31 days

31 Days of over 100 degree weather while we were gone for all of it. What stinks is this week it is supposed to be up to 110 all week. It was 109 today and even the pool was too hot. Walking into church on Sunday through the parking lot Natalie started to cry and said "I hate Texas Mommy!" So here we are back in the heat.
We just got back from another fabulous trip to Canada. It was beautiful and great company. My Sister and her kids were there the whole time we were and of course we got to spend the whole month at my Mom and Dad's place. July weather there is perfect and we just went went went the whole time. I have HUNDREDS of pictures so I will split it up into a few posts but we basically just laughed, ate and had a lot of fun!
Love ya Mom and Dad and thanks for such a fun month.

Mom got the funnest bouncy castle for the backyard and one rainy day we foolishly decided to bring it inside, it was fun but totally a mad house!

These two had a love/hate relationship the whole trip. They were best friends and then worst enemies. Lots of pushing, fighting, pony playing, movie watching, Nana hogging, ipad fighting, and lets not forget lots of love! We are determined to make them best friends. We all know they really love eachother.

Now there is something I HATE about Canada Summer, the mosquitoes. We don't have them down here like they do there. Check out Drew's bite one night. THEY WERE MASSIVE!

THE BEST PART of the whole trip is that NONE of us got sick of each other (although we all had our bout of prolonged sicknesses) and we cant wait to do it again soon! LOVES!

Suckers from the bank

Passing a local walmart tonight, we noticed that there was police tape up, fire trucks, police, and news trucks all over the walmart and a bank. We were talking about what it could be. We brought up a bank robbery and Natalie asked me what it was. I explained about stealing something and that the bank has money that robbers might steal.
After thinking about it for a second, boots joined in very sad and asked "so did they take all of the suckers mom?".

Daddys Day

We started today off with breakfast in bed. I am only a little irritated about this though because 1) I didn't get breakfast in bed on Mothers day and 2)I hate crumbs in my bed. But cheesy scrambled eggs, bacon, berries, cheese puffs, and Gatorade was the choice of the kids. Good breaky, all of his favorite things!

My kids are just about the luckiest kids in the world though, whether they know it or not. They have the best dad on this earth. He has the kindest and most gentle demeanor with them and there is no doubt in their heads that their Daddy loves them. He is amazing. Thanks for being such a great example to our kids and to me of what a parent should be. Yesterday we ventured out in 111 degrees to a little league game and it was soooo unbelievabley hot. Courtney did not like it at all! I am not so sure how this summer is going to go, but so far it is HOT!!!

I have wonderful men in my life all over the place. I know great Fathers and have great Fathers. My Father in Law is great and has raised 4 amazing sons.

And Last, but certainly not least, is to my Daddy. I love him more than he will ever know. He is amazing and wonderful in every way possible. I love you Papa bear.

Happy Fathers Day to all the Men in my life!

clip clip

Last week we finally decided to give Natalie an even up trim and she did so good. It was only a little hair taken off but it made a huge difference to how it looks. Thanks Kathleen.

We had a lunch date with the Ladies yesterday. Every time we get the 3 Rawlins babies together we remember how awesome it is to have babies the same age! Hopefully they like it just as much! It was a chick-fil-a conference.

So I keep little journals for the kids and I had been pretty good at Natalie's until boots was born, then Boots' I was late on getting it. Last night I pulled them out and found that I had only done one entry in Stephens, and Courtney hadn't even had an entry yet. I always write a few pages so this can take a long time with 3 kids. I fell sleep while trying to write in Stephens, so that will have to take me a while today. Journaling is hard to keep up on when you aren't in the habit. I really think it is important though, especially since I have a memory like I do (BAD).

So we have been pooling it every day and I am so proud of the kids. Stephen is much more free than Natalie is and was but she is doing great too. Yesterday she took the huge leap of swimming by herself in the big pool. She usually screams at me until she cries but after hours and hours of convincing, she finally did it! She can do it in the kiddie pool without touching the bottom but for some reason the deep pool scared her. I told her that if she can jump in, sans floaty, and swim to the edge that I would take her out on a date for ice cream.

Stephen jumped into the pool and swam to me yesterday. I totally tricked him and it scared the littles out of him, but he did it!

All three of them are browning up like they are in an oven. They have passed me up on tanned and are just so cute all browned up!

hoarders

I went into Natalie's room today and saw her dresser covered in trinkets, shoes, flowers, cards and many more things. I said "Nan, stop hoarding! Put your things away where they go!" She turned to me and asked whats hoarding. I told her it is when you keep everything and don't put it away or throw it away. She looked at me and very sternly told me "Im not hoarding mom, I am making collections!"

So on Sunday we had a FIESTA for family and friends. It was our month for our monthly rawlins dinner and get together and we decided to invite a few more. We had about 50 ppl in our tiny house. The air was turned down to 58 and it was still 80 degrees in our house! It was really fun though. Gotta love a Mexican feast with everyone we love! We even had the cake with EVERY ONE'S name on it and a pinata that got beat down in the family room. haha I know we couldn't invite everyone, but I promise we will have another! I think this was our max, so we will hit you next time!

Natalie's Dance recital was on Saturday night and she did fabulous! She was spoiled to have so much family come and support her and the gifts and flowers afterward were awesome! She did so good, she didn't miss a beat! I wish I could have recorded that night! But we are so proud of her!! She did say afterwards that she wants a break from Dance. I hope that doesn't last because she was so stinking cute!

sveaty

I cant believe how fast 9 months go. Courtney is there and she is crawling and "talking" and just growing up so fast. I actually had the thought today that I wanted another baby. THAT is crazy talk, because IF that ever happens it wont be for a long time. But she is just so dang cute it is hard to resist!! She officially says "mama" and the occasional "dada" will come out, but I am pretty sure it is on accident!

I was sweating a lot today. This is half because of the heat and half because of my stress level when I am out with 3 kids under 4. I went to Target, sweat. I have to say, trying to keep 3 kids quiet in the target bathroom while taking us all potty, keeping hands clean and stopping them from touching everything and boots from licking everything he sees is hard. Lets just say Bathroom floor, Bathroom sink, or lollipop... there is no difference to this kid. Then as I finally take my turn to quickly empty the bladder after taking care of the kids, its always fun when Boots opens the door to the store as I am squatting there. Nice. Thanks Boots. Then it was off to Dollar Tree and Hobby Lobby where there was equally as much sweat. Why do I take them out when I actually have things to buy? WHY?! (ps. why are little boys ALWAYS touching themselves? Like always? and how do you stop that?!)

So we have started doing charts in our house. These first charts were for bicycles. My kids don't know how to ride a bike and with Natalie being almost 5, it is well overdue. So with Natalie and Court being in the same room, we had some problems in the mornings with Natalie being so excited to see her and play that she woke her up, or would give her toys, or get in her crib. It is really sweet and cute because Courtney loves her so much, but it sucks when I know that she would have slept longer.

Boots on the other hand had a hard time staying in his room at night. He would come out time after time all through the night and it was tiring. So we got a lock and it fixed it fast.(by the way he has a loft bed which is about 6 feet off the ground and he totally fell off the top the other night half asleep while trying to climb down. I walked in to a crying little heep on the floor. It broke my heart. I want to sell that thing so bad!! word of advise, DONT buy a loft bed for a 3 year old!)

and ALAS Stephen and Natalie's charts... and their rewards!

Phase 2, learn to ride them!

So a big perk to having a hair dresser in the family is that we get in on the hot new trends. This week I got a feather. They are feather extensions and I love it! The best part? Natalie got one too! She got a pink one and purple zebra striped one. She also got her first trim and she looks sooo rocker chic! I love it. Pictures of her hair are to come!

Earlier this morning I took Natalie to her dress rehearsal for dance. They don't let you take pictures on the day of, or video, so today was my day. She is sooooo cute and did such a great job.

I am so proud of her. I thought she would tense up on stage but she did excellent. She danced it all and was perfect. She did not smile at all though and was very serious about it all day. She is not a shy girl to me and is just a happy little chatterbox most of the time, but for some reason she has been closed off and serious all day. I think she is in the recital mind set! The video wouldn't post, so I will try it later. One of Natalie's little besties goes to the same dance studio. They did such a cute little number too! I love watching these little girls perform! It is so sweet.

Lastly, as if this isn't long enough, our washing machine has been out for almost 2 weeks now and it is such a pain. I have been to a few peoples house doing laundry and I hate that. I don't like to feel like I have to rely on others but honestly, my laundry baskets are running over. Its like there has been more laundry just because the machine is broken! Luckily Saturday is the big fix day. I will give a huge sigh of relief!

Anti tooth

We headed down to Houston last weekend for another visit to the dentist for my tooth...aka another root canal. The good news is that we may be done! HOORAY! The other good news about those trips, we get to see good friends every time we go!


Other than a trip to the endodontist, we beached it, went to a water park, had some fogo de chao, and of course we topped it off with our ER trip with Boots.

So there was a water slide the kids all loved and they went down dozens of times. This time around, they let Natalie go with Maria down and it was all fun and laughter until Natalie went under in the water. She isn't super familiar with going under(because she is a water wuss) and when she came up she threw up. It was sick since all she had eaten was a Slurpee and licorice. It looked like blood. But after a quick rinse of the mouth she was happy and playing again.



After coming back into Dallas on Memorial Day we went to families house for a pool party and it is never complete without a basketball game with the brothers.

I found a new blog called the Tidy mom. It gave the best tips on keeping a clean and tidy house. I feel so overwhelmed when the simple things aren't done so I am going to do everything I can to keep the simple things like laundry and picking up under control. I mean, who doesn't feel better when their house is organized? Its just finding the time for everything else when I am trying to keep my house tidy. I have a million projects and fun things to do and just cant get to them.

Another fun blog is Oh Happy Day. She is having an amazing giveaway right now of a trip to Paris! One of my most favorite places in the whole world!!