Harry Potter book #2 complete!

 I wrote before about Dave and Bailee reading Harry Potter together and tonight they finished the second book! We had the missionaries for dinner and Dave drove them home afterward, but had told Bailee that he would read more to her at bedtime. While waiting for him to get back she colored, did a puzzle, helped clean up dinner... she was anxious for him to get home to read. They finished it and are ready to watch the movie tomorrow! It has been really fun for both of them to have a special thing to do together.

      The night of January 14th, I took Dave out to a restaurant called Half Shell Oyster House in Gulfport to celebrate his 31st birthday which was the 15th. Little did he know it was a bit of a decoy for his big birthday surprise but turned out to be an amazing dinner too! He had to work the following morning (his birthday) at 5:45am so he was ready to get home and go to bed but I needed a good excuse to keep him out until 10pm when Leslie (his mom) would be arriving at the Gulfport airport. I am not the best at keeping surprises so it was really exciting to pull one off! After stalling him at Walmart for a while, I drove to the airport a couple of minutes away and his confusion quickly turned to excitement once it clicked that we were there to pick her up! The girls also had no idea she was coming so they were surprised to walk downstairs and see her sleeping in the living room on Sunday morning.

Sorry girls for the bright sun!

      We had a great week and the girls loved having so much attention and time with Grammie! 

We spent our last full day at the Audubon Zoo in New Orleans and it was a really great zoo. They had everything separated by continents and did an excellent job adding a cultural feel to each area. 

I thought this picture Bailee took turned out pretty artsy.

This guy was really entertaining as he sat up on his rock picking his nose and eating whatever he could find in there. He was a lot closer than the picture makes it appear which I am not used to for a gorilla exhibit.

 The area dedicated to the South had the most detail and was really interesting. We saw a white alligator (not albino) and learned about how they are really rare and were first found in Louisiana and the gulf coast, also the difference between a white alligator and an albino. I love learning about the history of the south and embracing the unique culture which they did a great job portraying at the zoo. 

 The girls asked Grammie to be their teacher so she was telling them all about the Crane that was flying around on the water behind her. 

Bailee was practicing her picture taking skills at the end of the day and did a pretty good job keeping the pictures clear. 

Bailee's loose tooth

She is still working on it, but she has her first loose tooth and now a second one is starting to wiggle! 

Elise's birthday party day!

We celebrated Elise's 3rd birthday with her friends on January 7, 2017! We had 12 little girls, plus a few moms and extra older siblings in our house from 10-12 this morning and although loud and crazy, it was a lot of fun! The theme was the movie "Inside out" and Dave was a tremendous help in decorating and thinking of ideas so I can only take a little credit. I was SO happy to have him at the party as well. Bailee's 5th party with friends was while he was at COT for the Air Force and her 4th he had to sleep before making our drive to visit Nauvoo so it was nice for him to be a part of it all. We also babysat for some friends to have a getaway the night before the party so we had an extra 3 year old and a 3 month old for the night. We forgot what it was like to have an infant in our room for the night so we were a little extra tired in the morning :) It was fun to have a baby for a little bit though.              

Instead of a pinata Dave thought of hanging these balloons with smarties (Bing Bong's tears in the movie) in them for the girls to pop right at the end and add them to their treat bag. 

 

  

When the girls (Elise only wanted a girl party, no boys she said) arrived we had tables set up for them to color their own Inside Out character masks. 

Bailee and her friend Brynn were so cute with their masks. 

  We attempted to play a game of Simon Says with the faces but some of the girls didn't quite get it. I probably should have explained better at first but I left it to Bailee. They thought they could only hold up their mask if it was called but after a bit they caught on and each them wanted a turn calling out the face for the girls to show. Bailee and Elise had been playing the game before the party multiple times and continue to play with the plates I colored even after the party is over. 

Showing her best disgust face.

Right now Elise loves to play memory and is really great at remembering. We thought we would tie this into the party and split them into two groups to play with some Inside Out cards I printed from online. They all loved it and did really well! 

After memory, each of the girls got to make their own pizza. I remember my mom doing this for kids she would watch on New Year's eve and thought it would go well. We had talked about offering them broccoli to put on it (like the pizza in San Francisco in the movie) but forgot to prep it ahead of time. The girls had fun with it and more than one mom said I was brave to do it :) All of the mom's were a tremendous help through the whole party! 

While pizzas were cooking each of them got to make their own candy necklace with various circular treats and cereals. 

 I have a really great friend, Keelin, and she was sure to help me get some (most) of these great pictures through the party. I made one cake recipe of cupcakes so we had well over 50 in the end plus the chocolate cake I made for Elise to blow out her candles on! We sent many moms home with a plate full to share with their families :) 

Some candies were eaten as their necklaces were assembled. 

We had pizza, carrot sticks and juice boxes for lunch!

Elise was so excited for her cake!

She has been waiting to play with the Inside Out characters I bought for the cake and she was excited to finally get them!

Bailee's shocked face was because one of the little girls pulled down a balloon with smarties... :)

I encouraged Elise to get the card first and Bailee was very helpful in reading each of them to her. 

We didn't snap any photos of the balloon popping at the end but each of the girls got to pop one and add them to their goodie bag before heading home!

 

The aftermath.. I cleaned right away to get things back in order and then laid down on the couch for quite a while! Dave and Bailee finished Harry Potter after the party and spent the afternoon watching the first movie. Bailee was proud of the fact that she didn't think it was scary at all! I think watching during the daytime helps with that. They have now started the second book and she thinks Dobby is cute.