardigan but she INSISTED on wearing one since her big sisters had cream cardigans on.  She wants to be 'big' just like her sisters.  

I have more pictures from our morning.  We had an early morning egg hunt and ate lots and lots of chocolate for breakfast.  It was perfect.  

Baby Wren

I am an Aunt again. Jon's brother, Syd and his wife Shea had their first baby - and in keeping with McGee tradition, it is another girl!  I was lucky enough to stop by the hospital and take a few pictures of this sweet family.  I won't lie, it did make me a bit baby hungry.  Baby Wren is just so sweet, tiny,  and fresh from Heaven.  I love her already.  

Blessed

My kitchen table and chairs have been bothering me for a while.  I had a few ideas I was thinking of doing.  What I really wanted was a farmhouse table and white chairs.  That would have been a pricey endeavor so I thought to switch it and have natural chairs and a white table.  I have decided lots and lots of things for our home even though I know they won't happen for a while.  It's just my creative outlet to decorate my home, even if it is, at times, just in my head.  When chatting with friends I'll always talk about what I'm hoping to do...someday. 

Well, this year for my birthday, my friends surprised me. They got together and they bought me the  chairs they knew I had been saving for! We all went to dinner and when I came home, the chairs were in my kitchen waiting for me.  Seriously.  What?!  Who does that?  I was so excited that I started to cry.  For real, I did.  Thank you to Christy, Stacey, Sara, Marlene, Elizabeth, Becki, Lizzy and Nicole.
(lizzy and becki we missed you at dinner!)  This picture below was the night of my birthday.  I am so blessed to have such amazing, kind and generous friends.  I don't look at my table and chairs without thinking of these amazing friends. 

I had the chairs and then my table was still black.  It looked fine but then my friend Stacey called me and said that she was getting her kitchen cabinets sprayed white and they were also going to spray her kitchen table as well.  She ended up deciding to do something else with her table so she called me and said, "drop your kitchen table off at my house.  it's getting sprayed."
Again, I cried.  And I'm not even "a crier"!!  It was such an unexpected surprise...the whole situation.
So now, every time I look at my cute little kitchen nook I just think of my beautiful, generous friends.  They are an amazing group of women and I am so thankful they are in my life.
I am blessed.

As for how everything turned out, I LOVE it.  It's so much more, "me".  The way the chairs and table were before was nice and I think, tasteful,  but it really didn't reflect the 'look' that I love.  I feel like the whole downstairs flows a bit more smoothly now.  I'm happy.

Tooth Fairy

Gwen is losing teeth faster than she can grow them back.  Her cute smile is full of holes.  Every lost tooth is just as exciting as the first for her.  She screams with excitement and then runs and gets our tooth fairy pillow.  That little hole you see in the pillow is where they put their little teeth before tucking it under their pillows before bed.  All 3 girls are at such a magical stage right now.  It feels like I'm living with little cartoon characters.  The best!  

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

Yesterday was St. Patrick's Day.  The girls get sooo excited.  Our milk and orange juice were green, the chairs were all tipped over, chocolate coins were all over the ground and a huge box of Lucky Charms cereal was on the kitchen table. I don't have any pictures of it because I video taped the girls this year.  They ran down the stairs screaming with excitement.  Seriously, it cracks me up every time.  Elle went as far as to make everyone wear something green to bed for fear of being pinched in our sleep.  

Lily made this cute leprechaun hat in her preschool class and wore it for 3 days straight.  Gwen had a hat from kindergarten that she also wore.  I need to get the picture of her wearing her hat off of my phone.  So cute.  

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

Ellers

I can't begin to explain how much I love my Elle.  She's growing up before my eyes and it's fun. She's in 3rd grade and I just don't want this school year to end.  She is HAPPY.  She has an amazing teacher.  One of the things Elle always tells me that her teacher Mrs. Downing says is, "if it's important to you, it's important to me".  Isn't that great?  She plays a game called "States" every single day at recess.  There's a painted map of the United States on the playground's black top and she and her friends have made up some sort of tag game with it.  In the car, she rules the radio and likes it loud.  It drives me nuts.  The funniest thing is I feel like just yesterday I was doing that in the car with my mom.  Her favorite TV show is "Good Luck Charlie" on the Disney channel.  She is still just as sweet as ever. I really don't think that will ever change.  She is a good and sweet girl to her core.  One foot is still firmly planted in her little girl world and she still loves to play dolls with her sisters but the other is wanting to grow-up. It's so cute to watch.  I took this picture of her randomly the other day.  I was on my computer and she just pulled this chair up next to me and was chatting away.  It was so cute that I made her let me take her picture.  I wanted to remember her just like this forever.  She's my little buddy and I adore her. 

Betsy Ross

Gwen had her Kindergarten Patriotic Performance last week.  She got to be Betsy Ross.  She was so excited about it that she could barely sleep the night before the show.  One of my favorite things about being a mom is whenever there's any kind of show, recital, performance or even if I just stop by the school to drop off a forgotten lunchbox, they get so excited!  I was seated in the auditorium when the Kindergarten class marched in and on to the stage.  I could see Gwen scanning the audience for me.  As soon as our eyes met she lit up like you wouldn't believe and I returned the favor right back at her.  It's so darn cute.  I don't think her eyes came off of mine the entire show.  She wore this silly paper hat the entire day -- so cute!  Please don't ever grow up, Gwenners.   

Sorelle

My beautiful niece Sorelle asked me to take her Senior portraits last year.  I'm finally posting them.  She's off at college now and we miss her like crazy.  When Jon and I were first married we used to have her and her sisters over for sleepovers quite regularly.  So much fun. Then overnight it seemed she grew up!  She drives a little red mini cooper and even though she's far away right now when we drive around town and lily spots a small red car she screams. "Rell!!!"  We love her.  A lot.   

Sorelley, we miss you.  xoxo

Little Friends

One of my favorite things about being a mom has been watching my girls develop friendships.  It is one of the sweetest and cutest things to witness.  They go from their entire world consisting just of mom and dad and siblings to discovering independence and fun away from us.  These are a few of Lily's friends. She has a playgroup with them every Thursday. It's the highlight of her week and she talks about these little friends constantly.  I'm hoping no one moves away and that they will be friends for a long, long time.  I took this picture with my phone so it's a tad grainy but as time goes on it will be a fun memory for sure.  

The Morning After

I just ran across this picture of my Gwenners.  It makes me smile.  This was the morning after the school Halloween carnival.  She was a pirate but had her face painted like a bunny at one of the booths. I remember walking downstairs and seeing her on the couch with crazy bed head and watching cartoons with all that face paint still on and her carnival wristband still holding strong.  

I sure love her.  

Girly Girls

For Christmas Santa brought the girls these adorable dolls.  Elle's is a snorkeling doll, Gwen's is a ballerina and Lily's is a princess.  Santa must really know them.  They can't get enough of them. It's the one "toy" I never mind buying because they really never tire of them.  The American Girl dolls that Santa brought last year are also just as much fun to them (that's gwen's AG doll in the top picture).  Even my 8 year old Elle will play "babies" (as they refer to it) for hours.
There is no lack of pink, dollies, kitchen toys or the like around here.  Lily had a little boy over for a playdate and the first thing she said when he walked in the door was, "hey, you wanna play babies?"
I wouldn't change a thing.  

Christmas Party

Jon and I were put in charge of our ward's Christmas party at church.  It completely stressed me out to begin with but as soon as I got my bearings it ended up being a lot of fun.  I was so busy with it that I forgot to take any really decent pictures.  (huge bummer)

We had A Christmas Breakfast which was fun complete with a cereal bar for kids and donut holes and then breakfast egg casseroles, fruit kabobs and cinnamon rolls for the adults.

I decorated the tables with white table cloths and then used kraft paper as the table toppers.  We put little felt Christmas themed buckets on each table filled with crayons so that kids (and adults) could color during breakfast.  Half of the tables I put small faux Christmas trees with burlap wrapped bottoms and then tied red and white striped grosgrain ribbon bows on the top of each.  The other tables I used glass vases of different shapes and sizes with green moss inside, battery lit "flickering" candles and again tied with the red and white striped grosgrain ribbons.  

I knew from the very beginning that since it was going to be in the gym I had to somehow "drop" the ceiling.

I enlisted Jon and he and our friend Paul strung white twinkling lights the whole length of the gym.  

We turned off all the lights and so the main light in the room was from the christmas lights and then the candles in the vases.  It looked so pretty.

My friend Missy was INCREDIBLE and I could NOT have done it without her.  We put together 90 gingerbread houses for the primary children to decorate.  

The primary kids put on a short Nativity which was so sweet and my friend Missy and I found the most hilarious backdrop in a closet at church that I think was used behind Santa Claus one year for photos.  We set up a brown couch in front of it and had a bunch of little props as well.  We had family portraits taken by my dad who came and set up lights and then had a link where families could download the pictures after the party (the picture of our family shown above is just one off of my phone.  the real ones were great). It was an "ugly sweater" breakfast so the pictures turned out pretty funny.  Missy made an amazing Christmas mix which we had playing --- music makes everything more fun.
So much fun but also so much work.  I was honestly most relieved when it was over.
A fun memory for sure.

Christmas Card 2012

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Christmas Room

The most exciting Christmas storage box we open each year is the one that contains the girls Christmas bedding.  It is such a simple thing to do and I have a feeling as the girls grow up it will be one of their favorite Christmas memories ... sleeping in their "santa sheets".  This year when we were at the tree lot getting our tree the girls found this cute little one and begged to put it in their bedroom.  Elle promised she would make sure it had plenty of water each day.  It looks so cute in their room.  We just put simple white lights on it and at night their room looked so magical.  I don't want them to grow up.

Christmas Wreath

I put this wreath together for our door this Christmas.  I had purchased a fresh bay leaf wreath which was incredibly beautiful but it dried out much more quickly than they ever have before for me.  It went bright orange which didn't look quite right for Christmas.  I then saw the boxwood wreaths at Trader Joes and was so happy. I just tied everything together with string and then added the red satin ribbon and my favorite Santa and it looked pretty cute.  

I took almost this exact picture of Lily last Christmas on our front porch.  It's incredible how fast she is growing up.  Wishing I could slow it down somehow.  

Christmas Morning

Santa Claus found the McGee girls once again.  I came downstairs and took this picture just before the girls got to see their treasures.  The girls each got the dolls they wanted so much.  Elle's is the snorkeling girl.  Gwen's is the ballerina doll and Lily wanted the princess dolly.  They also each received a scooter.  For weeks Lily had been asking for an orange scooter.   Gwen wanted hot pink and Elle didn't ask for a scooter but since her favorite color is navy blue, Santa brought her a navy blue scooter.  All the gifts were fun but I'd have to say that the gifts they loved the most were their little art boxes.  Santa put together a box for each of them full of crayons, scissors, markers. stickers, paper, glue sticks etc.  Even my little Lily received her own box.  She's so proud.  This is one of my favorite pictures of the morning:

...the girls first realization that Santa really did make it to our home.  Each of them are looking directly where their gifts were.  No guessing or names on anything was needed.  They each knew right where to run.  As much fun as they had, I must admit, it's waaaay more fun being the parent.  

Countdown...

Wishing I still had 12 days left until Christmas.  The reality is there is just ONE more day.  I LOVE having small traditions that we do each year.  It makes for such a magical time of year with little kids.   Our Countdown advent calendar has been a favorite of the girls over the past few years.  The girls take turns each day as to who turns over the little card.  They get soo excited when it's their turn.  I also found these cute little vintage Santa mugs .  They're tiny and the girls have LOVED using them for everything from hot chocolate just to drinks of water during the day.  I'm on the hunt for a vintage Santa cookie jar as well.  I've seen lots of reproductions in stores but nothing that I've loved.  And don't think we didn't hit the mall for our annual picture with Santa.  I've done this every single year since Elle was born and have framed them.  It's my very favorite thing to pull out of our Christmas boxes each year.  I've even got one of me when I was a little girl.  They're covered in little fingerprints because the girls constantly are taking them off and looking at them.  I can't wait to add lots more as well.   I once heard a man I admire say, "happy childhood memories = healthy adults."  I think of that often.  My hope is that we are creating happy memories for our girls as they grow up.