The girls are having such a great time (as are we), that we’re debating whether to try and get a good deal on one more night since our condo isn’t rented for tomorrow night. Here’s the latest pics:

AJ and Ali getting ready for dinner with their matching bows. That was quite thrilling for them!
At LuLu’s, sharing food. They eat much better when they eat each other’s shared food than when they eat their own food.
I love this shot – it looks mirror-image. . .the einstein tabletoppers, the cups, the bows, the direction they’re looking. . .

So excited about riding side by side in the car!
Ali and Daddy at the ocean. Ali hated to walk on the soft sand, but as soon as we got out to where the waves were coming in, she insisted – “WAK! WAK!”
Playin’ in the sand. . .
All wrapped up!!

AJ and Daddy!
The Callahan’s. . .
The girls and their beloved Daddies!
AJ and Mommy. . .
Lovin’ the surf!!

Squinty-Sun-Eyes!
Kiss for G’Ma Kitty, who came to spend a little time with us!

All the Callahan’s. . .

The Spurlings!
We just got a really loud page in our condo saying we were under a tornado warning. . .very strange. A good storm is brewing out over the ocean. . .cool to watch. Both girls are napping, so we’ll watch the storm.

p.s. – I have a couple of videos that I will start the upload on, so stay tuned!

I don’t have any beach or pool videos yet, but here’s a couple of little videos of them hanging out and having fun on the balcony:

We are at the beach!! The girls are having SO much fun together. Too much, in fact, because mine is so keyed up that it is 2pm and she has yet to nap!! She’s in there, supposed to be falling asleep, no luck yet. And she’s supposed to be worn out!
Here are pictures from our trip so far:

Ali and AJ eating dinner together last night:

Getting reaady to go to the pool for a few minutes yesterday afternoon. We only got asked if they were twins twice on the way down to the pool. Probably because we only saw two people.
All of the girls in the Kiddie Pool!!

Ali in her awesome PuddleJumper!! Thanks, G’Ma Kitty!!

Today at the pool – with their bucket hats and their buckets!

We had to come back up today after about half an hour in the pool because there was lightning way out on the ocean. They even closed the indoor pool because of it! We didn’t quite get that. But we let the girls play on the balcony for a while since they were wet and the A/C indoors would have been chiiillly. So to pass the time, we took lots of photos!!
Ali having a serious thought while sitting and staring at the ocean. AJ, not so serious.
BFF!!

Daddy trying to keep her from sitting in the puddle. . .

Playing games with Miss Ashley!
Yay!! The storm is gone! Back down to the pool!
In the elevator. . .

In the pool!!!

Putting the bucket on Daddy’s head. . .

PuddleJumper has a hat!!!

Swimming!
That’s our trip so far!! I’ll post more pics later, and maybe a video or two!

Ali is sitting in my lap groggily waking up, eating her breakfast, and drinking her milk. A few minutes ago, she grabbed my thumb (she always holds one of our fingers when we pray) and said “pray Eli, pray Eli, pray Eli!” So we prayed for Eli, and she said Amen. Then about a minute later, she does it all again, and then (so far) two times after that. So Eli is very prayed up today – I’m not sure if God gave Ali a burden on her heart or she just finds praying fun, but whichever, he’s well prayed for!

Another Ali prayer story this week – Ali and I went to the hospital to see Becca, one of the girls in the Lifegroup of 15-16 year olds I co-lead, and Pastor Walls and Pastor Jack came up the elevators at the same time we did. When they got ready to go, Pastor Walls wanted to pray for Becca, so we all got in a circle and held hands. Ali knew we were praying and so was very quiet – she just looked from one person to the other. However, Pastor Walls’ prayer was a bit longer than she was used to, so about a minute into it, she looked at him and said “Amen!!!”. When that didn’t work for her, though, she was quiet for the rest of the prayer.

Ali and I stopped by the Zoo for a minute the other day, and we went to feed to Lorikeets. I personally find this very fun – you are in a large cage with about 50 birds, and they come and land on you and drink from your itty bitty lorikeet cup. Ali is still a bit uncertain but curious. And a bit offended when the Lorikeets would intrude her personal space. Here are pictures of Ali’s indignance and curiosity.

We are leaving for the beach tomorrow!! We are going with David, Ashley and AJ (Ali’s best friend). Ali and AJ are going to have SO much FUN!!! I hope to blog while I’m down there, but that depends on internet access. So check in and see – but if not, I’ll definitely post Tuesday when we get back!

OK OK, Obviously homeschoolers made it to reality TV long ago on TLC thanks to “Kids by the Dozen” and the Duggar Family shows, but now they’ve made it to network reality TV!!

We were first introduced to the Taubls several years ago when they performed at our church. They are a traveling homeschool family consisting of Mom, Dad and their 50 kids (really 7 I think, but that sure feels like 50 kids!!) that all play symphony instruments and sing BEAUTIFULLY. We own their Christmas CD, and it is definitely some of our favorite holiday music. They are quite the straight-laced-looking homeschool family, so it was shocking to see them come on the stage right after the very poor Ozzy Osbourne impersonator and right before the 12 gay cowboys doing some sort of stripper dance without the stripping. Bizarre. BUT – the Taubls made it through!!

Time to announce the winner of my scavenger hunt!!!
I had 142 entries, and since I am, as mentioned before, a total Excel Nerd, I used the RANDBETWEEN function to pick the winner. . .and the winning number was entry 38, who was:
GINA!!!!
Congratulations, Gina!! I will bring your gift card to work tomorrow!
And thank you to everyone who played – I hope you all enjoyed it as much as I did!

Happy Blogday to me, Happy Blogday to me. . .

HOOOOOORAAAAYYY!!!! 230-some-odd invitations are at the Cahaba Heights Post Office!!! It was quite an adventure making it through the 50 steps. The person getting me the addresses stayed up till 2:30 am this morning getting them finalized, then lost all of her changes when saving the file. I spent the morning helping her redo them, then brought it all home, hand fed every envelope into my printer (they were slightly wider than a piece of paper, so my printer didn’t like them too much), then stuffed 5 items in each envelope, stamped and sealed them, with MUCH help from my Mom and Ali. Ali, for instance, kept all of the superfluous “stamp” stickers for us:
(She was being a Tiger with stripes and saying “ROAR”)

Ali has become VERY obsessed with cleanliness over the past couple of weeks. She loves cleaning up messes – if she spills a little milk, she will take a paper towel and obsessively wipe the floor, her mouth, my mouth, the table, her body, etc. So here’s a video of just that. For translation purposes, her words are “foot”, “uh-oh”, and “MILK!”.

She’s also still obsessed with kissing everything. Here is her kissing her plastic Zebra, and then giving it to Oreo to kiss (something that Oreo was very much wanting to do, of course).

She’s talking more and more every day. Not so much new words anymore, but new phrases. Last week, I had parked the car and was coming around to get her, and she said “Out of the car. Walk around.” It just amazes me how she learns these phrases and just spits them out like she’s been saying them forever!!

And last but not least, I’ve been trying to teach her what the camera is for, because she has been uninterested in allowing me opportunities to get good pictures of her. BUT, she LOVES looking at pictures of herself, so I thought I would try this morning to take a few pictures of her, then show her the results. And, although she enjoyed seeing them, she was no more happy about me taking them. This was her deadpan expression that she kept up until I put the camera down:Maybe she just likes the “serious” look.