The Kirbys: 2011

Happy New Year - Kirby Style

December 31, 2011

I'm not gunna lie, we party hard for New Years in the Kirby household.

I'm totally lying.

We acted like it was any other day of the year except that at 7:30pm we took the girls out on the front steps and banged pots and made all sorts of noise to ring in the new year. I really doubt they had a clue what was going on, but they love making noise so there were no complaints :) The early ringing with pots and pans is a tradition that I grew up with and we have since passed on to our own little girls.

It's a fun one, even if we do get weird looks from the neighbors.

The girls are all settled into their beds now, and Mike and I are working on finishing our talks for church tomorrow (oh, yeah, speaking in church on the first of the new year.) ...And then we are probably just going to go to bed. ha! Party animals I'm telling you!

Ready or not, here comes 2012!

Goodbye 2011

December 30, 2011

It sounds sooo cliche to say that the year has just flown by. But it has, and most of the corny stuff I say on this blog is cliche anyway... We missed the boat on sending out Christmas cards this year, sue me, so we did the next best thing and are sending out New Years cards. I think they are more fun anyway because they are less expected :) and ours are fun and glittery and that always makes everything better too.

I feel bad for my poor out-numbered husband, he always loses the color battle and gets stuck with pink glitter. Okay, I don't feel that bad.

Happy (almost) 2012!

I can't wait to see what the new year holds for us!

Another Creative Outlet

December 28, 2011

So, for a while I've been making my own little newborn hats for my sessions and for baby showers and such. Well, I decided I needed another thing to add to my to-do list so I opened up my very own etsy shop and I sell some of my lovely little creations there. If you are ever in the market for some cute newborn hats or some pretty watercolors for your home you should go visit my shop :)

Christmas

December 27, 2011

We spent Christmas up in Idaho this year. It was so fun to get up there again and it was actually our first Christmas morning we've spent up there since the girls were born. It was fun to be around so much family during the holidays!

We continued our Christmas Eve tradition by opening up some brand new Christmas jammies:

The girls came out bright-eyed and ready to open some presents. Christmas morning is 1000 times better when you are a parent getting to watch your babies get so excited about all of the Christmas magic.

Kylie helped Em open all of her presents. How nice of her big sister, right... Emily wasn't too excited about the help, but it was still cute.

The only things Kylie asked for were a Jingle dog and princess stuff. She was a happy girl!

Daddy getting a hot wheels massage, and mommy cutting out some quiet book dolls for the girls.

We spent the rest of the day making the rounds with family, eating lots of food and tasty treats and enjoying the special time of the year. Gosh, Christmas feels like it completely snuck up on us and was gone before we knew it! Where has this year gone?

Express Christmas

December 20, 2011

Are you a fan of the show Modern Family? Because we are! It's one of those shows that we don't get to watch at it's regular time on Wednesday nights (because it's right in the middle of bedtime), so Mike and I have special dates on Thursday nights, after the girls go to bed, when we hook up the computer to the tv and catch up on our favorite show online. If you're a fan, I hope you know what express Christmas is- (the characters threw together a pretend Christmas morning since they weren't going to be together on the real day). That's what we did while Mimi and Bapo were out here.

On the last day of their trip we started off the day with a pseudo Christmas morning. The girls were spoiled rotten ("because that's what Mimi's are for"). My mom always made Christmases for my sister and I so special and it warms my little heart to see her making them just as special for her cute little grandbabies. Even though we couldn't be with Mimi and Bapo for the 25th, it still felt just like Christmas with all of the same magic that we look forward to every year.

Remember how I mentioned the word "spoiled?" They got a 4ft tall, 4 story doll house! It has since become a semi-permanent furniture piece in our living room, mostly because I don't know where the heck to put it! The girls absolutely love it and play with it for hours every single day!

it's a little tall for them but they'll grow into it :)

Guess Who Came To Visit...

December 17, 2011

Mimi & Bapo!

They came out to visit for just a couple days and it was so much fun. The girls were in heaven with all of the extra attention, hugs and kisses, and princess-castle-building. It was the perfect early Christmas present (for us big kids too).

We crazily decided to go roast hot dogs and make smores in the canyon one afternoon. It was below freezing outside and all of the campgrounds were closed because there was a dusting of snow on the ground (maybe we should have looked into that first). So we ended up finding a park with a grill to make our fire (same idea, right?) It was freezing cold, but we ended up having a ton of fun.

Mimi & Bapo and the girls made a tiny snowman.

Kylie made "snow-mallows" and even tried roasting one on the fire. It didn't really work too well...

The girls also got to try out one of their new Christmas presents from M&B. They were so excited about their new camping tent and it was a nice place to bundle them up while we were roasting hot dogs.

I even got slammed with a couple icy snowballs by my little three-year-old. She was a little too excited to throw them at me...

...The Darndest Things

December 10, 2011

Oh, gracious! I wish I could record everything that goes on in our crazy house or at least all of the crazy things that our whitty little three-year-old says. She cracks me up! This is such a fun age because she has her own thoughts and real dialogues and she tells the funniest, most detailed & animated stories.

The other night I was tucking her into bed and I leaned over and said, "Kylie, I just love you so much" after which there was a long pause and she replied, "...awkward..."

I died.

Another night, tucking her in, I said, "Kylie, who do I love?" and without missing a beat she replied, "Lamp!"

I've tried teaching her how to tell knock knock jokes. We are still working on coming up with good punchlines... This is how they usually go:

Kylie: knock knock,

Me: who's there?

Kylie: (looks around the room and shouts first thing she sees) lamp couch!

Me: lamp couch who?

Kylie: Mommy!

-or-

Me: pillow hat who?

Kylie: Daddy!

-or-

Me: tree who?

Kylie: Emmie Grace!

...we'll keep working on it.

This crazy little firecracker not only lights up our world, but she keeps us laughing all the while too.

A Model & A Photographer

December 4, 2011

I had a little baby over to our house for a newborn session a few weeks ago. I left the backdrops up and found both girlies taking advantage of the set-up.

Emily insisted on being the newborn model. This was just one of her many poses she did for me.

And Kylie took her own pictures of her newborn baby with her own kid-tough camera.

They make me laugh.

Happy December!

December 2, 2011

I can't believe it is already December and Christmas is just a few weeks away! I feel like ever since Mike started school this fall, we have just been going non-stop. His first semester as a grad student is almost over and all I did was blink. He spends alot of his days on campus and us girls hang out at home, or run errands, or find other ways to busy ourselves. Everyone told us that once Mike was in school we wouldn't hardly see him, but lucky for us it hasn't seemed as bad as we were warned. Either he has a light load or we are just used to his crazy workload that he had while we were at Walmart, so this doesn't seem so bad. I think it's the latter of the two. It's kind of strange being back in the college student lifestyle, after we were real "adults" for a few years, but it's been alot of fun too, and we have loved being in Provo. It is such a great family town and having the University here means there is always something to do.

Speaking of things to do, since it is officially December, the girls and I decided we wanted to get them all dolled up and take some pictures in their Christmas dresses. Seriously though, it really was their idea. I think Kylie just wanted to be able to put on the dress I kept telling her not to touch until Christmas and Emily wants to do everything Kylie does.

Merry Christmas Month!

Now, wait, let's just take a look at how this little shoot really happened... (and how I got the polka-dotted-light background aka bokeh)

Me: "Kylie will you sit nest to Emmie and put your arm around her?"
Ky: "Emmie! Let me put my arm on you-ou-ou!"