Katie Lynn is turning into a little girl right before our very eyes.  We had a very busy birthday weekend and she loved every minute.  Katie Lynn started with celebrating at school with her class.  Then we took her out to dinner, she got to pick anywhere she wanted to go and she picked her favorite, Chick-il-a.  After dinner we headed up to Monica’s work, her school had a big 10 year celebration which the girls enjoyed.

Next we headed home and Katie Lynn got to open her gift from us.  We already had it together and set out for her.

Next it was off to bed, someone needed their beauty sleep before their party the next day.

Party time! Katie Lynn had her party at a girly dress-up place.  Her and some friends got to dress up, eat cake and dance.  They had a blast.

After the party we headed home, we had a nice evening and Katie Lynn opened her gifts. This is one from Karyn.

Katie Lynn opening her 4 precious moment.

Daddy and his little princess.

Katie Lynn had such a great birthday.  Thank you to all our family and friends who came out to celebrate with us.

Happy Birthday Princess, Mommy & Daddy love you!

Thursday night we headed to our family Y to join in their festival.

Both girls played the cake walk and both ended up winning, yummy stuff with way too much icing.

Friday night the girls school had a fall festival, we of course went.  The girls got to dress up in their Halloween costumes and Monica’s parents were able to come and join us.

Katie Lynn with her bestie.

Karyn with her bestie! Both in yellow.

Grams helping Katie Lynn make a scary hand with candy corn and popcorn.

Granddad and Katie Lynn.  Karyn is not very into pictures right now, she runs from the camera.

Saturday night Tom and I went to a Halloween party, Steve Jobs and an Apple.

Sunday the girls had a birthday party to attend, they had so much fun!

Monday night rounds out our weekend, we took the girls trick-or-treating and Tom’s parents were able to join us.

The girls started off a little slow and unsure but after they got the hang of it, they were off! Katie Lynn would look at us while waiting for Karyn and some friends, “Come on! We need to get candy”.  There was also a house with no lights so we told Katie Lynn that no one was home and that we needed to go to the next house, she says “we just need to knock on the door” Silly girl.

Down the street there is a huge spider we drive by, last year Katie Lynn wouldn’t even walk up to the spider, this year both girls went up to it.  They were sad when the spider went away till next year.

We had a great Halloween and I think the girls enjoyed trick-or-treating the most.

Katie Lynn has continued to grow and we have enjoyed watching her every step of the way.  She is such a big girl and is so independent. She can spell her name, all of it and when she writes it, you can make out that it says Katie Lynn.  We are still working on the K, it is one of the hardest letters for kids to get.  She likes to ask a lot of questions and expects you to know the answers, I don’t know is not acceptable.  Katie Lynn is very observant of her surroundings.  The other week she let us know that the green circle at the store is where people go in and the red circle is where people come out.

Katie Lynn is such a blessing to us and we can’t wait to see how much she grows this next year.

I took this from a friend and though it was a neat idea.  We will be answering these questions each year with the girls to see what they like and how they change through the years.

What is your favorite color?…yellow

What is your favorite toy?…Lotso (stuffed animal character from Toy Story)

What is your favorite fruit?…bananas

What is your favorite TV show?…Jake and the Never Pirates

What is your favorite thing to eat for lunch?…chicken

What is your favorite outfit?…dresses

What is your favorite game?…hide-n-seek

What is your favorite snack?…fruit

What is your favorite animal?…giraffe

What is your favorite song?…The Itsy Bitsy Spider

What is your favorite book?…Pinkalicious

Who is your best friend?…Kati & Bridget

What is your favorite cereal?…cheerios

What is your favorite thing to do outside?…play

What is your favorite drink?…milk

What is your favorite holiday?…

What do you like to take to bed with you at night?…Lotso

What is your favorite thing to eat for breakfast?…

What do you want for dinner on your birthday?…Chick-fil-a

What do you want to be when you grow up?…

Happy Birthday Katie Lynn, we love you ever so much! – Mommy & Daddy

We took a trip to the pet store.

The girls spent a lot of time playing and enjoyed eating together.

Melissa’s husband is a pilot, he let us know they were going to be doing drills.  We took the girls out to the air base to watch the jets, we ended up seeing several fly by.

We had pizza/movie night.  We made pizzas from scratch and watched Tangled.  Katie Lynn’s new favorite movie.

All four of our girls hanging out on the couch.

We even got a picture of the two of us together.

We finished our visit by taking a trip to the park.  Aren’t they so cute!!

They are 3 months apart in age.

These two were 2 peas in a pod.  It was amazing how much they were alike.

They are just a day apart in age.

The trip home was very uneventful…thank goodness.  We had a great time.

We saw a ton of trains throughout the whole trip, the girls would call them out and talk about whose side the train was on.

We headed off to see some of the animals before the shows started.  The girls really enjoyed the penguins.

Next we went to see the whale and the polar bears.

Katie Lynn was checking out the prints in the ice.

Checking out the “turtle”

Daddy and Katie Lynn hanging out before a show.

We headed to see the show with the Killer Whales  The girls enjoyed watching them.

Our second show was the Blue Ocean, I think this was the girls favorite of the day.  There were dolphins, acrobats, flying, swimming, lots and lots of action.

Off to the next show….

as we arrived at this show, Karyn had fallen asleep.

It was warming up so we had a break to eat some ice cream.

As we started to walk there were some games for kids to play and win prizes.  It was 5 bucks for 2 tries, we figured each girl could get a try.  There were 3 levels of prizes.  You pulled from a set of about 40 strings and it would pull up a colored ball from the bucket, there were a lot of red for the smallest prize, a few blue for the middle prize and then about 3 yellow for the big prize.  You know how it works, they had cute little sesame street characters we figured, cool, they can each win something.  Well, Katie Lynn went first and she pulled her string…she pulled a yellow ball which was the biggest prize.  Awesome…Tom and I look at each other and think, great, Karyn is going to pull and win the small prize.  Yea, Karyn pulled her string and she had also pulled a yellow ball, so she won the biggest prize too!!!  So here the girls are with their prizes….they were excited.

Off to the next show, this was a comic show and the girls were laughing at the seal, walrus and otter.

At the end of the day we headed back to the penguin hut to get the girls a shirt.  Karyn was very tired at this point so she just dropped down right in the middle of the store, everyone was cracking up. She is so funny.

We made it back to the hotel.

We had dinner at the In-and-Out Burger in San Diego.  A couple opened up around us in Texas but we decided to try it out while we were in California.  Karyn decided she wanted to drink my soda.

Next up: The Zoo

It’s so hard to believe our little girls are two and (almost) four! Time is going by too quickly!

We got up at 3am on the 4th of August to head out, we figured the girls would sleep all the way to Abilene, the first half of our day was smooth sailing.

We made it to Pecos Texas and decided we should have some lunch.  We stopped at the DQ because it had a playground for the girls to play for a little while.

on the road…..

Passing through El Paso and you can see Mexico, here is Tom driving and Mexico right there!! It was kind of crazy to be able to see another country just across the road.

We made it to our first stop, we were going to be staying in Las Cruces, NM.  We made great time, it was about 3pm when we got there.  Long story short, we noticed the air in the car was acting up the last couple of hours into NM, we ended up driving through the night to California.  We had already checked into the hotel so we took advantage of the pool, grab some dinner and then headed back out at about 6pm to get to California.  You can read the whole story here… http://www.tomsepper.net/2011/08/25/goodbye-trailblazer/

Here are the girls enjoying the office chair, they would spin round and round.

The girls enjoyed getting a break in the pool, the were able to burn some energy.

We grab a quick bite to eat at Cracker Barrell before it was time to hit the road again.

As the sun started to set and we entered through the rest of New Mexico there were signs warning of strong winds and dust storms.  They were not kidding, this large cloud of dust was moving fast and we ended up driving right through it.

After the storm, the sunset was so pretty.

Karyn catching some zzzzz’s.  Both girls did pretty good considering our plan was to sleep in a hotel and not the car.

After 26 hour adventure…we had made it safely to San Diego.  We arrived at the hotel at about 4:30 am, Tom checked us in and we headed to the McDonalds down the street for some breakfast and an area for the girls to play.  During this time, Tom and I made a plan for the day, headed back to the hotel and hung out waiting for our room. Check-in was at 3pm so we had a long time to wait, luckily since Tom signed us in earlier we were 1st on the list.  About 7am a bell hop brought us our room key and we could go up.  Thank goodness because I think the girls were wearing out their welcome in the lobby. We were on the 8th floor and had a beautiful view of the harbor and downtown.

After we got checked in, Tom headed out to sell the Trail Blazer and I took the girls down to the boardwalk to walk around.

Since we ended up having a whole extra day in town, we decided to take a walk to downtown and see what was around.  We had lunch at the Hard Rock and checked out some shops.

Later that afternoon we took the girls to check out the trains and trolley’s. They loved them!

As a fun treat we took the girls to a make your own yogurt place.  You pick out the yogurt and add your own toppings.  It was fun.

There was a patio outside and a view of the water.  It was nice to sit outside and not melt.  We enjoyed seeing all the people about and we were almost chilled.  We were not missing the 108 degree weather back home.

Just happened to catch this one just right, one of my favorites. Sisterly love.

Girls are clean and ready for bed, enjoying a little Toy Story before bedtime.

Up next….Sea World.

The girls LOVE to dance!!!

Our friends came to visit, the 3 big kids got along great!!

My mom offered to take the girls to an indoor Safari Park down in Southlake. The girls had a lot of fun playing in the play area and riding on the train.

Their favorite was jumping!!