The Cake Has Been Eaten so Ella is Officially Three!

Yesterday was Ella's third birthday and in the time leading up to her big day when I would ask her what she wanted all she would say is to go to the river park and have a pink princess cake.  So the park part was no big deal but being that I haven't decorated a cake, besides putting frosting on it and shaking some sprinkles on top, since I was in 4-H at the age of 10 I was feeling a bit nervous about living up to the great princess cake my mom made for Madeline's birthday in April.  Saturday afternoon and evening were dedicated to the cake, making sure I gave myself plenty of time to start over if needed, but I will admit I felt a great sense of pride when I finished it and then saw Ella's face when she saw it for the first time and said "Oh, it's beautiful"  - she loved it and that was all I needed to get past my over critical nature!

Another highlight from Ella's day was that she got to go to the big girl class at church.  It was a big motivator for her in getting potty trained knowing that she wouldn't be able to go to that class until she was 3 and potty trained so she was so excited to get to go to her new class yesterday.

After church and a little nap it was off to the park for an afternoon of celebrating with friends and family.  Here is a little slide show of our day including when we ate the cake since, according to Madeline (not sure where she got this idea), that is when Ella turned 3 - when she ate the cake!

A Record-Breaking Night!

So tonight was probably one of the most fun family outings we've had in a long time and I might go so far as to say it's the most fun family outing we have ever had!  We decided to head down to the Holiday Bowling Alley for some Wheatcroft style fun.  The night started on a high-note for me when I achieved my highest score ever with a 132, and as if that wasn't enough, I beat Brett, who scored a mere 121, for the first time in our entire relationship (dating included)!

The girls sat out for the second round to eat some pizza while Brett and I went head-to-head, and Brett began his reign as the 9-1 Spare King.  In the final round Brett continued to flirt with the strikes frame after frame but finished with a disappointing 153, just one point shy of his personal best 154.  I was pleased though to score a 135 beating my personal best from the first game!

With the bitter taste of "close but oh so far" left in his mouth Brett couldn't walk away so he bowled one more game by himself to challenge that illusive personal best and as you can see by the scoreboard he SHATTERED that score with an amazing game!

And of course the evening was not devoid of a lot of entertainment courtesy of Madeline and Ella.  Ella loved the hand dryer thing, we couldn't get her away from it, she loved just standing in front of it feeling it blow on her face and hair - I see a little Marilyn in her!

And Madeline, well I'll just let the video speak for itself.

 

So as you can see it was a super fun night for the Wheatcrofts!

My Baby's Turning THREE!!!

Okay so we still have 2 more weeks until Ella's birthday but I thought it would be fun to put together a little video/movie of Ella from the last year.  It was so much fun to go back and remember all the funny things she's done - never a dull moment with that girl.  This is my first attempt at making something like this so please forgive me, oh and the red-eye is terrible in some of the pictures but on that I was just too lazy to go back and fix all of them.  Anyway, I hope you enjoy, oh and Ella picked the song.  I'm pretty sure it's an okay song to have her know (due inpart to the fact that it's on a children's movie, not that that means anything these days).  Okay I'm gonna stop now!  Enjoy!

Wednesday Buddies

A few weeks ago a good friend of mine from the church whose kids are great friends with Madeline and Ella proposed that we start a little co-op so that she and I can have some time to go run errands without kids, or just go read a book and have some time to ourselves.  So while one of us goes to do that the other hangs out with all the kids which they all LOVE!  Madeline and Tirzah especially are good friends, when we are at church and they see each other they will yell each other's name out from across the room.  It's so sweet to see their little friendship grow even from such an early age.  Rebekah (Tirzah and Jude's mom) told me that one morning during Sunday School it was time for them to pray before their snacks and just as they were starting Tirzah popped her head up, located Madeline and ran over to sit next to her while they prayed.  It's so sweet to think that at even such an early age they have a little prayer sister.  It will be fun to see all of their friendships grow as we get to continue to spend time with one another and I know Rebekah and I both are so thankful to have this one morning every two weeks to get some time to ourselves.

Ella, Jude, Tirzah and Madeline

My Amazing Husband

So I just have to brag on my amazing husband.  I could not be more blessed!  Brett is the most thoughtful, loving, respectful, caring, Godly husband I could have ever asked for or imagined spending my life with.  All of this I already knew of course but I was recently reminded of how wonderful he is.  After a couple of weeks of feeling completely and totally exhausted my husband planned a fabulous weekend for us in Atlanta.  We stayed at an amazing hotel where we got to just sit and watch TV and have nothing to do and no where to go.  That is until he took me to this fantastic restaurant at the Westin Hotel called the Sundail.  It was on the 73rd floor of the circular shaped building and the coolest part was that the part of the floor that the tables were on rotated around the building so that by the time an hour had gone by we had traveled all the way around the building and had seen all of Atlanta from this amazing vantage point.  Plus, I got to get all dressed-up which is always fun for me!  I am so spoiled to have such a thoughtful husband and thank God for this man He has given me the honor of calling my husband.

Hulla Babies

Okay so I couldn't not post these pictures. These are from Labor Day when we went swimming. Aunt Valerie and Uncle Brad got Madeline this Sponge Bob swimsuit that came with the grass skirt and all Ella wanted to do the whole time we were there was wear the "shaky fang".

The Many Faces of Ella

My Bean - what is there to say about my Bean other than she totally lights up my world. From the beginning of her life she has definitely been the more challenging of the two girls but to the same degree that she challenges me she makes me laugh. She has always been so expressive with her face so here are some recent pictures of her many faces:

Biker Babe

So Madeline cannot get enough of her bike lately, if there is a spare moment in the day she wants to be on her bike. We got this bike for her when she turned 3 but wanted nothing to do with it after being on it for 15 seconds and couldn't figure out the whole peddling issue so it sat in Dennis and Sidni's storage until about a month ago when we decided to give it another go. My favorite thing is when we go to the park and I can hear her from the other side of the park singing at the top of her lungs so carefree as she cruises around the park. Every now and again she'll stop and ask some complete stranger if they like her beautiful purple bike. And it's fascinating to watch her as she rides outside and to just see the joy on her face, I can't help but wonder what magical world she's in and what fascinating places she's going to there in the depths of her incredible imagination - oh to be so carefree and worryfree again.

So here's the story of Madeline and her bike:

We bought the bike at a garage sale for $2 and by the time we bought the stuff to paint it and fix it up we could have probably bought a new bike for a couple dollars more but it wouldn't have the story of all daddy's hard work to "pimp her ride" (he even used chrome paint).Madeline thought it was so cool until we took her outside to try it out:
Now fast forward a year and a half and you have Madeline totally and completely in love with her bike:

Finally Gave In

Well once again I'm doing something I never thought I would do - blogging, which now joins the likes of mySpace (which I'm kind of over) and Facebook which I am loving more everyday with all the people I have gotten to reconnect with - especially from college. With all my family out west I thought this might be a better way of keeping them up to date with our life here in the south as opposed to just sending pictures where they don't really get much of the story. I'm not sure how I'm going to be at this given I am already feeling some writer's block but it's worth a try right? So stay tuned for a post with some recent pictures - I've gotta look around here and see if I can figure out how the heck to do that! Wish me luck.