The BABIES turn 2!!!

So I haven't posted anything in a while because I was consumed with preparing for and then cleaning up after the babies SECOND birthday!  It is really hard for me to believe that they are actually 2 years old.  I still call them "the babies" most of the time, but I guess that will be changing quickly.  But like all moms, of course they will always be my babies.  Even the big girls are still my babies.  But this now means we will actually be moving out of the baby stage.  Which I am pretty much okay with.  Babies are hard.  Especially more than one at a time.  I heard someone say recently, "the years are short, but the days are long."  How true!  And what a long road it has been from the moment we found it was twins AGAIN.  It doesn't seem like we would have survived and yet here we are.  One more year and then the twin thing doesn't seem much more different than any other siblings, minus a few issues.  But enough with all that.

Here are my precious babies on their birthday!!  It was actually a VERY cold, uneventful day so we mainly just chilled out indoors, knowing that the party would be a couple days later.  I would have liked to have done more but it was all I could do to get Christmas down and get the house ready for the party!

Reagan really wasn't in a great mood on her birthday and definitely wasn't into being photographed.  But here is my little sweetie in a shot I DID get.  Reagan is getting more beautiful every day and I think her eyes are gorgeous!!

Since I saved the cake for their party, I made them birthday sugar cookies with sprinkles (always a favorite!!)  Here is Miss Reagan having her birthday cookie.

And here is Miss Energy, I mean Ashley.  Once she had a nap she was ready to go!  She was full of life, bouncing and singing, and really got into her sit-n-spin!  Oh, and I HAVE to mention, look at her new do!!  Ashley has a new look, just in time for her birthday!  I didn't want her to still look like a baby in all her birthday pictures and thankfully she let me fix her hair.  So from now on she'll have her little pygmy sprouts when we go somewhere nice - today I put them on her for church and she said "I cute!"  How precious.

Ashley was very delighted to have her birthday cookie as well.  Who wouldn't be?

Now, onto the big day...THE BIRTHDAY PARTY!

So, thanks to the Arctic blast we had over their birthday week, my hopes of having our new swingset entertain the kids at their party was not a possibility, so 2 days before I found myself scrambling to come up with activities and games.  And I have to say, preparing for those took so much more work than I ever dreamed.  We started off with the kids putting glittery foam stickers on foam mirrors and picture frames for a craft. That was a great time-filler!  And then it was on to snacks and cake!

I was in no mood to tackle baking a cake this time so here is the cute one we ordered - it was really supposed to be a princess cake but we just left off the princess stuff and added on our Barney decorations. Oh, the theme of the party was...you guessed it...Barney! Both girls love Barney, and Ashley probably has taken her love more to the level of obsession.

They were actually quite hilarious when we brought the cake out and they saw Barney, Baby Bop and BJ all over it.  They sounded like the muppet who just keeps mumbling something (probably no one out there knows what I am talking about), only the one word they both uttered over and over for about 3 minutes was "Barney, Barney, Barney, Barney, Barney, Barney, Barney, Barney, Barney."  You get my drift.  I think they finally quit saying it when we actually cut the cake.

Oh happy girls. Both were trying very hard to carefully eat their cake.

Now, onto the games!  We started with pin the heart on Barney!  Ashley and Reagan loved their Barney poster and it is still hanging up.  I don't think I can take it down because Ashley goes over to it on her way up to bed every night and waves to him and tells him Good Night.  But what do you think of my free-hand drawing of the big purple dinosaur?  I'm pretty proud of it - except I forgot his tail.  It's a front view, whatever.

So here's Ashley pinning her heart.  I didn't blindfold the birthday girls.  We figured if they could just follow the lead and get something on there they would be alright.  Unfortunately the two big girls didn't do so well.  Both of them weren't even on the poster and everyone got a big laugh.  Kaitlyn laughed at herself but Mackenzie went and locked herself in the bathroom for about 10 minutes.  And people think girls are dramatic.  We finally got her to come out by telling her she could go first in the bean bag toss.  Well, it took some stern words as well but let's not go there.

Reagan posing in front of the poster.  This is probably the best picture I got of her.  She is just like Mackenzie used to be - hard to photograph because she is always so busy looking at everything around her that I can't ever get her smiling and with her head up.  And aren't these outfits precious!  I think we just might have to have portraits made in these.  They look like little divas.

Reagan and Ashley with their new Barney dolls.  What else?  Ashley sleeps with hers every night and she lays him on her pillow, then I give her a kiss, then I have to give Barney a kiss, and then she kisses Barney, lays next to him, and I cover them both up with a blanket.  But at least she's happy to go to bed!  Reagan likes hers too but she does not discriminate.  She likes him as much as she likes ALL her new presents.  As if they needed any.  Still, a birthday is a birthday.

Here are all my girls getting into some of the new stuff.  It's interesting with multiples, after every birthday, I look around almost in disbelief of how much stuff they get.  I honestly feel guilty that they end up with so many presents, but it is because there are 2 birthday girls!  Every birthday looks no different from Christmas when it's all over.  And it's really bad when it's only 2 weeks after Christmas!  Oh well - lesson learned this year - start clearing out toys to make way for the new ones.  Worked out great!

Last we concluded the party by having the kids go on a treasure hunt to find a treasure chest full of their party favors.  Aye matey!

These two are mainly just trying to figure out how to look through their telescopes.  Goody bags were found and party was over!  What a great birthday!

Here are a few "after" shots from the kids having fun the next day.

The girls really had fun with the balloons the next day. There was so much static they noticed one of the balloons just stuck to the cabinet.  So then they figured out they could put them on the walls and on their head and stuff.  Kaitlyn thought it was really funny to take off running and the balloon literally followed her!  Great fun!

Happy Birthday to my little girls! Big transitions in the year ahead - big girl beds and potty training!  Ahh!  And let's not forget the crazy Terrible Twos.  But maybe instead of terrible they will be fabulous!