Our White House Adventure

As only Bill Brigman can, he managed to get us on the invitation list to the White House for the Presidential presentation of the National Championship to the LSU Fighting Tigers! Here are a few pix from our big White House Adventure!

As many of you know, you are not allowed to take ANYTHING in the White House... I had two 3-yr-olds in the freezing cold drizzle for nearly 3 hours, with nothing other than two McDonald's Happy Meals, a handful of napkins, 2 pull-ups, and 2 wet wipes! And, we made it!!! Thank goodness for Daddy's big military coat that served as our blanket... otherwise, we would have been in big trouble. It was COLD yesterday in DC!

Here's me and Ella and Katie and Daddy on the South Lawn of the White House. By the way, BIG mistake to tell a 3-yr-old you are going IN to the White House -- Ella was M-A-D that we didn't actually go IN and were only allowed on the lawn. Note to self: 3-yr-olds are very literal.


Waiting for the ceremony to begin... notice the sleepy eyes? It was WELL past nap time at this point and we had been in line outside the White House since about 12:30. Cold and tired and getting very clingy to mom!

The ceremony from afar.
The President's speech.

Mom and kids huddled up under dad's jacket... Katie's asleep and Ella is soon to follow.
Proof Bill was there too.
Mom with two kids asleep on her lap... Dad decides to make the rounds getting as many photo ops as possible.
Bill with LSU Tiger... ummm, I don't know. He'll have to tell you.
Bill with another LSU Tiger (again, you'll have to ask Bill!) showing off their "rings" -- Bill's LSU ring and his National Championship ring.

Bill with Matt (?), the quarterback (?)
Bill with two other LSU guys that actually wanted to take a picture with HIM! He was sort of min-celeb because he was in uniform. Nice guys!
They came over to take a photo with the sleepy girls. Very nice guys!

Granny's Visit

Here's the family with Granny. She was here visiting last week. We were bad and only took out the camera once, but what a great pic!

Spring Swing

Grandma and Granddad gave the girls a swingset for their birthday last year, but it turned cold shortly after it arrived. Now that we're starting to have some nice Spring weather, the girls finally have a chance to play on their new swingset. They LOVE it!!! Mommy loves it too because it keeps them entertained for HOURS! :-)

Ella's on the left in the blue dress, purple pants, and purple jacket (can you tell she dressed herself?). Katie's in pink (of course!).

Like the hair do? They LOVE pony tails (dog ears is what we used to call them when I was little, I think?) and they have both requested to let their hair grow long so they can have a pony tail like Aunt Bonnie. Ella wants hers to grow long so that it will tickle the middle of her back... I don't think so, Sweetie, but we'll see...

Learning to Write

Katie was drawing yesterday and she said, "Mommy, I spelled my name... E - L - A... see?"

I said, "But, Sweetie... your name is Katie."

"Oh..."

PS: She also drew the "baby" in the picture... the scribble under the mouth is the diaper.

Easter Morning

The Easter Bunny brought Ella a Cinderella doll and Katie a Sleeping Beauty doll, some new pj's, a chocolate bunny, of course, and a bunch of candy-filled Easter eggs.

The girls showing off their new dolls (sorry, not a very good photo).
Checking out all the candy... Katie is the one yawning. She's my morning sleepy-head (but she's also the one that has a harder time falling asleep at night!).
Ella trying her chocolate Easter bunny.
Katie taking a bite...
"Hey! This is HARD TO EAT!"

Hunting Easter Eggs

Our neighborhood is so awesome... remember the Halloween parade in October? Well, they also have an Easter Egg Hunt. Here are a few snapshots of the festivities...

Ella (in blue/purple) and Katie waiting patiently for the big event.
Katie checking out all the eggs on the beach.
You can't really tell from this photo, but the beach is FULL of Easter Eggs (if you look closely you can see little dots of color EVERYWHERE -- those are the eggs!). We were told they put out 600 eggs for the little ones to "find".
And, they're OFF!
Katie making a mad dash to fill her basket.
There's MORE!

Katie's basket is full of a variety of colored Easter Eggs. (Notice the great fake smile she has? But, she forgets to look at the camera!)Ella, you'll notice, has only BLUE Easter Eggs! We were so surprised at the end of the hunt when we looked in her basket and saw ONLY blue eggs. We didn't notice that she was only picking up the blue ones, but apparently she was ignoring all but blue. That child LOVES blue! (I like the other kid in the photo eyeing her basket!)
Going home to enjoy our Easter treats.
We all got a lollipop from the Easter Bunny. This is one time that Ella doesn't like blue. She tried the blue sucker, but went back for a pink one. Mom got the leftovers.

Showing each other our colored tongues.
Now showing DaDa.

The Subtleties of Language

Okay, I don't have the Easter photos up yet (hopefully, will get to that within a few days), but wanted to jot this down while I was thinking of it...

The other night I was singing a bedtime song to Ella and I had already brushed my teeth and had on my retainer. Ella asked me, "Mommy, what that thing called in your mouth?"

"That's a retainer."

"Oh", she said. "Mommy, you sing beautifully with your... um... 'tainer' on."

I said, "Thank you, Honey" (very emphatically) and continued to sing.

A few seconds later she said, "But not VERY beautifully."

I guess she didn't want to give me the wrong impression...