Blythe and Joy's Auburn party!

We celebrated Blythe and Joy's upcoming second birthday last weekend with a small family Auburn party! We plan to alternate "friend party" years with "family party" years, and after their pumpkin shindig last year, it was a just family occasion for their second birthday.  With one exception: because our plethora of aunts, uncles, and cousins has shifted massively with all the moving in the last few months, we invited my dear friend Katie and her family to be stand-in extra family.  Carlton was under the weather on party day, but we were still blessed to have Katie and baby Clara join us! In addition to the Sheerins, we were joined by Grammy, Mimi, Bop Bop, and my Grandaddy and Granny Joan for chili, cornbread, and some treats... followed by an after-bedtime Auburn game viewing... but we all know how that game turned out.  War Eagle anyways!

Moving on...here is the most excited big sis getting ready for the party.  She was more thrilled than I could have imagined for a party that was not her own! The Auburn theme was an easy one to go for as the girls are still pretty high on life after the prior Saturday of tailgating!

 Grandaddy became party hat police at some point in the party.  I LOVE my Grandaddy!

 Katie noticed Blythe had been quiet over by the table for a while. We realized she had been contentedly double dipping the same carrot in the hummus again and again...

 But look how happy that little hummus face was!

 SWEET two month old Clara!

 I LOVE how animated a grandparent face is when interacting with a grandchild!

 I'm so proud of my two-year-olds!

 Check that curly mop on Blythe- I love how different my ladies are!

 Sweetest daddy in the world!

 Hugs for Mimi!

A few takes of the four generations!

There is such blessing in celebrating happy, healthy, precious children with family!

Foray into Pottytraining twins

Blythe is really close to being ready to pottytrain.  I had planned to do this on a friekishly cold week in January when it's difficult to go somewhere anyways.  But Blythe seems to be ready now.  So on Monday, I gave her a shot.  Don't judge for moving this operation outside- I knew none of my neighbors were going to be home that morning!

Mimi came over and supplied butterfly wings for the rare stay-at-home morning.

Well, Joy decided if Blythe is doing something exciting, she needed to do it as well.  Now we do own two of these potties, but only one was at our house, as I didn't anticipate this being a multi-child operation. Joy was definitely not ready to potty train that day and is an extremely well-hydrated child.  So it was a busy morning to say the least.

Issues like Joy shoving Blythe off the potty threw an extra wrench in the works, and Blythe didn't really want to be there anyways. Even though she notifies me every time she has an urge for potty-related activities.

So in the name of making life with twins as easy as we can and not taking on unnecessary challenges, we are going to put off twin potty training boot camp until Joy is actually ready and just let Blythey ease into it on her own little timeframe.

Poor kid, she can't even potty train by herself.  Such is the lot of a twin.  Good thing there's a lot of upsides, too!

S'more please!

It's been a little over six years since I gave Jake a chimnea for his birthday, but we have used it more in the last calendar year than in all the years before combined.   

Last Sunday night, we did our first front yard s'mores of the season.

 We have committed to doing this at least two more times before the end of the year- it was so fun!

It's like some of the best  parts of camping... time with family, warmth of fire, s'mores, talking by firelight outside after the kids go to bed... then you go inside and sleep warm in your bed. Not a bad tradition!

 We even got to help the neighbor kids roast their first s'mores.

It was a sweet fall night!

Favorite place in the world

Right, so of late, I've felt like the number of pictures I include on my posts is getting a little out of hand.  But I absolutely cannot help it- there are just far too many moments I can't bear to leave out of my recording of our lives.  So there you have it.

With no further adieu, we tailgated in Auburn last weekend, and it was the fabulous Saturday in Auburn with our kids and our friends that we have been looking forward to ever since we started having kids.  With the girls old enough to successfully skip naps, we actually spent the whole day tailgating.  AMAZING!  It was the perfect day, only made more perfect if we had seen a few more folks we wanted to see and if we had... actually gone to the game and not recorded it to watch when we got home.  But there will be many many a day we walk into Jordan Hare as a family- just not now when they won't appreciate it!

 We all loved tailgating...

We were amazed that this weekend happened to work out for a huge number of precious friends to be in town as well, and we spent the majority of the day on Samford lawn with sweet precious folks.

There was a plethora of children, five of whom were under one!

 It was so sweet to share my girls with my girlfriends and my girlfriends with my girls!

My precious original roommates, minus Steph, who is busy growing a baby in her tummy. The history and stories with these ladies is long and so precious.

We went to the girls' first Tiger Walk, and we rubbed elbows with Aubie himself.  We would have had a picture with him, but Abby Jane backed down at the last minute.  Blythe and Janie were both so excited to just be just close to him! Joy LOVED seeing Aubie, too... as long as she was no closer than about 10 feet away.  Now if you say "Auburn" she says, "See Aubie?"

 A better view of the band.

At this point, Abby Jane said, "Mama, we've seen your girlfriends.  I'm ready to see my girlfriends!" Good thing we were on our way to play with the Kelleys!  Abby Jane and Anna Beth were two sticky and worn out girls at this point in the day, but they were still glad to see each other and ready to play.

Miss Shelley showed Abby Jane how to join in with all the kids sliding down the hill behind the baseball field.  Who knew cardboard sleds were so fun?!

The little girls loved it too!!

 I was so glad to see my sweet friend Shelley- we've missed them while they've been in St. Simons, and are looking forward to getting them back in Atlanta!

 Though we were sad to not be joining the throngs pouring into that beautiful stadium, there is such immense satisfaction and a deep filling of your soul to walk across campus as the sun is setting and a game is on the cusp of kick-off.  One of my all-time favorite memories as a student was right before another night game against Florida, looking out across campus from the president's mansion at the end of a lovely day of tailgating and Auburn events, about to walk into the game.  It was the quintessential golden moment of all things beautiful and perfect in a Saturday in Auburn.  We soaked that in as we trekked across campus back to our car, conveniently on College Street.  The girls made one more run for Samford Hall, and it figures they head for these stairs.  These are the stairs where Jake Gross told me he loved me and put a ring on my finger.

 We paid our respects to Toomer's oaks,

 then we headed home, grateful for a perfect day.