Hanging out with the Collier Girls!

Erin and Ashley came over to play with Maya today. Mary, their mom, was going to see family, so the girls spent the afternoon at our house. Our normal bottle, diaper, play, nap, repeat day quickly turned into a busy day, buzzing with conversations about potty, juice, lunch, "My Little Pony", "Little People", "Little Mermaid 2", hair barrettes, pony tails, "big-girl underwear", Pull-Ups, Tinkerbell, The Princesses, new suitcases, "I'm three", and blankies. It was a bit of a whirlwind, and we loved every second of it! It was so fun to play with the girls, read to them, and watch them work so intently on decorating a gingerbread house, placing brightly colored candy bits into the thick frosting just so. To any adult, the candies may look like they were placed a bit haphazardly, but having witnessed the construction and decoration, I can assure you, they were not. Each piece of candy was placed with a purpose, and the girls were very determined to make each candy stick to a specific spot, whether or not there was enough frosting to hold the piece in place. Often, we just added more frosting wherever the piece needed to go! It was really awesome, watching their budding creativity.

They did indulge in a little of the gingerbread house goodness. They quickly figured out that if they pressed the tiniest balls into the frosting hard enough, they would end up with the frosting on the tips of their fingers. And, what's a girl to do when she has frosting all over her fingers?? Lick it off, of course! (As you can see, Ashley really enjoyed the sugary substance!) They didn't really eat many of the candies, but they sure loved the frosting! They were pretty proud of their gingerbread house when they were all done, and I think they had a ton of fun putting it together. I know Will and I did!

The rest of the afternoon was spent playing with toys and watching movies. Erin and Maya got a head-start on watching "My Little Ponies" while Ashley was finishing up with the gingerbread house (read: still eating frosting). After the big girls got situated on the couch, I saw Will sneak them each a piece of candy and tell them, "Shhh...", so apparently I wouldn't know. I pretended like I didn't notice for a minute, then I said to the girls, "Did Will give you some candy?" Ash completely ignored me, as she was too absorbed in the movie to even know I was talking to them. Erin looked at me, started shaking her head "yes", then quickly switched to very vigorously shaking her head "no". She almost let their little candy secret slip, but covered it up at the last second (as if I hadn't noticed her shaking her head "yes" at first, that little stinker!). I just said, "Oh, okay." Then I went into the kitchen, told Will what had happened, and had a really good laugh about it. Those girls totally crack me up.

It's going to be so fun to watch our girls grow up together. In a couple of years, they'll be able to play together pretty well. It will be fun to see where their imaginations take them... and who will be the driver! I hope that we can see each other enough throughout the year that the girls always remain close. Can you imagine what sort of mischief those 3 will be getting into? I'm sure they'll form quite the alliance, and when they start working and scheming together as a team, we're in for it!

We had a great time with the Collier girls today! Come back to see us soon!!