family night #7: "Let's go to the movie's"...

tonight we did a Movie Family Night with a "Lady and the Tramp" theme...
we started out having a spaghetti dinner just like the classic scene in the movie with the 2 dogs (Lady and Tramp) sharing spaghetti...oh, and as you can see, all (or, most) of the girls little dogs joined us for dinner :)...

we had the girls re-inact the scene from the movie (it took a few "takes")...
it was a full table!
then, after dinner the girls went to the "concession stand" to get some candy...

and, you can't go to the movies without popcorn!
here are the girls and daddy coming in to the theater with their snacks and movie tickets...
and, we finished off the night watching "Lady and the Tramp", of course!
as you can see, it's early...we started early tonight so we could be done in time for the debate.
it was a fun night...short and sweet! :)

thank you texas friends!

my mom's a teacher (in texas) and her sweet students all wrote letters to kaia and leia. they all took so much time to draw beautiful pictures and we loved every single one! kaia read every card word-for-word and both girls "oohed & aahed" over all the pictures. thank you for taking the time to put so much effort & time into making these for us! love, the paulo's

being sneaky!

leia has definitely been "acting 2" today, first of all...
i made blueberry muffins and they were too hot to eat, so i told the girls to go watch their show on t.v. and in a minute we'll have a muffin. so, i go upstairs for like 5 minutes and come down to see the top of one of the muffins with a bunch of little pieces picked out of it. it looked like a rat (a.k.a leia) had gotten to it. so, i ask leia, "how did this happen...did a rat get to it or did leia?" she replies with "a yat (rat)". so after a couple more times of asking/giving her the "telling the truth" lecture...she fessed up (with a very sheepish smirk on her face). hmmmmmmm.
then, i went back upstairs a little while later and i hear little footsteps coming up a few minutes later and expected leia to come look for me...no, no leia. so, i go into the girls' room...no leia, then i call downstairs to kaia to see if leia had gone back down there...no. so, i go into our room, no leia. wait....the closet (that's kinda been her hiding place lately)...so, i go in there not only to find her. but, she's in there sitting on the floor by the mirror smearing chapstick all over her lips (and face). she NEVER stops! :)

the last few days...

i don't know what my deal is...maybe the "fall-like" weather is making me kinda lazy doing my blog lately. so, i thought i'd do a quick random pics post of what we've been up to the last few days...
spent part of the day on saturday with the whittaker's in pasadena...it's so pretty there!
i had to take this picture of leia in her jammies...this is how derek puts them on...he pulls them up ALL the way :)!
kaia brought home homework to do for the first time...
she LOVES anything to do with school....i wonder if it'll stay that way? ;)
kaia's pre-school had "pick-a-pumpkin" day today...so, here are the girls on the front porch with their pumpkins. they're good girls.

we're in!

in a little less than a month, me, derek, kaia, leia, kim, john & caleb will be participating in the Mission Inn 5K run/walk. derek's gonna walk with the girls (in a stroller) and with "the bennett's" and i'm gonna be running. now, a 5K run might not seem like a very long run to a lot of you, but to me it'll probably feel like a marathon, or at least a 1/2 marathon. maybe not, i'm just being dramatic. anyways, it'll be fun.
31 day and counting! :)

family night #6: the great outdoors!

tonight we decided to do kinda like a camping night...now, i'm not a very good camper, so i had to really think hard for this one :). we (kinda) wore our camping attire...i don't know why i thought wearing camoflauge/brown/army green is the correct camping dress code... now that i think of it, i think that's more what you'd wear to go hunting. anyways?
we cooked hot (chili) dogs outside...thank you to derek's dad for bringing their fire pit over, it was perfect!
kaia enjoyed her hot dog, without any major issues...
i can't say the same for leia...poor baby, her hot dog gave her a hard time!
smash...
squish...
anyways....on to the roasted marshmellows :)


leia didn't understand why we were holding our marshmellows over the fire...she thought it was much easier to just eat them right out of the bag. smart girl!
then we made a "tent"...
derek sang us some campfire songs (minus the campfire :)
then, the girls went "fishing"...
they got "a bite" (thanks daddy!)
for dessert, we had campsite brownies (with the help of strawberry shortcake again)...
and finally, the girls shared some hot cocoa (i wanted to add, that my car said that it was 101* outside today) but you can't go camping without hot cocoa, right?

p.s.~thank you to my blog friends who gave me some family night ideas last week...they were all great ideas!

good girl...

after we dropped kaia off at pre-school this morning, it was just me and leia at home and i put a load of clothes in the wash and then i went over to the computer to check blogs. i realized that it had gotten kinda quiet (which most of the time means that leia's doing something she shouldn't be doing)...so, i walk into the girls room to see this...
...just innocently reading her bible. i love you leia. :)

kinda fun...

i got this idea from my friend, heather...it's kinda fun

try it: www.wordle.net

a good day for a hike...

i can't believe it...it's actually starting to feel like fall (well, for today, at least :). so, after kaia's very early soccer game we went on a hike with kimmy, john & caleb. the girls and caleb loved it!







go caleb...i can't believe you're already 7 months old!

family night #5: "P" family night:

tonight we decided on doing a family night with thing that start with the letter "P" (can you tell it was kinda a "last minute/not very planned out" night :)? so, this is what we did...
1. we started off making Pudding...
2. then home made Pizza (kinda like Pepperoni...well, actually it was bacon...but it kinda looked like Pepperoni)


3. the girls took a few Pics while i rolled out the dough (this was one leia took)...


4.then, we decorated little Pumpkins to (kinda) look like ourselves...i thought that since it's now October, we'd put a Fall "spin" on it ...even though it was about 105* today!
5. the girls Painted...



ta da...here "we" are...

6. oh yeah...we had Pears too :)

7. and, the Pink milk was a hit!
8. than, after dinner we Peddled our bikes to the Park...



9. we watched a Pretty sunset... (can you tell i was getting desperate to think of "P" things :)

10. then, when we came home...we ate our Pudding. yummy!
11. and last but not least, while they were in the bath we read "winnie the Pooh" to them.
i was telling kimmy that i hope we don't get to add the words Pee and Pants to the list....leia had a couple of accidents yesterday & i'm VERY happy to say that it was an accident free day...yay!
p.s.~i'm gonna try to think of a better family night idea for next week...any suggestions?