Look at those EYES!

Well, so my girls got my skin... BUT they certainly have their Daddy's blue eyes! I didn't even know about these pictures, I guess they were playing "photo shoot." I just found them while I was trying to upload the Sunday pictures to the computer.

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Now for the Sunday morning pictures... the girls have a thing for pocketbooks (I guess people here call them purses, I always called them pocketbooks... either way, big fetish in our house)

Yes 4 weeks left and counting... get this girl out of me!

New Bedding

I love how just buying new sheets and a comforter can change and brighten up a bedroom... so the girls both got new bedding! I bought it yesterday and washed everything, Matthew put it all on her bed and KYLIE WAS IN HEAVEN! I mean it's super cute, I love it, but she LOVES it, which makes it all that much better. I feel so good when little things like that make her SO unbelievably happy!!!

Kylie's is a soft purple princess type theme with hearts, and 2 matching decorative pillows of course (can't forget those!) she loves that little princess pillow!!!

I got Kacey a new set too, she's still in the crib and we're not forcing her out for the new baby- fortunately we do have 2 cribs- even after the climbing out of the crib incident and cast... we're still holding onto our sanity with her in the crib. But I did buy her a set for her big girl's bed that she'll get whenever she's ready for it. Although I have the comforter folded in the corner of her crib because it's so sticking cute! It's soft pink with various flowers and ladybugs, and she adores her pillows also as you can see!

After each picture I took, she kept saying, "One more time." And sticking up her index finger. "One more time. One more time." Silly girl, I guess I say that alot when I take their picture.

(i love those curls!!!)

I Hate...

the way they make little girl's shorts... has anyone noticed this? They are so small and so short! I've been going through my girls' clothes, passing down things from Kylie to Kacey's closet and from Kacey to Kadyn's closet (yes, our new name broadcasted!)... and of course there's been some back-to-school shopping we need to make room for (even though Kylie's the only one who goes and it's only Preschool, all 3 girls are getting new matching outfits in a big UPS package arriving today). BUT I know it's bad when the 2T's barely fit my Kacey who's just pushing the 5th percentile as a 23 month old. That really bothers me, it's like setting these little girls up for confidence issues and tighter/smaller clothing as teenagers.

Seriously, have any of you noticed this or am I just a raging pregnant woman? Well, I have found a solution. I've been buying boy shorts/even jeans and khakis for the girls, they're longer, roomier, and lots of times come with cute cargo pockets on the sides! AND you can actually see the shorts on their legs, they don't just cover the upper part of the thigh and disappear when the child sits, they actually go down the thigh a bit... and funny, the boys clothes fit true to size. I just wanna smack those big wig kid designer people!

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Not to be a huge complainer, I'll end this on a nice note... but I have to share the cutest thing Kacey did this morning. Matthew was getting ready for work and she goes into our closet... she puts on one of my high heels and starts walking around, "I'm a Princess, I'm a Princess!"

Look at her pose, she is too much!!! :)

We're still alive...

I know it's been longer than usual for my posting, I can explain in 2 words: Breaking Dawn. My book came Tuesday and I tried my hardest to "drag it out" and savor it longer... but 2 days and 750 pages later :) LOVED IT!!!

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Highlights from this week, include a recent conversation between Matthew and Kylie:

Matthew: "Kylie, you want Mommy and Kacey to come with us to Disneyland?"

Kylie (with enough conviction to cause temporary hearing loss): "NNNNNNNNNNNNNOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!"

Matthew: "Okay, well..."

Me: "Matthew enjoy this moment, there will be times down the road when she'll be trying to get rid of you... not trying to keep you all to herself. Enjoy it now while it lasts."

Matthew: "Kylie, what do you do when we go into the boy's potty?"

Kylie (with accompanying hand motions): "We cover our eyes."

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It was cute to watch. Kylie has a really hard time going into the boy's potty. She's a girl, and she knows the difference between the restrooms. He's tried to rush her in really fast so that I always don't have to do it, but as soon as she notices, she wants no part of it and runs right out. (we raise strong women in this house, and when their mind is set on something... there's nothing you can do!) So I've been working with her, the only way she can go to Disneyland is to go in the boy's potty in Disneyland with Daddy. So she's getting okay with it.

BUT, I think he's getting nervous... :) He keeps asking me if I'm sure I don't want to go... not like he's concerned about me, but more that he's concerned about him handling all the things you do with a girl... or maybe just "our girl." Obviously, Kylie will go on every ride 15 times, Tower of Terror here she comes, and she'll be a trooper from sun up to sun down. I reminded him that unlike Edward :) hehe, she has to eat so feed her regularly to avoid major meltdowns. (somewhere attached to the X chromosome on my side is a mutation that causes us to become terribly cranky when we don't eat). On top of that, she has some sweet little quirks... to say the least. Kylie likes baby powder on her chest before bed as well as milk every evening, her toes freshly painted every morning, she'll tell you how she wants her hair to be done- and if it's not good enough, you have to do it again... he'll be in that boat for sure and I won't be there to bail him out ;) Should be exciting! :)

Happy Birthday Daddy!

Today he's the big 3 - 1 !!! Lucky him awoke to us 3 (in our grand voices) singing Happy Birthday! But he had to get up and get ready for work. Good thing Kylie was around to tell him what to wear this morning (how does he survive without her)... her choice today was a pink dress shirt! He was planning on leaving work at 11 am to come home and partay... but he didn't escape until 1:30. As you can see, we had birthday cake and played in the pool.
Gotta say, Matthew's tan is looking great!!! Usually out of the 4 of us, he burns... very painfully I might add. But it looks like there's some Italian skin under there afterall!!! :) Right after we sang, Kacey's goes, "I want some cake... want some cake... cake!!!" As if letting us know that she's here and she's gonna get some.

As for the "big gift," that Kylie did manage to keep secret. It's a Disneyland getaway for later this month for him and Kylie, complete with hotel reservation and Disney gift card. I figure without Kacey and me slowing them down, they'll have a fabulous time and get on all the rides quite a few times! (This is a big thing on my part-- I'm a little nervous, I've never spent a night away from Kylie... well one night, when I was in the hospital giving birth to Kacey. Nor do I do vacations, or anything for that matter, without my girls. It's just my thing, I worry too much and I just can't handle it. Matthew's been begging me to leave the girls with my folks so WE can take a small CA-type vacation. Now he's down-played it with us just doing a "Vegas Vacation," just staying in town and getting a nice hotel, seeing some shows, eating at all the great places. But I refuse, I'm just not strong enough and everything would remind me of the girls, I'd cry the whole time and would be miserable and would have to come home early-- it would just be a waste. So this trip with them leaving is a BIG step for me, and I know Matthew's still shocked I'm going through with it. -- hopefully I don't chicken out last minute and Kacey and I drag ourselves along, but it is still an option-- I know Kylie will be fine without me, she won't even miss me... but I'll be in tears that whole night for sure missing my baby... I'm sure you'll read a blog post about it later)

Back to birthday boy, I feel so bad for him... it's his birthday and he can't get a moment's peace. His phone was ringing non-stop this afternoon and then he spent over an hour on his work intranet doing emails... and now he's sitting in a (very hard- and I enjoy math) statistics class for 4 hours... Happy Birthday Dear! Love you :)

*****

So the girls are in bed, I'm all alone, there's nothing good on tv (is there ever?!!), I don't even teach the Sunday school lesson this Sunday... and my Breaking Dawn book doesn't get here until tomorrow! Grrrrrrrrrr.

Sunday

Morning pictures were rough this morning... people blinking, heads in the wrong direction, who wants to sit by who... this was the best we could do. I know all are shocked, my girls aren't in matching outfits!!! Sometimes I've gotta do it to showcase all our pretty dresses. Kacey's dress was actually one of my faves back when it was Kylie's, it crisscrosses in the back, oh I love it! And well Kylie's dress, is adorable, and she and I matched in brown today. Her dress was a fun clearance find... like under $3 at Kohls clearance last season! Love that!!! She looks so thrilled here. She was a little upset this morning- we couldn't find her pink scripture bag. We searched the house, luckily her Sunbeam teacher had it from last week. (Totally Matthew's fault, Kacey and I left early last week- Nursery issues- and Matthew forgot to make sure Kylie had it when he picked her up from Sunbeams)

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So, this afternoon during Kacey's nap... and while Daddy was on visits... Kylie and I worked on Daddy's birthday cake for tomorrow. I used to buy one, but I've found it's a little more special when I make it and I have a few little secrets (from my mom, the expert cake maker/decorator for YEARS!)that make homemade cakes exceptionally good. As you can see, I'm not the only one who thinks it's exceptionally good... this is what I found after letting it cool for 30 minutes. Somebody's got sneaky little fingers and apparently one bite wasn't enough.

PS- Kylie can't wait until tomorrow for Daddy's birthday... she's already taken out the Tinkerbell party hats! I know he's going to be thrilled for that ;)

Happy (early) Birthday to Daddy!

Matthew's birthday is Monday, he'll be 31... I love it when his birthday rolls around because it changes our age gap from 3 to 4 years!!! I love that he's always so much older than me!!! (I rub it in too, probably always will)

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With his birthday falling on a Monday, I was kinda bummed. Mondays are always difficult in our house-- his busiest day at work by far, conference calls, meetings and cleaning up whatever business mess happened over the weekend, and of course class at night. But I guess I should be grateful... he just barely got out of a 5-day training in Boca Raton that was going to have him gone during his birthday (he moved it to October, which I guess I'm thankful for now, but I won't be in October) ANYHOW, we celebrated his birthday meal today at:

SUPER yummy!

We shared the Oriental Potstickers for an appetizer, which wasn't my top choice but it was his birthday celebration so I went along with it... (potstickers are usually too gooey for my liking) but these were absolutely fabulous! The soy sauce and sesame seeds and all the other spices really complimented each other... I highly recommend it! Matthew had the filet mignon, which he said was so good he barely needed a knife to cut it. I had a crabcake sandwich, which was huge- I had to take half home....

So taking half home left room for dessert- two decadent slices of cheesecake, of course! One was a peanut butter and fudge ripple and the other was peanut butter cup and chocolate chip cookie dough... wow, huh! A pregnant woman's dream... oh wait, we were there for him, right????!!!! :)

Now, it's all I can do to keep Kylie quiet about his birthday present, more to come later.... and he doesn't help, always trying to bribe it out of her and trick her into saying something!!! You can do it Kylie, just a few more days! :)

Family Inaugural Swim

Today was the day... I called Matthew and said Mr. Pool Man gave us the go-ahead. Matthew was golfing, so I told him too bad and that we were going in. Hehe... we waited, he was home within the hour.

Us waiting

The first few steps in... at first you think it's a little cold, but after a few seconds, it couldn't be more PERFECT!

Refreshing.

Relaxing.

And just plain fun!

If you can't find us, or don't hear from me in a while... you know where to look!

We've Got Water...

...but I bet it's cold! It took 12+ hours to fill up. It was almost like having a newborn baby, Matthew set his alarm for nearly every hour last night to wake up and go check on the water. We had instructions to turn it off when the water hit the middle of the tiles. It looks fabulous, it's taunting us right now because they are chlorinating it and the special cleaning system we bought is working it's magic... so we must wait.

Today was also really nice because we got rid of this:

And got this:

The button on the sliding glass door is the most annoying (but useful) thing. You have 7 seconds to open and shut the door and push the reset button, which is specifically up high. Difficult when with two adults (one being slightly big in the mid section), two little girls, and a dog all trying to get out the door/push the reset button/ and shut the door in 7 seconds. It makes a terrible noise if you miss the time limit or if you don't push the button SO you know if you're kids are outside and shouldn't be. It's really a great safety tool, but we went ahead and did the safety fence with a lock. And on top of that, with our security system... anytime a door or window opens, our alarm system control pad (both upstairs and down) speaks to us like on an intercom and tells us, "fault garage door." Meaning the garage door opened, or "fault master bedroom window"... you've got the picture.

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Mr. Pool Man says that the chemicals and whatnot are doing their thing and we can go in Saturday (maybe sooner) so it will have a few days to warm up from the nice Vegas sun... I'M READY! On top of that, we sold the Universal Gym for our asking price and that leaves Saturday morning too.... I'm getting my backyard back!!!! YEAH!!!!

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This picture I just thought was funny... Battle of the Dirt Devils, mine and theirs. My girls have a thing for vacuums. In fact, on Sundays in nursery when they clean up, Kacey's usually assisting a Nursery Leader holding the vacuum. I usually have to "hide" as I vacuum or do little jobs just so I can get it done... but what ends up happening is everyone has to have their turn with the vacuum.

Saturday & Sunday

I bought Kylie a little play money set. She already knows all her coins- the girls milk my parents for all their change everytime they come over to our house. And my dad happily empties his pockets as long as they correctly name each coin. (He did the same thing with me, amazing how keeping it is great incentive to learn!) There is a house minimum of 10 coins per girl (my girls are demanding) and if you don't have the 20 to pass around, their tempers go flaring! :) Kacey's right about half the time too when identifying her coins- obviously the penny is the easiest, and dimes are called "diamonds"... the nickels and quarters cause Kacey some problems. But Kylie's got it down! So, I got Kylie this play money set so she could not only practice coins, but also learn dollars. She learned fast.... (Papa time for the big bucks please) This is SOOO my girl, it kept her content for an hour! Sunday Morning prior to church.
Sunday morning family picture.
Love this one, "Where's the baby?" (just a few weeks left)

Little Things

You know, I really get enjoyment out of the little things in life.... the simple things really make me happy. Example: I love it when everyone eats all their dinner, especially when it's something new or something they didn't eat the last time I made it. Today, salisbury steak with macaroni and gravy, and biscuits... girls ate their plates clean. Love it! Matthew, he's eating salad!!!! Salad-Aka "rabbit food" because I found a salad dressing he LOVES- Kraft Light Raspberry Vinaigrette. These things make me so happy... when I tucker the girls out from a fun filled day and they're happily going to bed... when my air conditioning bill is less than my car payment (love that one!)... when all the ironing's done... when the mailman brings my mail to the door because we have a package... and of course, my most obvious little enjoyment... matching clothes for my 2, nearly 3 daughters... SO the girls got a couple new bathing suits. Here they are modeling before we go out to renew our tan... (another one of my little things, I love those tan little babies of mine, and their cute white butts when they get in the tub... am I allowed to put a pic of that on a blog, too cute!)

Another thing that brings me joy, shopping around... we're getting estimates on the pool fence, first estimate $1200. Slightly outrageous for 12 feet of fence, when 5 of that 12 feet is a gate... shopping around playing companies against eachother, Matthew found the exact same fence for $480. Good job Dear! See, it's the little things :)

One Minute...

... we love eachother. (what is going on with Kacey's hair, it didn't look that frizzy in real life, must just be the pic) The next minute, we're mad. It's hard to keep up.

Summer is starting to slow down (ahhhhhh!), all of the girls' activities are coming to an end. It was very fun and I'd do it again, it kept us busy and happy.... but we'll take the month of August to play in our "nearly days away from being done" pool. Kacey and I had fun in gymnastics, but we're done with it. It was something nice to try, not something she loved. Kylie more enjoyed Kacey's class by sitting on the side watching and participating on her own. This is the last week for Kylie's creative class, Wednesday specifically is cooking and today she made breadsticks (actually fairly good). She also (a few weeks back) made an edible playduh with peanut butter and m&m's, which was really really yummy! But tomorrow's the last class, and soccer's over after tomorrow too. Although we're doing soccer again in August, and really looking forward to it.

*****

Here's the progress on the pool. I eat my words, the spray on the decking really does keep the cement cool, it's much cooler than the other patio cement we have! They've rebuilt our fence and all we need now is the dark blue plaster on the inside of the pool and we're done!

Happy Anniversary

Sunday is our 6th year anniversary, so we were planning on going out Saturday night... but that's the ward pool party... so we went out tonight instead. Oh the difficulties of finding a restaurant!!! Matthew was thinking the Eiffel Tower Restaurant or Top of the World, I'm thinking like Chili's- any meal w/o children means peace and quiet, I don't need fancy frills! Needless to say, I showed him the online menus of his places (which grossed him out, and I think it's a red flag when half of the menu's in French and I don't even understand what half the English words mean... we have simpler palates... pheasant and rabbitt, yuck!)) So we went to Red Lobster! So yummy!!! (Thank you Yaya for watching the girls, they played hide-n-seek and of course sang and danced to Leslie Gore songs... they were so tired and ready for bed by the time we got home.)

And it completely figures, yummy peaceful meal at Red Lobster without the girls and I totally miss them the whole time. We took this picture because Kylie loves looking at the lobsters. So this one's for her. Matthew was a bottomless pit, eating his plate clean: snow crab legs, shrimp scampi, lobster tail, and fried shrimp. Me, not so much... I went off my "watching sodium intake so I don't swell up in my 3rd trimester" for this meal and I'm completely feeling it in my ankles already. Oh, and we should have taken a picture of our dessert, molten chocolate chip cookie a la mode. Delicious, should have started the meal with dessert!
*****

So, Happy Anniversary Dear... obviously our wedding picture is to the right...

Here's a photo from when Matthew and I were dating.

This picture was taken over 8 years ago in front of my Oma's house, it looks like me (to me) but it looks like I'm with Matthew's youngest brother, Aaron.

Fun things you may not not about us:

1. We met at a tri-stake dance, Matthew was home from his mission and thought I was about 15-- I was 18. He asked me for my phone number over a dozen times that night and I kept telling him I'd be sure to give it to him before I left. Really, I had my number written down on some paper in my pocket, I just liked to hear him keep asking!

2. We lived about 30 miles away from each other... he would drive to come and pick me up (30 miles) drive us back to his town (60 miles) because he knew his way around and we'd go to the movies/mall/etc, then he'd take me home (90 miles) then he'd drive back home (120 miles). He did this about 5 days a week, for a year.

3. While we were dating, I transferred to BYU, so he transferred his job (with ADT even back then) out to Utah to be with me.

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4. I don't call him Matt, ever- some of you may have picked up on that. Not that it's not his name or that he doesn't like it, everyone else calls him Matt. In fact, it's weird to him when other people call him Matthew-- we figure they don't know us yet or they only know him through me talking about him and referring to him as Matthew. I only call him Matthew, always have. He's not Matt to me- he's Matthew, that's just the way it is.

5. He'd sooner work 4 jobs than have me work. Even prior to having kids, I've never had a real "job"... When I graduated from BYU, I decided to put my Economics degree to work and started interviewing with a company. Then went back for a 2nd interview, and a 3rd, and they wanted me to come back for a 4th on a conference call with someone from Colorado or something like that--- it was becoming ridiculous--- Matthew told me to go and tell them where they could shove it... which is probably why I've never worked. I don't think he likes the idea of someone having authority over me and telling me what to do.

6. He'd give me his last dollar if I wanted a Slurpee- or some other frivolous thing... which I'm not sure if it shows why I do the money or just how much he loves me :) we'll go with the love thing.

7. He always says he's sorry first, which works out nicely because I've never been wrong since we've been married.

It's fine... I'm not jealous at all ;)

(A post dedicated to my husband)... today he caught a flight to LA for some sort of training (I don't pay attention), his alarm went off at 4 am, and by 7 am he'd called me saying that he was in the LA office. Early day for him to say the least!

So Dear, Kylie and I did something special for you given your rough day... you know the whirlwind mess of shoes all over our closet, well we organized them all during Kacey's nap!

I did mine first but quickly realized I needed to enlist help for your side. I just handed them to Kylie who matched the pairs all around the floor of our bedroom. We weren't finished at this point, there were still shoes in the closet (all yours, yes). Halfway through, Kylie said she was tired and was going to abandon me to do the job alone, I bribed her with a lollipop... all was well!

So, us girls did sandwiches for lunch and ate tv dinners while in our jammies for supper... how about you? Were your catered breakfasts and lunches good? :) How about Gordon Biersch for dinner, I bet that was super yummy too? It's fine... I'm not jealous at all, no pregnancy craving envy from me ;) I'm gonna have a yogurt in a little bit anyway, that'll do just fine :P

Can I put water in it... now?

Oh we're coming along now, no longer is it a yucky hole... the estimated finish date on our contract is July 28. So that would be 13 days from now, but I'm ready to fill it up and hop in! This humidity (mind you it's like 24%) is killing me!!!

Since the last picture, they've plastered over the gunnite, added our tile trim around the top, leveled out the rocks, and given us a new backyard gate. We will also be putting in an additional fence back where the a/c units are so that I have double protection with the girls being outside. We'd be able to do a bigger pool if it was more centrally located in our backyard, but I refused because we wouldn't be able to completely block it off... and I'd spend my life worrying about where the girls are every second of the day! But I think this was the best way and is working out quite nicely :)

So 13 more days to add our "special dark blue" tile stuff to the inside/plaster part of the pool (that makes the pool look a deep blue), cement all around the pool and add a finishing spray that supposed to not get hot on your feet (I'll believe it when I see it), put our fence back up, oh and how can I forget... take more of our money! (hehe)

Doctor Appointments

The girls had their well-child checks on Friday morning. Kylie is in the 95th percentile for her height (figured that) and the 60th for her weight. Kacey is in the 50th percentile for her height and the 5th for her weight. And no I didn't forget another number, it's 5... now the kicker is, Kacey (on any given day, at any given meal) eats twice as much as Kylie! When I make the plates up for dinner, Matthew will put them on the table and give the girls the wrong plates. Kacey's plate always has more food, because she eats way more. Weird, huh??!

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Kylie got 4 shots, and Kacey got only one. Kylie was such a champ, 2 in one arm and 2 in the other, the nurse really poked those big needles in her arm too, no gentleness about it. Kylie cried on the last shot, the nurse said it stings really bad (MMR) which is why she always does it last. Kacey cried with her shot, smart little cookie then continued to kick the nurse away... she couldn't even get the bandaid on her, I had to do it.

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Kylie's having a little reaction to her shots, the MMR left a bruise...

The DTaP, just today, started itching and is very swollen and red and HOT, very very HOT. I've been putting cold compresses on it. I didn't realize how swollen it was until she got dressed and I could see how loose her dress sleeve was on her right arm but then how tight it was on her left. She's a tough little thing though.

To lift her spirits a bit, I did a French Manicure on her nails. And then put a sparkly nail polish on top (you can't see it well on the photo), but she's just beside herself in delight!!! Mind you, my nails are dull and boring, but my daughter's look great!!!! :)

Here are some Sunday morning pics, no family picture though... The Stake Presidency was here today so Matthew had meetings all morning and never made it back home... And I have no clue how to do the timer on the camera.

5:51 am

... and the door bell rings, twice. Not once and wait a bit, no one must have heard, let's try again. But ring, ring, like an impatient person. Matthew springs out of bed, I mumble 5:51 in the morning. My thought is kill anyone who is ringing my door bell at 5:51 am, that seems like justifiable punishment. The dog's barking, Kacey's crying... ugh.

It was the gunite people, like I know what that means, telling us to move our cars out of the garage because they'd be blocking it for a while. So,they worked for 5 1/2 hours today, and this is what our pool looks like! (the stair-type things is our wetdeck, then it goes from 3 to 5 feet deep. Matthew tells me those poles won't be sticking out. They are the plumbing for the inground cleaning system -bottom ones - and water to be pumped in - side ones, - which will be cut down once they put in our tiling)

Baby I Know... (with back up)

Okay, here is a video Kacey and Kylie singing our version of Maybe I Know, aka Baby I Know...

An explanation first... they are in jammies, Kacey's jammies are makeshift versions of snuggies that we cut off the feet and arms to and put on her backwards....(my husband is so smart, he thought of this when Kylie used to take off her jammies and diaper. The idea was to get the zipper to the back so they couldn't undo it and start removing diapers! I am so lucky to have such an inventive hubby! He wants to patent it and sell it to some children's clothing line!) Now Kacey wears them also so she can't get her clothes off while in her crib and take her diaper off and be "free" if you get my drift... getting all sorts of "stuff" everywhere on her and in her crib in a matter of seconds (been there, done that, TOO many times, so we (he) came up with a solution)

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And here are just some pics from this morning before we left on our errands...